why do people want to be liberals?

[2bighorn]

Like I told you, I was there in the middle of it when this all went down, and I can say with 100% certainty from the operational level, it was the SMART thing to do. I could care less about the political side of it, but where the rubber meets the road it was the right thing to do.

From operational level it's just a disaster. The biggest bureaucracy ever, inefficient, slow and wasteful.

DHS costs 50 billion extra per year, yet it does not improve anything.

[Hornet33]

From operational level it's just a disaster. The biggest bureaucracy ever, inefficient, slow and wasteful.

DHS costs 50 billion extra per year, yet it does not improve anything.

What agency do you work for within the deptartment?

[2bighorn]

What agency do you work for within the deptartment?

GAO reports are available to all, so are OPM reports. Federal budget is not secret either. Follow the trail and you'll see that DHS waste more than their 'official' budget is...

edited typo

[crockett]

Because in an emergancy would you rather have 1 person calling the shots, or 22 organization heads, plus the 11 dept heads they worked for all trying to have a meeting to figure out who is going to be in charge, trying to figure out who has jurisdiction over what, and who's going to be responsible for everything after the fact? Then once they have their meeting have to go through channels to get the information to the President, because he had to be briefed by the 11 dept heads seperately for their own actions,/responses. Now the President goes to one person and asks, "What is going on?" and that person has been briefed by his people who all work for him.

Like I told you, I was there in the middle of it when this all went down, and I can say with 100% certainty from the operational level, it was the SMART thing to do. I could care less about the political side of it, but where the rubber meets the road it was the right thing to do.

Also as far as the dept head being the most powerfull person in the country and he's not elected, not quite accurate on that either. That person has to be appointed and APPROVED by Congress, and can be FIRED anytime the President wants to for any reason.  Not so powerfull after all is it?

"Those who would give up Essential Liberty to purchase a little Temporary Safety, deserve neither Liberty nor Safety."

Benjamin Franklin


I remember it used to be all the rage with the hard core right wingers who used to claim the evil liberals were going to take over the country using FEMA. Claiming FEMA was some secret shadow govt operating in the background. There was all kinds of wacko sites floating around the net in the early 90's. Now here we are with one single govt entity that controls everything run by a non elected civilian and they are welcomed with open arms.

I'm sorry but in a perfect world one organization might be good, however it's nothing more than bigger govt and more spending and now all that power is in the hands of one non elected person.

[Ripsnort]

Formation of DHS:
Damned if Bush did nothing, Damned if he did....

[2bighorn]

Formation of DHS:
Damned if Bush did nothing, Damned if he did....

Majority of Dems and Reps voted for it. I don't like Bush, but I can't blame him for everything either...

[crockett]

Majority of Dems and Reps voted for it. I don't like Bush, but I can't blame him for everything either...

Yea I can't say I blame Bush directly either.. it is what it is. I was just making the point that current day Republicans are all for bigger govt and more spending. That's why I say the current crop is not Fiscal conservatives but rather a mix of Neocons and Religious Conservatives. Both of them want more power and bigger govt with less rights for the Average American.

[Ripsnort]

Yea I can't say I blame Bush directly either.. it is what it is. I was just making the point that current day Republicans are all for bigger govt and more spending. That's why I say the current crop is not Fiscal conservatives but rather a mix of Neocons and Religious Conservatives. Both of them want more power and bigger govt with less rights for the Average American.

Do you think you're going to get smaller government and less spending with a democratic Congress/Senate majority and Democratic president?

Enjoy the extra cash that you have now....

[Sixpence]

Of course, we could have just let Saddam rape and torture and kill his own people .

We lost 600k in our civil war, I don't think any other country sticking their nose in it would have made us a better country. Let them fight for their country like everyone else has.

Sorry Rip, but them killing each other as an excuse to invade just doesn't fly. Sell me anything else, but not that

[BigPlay]

WWJD?

Jesus is probably very sad right now.

