Elon Musk @elonmusk
·
SpaceX engineers are trying to deliver Starlink terminals & supplies to devastated areas in North Carolina right now and @FEMA is both failing to help AND won’t let others help. This is unconscionable!!They just took this video a few hours ago, where you can see the level of devastation: roads, houses, electricity, water supply and ground Internet connections completely destroyed. @FEMA wouldn’t let them land to deliver critical supplies … my blood is boiling …
3:25 PM · Oct 4, 2024 //
Secretary Pete Buttigieg @SecretaryPete
·
Replying to @elonmusk
No one is shutting down the airspace and FAA doesn’t block legitimate rescue and recovery flights. If you’re encountering a problem give me a call.
2:32 PM · Oct 4, 2024
Elon Musk @elonmusk
·
Replying to @SecretaryPete
There are hundreds of reports of FEMA/FAA blocking flights. This literally just happened.
I will follow you. Please DM me the number to call.
3:32 PM · Oct 4, 2024
Elon Musk @elonmusk
·
Replying to @elonmusk and @SecretaryPete
Still waiting … the helicopter is trying to land to deliver critical supplies. What’s the number to call?
3:48 PM · Oct 4, 2024
Musk said the pilots were not trying to land in an unsafe area.
How is the governmental effort so lacking in coordination and response, and then on top of that, getting in the way of those that are responding? Even this exchange seems to tell the tale — why should Elon Musk have to be begging Pete Buttigieg for a phone number just so a helicopter can land?
It's just unreal.
Buttigieg finally did get back to him. But he's responding only after all this has exploded all over X, with many who are not as well placed as Elon Musk complaining about the issues. //
Elon Musk @elonmusk
·
Replying to @SecretaryPete
Thanks for the call. Hopefully, we can resolve this soon.
4:29 PM · Oct 4, 2024 //
CarolineL
5 hours ago
Several years ago, a typhoon hit the Philippines, hard. We diverted a Carrier group or two and were there in two days, with helicopters being sent ahead to rescue and supply (same for the tsunami in Japan years ago).
It’s been EIGHT DAYS! Where is the military, all of their helicopters, supplies and medics? There are multiple military bases nearby, the soldiers could have Walked there in EIGHT DAYS! //
sb2
5 hours ago
The key word was "legitimate". So Buttigieg is saying they will determine who is "legitimate" or not. In other words, nobody is if they're not a Dem operative. //
War Planner
5 hours ago
Musk at 12:32..
..silence..
Musk at 12:48..
..silence..
Butte-Plugge at a little before 1:29..
When seconds count, your government are minutes, sometimes hours away..
The government response to Hurricane Helene has been nothing short of horrific. As RedState has been covering, everything that should be functioning normally to help the American people in terms of rescue efforts and assistance has been a colossal failure due to our inept and corrupt government.
Amid all of this failure of government has been an incredible display from private citizens who are lining up to help those in trouble in the affected areas. They're willing to put their time, money, resources, and skills at the disposal of those in need. It truly is a stunning display of humanity.
(READ: The Government's Failure to Help After Helene Goes Far Beyond What the Media Is Willing to Tell You)
But among all of this are reports that there are government officials attempting to halt the people's efforts in various ways. They threaten to arrest helicopter pilots who are rescuing the stranded. Reports that FEMA has told people to stop giving supplies out privately and direct them to FEMA camps have been made.
As former Army Ranger and MMA fighter Tim Kennedy told a local news agency, the government is actively hampering attempts to help. //
A Man Of Memes @RickyDoggin
·
She’s based. She’s 100% correct and you can’t deny it or bust her argument.
Let’s change the status quo. The quickest way to change it is to vote for the person that both sides hate…. Hmmmm, I wonder who that is?
6:25 PM · Oct 3, 2024
Summarized, her point is this.
If the media were to begin accurately reporting on the civilian effort to help the people and how successful it's been, operating on a shoestring budget with supplies gathered here and there, and all without government assistance, then you'd likely start wondering what the point of the government is.
The government wants you to believe that without it, you're entirely vulnerable and at the mercy of everything around you. It wants you to believe that you need it for your protection and survival. To be sure, there are elements of it that should exist for that very reason. Police forces and the military are necessary to maintain safety from both domestic and foreign threats.
However, it's pretty clear that the extraordinary amount of taxpayer dollars that we pay to it in order to keep the country functioning as it should are being wasted continuously. Even with all the billions and billions of dollars it takes from us, it can't seem to prioritize it well enough to be utilized properly. You start to realize you don't need the government as much as you think you do, and before long, you're enthusiastic about shrinking it, giving it less of your money, and reducing the number of people who work there.
This is a nightmare scenario for the government. If you know your own power, it highlights the weakness of the government //
If anything, Helene is a wake-up call. It's a full-on display of the power of the people, and a perfect example of how government should always be small and minimally funded based on basic need. //
Xanthro
33 minutes ago
All this failure is because of the current Administration. CERT (Community Emergency Response Team) is actually part of FEMA and we have been part of search and rescue for years. We are the ones who often train others, as we are volunteers and usually have decades of experience.
When we showed up at a disaster, we often even took lead, because we were there first. CERT is sometimes called the Zero Responders, because we are in the community, we don't need to travel to it.
I noticed a massive change with the snowstorms the San Bernardino Mountains. People were trapped for days and we were not allowed up the mountain, and those who came down the mountain were not allowed back up. People were tricked into coming down the mountain in refill medications and were arrested to prevent them from going back up, all the while their family members died.
While have no direct knowledge of the Maui, it screams the same incompetence.
Nowwe are once again prevent from rescuing people. Eastern Tennessee and Western North Carolina are insanely impacted. FEMA is doing everything they can to thwart rescue and aid.
I'll admit, FEMA was pretty shoddy at time pre-Katrina, but after that they stepped up their game, but all that improvement is gone.
