After being appointed Chairman of the Homeland Security Commitee, Powerless Peter said on WNBC "It has to be good for New York if I do my job because I strongly believe that all funding for homeland security has to be based on threat..... So to that extent, New York will be represented at the highest levels of the homeland security table."
Right after that, Congress voted to take back $125million from the 9/11 Relief Fund for New York. It took Senators Schumer and Clinton and other New York representatives to get the money back. Now we have anti-terrorism funding cut 40% by the Department of Homeland Security.
King appeared on MSNBC's Hardball with Chris matthews thursday night to raise righteous indignation at the 40% cut. What we nee
d to know is why King with a seat at the "highest levels of the homeland security table" didn't know about the cut beforehand.
MSNBC reported David Schuster tells us "The anti-terror grants to Washington, D.C., are being cut from $77.5 million to $46 million. New York City’s grants are being cut from $207 million to $124 million. That’s a 40 percent decrease. And the cut, as well as the Homeland Security Department’s assertion that New York has no national landmarks, has left lawmakers infuriated.
"For months, the Department of Homeland Security has been warning that it was going to make changes. Officials vowed to force more regional cooperation, award the grant money based on risk and cut down on waste, like Segway motor scooters. Last year, police in Santa Ana, California, used part of their money to purchase four of them."
Did he say "months?"
Yes he did.
Where was the Chairman of the Homeland Security Commitee for months?
What does Chairman Powerless Peter know about what's going on?
"MATTHEWS: You’re well placed, you’re the chairman of the committee, Congressman — who in the White House have you talked to today? Name the guys?
KING: No, I haven’t spoken to anybody in the White House. I have sources within the Department of Homeland Security who told me that..."
All King has are "sources?"
That's not much for a Chairman to have or what he claimed he would have.
Matthews to his credit actually asks King about the congressional vote that cut Homeland Security funding...
"MATTHEWS: Let me turn the tables on you a little bit here.
Their defense over at homeland security is that you in Congress, because you have a budget squeeze that we’re all facing in this country — you could argue whose fault it is, but we got one with the deficits rolling up to about a half trillion dollars a year — that you on the Hill cut $600 million from funding for these programs and that each — that Homeland Security Department, they simply had to divvy it out; and you don’t like the way they divvied out the cuts, but you were the guys that cut it overall.
Is that a fair shot at you?
KING: Chris, they’re changing the story by the day.
The actual cuts were about 14 percent to 15 percent. Most of them were recommended by the president. So there’s a 14 percent cut and they cut New York 40 percent. So it doesn’t add up.
No, again, this is like their fifth explanation. None of them work. They’re phonies."
What a quick diversion. Congress cuts $600million, DHS cuts funding to NYC and King tries to wiggle out of it with numbers.
King admits funding cuts but says that those cuts don't add up to what was cut from New York.
But the numbers just don't add up in Kings favor.
New York funding went from $207million last year to $124 million this year. That is $83million, well within the $600million cut.
Kings percentage BS is just that.
King is one of the phonies he complains about.
The long and short of it is that King as Chairman touts his clout but in the ned he doesn't seem to have any.
More to come on this later....
Subscribe to:
Post Comments (Atom)
5 comments:
Peter Peter Peter - more bluster from you, eh? First its the angry letters to your constituents. Then you jump on the political bandwagon and scream about Dubai taking over our ports - but only weeks later as the "Powerless" chairman of the Homeland Security Committee, you cave into corporate interests and kill legislation to inspect all cargo containers coming into our ports (gee - guess there is no way for anything potentially harmful to come into the country that way!). And now this. You have the nerve to say that we should thank god you represent us??? Give me a bucket so I can throw up. But instead I will take a ballot and vote for David Mejias because he wont just talk - he'll truly protect NY's interests. Homeland Security effectively tells us to drop dead and you act like god. Peter - time for you to go - and don't let the door hit you on the way out you hypocrite.
No clout? Do you even remember the Dubai Ports deal? Which he was the lead on. And you can't blame the 40% cuts to NYC on Congress' cuts to DHS when other cities received increases. If every city received cuts then you could blame Congress, but when cities with less of a threat recieved increases the problem is with the formula not Congress' cuts.
Chuck Schumer was the person who exposed the Dubai deal. King jumped on Schumers wagon. Other republicans were also very vocal in opposition.
Ummm.... if you CUT total funds and give money to more cities th emoney has to come from somewhere. That somewhere is NYC. It's simple math. Or to put it plainer.. rob peter to pay paul.
NYC, San Diego and DC all lost funds while other cities got funds for the first time or goty an increase.
Also, using the formula as an excuse doesn't help King too much because he stuts around saying he fought to make changes in the formula.
So it seems Powerless Peter is indeed powerless.
That is probably why King is so mad. He did fight to make the formula change and now DHS cut $ to most vulnerable cities. Just because DHS doesn't have the foresite to tell King about the cuts before they annouce them isn't King's fault or because of a lack of clout on his part. And your not making much sense with your explanation on the funding. Sure, b/c more $ was given to other areas NYC lost out on money. But that's not the issue. The issue is why those areas who didn't need increases received the money instead of NYC. Not even Clinton or Schumer are blaming the cuts made by COngress they're blaming DHS and how the funds were allocated.
Post a Comment