Hammering on this a lot, but it just keeps getting more ridiculous

So Darrell Issa finds it inappropriate for the federal government to be funding medical care for sick 9/11 rescue workers.  Says Rep. Issa, “I have to ask … why the firefighters who went there and everybody in the city of New York needs to come to the federal government for the dollars versus this being primarily a state consideration.”

So as to prove that he’s not just running off incoherently about hating rescue workers, Issa wants you to know he’s proud of his alternative plans for spending federal funds.  To that end, he’s triumphantly sent around a press release listing all of his new earmarks (word doc, h/t Chris Reed).  So what, you’re probably wondering, has Representative Issa chosen to crow about that exemplifies the “local money for local issues, federal money for screw you” spending mantra?  Here’s the quick list:

San Diego Regional Interoperable Computer Aided Dispatch Project -$6 million

San Diego Regional Communications System (RCS) Upgrade -$3.5 million

Gang Prevention Program (City of Oceanside) -$500K

Lake Elsinore Emergency Operations Center -$250K

Murrieta Creek Flood Control Project -$13 million

San Luis Rey Flood Control Project -$7.2 million

Perris II Desalter (Perris, CA) -$2 million

Non-Potable Distribution Facilities and Demineralization/Desalination Recycled Water Treatment and Reclamation Facility Project (Riverside County) -$2 million

Santa Margarita Conjunctive Use Project (Camp Pendleton) -$1 million

San Jacinto & Upper Santa Margarita Watersheds Project -$355K

San Diego County Fire Safety and Fuels Reduction Program -$45 million

Corpsmen/Medics Civilian Nursing Training Program (Oceanside) -$1.6 million

Vista Community Clinic -$1 million

North County Health Project Oceanside Clinic Expansion (Oceanside) -$1 million

Railroad Canyon I-15 interchange project -$8 million

State Route 76 (widen and realign) -$5 million

San Luis Rey Transit Center (Oceanside) -$3.1 million

West Vista Way (City of Vista, widen) -$2 million

French Valley Airport (Temecula) -$1 million

Renovation and expansion of Fallbrook Boys and Girls Club -$500K

Some pretty nice projects in there. But it begs the question: Ahem, why do all these people need “to come to the federal government for the dollars versus this being primarily a state [or local] consideration?” Rep. Issa? Bueller? Bueller?

Lemme just venture one guess. Rescue workers in New York don’t vote in Temecula or Oceanside do they? Oh yeah. So only when Issa is trying to hook it up for his own self should federal money be spent on state and local projects.  Not only cruel and hateful, but selfish and duplicitous too.  He’s building himself quite a nice collection of adjectives.  Full of crap isn’t technically an adjective, but it also applies.

Robert Hamilton is challenging Darrell Issa this year.

Cross posted at San Diego Politico

Yesterday I noted with considerable disdain that Darrell Issa doesn’t give a crap about 9/11 victims and is, not surprisingly, an ass.  Turns out that Issa’s heartless BS isn’t finding much of an audience elsewhere either, as people from coast to coast line up to tear him a new one:

“That is a pretty distorted view of things,” said Frank Fraone, a Menlo Park, Calif., fire chief who led a 67-man crew at Ground Zero. “Whether they’re a couple of planes or a couple of missiles, they still did the same damage.”

“New York was attacked by Al Qaeda. It doesn’t have to be attacked by Congress,” added Long Island Rep. Pete King, a Republican.

“I’m really surprised by Darrell Issa,” King added. “It showed such a cavalier dismissal of what happened to New York. It’s wrong and inexcusable.”

Lorie Van Aucken, who lost her husband, Kenneth, in the attacks, slammed Issa’s “cruel and heartless” comments.

“It’s really discouraging. People stepped up and did the right thing. They sacrificed themselves and now a lot of people are getting really horrible illnesses,” she added.

New York Democratic Reps. Jerry Nadler and Anthony Weiner and GOP Rep. Vito Fossella also added some heated criticisms of Issa.  Issa, however, remains mostly unrepentant:

“I continue to support federal assistance for the victims of the 9/11 terrorist attacks,” he said.

But he didn’t retract his wacked-out rhetoric claiming the feds “just threw” buckets of cash at New York for an attack “that had no dirty bomb in it, it had no chemical munitions in it.”

He went on: “I have to ask … why the firefighters who went there and everybody in the city of New York needs to come to the federal government for the dollars versus this being primarily a state consideration.”

In his statement yesterday, Issa insisted he only “asked tough questions about the expenditures” during a hearing Tuesday on an aid bill for sick New Yorkers.

And if that wasn’t enough, contrast this with another recent dumbass maneuver by Issa in which he DID scurry to apologize for his missteps.  Back in February during hearings into a million missing White House emails, Darrell Issa enthusiastically did his water carrying for the Bush administration, declaring it entirely reasonable that converting from Lotus Notes to Outlook would cause such a loss of information.  He went so far as to compare Lotus Notes to wooden wagon wheels and Betamax.  But once big business got agitated about it, Issa fell all over himself and even officially correcting the Congressional record.  But 9/11 rescue workers? Apparently not on the same level as keeping Lotus happy.  I mean after all, according to Issa, 9/11 “simply was an aircraft” hitting the World Trade Center and causing “a fire.”

I don’t know what world Darrell Issa is living in, but he certainly doesn’t have much company.

Robert Hamilton is challenging Darrell Issa this year.

Cross posted at San Diego Politico

I’m not sure if he’s just a soulless ass or if he’s also actively trying to undermine the entire foundation of post-9/11 conservativism, but Darrell Issa is doing his level best to spit on the rescue workers who got sick at Ground Zero in the aftermath of the twin towers attacks.  He’s flatly refused to vote for federal funding that would provide medical care to these victims of the attack because, in Issa’s mind, it apparently was just a local thing, and not a major one at all:

“It simply was an aircraft, residue of two aircraft, and residue from the materials used to build this building,” Issa said during a hearing into whether a new 9/11 victims’ compensation fund should be launched.

Which is odd since, as Rep. Anthony Weiner notes, “The gentleman voted for [original 9/11 funding] because we had the national sense that this was not an attack on New York City, this was an attack on our country.”

But hey, keep up the dispicably cruel hypocrisy Rep. Issa.  Feel free to even bring some friends along. Because all it proves is that 9/11 to you is nothing more than a tool to intimidate people into sacrificing Constitutional rights and attempt to justify the $3 trillion Iraq boondoggle. That’s when it’s a national issue. That’s when America is at stake. Only when it serves the political interests of Darrell Issa.

But when the heroes who sacrificed at Ground Zero need help? For Darrell Issa, that’s not America’s problem and it apparently sure isn’t his problem. It’s…well…somebody else’s problem.

Robert Hamilton is challenging Darrell Issa this year.

Cross posted at San Diego Politico