FEMA is the problem, not the solution. //
C. S. P. Schofield
an hour ago
The Progressive Establishment firmly believes in the wonderfullness of Central Planning. They believe in it the way Medieval Aristocrats believed in the Divine Right of Kings. No matter how often it falls down, it is their reason for existing in the first place. And, to be fair (and it hurts to be fair to these weasels) Central Planning has had its victories. The spread of water and sewage systems was planned that way. Such networks are hard to start as private enterprise because the value they impart is diffuse and therefore hard to charge for up front. But the Progressives think EVERYTHING should be centrally planned and controled, and that simply doesn’t work.
The core idea behind our Constitution and Bill of Rights was that government should be a service organization, limited in authority. It was a radical idea in 1789 and 1791 (when the Constitution and Bill of Rights were ratified, respectively), and it has REMAINED a radical idea ever since. Elites do not like the idea of limited government. They do not like the idea that the peasants (that’s us) get to tell them to go climb a tree. So they try to undermine the Constitution every chance they get.
Erick-Woods Erickson
Oct 04, 2024
A lot of people who think the government is a mess are upset that it has been slow to respond to Helene. Of course it has. What did you expect?
In fact, it was FIVE DAYS after the storm struck that Joe Biden really mobilized the government. The Southern Baptist Convention was already on the ground while the flood waters were still raging.
The government is not going to help you.
You think FEMA is a mess? You’re damn right it is. You do not need to imagine maliciousness when the government that got research showing COVID doesn’t spread well outside decided to shut down beaches. You do not need to imagine maliciousness when the government that got research showing COVID mostly does not affect kids chose to shut down elementary schools. You do not need to imagine maliciousness when the government cannot deliver the mail competently, which is an Article 1, Section 8 responsibility, unlike disaster relief.
Besides, these people are fools, and a dementia patient leads them.
Pete Buttigieg and the Biden Administration have hindered private aviation’s ability to rescue people and ferry supplies as needed because Buttigieg et al put their trust in Uncle Sam’s man boob. Meanwhile, in North Carolina, neighbors are helping neighbors. Towns are rallying. Private helicopter pilots are defying threats of arrest to rescue people. Private pilots are shuttling supplies as needed. Baptists and Mormons are working together as first responders.
The question should not be about the government stopping citizens' private charity but about the response of those citizens and communities to the government trying to stop them. After all, the government is ultimately beholden to the people.
Joe Biden's government wants people to rely on the government. After all, Democrats believe the government is the only thing we are all a part of. They forget about the community. We are all part of one. And our local community is what will help us through hard times. The local communities of North Carolina will provide more help than FEMA. The state government of North Carolina and its neighbors will provide more immediate resources and do more heavy lifting than the federal government and that is by design and how it should be.
FEMA has prioritized equity for relief distributions, and it’s still looking for underserved non-white communities in the mountains to help first.
FEMA and the feds should be a last resort. These disasters are best recovered at the state level, with an assist from the Feds. Local and state disasters are not, after all, in Article 1, Section 8 of the Constitution.
Currently, however, some people on social media profit from rumors, unsourced allegations, and lies. My personal favorite is about Chimney Rock, NC, where the feds have purportedly told people they’re going to leave the bodies in the street and let them rot, then bulldoze the town and take the land. Seriously — that allegation had over 2,000,000 views on Twitter.
It is not true.
How do I know? I asked my friend who lives in Chimney Rock who survived the disaster.
Lots of people are showing drone footage, claiming no one is coming to help the locals. Well, someone is there—bulldozers and dump trucks are working. You can see them in the very footage used as proof no one is there to help.
It is probably not FEMA, but it is not supposed to be. Despite the branding, FEMA is not actually a first responder and never has been. We’ve only been conditioned to think FEMA comes first because of Anderson Cooper’s outrage about the incompetent state and federal response to Katrina on CNN in 2005.
The Southern Baptists always show up first.
Americans show up first. They are first in and last out, as they should be. The government is not malicious. The trolls are preying on many people’s existing distrust of government to sow more discord and division. If it sounds super outrageous online, it just might not be true. //
What is true is that Americans will take care of each other, with or without the federal government. And this, my friends, is another reminder that we should not grow the federal government for Republican purposes. We should gut it and encourage people to rely more on their local communities and states.
In his pamphlet, “A Simple Way To Pray,” Martin Luther said of the line “Give us this day our daily bread,” in the Lord’s Prayer, that we should reflect on it praying, in part, “Grant to every estate-townsman or farmer-to be diligent and to display charity and loyalty toward each other.”
We get our daily bread not directly from God, but from the farmer who grows the wheat, the harvester who harvests the wheat, the petrol man who makes the gas to fuel the combine and truck that goes to market, the grocer who sells it, and the relief operator who buys it and delivers it to the mountains to those in need. It is the body of Christ working and the people in communities working who are going to provide relief and rescue.
The government will not save us. FEMA will not save us. We will save each other.
“[S]eek the welfare of the city where I have sent you into exile, and pray to the Lord on its behalf, for in its welfare you will find your welfare.”
The Holy Bible: English Standard Version (Je 29:7). (2016). Crossway Bibles.
Trump War Room @TrumpWarRoom
·
.@AshleyMoodyFL: "Everyone should be waking up this morning outraged... They have taken the FEMA EMERGENCY food and shelter program, and over time, siphoned off hundreds of millions of dollars into basically making it an illegal immigrant resettlement program."
1:22 PM · Oct 3, 2024 //
FEMA @fema
·
If you were affected by Helene, we urge you to apply for assistance as soon as possible.
We understand that everyone's journey to recovery is different, so we are here to help with your unique situation.
To apply, call 1-800-621-3362 or visit http://DisasterAssistance.gov.
#Helene
5:22 PM · Oct 2, 2024
But riddle me this: How do people who have absolutely no access to phone, power, or internet accomplish this? This is one indication that someone at FEMA failed to think this through.