We should be sad as well for letting this country go down the tubes. It's not just the politicians fault it's ours. They gave this country an opportunity to  become even more greedy than than we were. Since when do you refy your house to buy toys and all the other crap that this nation bought to make their lives better and rub it into their neighbor's face.
I live in an above average neighborhood in Southern California. My wife is a mortgage broker and I'm a building contractor. I 've lived in the same home for 16 years. At one point I had close to 2 million in equity which now has been cut in 1/2. Did I go out and buy that Ferrari I always had my eye on? Did I buy that platinum Rolex ?did I buy that 300ft long motorhome with 14 plasma TVs in it? Hell no...... why? because I knew I would have to pay for it . I  seen this happening in my neighborhood when money was cheap and now the sad reality is now some are walking away from their homes . They still have their toys. That's why I never took a drop of equity out of my house and the government should have regulated that industry and protected this nations people against what happened by not tempting the tempted sheep we are. IT"S ALL OF THEIR FAULT AS WELL AS OUR"S !

[Hangtime]

Resist partisan labeling and herd politics.

Become an American. Do what you think is best for the country on election day.

And remain an American.

[Ripsnort]

We lost 600k in our civil war, I don't think any other country sticking their nose in it would have made us a better country. Let them fight for their country like everyone else has.

Sorry Rip, but them killing each other as an excuse to invade just doesn't fly. Sell me anything else, but not that

We're talking about a dictator that lit oil wells on fire with the purpose of making the world pay in 1991...a man who would stop at nothing to get what he wanted to eventually destroy Israel and the U.S. It's not just about Iraqi killing Iraqi, it was about having a neighborhood watch program on a stationary carrier called "Iraq". I'd hate to think of the alternative had he been left in power.....

If you're going to bring the Civil War into the discussion, then let's play "What if" had we taken out Hitler before he gained too much momentum.

[Sixpence]

We're talking about a dictator that lit oil wells on fire with the purpose of making the world pay in 1991...a man who would stop at nothing to get what he wanted to eventually destroy Israel and the U.S. It's not just about Iraqi killing Iraqi, it was about having a neighborhood watch program on a stationary carrier called "Iraq". I'd hate to think of the alternative had he been left in power.....

If you're going to bring the Civil War into the discussion, then let's play "What if" had we taken out Hitler before he gained too much momentum.

Yeah, and we were talking about a south that wanted slavery, what's your point?

[crockett]

Do you think you're going to get smaller government and less spending with a democratic Congress/Senate majority and Democratic president?

Enjoy the extra cash that you have now....

No, but I'm also not a fool whom believes the Republican will give me a smaller govt like many here claim they will. I've already posted a few times why I vote for Democrats. It's because I value my personal rights that the current Religious Conservatives would love to take away from me.

The basic idea of Liberalism is protecting personal freedoms and to pushing for equal opportunity, which is the exact opposite of Religious Conservatives & the Neocons. While the far left libs can get a bit extreme with the equal opportunity stuff I'd much rather deal with that, than having the extreme Right forcing their religious beliefs on me, or getting us in another war that has nothing to do with protecting this country.

The simple fact is Liberals tend to be more for the individual while Conservatives are more for their specific group and screw anyone else.

[Hornet33]

GAO reports are available to all, so are OPM reports. Federal budget is not secret either. Follow the trail and you'll see that DHS waste more than their 'official' budget is...

edited typo

So you don't work for any agency within the dept so how would you know what it's like at the operational level, and at operational level I mean the guys like me that are out there every day doing the actual work.

From an operational standpoint it was a great move. Past situation before the dept was created. We would board a vessel and conduct a routine inspection. Unless we had intel allready on hand regarding crewmembers we were in the dark. If we wanted info on a drew member or passenger that wasn't on the manifest it could take upwards of 2 days to several weeks to get information from Imigration, DEA, or anyone else. Current situation we can send a couple of messages, or pick up a phone and have information about anyone on the ship in less than 24 hours because all the info is internal to the dept. That is a huge improvment at the operational level. All those agencies now work for the same boss, using the same communications links, and networks, and the ability to pass time critical information has been increased by a huge margin.

That's not big government, that the government actually doing something that improves the ability of all those agencies to actually be able to do their jobs in a timely manner. You look at the GAO budgets. Yeah the funding has gone way up from where it was because all those agencies are having to upgrade all their equipment to operate together, and that cost money, but the end result is worth the cost at the operational level.