Hostage situation goes beyond mere politics

Wednesday, September 28, 2011

Political blackmail is nothing new.
"If you want this, you must give us that." That's been a standard part of American politics since the earliest days of our Union when men like John Adams and Alexander Hamilton and their Federalists went head to head with Thomas Jefferson and Aaron Burr and their Democratic Republicans.
The biggest difference between them and now, however, is that compromise appears to be dead. Today the saying is more likely to be "You must give us that, and we will give you nothing you want."
In fact, the hostilities have grown so bad that today's Republicans - who only count themselves to be the majority in one-half of one-third of our federal government system - have gone beyond the usual political blackmail and are now using hostages in their "negotiations."
Those hostages are the millions of people, and thousands of communities, that continue to suffer from a summer plagued by natural disasters. From floods and hurricanes on the east coast, to severe drought and wildfires in the southwest, our country has been hit hard this year.
In times like these, we, as a nation, usually pull together and offer up funding for disaster relief. We collectively help rebuild homes and schools; repair bridges and roadways; and help bring some level of stability back to areas ravaged by Mother Nature. We saw firsthand the importance of those disaster dollars following the flooding of 1996 in this area.
But Republicans in the U.S. House have refused to grant that disaster relief without conditions they know the Senate and president will oppose. In what should be a simple humanitarian vote, they have instead opted to tie it to their ideological battle with Democrats. Meanwhile, the Federal Emergency Management Agency is nearly broke, many people may not get the help they need.
Not only are Republicans holding disaster victims hostage with their actions, this latest stalemate can only demonstrate to an already skeptical world and business community that the American system of government is unreliable and possibly broken beyond repair. And to do it all over a a short-term continuing resolution that will only fund the government for a couple of months, is unconscionable in this fragile economy.
Instead of these games that deny aid to those most in need, we need our lawmakers to return to a vision of cooperation, where compromise replaces blackmail and hostage-taking, and real results that help our country through its recent mess replace this era of inaction and stubbornness that only pushes us closer to collapse and chaos.
Games should not be played with disaster funding. It hurts our people today and sets a very dangerous precedent for future negotiations. If matters such as disaster relief can't be held above the political scrum, we certainly are in trouble as a nation.