There have been claims that FEMA is restricting private citizens from rendering rescue, aid, and comfort to the ravaged towns and limiting emergency response to their approved agencies, and counter claims that this is not occurring. What appears to be confirmed is that whatever resources FEMA does have available are not being distributed. Aircraft, ambulances, fuel supply tankers, and trucks with supplies that are supposed to be for the Hurricane Helene victims are sitting on a tarmac in Greenville, SC, still waiting to deploy. //
RedinOR 3 hours ago edited
This is why we should NOT have socialized healthcare. The government (as currently mismanaged) is incapable of efficiency. No one in the government bureaucracy is incentivized to operate in a way to maximize resources and funding. Their survival is based on growing, when they should be focused on staying as small as they can be and still cover the bases. It is said that a piece of writing is perfect not when there is nothing more to add, but when there is nothing more to remove. The same can be said of a bureaucracy.
This is a tragic reminder that the government cannot be trusted to be there when we most need support. //
duggersd 3 hours ago
Someone else pointed out to me that the beginning of the fiscal year is October 1. So how did they run out of money in less than 4 days?
Perhaps you've seen the video of Transportation Secretary Pete Buttigieg going around where he tells citizens to refrain from sending drones into the air, or piloting aircraft in the area where Helene has left a path of destruction.
"There's also some safety issues that come up," said Buttigieg. "For example, temporary flight restrictions to make sure the airspace is clear for any flights or drone activity that might be involved in helping to allow those emergency responders to do their job."
Brandon Morse @TheBrandonMorse
·
This video is the government attempting to stop footage from getting out that shows the extent of their ineptitude and halt civilians help so there’s no contrast to highlight it’s failure. Full stop.
12:26 PM · Oct 3, 2024
The excuse is that you need to keep your drone or aircraft out of the sky in order to allow emergency workers to do their jobs and not complicate matters. That would be a valid thing to suggest... if there was an effective rescue operation going on, but there's not. As I covered in my last VIP article, FEMA is out of disaster relief money because it was spent on illegals.
If you're like me, you probably didn't see this as a federal official attempting to help people. Given that this is the Biden-Harris administration, you probably became suspicious pretty quickly that something else was likely behind Buttigieg's words.
Personally, this feels a lot like a call for censorship, even if it's just an attempt to encourage it through "advice."
If you want to know what the real story on the ground is, the government isn't going to tell you. Their response has been disastrous, and it makes them look awful. The less you see of this disastrous response, the better for them. They can craft their own narrative where they were the ever-present heroes working hard to help victims.
But it would be an egregious lie. The real heroes are the ones out there helping their fellow civilians in any way they can. Private pilots are attempting to rescue stranded victims. Food and water are being delivered where it can be effective, and this is in spite of government disaster groups telling them to stop. //
Maximus Decimus Cassius
19 hours ago
The "authorities" are trying to enforce no-fly zones for everything--helicopters, drones, whatever--to prevent assistance to the stricken. This is beyond treason.
Lets just call it what it is: government sponsored genocide. //
Vigilo
17 hours ago
This is like the Biden regime response to the Maui wild fire. "No cameras allowed". //
Sancho Panza
18 hours ago
The idea of citizens taking direct action to make things better for their communities, neighbors, families and selves has uncomfortable connotations for fascists. They feel it keenly, and instinctively suppress it any way they can.
Mark Moyar’s story shows why Trump has to prove to the people he needs for an effective presidency that he will not leave them twisting in the wind. //
In advance of Tuesday’s vice presidential debate, the Democratic National Committee put up a billboard outside Madison Square Garden calling Donald Trump’s running mate, Sen. J.D. Vance, the “Poster boy for Project 2025.” As predicted by campaign email blasts, during the debate Kamala Harris’ running mate, Gov. Tim Walz, name-checked this blueprint for conservative federal governance, yet again proving the Harris-Walz campaign has zero policy accomplishments to run on.
Since most voters don’t care about this pretty unremarkable effort to slim an ungovernable federal bureaucracy and staff the next Republican administration with effective people loyal to the United States, it’s telling that Democrats have turned it into the only other issue they’re running on besides abortion until birth. It shows Democrats believe growing the unelected bureaucracy that undermines elected officials such as Congress and the president is their top priority (competing with murdering mostly black and brown babies in the womb).
It’s also yet more evidence they always push Republican defeat even in the event of Republican victory, because Project 2025 proposals are nothing more than simple common sense. A majority of voters, and three-quarters of solid Republicans, think the federal government is corrupt. And it is. It’s now obviously a far cry from early progressive fantasies about “apolitical experts.” It’s a politicized fifth column enacting regime change by substituting unelected, unconstitutional government for elected, constitutional government of, by, and for Americans. //
A book out this year, Masters of Corruption, by former Trump appointee Mark Moyar, provides yet another vivid illustration of why. In it, Moyar, a former Trump appointee to the U.S. Agency for International Development, details how career bureaucrats sabotaged his whistleblowing on their corruption. His story shows that Trump has to prove to the people he needs for an effective presidency that he has their back, and that if they work to achieve Trump’s goals in office they will not be left twisting in the wind.
That’s effectively what happened to Moyar. A researcher with military and foreign policy experience, plus a PhD, Moyar wrote his sixth book in 2016. He submitted the manuscript for Defense Department review, in multiple ways going far above the legal and regulatory standards for ensuring he didn’t release classified information. After the department failed to review his manuscript despite receiving more than six times as much time to do so as court precedent allows, Moyar informed them he was moving forward with publication.
The book was published, and that was the end of it — until Moyar became a Trump appointee at USAID two years later and started to blow the whistle on corrupt employees. Then the manuscript review resurfaced. It was used as a pretense to deny Moyar the security clearance he needed to do his job, then ultimately to kick him out of the job on the grounds that he couldn’t do it without a security clearance. In a recent speech, Robert F. Kennedy Jr. said his uncle, President John F. Kennedy, started USAID to benefit U.S. policy, but it’s become a CIA front organization for regime change.
