While the National Economy Burns, Bush Fiddles with Killing Endangered Species

By Si Dunn

Companies are collapsing, unemployed workers are streaming out onto the streets, and Americans are losing their houses and burning through their savings in hopes of surviving the current recession that may turn into a depression.

So what is the Bush Administration now doing about these crises that have occurred on its watch?

Killing endangered species.

According to an Associated Press report at the CBS News website: "Animals and plants in danger of becoming extinct could lose the protection of government experts who make sure that dams, highways and other projects don't pose a threat, under regulations the Bush administration is set to put in place before President-elect Obama can reverse them."

The rules have to be published by Nov. 21--tomorrow. Otherwise, once President-elect Barack Obama is sworn in on January 20, he could quickly undo the new regulations.

Among other things, according to the AP report, "The rules eliminate the input of federal wildlife scientists in some endangered species cases, allowing the federal agency in charge of building, authorizing or funding a project to determine for itself if it is likely to harm endangered wildlife and plants.

"Current regulations require independent wildlife biologists to sign off on these decisions before a project can go forward, at times modifying the design to better protect species."

The AP likewise noted: "The regulations also bar federal agencies from assessing emissions of the gases blamed for global warming on species and habitats, a tactic environmentalists have tried to use to block new coal-fired power plants."

Clearly, harming the national economy, the national reputation and the American people is not enough for the scurrilous hacks who comprise the Bush Administration. Now, on their way out, they want to finish off a few endangered species, too, just for "good" measure.

There may be no way to immediately stop this latest outrage--just one in an incredibly long string of outrages--generated by the outgoing Administration. But perhaps the incoming Congress will have the courage to overturn Bush's new "gotcha" rules by using the Congressional Review Act, a law that allows review and rejection of new federal regulations.

Two months and counting.

There is still plenty of time for new political mischief and outright political retribution by the outgoing Bush Administration. But the nightmare of the worst--the worst--Administration in modern American history is, thankfully, at long last coming to a close.

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Bail Out the Hurricane Ike Victims--NOW!

By Si Dunn

Two months after Hurricane Ike slammed into Texas' Galveston Bay area, many people are still waiting for help from the Federal Emergency ("You're doing a heckuva job, Brownie!") Management Agency (FEMA).

Coastal residents who live and work in fishing communities especially have been hit hard and remain caught up in a vortex of federal buracracy and red tape that has delayed the arrival of the infamous FEMA trailers. According to the Dallas Morning News, at least 2,000 families are still without FEMA trailers in areas devastated by Ike.

"People's lives are literally stacked up on the side of the road," Anahuac, Texas' mayor, Guy Jackson, told the Morning News.

Still Stuck in the Mud

On tiny Oak Island, for example, what once was a bustling fishing community "is now a giant mud flat, dotted with cheap tents and interrupted by heaping mountains of debris," according to Morning News reporter Emily Ramshaw.

In a few cases, FEMA trailers have been delivered but must remain padlocked until inspectors show up and okay them for occupancy. So some families are having to keep living in tents right next to trailers that are supposed to be helping them.

Meanwhile, their houses, jobs and belongings have been swept away, and they are trying to restart their lives literally from nothing.

Many Americans generously have donated food, clothing and other items to Hurricane Ike's victims, and this assistance has reached even remote locations such as the Oak Island community, which is settled by Vietnamese and Anglo commercial fishing families.

But, too often, the federal government still can't seem to organize a one-car parade when it comes to delivering disaster relief. We are supposed to be the world's greatest and most capable nation. Yet what kind of great and capable nation forces its disaster victims to camp in the mud for two months until somebody "official" shows up with a clipboard?

Can't Others Help?

And why wait for FEMA? Surely there are Army, Navy, Air Force, Marine and Coast Guard personnel in need of training in debris removal, reconstruction and taking care of refugees--just as our military units are doing overseas. Why can't more of our stateside military help here now and get that training?

The State of Texas has provided some relief, but more aid must be forthcoming from the federal government. According to the Morning News, Gov. Rick Perry has asked for additional federal aid to fund costly removal of Hurricane Ike debris. But a month after making the request, Gov. Perry--a Republican--still has received no response from fellow Texan George Bush's FEMA.

Many private relief agencies have been doing what they can to provide assistance, but their resources are limited and their roles often are constrained by the very federal government that is still printing out and stacking up forms to deal with Hurricane Ike, which blew ashore in September.

Show Them the Money

The private relief agencies need more cash donations as soon as possible to help the victims of Hurricane Ike, the recent wildfires in California, and many other calamities, past, present and future. These private agencies, such as the American Red Cross, often have online sites where donations can be made.

Contributions frequently can be targeted to one specific need or disaster area. But you may have to follow a procedure that is less convenient than simply entering some credit-card digits online. For example:

"If you wish to designate your donation to a specific disaster," the Red Cross website points out, "please do so at the time of your donation by either contacting 1-800-REDCROSS or mailing your donation, with the designation, to the American Red Cross, P.O. Box 37243, Washington, D.C. 20013."