The entire time, no one ever provided any evidence that Moyar had published any classified material in his book that the Defense Department had failed — or refused — to review. And higher-level Trump appointees refused to defend Moyar against the bureaucratic jackals, leaving him defenseless. While his security clearance was held up simply out of spite, he couldn’t be hired for the majority of jobs for which he is qualified.
Torture by a Thousand Bureaucrats
That sounds Kafka-esque enough, yet it is a very brief gloss on the labyrinthian twists and turns that Moyar’s book relates. Reading them imparts a horror of ever getting caught in such a system embedded with people with the power to screw with you while they trap you there, all out of sheer hatred for political commitments that represent half the country. //
Moyar points out that anti-Trump bureaucrats worked furiously to sabotage the work voters had elected Trump to accomplish. They organized within agencies like an internal spy ring. They used their government positions to — often illegally — leak half-truths to media in a way that would damage Trump’s ability to govern. In Zoom meetings, they “offered the federal employees tips for thwarting Trump appointees, such as concocting excuses for procedural delays, demanding protracted legal reviews, leaking information to sympathetic journalists, and bringing complaints to the inspector general,” Moyar writes.
Thousands of good people who risked their careers to advance Trump’s policy agenda were not only backstabbed by agency colleagues, like Moyar was, but also placed on Democrat target lists and personally and professionally harassed to this day. //
Trump’s September promise to appoint Elon Musk to “conduct[] a complete financial and performance audit of the entire federal government” also is the right direction. A week later, Musk gave more details, according to a RealClearPolitics transcript: “We do have an opportunity to do kind of a once-in-a-lifetime deregulation and reduction in the size of government. Because the other thing besides the regulations, America is also going bankrupt extremely quickly.”
When asked if federal agencies could be cut by “two, three, four, five percent,” Musk replied, “I think we’d need to do more than that.” Yes, more — try at least a factor of ten.
Seidhom said he tried to de-escalate and asked the official for instructions on how to communicate with the Lake Lure Fire Department while he was flying a rescue mission near the town. Seidhom said the fire official ordered him to leave and not come back.
“If that’s what you want us to do, we’ll leave no issue. And I explained to him that I left my son on the side of the mountain, and I left another victim. I was going to go back and bring them. It was already set up for the landing spot and then I would get out of his area. He told me I wasn’t going to go back up the mountain to get them, I was going to leave them there.”
Seidhom said he asked the official for a specific reason he was ordering him to stop his rescue efforts. “You’re interfering with my operation,” is the reason Seidhom said the fire official gave.
“I’m going back and getting my copilot. He said, ‘If you turn around and go back up the mountain, you’re going to be arrested.’ I said, ‘Well, sir, I’m going back to get my copilot, I don’t know what to tell you.'”
Seidhom said the official called over two law enforcement officers and again threatened him with arrest if he flew back up the mountain.
“At that point, I had to make a decision. I have a victim, I have my son, and I politely asked the officers, told him the situation again, explained everything, told them who I’d been coordinating with, and I said, ‘Hey if I go back up and get this victim and bring him down to this landing spot that other emergency personnel have designated, am I going to be arrested? And the officers’ response was, ‘Man, I really don’t know what to do in this situation.’ I said, ‘So you can’t tell me if I’m going to get arrested or not?’ And he said, ‘Man, I’m not sure what to do.'”
The out-of-state chief and fire captain Seidhom said he encountered at the landing zone spoke with him before he took off.
“They came back over and said, ‘Hey, man, we can’t tell you to go get the victim. We can’t even ask you to go get the victim, but we can tell you if you come back with the victim, we’ll have you a designated landing spot and we’ll make sure they don’t come over here,” Seidhom told WJZY.
“So, at that point, I felt like the other person was going to pressure him to arrest me when I come back with the victim and then my son would have been left on the side of a mountain with this person to go and rescue him,” Seidhom said. //
The fire official told Seidhom to report to the Rutherford County Airport and wait for Federal Aviation Administration officials to meet with him, according to Jordan Seidhom.
The father of two got back into his chopper, turned it in the direction of the mountain and lifted off right back to where he left his son and the woman’s husband. He picked his son up and told the husband what happened at the drop-off with the Lake Lure fire official.
Seidhom took off and looked back at the husband, standing helpless in his crumbling driveway as the help he thought would come for him flew away. Seidhom said the fire official told him the fire department’s ground crew would walk up the mountainside to rescue the man “in a few hours.” Seidhom said it was a three-minute flight from the couple’s driveway to the landing site where he left the woman with first responders.
Seidhom and his son flew to the Rutherford County airport, just as they were directed.
“I did leave the Rutherford Airport. I knew at that point he had no jurisdiction, I was legal in what I was doing, and I was following all FAA guidelines and airspace guidelines. I was on private property,” Seidhom said.
The Seidhoms spent three hours at the airport, but no one from the Federal Aviation Administration came.
Within a half-hour of the fire official and the arrest threat, Seidhom said a Temporary Flight Restriction was set up over the Lake Lure gap, right in the center of where he and the fire official faced off minutes earlier. //
Seidhom said the fire official told him to tell any other pilots he knew that they would also be arrested if they came back. Seidhom said he was the only helicopter within 40 nautical miles of Lake Lure at the time.
After the encounter with the fire official, Seidhom decided to fly back to his home in Pageland, South Carolina, and call off his efforts to help. //
“I’m sorry, if I had to do it over again, I would have stopped and I would have rescued as many people until they decided they were going to arrest me,” said Seidhom.
AkronMike 2 hours ago edited
Clearly, this malicious antipathy is intentional. So, the trillion dollar question is: why?
The Occam's Razor answer is that these suffering folks are mostly white, mostly Republican voters. So, the government doesn't care . . . or worse. If they die or are stuck wallowing in their destroyed homes, then they won't vote and key states go blue next month.
But my Spidey-senses tells me there might be something else going on. Maybe Joe Biden is getting payback against Harris-Pelosi-Shumer-Deep State for forcing him out. He's slow-walking all this aid to drive outrage in key swing states to ensure Harris loses those states.
Only the President can invoke Taft-Hartley to end a strike of national importance. But Brandon's not invoking the law . . . and it's going to bring lots of pain to lots of people ahead of the election.
Maybe Brandon has just enough grey matter left to get his revenge on those who crushed his dream of remaining President before he goes into a full vegetative state. Just maybe. //
Political-Paige 2 hours ago edited
NOBODY. Nobody on the planet is this incompetent. The only possible conclusion is that this is intentional.
Why?
NC is a critical swing state next month. The Dems are all clustered in the Piedmont to the east, where the academic & research triangle sits. The mountain side of the state (except for the lunatic clownshow of Asheville itself) is the Republican stronghold.
People with no power or water or livelihood don't vote.
Dead Republicans can't vote.
People who have been taught a lesson that failing to bend then knee has consequences are afraid to vote.
The only American disaster in my long life that would have bodies hanging in trees and underwater in cars a week out, that has no govt helicopter or supply support, that has government trying to actively BLOCK civilian rescue flights, is this one.
That can NOT be an accident.
So what's happening in WNC right now? Well, the sun has just come up, but:
- Yesterday, private NC & SC pilots airlifted 26 tons of food to us.
- Yesterday, the skies were full of private helicopters... not government.
- Yesterday, utility trucks from a plethora of southern states worked 24 hours to try to get power against massive odds.
- Yesterday, our local restaurants with any power or water at all gave free meals to everyone.
- Yesterday, donated water trucks pulled up in parking lots all over NC and people carried whatever they could: jugs, bottles, bins, even cat litter boxes, to scoop up some lifesaving water for their families.
- Yesterday, volunteers tried to clean up 500 mentally & physically disabled people left to rot in their own waste in a low-income complex in Asheville, but were deterred by looters.
- Yesterday, farmers from SC & north GA brought what feed they could to starving herds wandering WNC.
- Yesterday, animal shelters across the south desperately tried to find airlifts & transport for starving, stranded, & lost pets, but all the volunteer vehicles are needed to rescue people who are running out of time.
- Yesterday, police were ordered to stop anyone not local from taking passable interstates into the hard-hit areas, so volunteer relief supplies are stymied. One assumes they're acting on directives from the Democrat governor or FEMA bureaucrats. Social media was full of ways to out-fox them by taking passable back roads (scarce as those are).
- Yesterday, volunteers seeking FEMA in both SC and NC were turned away, but only after the FEMA workers took the meager cash donations they carried with them. FEMA, you see has smugly announced that it's out of money for this hurricane season, despite their 29.2 BILLION dollar budget and their decision APRIL 2024 to give 640,000,000 to DHS for illegal aliens.
Illegals will vote Democrat, now or later. 640 million.
WNC folks will vote Republican.
What's that tell you? //
Grumpy Right Seater 2 hours ago
Keeping the CNN crew out of a hard hit area is the same tactic used to keep news folks away from the Maui fire. Is this a new type of censorship? //
Random US Citizen 41 minutes ago
It’s on purpose. All those rural voters are cut off… but the big blue cities will be voting just fine. Harris was behind in NC… but there’s a very real chance she wins if actual Americans can’t submit ballots while those who are no longer our countrymen can stuff drop boxes like there’s no tomorrow. This could definitely swing the election.
As a side note: somebody should graffiti over the “Liberty” with Bragg on all the off post signs. //
Cafeblue32 2 hours ago edited
Biden: "We've given everything that we have."
If that's your best, then no wonder your party looks like a Chinese fire drill.
A smart party trying to win an election would have seen it as an opportunity for their candidate to take command of a tragedy dropped in her lap and show off her decision making and administrative chops, her being VP and all. But because they're rural folks, they must be Trump heads, so the instinct to punish them overides anything that might happen to be sane and logical. My granny used to call it cutting off your nose to spite your face. //
Ed in North Texas an hour ago
"...this is NOT the National Guard; it is the organization Ron DeSantis formed that caused some to befoul themselves over the thought that he may be going full Mussolini or something."
Texas formed the Texas State Guard in 1871 with Federal recognition starting in WW II. Among other missions, the State Guard takes over securing and operating the TXNG facilities on activation of the TXNG units to Federal service.
It has been nearly a week since Hurricane Helene hit western North Carolina, and Joe Biden has finally announced on behalf of whoever is running the country that he has authorized 1,000 federal troops from Fort Bragg (I will never call it anything else), North Carolina, to assist in disaster relief operations a mere 250 miles away in Western North Carolina.
These 1,000 troops will constitute the overwhelming federal military disaster response in Florida, Georgia, South Carolina, North Carolina, and Virginia.
According to the Department of Defense, the federal military involvement in this five-state catastrophe is minimal:
...
- Four helicopters with para-rescue teams are at McGhee Tyson Airport in Knoxville, Tennessee.
- Eight Army helicopters and ten Navy helicopters were available at Fort Bragg on Monday.
- Thirty high-water vehicles are at Fort Campbell, Kentucky, for reasons that are unclear.
The critical resources needed in the hardest hit areas of Western North Carolina are helicopters for getting stranded people out of danger and bringing supplies to areas cut off by flooding. As of this afternoon, the only military aircraft available are 11 from Florida, two from South Carolina, seven from Tennessee, and one from Virginia. Some of those may be in use in North Carolina as both Florida and South Carolina have sent National Guard contingents to North Carolina.
A lot of hard questions are being asked.
//
As an aside, Howard's story of petty bickering among local officials seems to be spot on; see Pilot flying Helene rescue missions in NC ordered out, threatened with arrest.
The Civil Rights Lawyer @johnbryanesq
·
People are flying their own helicopters in and actively rescuing people in NC and local government officials are threatening them with arrest. You don’t hate your government enough.