A dollar, five dollars, ten, twenty. Anything you can afford to give in these economically troubled times can help private agencies provide a measure of comfort and relief to those facing the holidays and winter with much bigger worries.

As for FEMA, the Obama-Biden Administration hopefully will figure out how to kick it into gear again, so its good people can start reclaiming--and redeeming--their battered and troubled agency.

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How One Dollar Can Help the Stupid Economy

By Si Dunn

Most of us can't battle layoffs. We can't bail out banks or corporations or sectors of the economy. Some of us think we can't do anything except stock up on canned goods and water and hide in the attic or basement until the current bad times blow over.

Two hot news flashes for the attic hiders and basement bunker-ites: (1) Things are gonna be bad for a long time; and (2) things are gonna be even worse if you try to hide from the recession.

No, you can't battle layoffs. You can't bail out banks or corporations or economic sectors. But you can help a few people save their jobs. And, in doing so, you will help lighten the load for their families and their families' families.

Tip a waitress or waiter or your barber an extra dollar today. Put an extra dollar in the church collection plate. Buy a birthday card or get-well card from a little, locally owned gift shop. Donate an extra dollar to a charity or a school fundraiser. Add an extra dollar to your kids' allowance or your grandkids' birthday envelope--and forget the usual admonitions to save it. They'd rather spend it anyway.

If there is something inexpensive you have been wanting to buy for your house or your car or your yard or your favorite hobby, buy it now. But don't spend every penny at your local big-box retailer that can still afford to undercut every Mom-and-Pop shop in your town. Go to the little shop in your neighborhood, instead, and willingly pay a dollar more than you would at the big shrine at the edge of town.

Your individual dollar makes no big difference to Wal-Mart or AIG or Bank of America. But to somebody trying to earn a living with a bicycle repair shop or a hair salon or a one-truck lawn service or a tiny hardware store, that dollar can have direct impact on keeping the doors open and keeping at least one person or a small handful of people employed and working.

If each of us keeps doing a little bit--a dollar here, a dollar there--to help out, the recession can be shorted and many jobs and households at the heart of our economy can be saved. But we will have to sustain the effort and keep doing it for a long time.

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Undecided? Just Take a Harder Look Around You

By Si Dunn

My mind was made up long ago. I wanted Hillary Clinton to win, and I wanted Barack Obama to be Vice President. I was hung up on the narrow notion that experience trumps almost everything else.

When Hillary lost, it took me a while to warm up to Barack Obama. But the more I watched him and listened to what he has to say, the more I realized that the man is the leader we need for these greatly troubled and hugely challenging times.

John McCain has served his country with honor and distinction. But now is not the time for Republican solutions, particularly narrow-minded neoconservative solutions. The Republican Party has splintered into factions and completely lost its compass. It may take years to rebuild itself, or it may spin off into two or more political parties.

At a time when Americans are fearful for their familiess, their jobs, their retirement savings, their homes and the very future of this great nation, the current Republican leadership keeps railing about tax cuts, socialism, abortion and 1960s radicals.

As a result, John McCain and Sarah Palin seem to be harping at us from other dimensions and other planets. They want us all to just sit on our little piles of money (if we still have any) and not let any of it get (horrors!) spread around.

Government? Hey, don't need it. Taxes? Evil! Don't need 'em. Change? The economy is fundamentally sound, you betcha. Especially if the wealthy get to keep their tax cuts forever and ever, amen. Iraq? There is only one victory, and that is the victory where we stay there for up to a hundred years and keep blowing up people and goats and things until somebody important says: "Okay, okay, you win! Thank you very much!"

We need experience and leadership in Washington. But more importantly, we need someone with the ability and courage to tell us that we have to make a few sacrifices and do a few things to help our nation out over the next few years. That may include paying a few taxes to help fund government services. And it may include--horror of horrors!--spreading a little of our money around to help our less-fortunate neighbors.

After 9/11, George Bush looked out over a nation angered and ready to fight back. Americans were motivated and eager to do their part for a war effort. Our fearless leader seized that moment and told us all to go out and...shop.

Huh? Fight Al-Qaeda and the Taliban with American Express? Just party hardy and pretend they don't exist? Have the difficult and painful lessons of World War II already been forgotten?

Now we are in a major economic crisis, and the Republicans are raging against government spending--the very spending that they exploded to unbelievable levels. Yet government spending on infrastructure and other job-creation programs may be almost the only tool left for resuscitating the economy.

The Republicans have had their time and opportunities for economic and social experiments, and they have made an utter mess of things. Now they want four more, or even eight more, years to create an even bigger disaster.

Just look around and take a hard look this time. Our nation is in peril on several fronts, and the party that has lead us to the precipice now wants your permission to take us all over the cliff to complete ruin.

Stand up, fight back and say "Hell, no! We won't go!" to the Republican Party in its present, bastardized form.

Barack Obama and Joe Biden can lead us away from that precipice and toward better and more sensible times. And they'll ask for--and need--our help.

Many of us are ready to be be part of the solution, even if it means making some personal and financial sacrifices on behalf of our country. We are patriotic Americans, not just mindless shoppers looking for the next sale on tax cuts.

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