Last edited
7:01 AM · Oct 1, 2024 //
To qualify for federal military assistance after a disaster, the Stafford Act must be invoked. This requires a governor to request assistance under that law. Biden declared a state of emergency in North Carolina on September 26 which released some federal aid. Governor Roy Cooper made a Stafford Act request on September 27), but Biden delayed invoking the Stafford Act until today, Wednesday. //
Note the tasking includes a single Forward Support Company. This is rather astounding as that unit has extremely limited capabilities. It has an aid station, a field kitchen, about a half-dozen trucks, and vehicle repair section. What is needed in Western North Carolina is emergency generators, communications, heavy engineering equipment, medical support, cargo haul capability, and helicopters. Even though Fort Bragg has well over 100 helicopters, only eight have been tasked to assist in recovery and relief operations.
Why has the tap been turned off to military assistance for North Carolina and other battered states? One can't help but remember this statement by Biden.
Greg Price @greg_price11
·
Reporter: "Do you have any words to the victims of the hurricane?"
Biden: "We've given everything that we have."
Reporter "Are there any more resources the federal government could be giving them?"
Biden: "No."
10:36 PM · Sep 29, 2024
And private helicopters flying rescue missions still outnumber military ones in the storm-blasted areas. //
Howard said that his congresswoman was able to get two contracted helicopters for search and rescue, but he also pointed out that local authorities are stopping even the media from seeing how bad the destruction is. He related a story that sheriff’s deputies in the Lake Lure area wouldn’t let CNN video the devastation.
He also gave an example of the buck-passing that’s going on in North Carolina: //
Howard pointed out that some of his colleagues are funding their rescue missions out of their own pockets. At the same time, Air Force helicopters are grounded and personnel aren’t working because they’re awaiting Title 10 orders that aren’t coming from above. //
Howard said that he doesn’t “know what kind of conspiracy” is behind this bureaucratic nightmare. In my more cynical moments, I can’t help but wonder if Gov. Roy Cooper (D-N.C.) and the Biden-Harris administration are willing to let Republican voters in a reliably red part of the state fend for themselves — and die. I don’t want to believe that, but it’s hard to shake that gut feeling. //
“I hope these politicians get fired,” he concluded. “I hope people get pissed off. They'll probably kick me out of the state of North Carolina for doing this. But you know what? I don't care. Because if I can save one more life for it, it's f***ing worth it to me.”
If only politicians in D.C. and North Carolina cared this much.
[If only churches cared this much about saving people!]. //
Jeroboam Maximus Decimus Cassius
7 hours ago edited
Those in power do care about one aspect of this, though. If they slow walk rescue and recovery efforts, no actual polling [voting at polling places] can take place in the worst affected counties, all Republican, a mere month from now. This could give the swing state of NC to the Democrats and probably would hand the Senate seat in Florida to them as well. It might also make a difference in Georgia.
Taxpayer-funded data locked behind insurance firm's paywall //
The National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) cannot reveal weather forecasts from a particularly accurate hurricane prediction model to the public that pays for the American government agency – because of a deal with a private insurance risk firm.
The model at issue is called the Hurricane Forecast Improvement Program (HFIP) Corrected Consensus Approach (HCCA). In 2023, it was deemed in a National Hurricane Center (NHC) report [PDF] to be one of the two "best performers," the other being a model called IVCN (Intensity Variable Consensus).
The FCC’s war on Musk may have contributed to Helene’s death toll, which is already at 138 Americans across six states, with many hundreds still missing. //
Among the serious problems facing rural victims is an inability to communicate with potential rescuers as roads are washed out, telecommunications are down, electricity is out, and people are facing fatal flooding.
It didn’t have to be this way.
In 2020, the Federal Communications Commission awarded Musk’s Starlink an $885.5 million award to help get broadband access to 642,000 rural homes and businesses in 35 states. A subsidiary of SpaceX, Starlink is a satellite internet system delivering high-speed internet to anyone on the planet. The plan would work out to less than $1,400 per linkup, same-day delivery of the necessary hardware, and only a few hours to get up and running.
Some 19,552 households and businesses in North Carolina would have had access to Starlink if they desired. Of the 21 worst-hit counties in North Carolina, the FCC-funded Starlink program would have served all or part of 17 of them, according to multiple officials. The FCC suddenly canceled that grant in 2022, a few months before Joe Biden suggested that the federal government find ways to go after Musk, a former Democrat who began criticizing some of the Democrat Party’s support of censorship of and lawfare against political opponents. After a challenge from SpaceX, the FCC reaffirmed its decision to cancel the award in 2023. //
The National Labor Relations Board went after Tesla over its dress code. The Securities and Exchange Commission and the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service are also investigating Musk and his companies. //
Joe Biden named Kamala Harris the Broadband Czar in April 2021 and placed her in charge of a $100 billion slush fund for broadband projects. At the Commerce Department, a $42.5 billion subset of that program was launched in 2021, with guidance written to limit the ability of Starlink to compete for contracts. The Broadband Equity, Access, and Deployment (BEAD) Program was supposed to fund programs in all 50 states. It has been a complete failure.
More than three years later, not a single rural American family or business has been connected to broadband through the program. At best the groundwork will begin four years after the launch and won’t finish until 2030 at the earliest. For that much taxpayer money, Starlink could be provided to 140 million people, and without the wait, observers noted.
The FCC’s anti-Musk efforts come at the same time that the Democrat-run agency fast-tracked a shocking application by a group backed by the Democrat Soros family to purchase more than 200 radio stations across the country.
Poor, agenda-driven choices made by FEMA, the Commerce Department and the FCC may be contributing to the death toll from Helene, and needlessly delaying recovery operations. //
Libs of TikTok @libsoftiktok
·
In case you’re wondering why the response to Hurricane Helene has been a disaster… Fema’s goal 1 is to instill equity as a foundation of emergency management. This is real
2:19 AM · Sep 30, 2024. //
Paul A. Szypula 🇺🇸 @Bubblebathgirl
·
Biden’s FEMA just bent a knee to Elon Musk and is installing 30 Starlink received to help those affected by Hurricane Helene.
North Carolina would’ve had 19,522 Starlink kits installed now if the FCC hadn’t withdrawn the grant they had promised SpaceX.
4:05 PM · Sep 30, 2024 //
ALEX @ajtourville
·
FYI – North Carolina would have 19,522 working @Starlink kits available today after Hurricane Helene had the FCC not revoked in bad faith the grant that was awarded to SpaceX as the winning bidder.
10:21 PM · Sep 29, 2024
anon-89ic God family country
4 hours ago edited
I don't think many Americans appreciate this danger. In banana republics, politicians, judges and lawyers are often murdered with impunity. Politicians, judges and lawyers are, for better or worse, the foundation of our Republic. Mass illegal immigration is bringing not the best of foreign cultures to our shores, but the worst of abuses of civil society. That's what Harris is promising to give more of--a world in which lawyers, judges and politicians, or the doctor who misdiagnoses your cancer, or the priest who opposes abortion, or the store keeper who didn't give you your change fast enough, is a bona fide target. For all of us lawyers who came under threat during the covid hoax for challenging government policy, this is just plain unbelievable. Lawyers having to carry guns? Lawyers having to give instructions to their spouses about what to do if they disappear on the way home from work? this is America? And that's why this story is not funny and needs to be seriously considered.
Gretz anon-89ic
2 hours ago
The erosion of the rule of law was the goal of the Marxists. Thank all of your Soros-backed cohort for making the law as ugly and meaningless as possible.
The 2025 Presidential Transition Project, better known as Project 2025, is the effort of a broad coalition of more than 100 conservative organizations working together to ensure a successful new presidential administration begins Jan. 20.
Project 2025, spearheaded by The Heritage Foundation, seeks to restore democracy, to loosen it from the grip of the political elites in Washington, D.C.
But the fiercest attackers of Project 2025 are lining up to protect the deep state. In recent months, the project has faced outlandish, hyperbolic attacks. //
Myth 1: Project 2025 is part of Donald Trump’s campaign.
Project 2025 was launched in spring 2022, before any major presidential candidate, including Donald Trump, announced he or she was running for office. //
Project 2025 is about people and policy. It isn’t advocating any particular candidate, but rather conservative ideals. Democrats and independents are welcome to its reform proposals as much as Republicans are.
The commonsense ideas in “Mandate for Leadership” transcend any one individual. They represent the solutions that millions of conservative and independent-minded Americans need after years of failed liberal leadership and bureaucratic bloat.
Myth 2: Project 2025 calls for a nationwide ban on abortion, in vitro fertilization, and contraception.
This claim is an outright lie. There are no calls for a nationwide ban on abortion or contraception anywhere in “Mandate for Leadership” or any other Project 2025 materials. In vitro fertilization isn’t even mentioned. //
Myth 3: Project 2025 endorses the “authoritarian” unitary executive theory.
Project 2025 doesn’t mention the unitary executive theory. Although many Americans throughout our history have debated the constitutional extent of executive authority, the Constitution makes it clear that the executive branch should be under control of the executive.
The Constitution also makes clear that the administrative state is not a fourth, unaccountable branch that may undermine the president and ignore congressional and judicial oversight—the situation America now faces.
The “authoritarian” and “unconstitutional” fearmongering is simply a projection. Many on the left have ignored constitutional rights, including those enumerated in the Bill of Rights, to pursue their political goals. //
Project 2025 would rein in rogue and authoritarian elements within the Justice Department, the Department of Homeland Security, and other parts of the U.S. government.
Myth 4: Project 2025 is the effort of a small group of elites to subvert and control the American people.
Project 2025, while organized by The Heritage Foundation, is the effort of over 100 conservative American organizations from across the broad spectrum of the Right.
Organizations associated with Project 2025 are united in their efforts to ensure a competent, conservative administration. //
Myth 5: Project 2025’s proposals to shrink the bureaucracy would harm Americans and are contrary to American values.
The Left claims that Project 2025 proposes to vastly shrink and in some senses “weaken” the government. On this point, the Left is correct.
However, those on the left are incorrect that these efforts would harm Americans. In fact, the efforts would make life much better.
As Ronald Reagan once said, “The nine most terrifying words in the English language are: I’m from the government, and I’m here to help.” Many Americans agree.
The federal government is bloated and inefficient and has not been reformed in nearly 50 years.
Making it easier to fire obstructive, lazy, or incompetent civil servants would save Americans money and make the government run better. Removing and reorganizing redundant and obsolete offices would do the same.
The United States has a federal system, but the role of the states in governance has been increasingly coopted by the U.S. government’s bureaucracy. Winding down and eventually abolishing the Department of Education would ultimately be in the interest of Americans, increasing the quality of education. Reforming the FBI would protect Americans from the politically corrupt leadership that runs the agency today.
These are just a few of the ways in which Project 2025’s implementation would serve Americans. //
Finally, there’s nothing sinister about Project 2025. It is an open book. It works out in the light and respectfully engages American citizens rather than gaslight them. It’s all available to the public at https://www.project2025.org
And while the Left fearmongers about the project, coalition partners have received feedback from many Americans, the great silent majority, that the solutions offered by Project 2025 are exactly what this country needs.
Government, as George Washington pointed out, is like fire — a dangerous servant and a fearful master. //
Seriously, could no one have sat down with the Maudes, informed them of however it was they were misusing land to which the family had held a grazing allotment for generations, and tried to work something out without immediately and capriciously resorting to criminal charges? The Maudes do, after all, have a long history with the land in question. They have grazed cattle and, apparently, made hay on the land, which doesn't seem unreasonable.
A member of the Maude family has held a U. S. Forest Service National Grasslands grazing allotment in good standing since the inception of that agency, he said. //
In summary: The Maudes had every reason to believe that there was some misunderstanding, that the use they had made of the land to which the family had held a grazing allotment for generations was still acceptable, and that, following the survey in question, some accommodation would be worked out. That is what any reasonable person would expect — but we are dealing with the government, that dangerous servant and fearful master. The Maudes certainly thought some accommodation possible — right up until they were hit with the summons.
And theft of government property? Seriously? One would think this would rate, at most, a trespassing charge. //
Catmother
13 hours ago
They are willing to get into a fight with an American farming /ranching family over 25 acres of grassland but the government isn't willing to do anything about the Chinese government buying up thousands of acres of farmland here in the US, especially if its near US Military facilities. Makes a lot of sense. ///
Bikeshedding in the Bureaucracy https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Law_of_triviality
Now a House of Representatives inquiry into the conduct of the census reveals that miscounts in that tally may have been hiding that the loss in blue states may have been underestimated; the Census Bureau has apparently miscounted in many areas, and oddly enough, the miscounts always seem to favor Democrats.
A key House committee has begun an investigation into Census Bureau overcounts and undercounts that favor Democrats in awarding congressional apportionment and Electoral College votes.
“The 2020 PES identified statistically significant overcounts in New York, Massachusetts, Rhode Island, Hawaii, Delaware, Minnesota, Utah, and Ohio, while finding undercounts in states like Texas, Florida, Mississippi, Arkansas, Tennessee, and Illinois,” he wrote. “Of the eight states overcounted in the 2020 census, six states have typically voted for electors for the Democratic Party candidate in presidential elections for the last three decades.” //
Of the six states undercounted in the 2020 census, all but one have tended to vote for electors for the Republican Party candidate in elections over the same time period. Because of the 2020 census’s failure to accurately count, Colorado gained a seat it did not deserve, Rhode Island and Minnesota kept seats they should have lost, and Texas and Florida were not awarded seats they should have gained.
It's important to note that no similar miscount is documented from the 2010 census.
Hawley said the pattern that was emerging from whistleblowers was that the rally that day was "undermanned, understaffed, they did not have people who had experience on it."
"The fact that the director will not level with the American people about what's going here is just totally unacceptable and unbelievable," Hawley declared. //
On top of what he said they were telling him from the internal Secret Service investigation, the DHS was telling them not to comply with document requests to Congress. That's incredibly problematic, and if that's true, anyone involved in that needs to be held accountable and further exposed. //
But it raises the question: What do they think those documents will reveal? And is that problem they don't want Congress to know about still continuing? Could it still expose Trump and other Secret Service protectees to further danger?
The Swiss are renowned for crafting the finest watches in the world, such as the Patek Philippe. The Swiss are now credited with inventing the most effective fiscal rules in the world, the Swiss debt brake.
The debt brake was enacted as a constitutional fiscal rule through referendum in 2001, with support from 85 percent of Swiss citizens. Like many countries, the Swiss have encountered recessions accompanied by unsustainable growth in debt. The debt brake was enacted to impose more effective constraints on federal spending and restore sustainable levels of debt. Over the past two decades, the Swiss cut debt as a share of national income roughly in half. //
Like a Swiss watch, the debt brake has several parts that are synchronized to constrain fiscal policies. The most important part is a rule that constrains the growth in federal spending to the rate of growth in potential output. This means that in the long term the federal government cannot grow more rapidly than the private sector.
Another rule is designed to stabilize spending over the business cycle. The federal government can incur deficits in periods of recession but must offset those deficits with surplus revenue in periods of economic growth. The rules cap deficit spending. If the deficits exceed 6 percent of expenditures, the excess must be eliminated within the next three annual budgets by lowering the expenditure ceiling. A compensation account is used to track deficits and surpluses over time. //
The debt brake has fostered fundamental reforms in the budget process in Switzerland. Before the debt brake was enacted, the Swiss relied on a bottom-up approach to budgeting. Each ministry proposed its own budget, and these were then aggregated into a total budget. Bottom-up budgeting is biased toward deficit spending, as each ministry lobbies for its own programs. The debt brake requires top-down budgeting. The finance minister is now required to draft a budget that conforms to debt brake rules, and that budget is then broken down into separate budgets for each ministry. //
The Swiss debt brake has proven to be the most effective of the new generation of fiscal rules enacted in developed countries. The reason is that it replaces discretionary fiscal policies with rules-based policies. ///
It only works for a moral people who have s conscience.
A new study has found that a vast majority of climate policies enacted since 1998 across 41 countries have been utterly ineffective. //
The study, published in the Journal of Science, evaluated about 1,500 climate policies implemented between 1998 and 2022 by 41 OECD countries (The Organization for Economic Co-operation and Development). The study found only 63 policies (about 4 percent) that, combined, had successfully “reduced total emissions between 0.6 and 1.8 Gt CO2.” Due to the low success rate, researchers estimate the CO2 emissions from the 41 nations they studied will exceed the Paris Climate Agreement target by 23 billion metric tons by 2030.
More importantly, the study found that two popular tools most governments’ climate policies rely on — subsidies and regulations — rarely reduce emissions. Researchers found some form of carbon tax approach was more effective at reducing emissions. //
Following the 2021 Infrastructure Investment and Jobs Act (IIJA) that pledged over $110 billion in climate and energy funding, the administration introduced its Green New Deal with a grossly misleading label, the Inflation Reduction Act (IRA), in 2022, with Vice President Kamala Harris casting the deciding vote in the Senate. The IRA purported to allocate $369 billion for climate change and energy over the next decade. However, the latest Congressional Budget Office’s projection of the IRA’s climate tax credit through year 2033 has already jumped to a staggering $428 billion, a rapid 16 percent increase than the IRA originally planned. //
The Harris-Walz campaign, as pointed out by The Wall Street Journal editorial board, has shamefully used the word “freedom” to “disguise that Democratic policies seek to restrict liberty across American society.” Voters who want to be free from the government’s wasteful spending and infringement on individual rights should not fall for the Democrat’s and Harris’ deception in the upcoming election.