Friday morning, Libertarian hero Rep. Ron Paul (R-TX) announced that he will join the motley GOP presidential field, marking his third run for the office.
Offering further insight into his presidential sensibility, Paul told CNN host Wolf Blitzer today that he would do away with the Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA), even at a time of unprecedented need. Think Progress has the story.
Viewing the agency as unconstitutional, Paul questioned why federal funds should pay to protect citizens from natural disasters and concluded, “It’s a moral hazard to say that government is always going to take care of us when we do dumb things“:
BLITZER: On the whole issue of FEMA, the Federal Emergency Management Agency, do you want to see that agency ended?
PAUL: Well, if you want to live in a free society, if you want to pay attention to the constitution, why not? I think it’s bad economics. I think it’s bad morality. And it’s bad constitutional law. Why should people like myself, who had, not too long ago, a house on the Gulf Coast and it’s – it’s expensive there and it’s risky and it’s dangerous. Why should somebody from the central part of the United States rebuild my house? Why shouldn’t I have to buy my own insurance and protect about the potential dangers? I mean it’s – it’s a moral hazard to say that government is always going to take care of us when we do dumb things. I’m trying to get people to not to dumb things. Besides, it’s not authorized in the constitution.
BLITZER: And if there’s a disaster, like flooding or – or an earthquake or Hurricane Katrina, what’s wrong with asking fellow Americans to help their – their – their fellow citizens?
PAUL: Nothing. And I think Americans are very, very generous and they have traditionally. The big problem is Americans are getting poor and they’re not able to voluntarily come to the rescue.But to coerce people, to ask them to help, that is fine and dandy. But when you bankrupt our country and nobody has a job and then they say, well, FEMA needs to bail out everybody, then all we’re doing is compounding our problems.
Watch it:
Paul’s brand of morality is particularly callous given the numerous natural disasters destroying Americans’ homes and livelihoods across the country right now, from floods to tornadoes to wildfire fires. Gov. Nathan Deal (R-GA) requested FEMA to respond to the devastating tornadoes that tore across the southern states, leaving at least 290 dead. Gov. Haley Barbour (R-MS) is telling Mississippians that are victims of disaster-level flooding to register with FEMA to receive federal aid.
After wildfires tore across Paul’s own state of Texas, Gov. Rick Perry (R-TX) pleaded for even more FEMA aid. Perry said that “the ‘severity and magnitude‘ of the fires was so great that FEMA should direct other federal agencies to step in and help run the fire-fighting effort in those counties.”
Paul’s suggestion that Americans are “dumb” for being victims of natural disasters is not only heartless, it seriously calls into question his credibility to preside over the country’s welfare.
– A Think Progress cross-post
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Ayn Randism is callous. On purpose. Far from wanting to walk in someone’s shoes to learn what they would feel, they regard any victim with comtempt. Any victim. Heartless Darwinism at its worst. Ron Paul is Ayn Rand’s living prophet.
Yep, living anywhere on the East Coast and huddling with my cat and important papers in the basement during a tornado outbreak was just dumb, plain dumb, dumb, dumb.
I shouldn’t be living anywhere a tornado could occur. I shouldn’t even have a cat to take care of.
But Rep. Paul, where should I move to that would not be dumb? I’ve been thinking and thinking. West Coast? Texas? The Heartland? Dixie? What region or even location is free from a possible disaster? Please respond quickly with a location so I, and I guess the rest of the U.S., can move there. I don’t like being dumb.
Well, that is the very strict Libertarian perspective on it:
- “Why should the government force other people to, in effect, pay insurance for people who are undertaking unnecessary risks?”
- Part of the same perspective would be: “Why should the nuclear-reactor industry be allowed to operate with less insurance than would be required to cover a worst-case power-plant accident?”
Indeed.
It seems an inhumane attitude on its face; but isn’t it also like not giving money to a meth addict, because you’re afraid you’re facilitating a lifestyle that is going down the tubes?
(Part of the argument is that you have to be clear on the distinction between FEMA, which is paid out of taxes, so one doesn’t have any control over it; and a voluntary contribution or effort out of one’s own compassion.)
It’s not easy to be consistent!
He’s actually got a bit of a point. When someone builds on a floodplain or in a wildfire zone, they often can’t get private insurance, and should accept the inevitable consequences.
The construction industry loves FEMA, because rebuilding opportunities keep them working. Better to build houses that are durable and not in dangerous areas to begin with.
As for tornados and earthquakes, that’s different. The areas they strike are too broad and too difficult to identify precisely.
This is turning in to the good, the Bad, the ugly and the evil….
So Ron Paul had a house on the Gulf Coast not long ago, and (presumably) something destroyed it. So at least he’s not being hypocritical. But his statement is way over-generalized.
Palin & Paul 2012. Slam-dunk!
Paul is a zealot, with all the indefatigable craziness that implies. Libertarians deny that government has any role in responding to disasters or protecting the environment. According to them, individuals and corporations will take care of such things just fine if only they are freed from all regulation. Yes. Really. They believe that.
They have such a superstitious dread of regulation, they have politically allied themselves with the Christian fundamentalists they used to openly despise. AGW denying Libertarians are now in bed with evolution denying fundies. Perhaps to their surprise, this appears to be a comfortable cohabitation. They have a lot in common, it seems.
I’ve never understood the philosophy of US-style libertarianism. It appears to be akin to anarchy – no government, every person for him or herself, no notion of societal responsibility to its citizens nor of citizen’s responsibility to society. Yet its proponents still stand for office, drive over public roads and bridges, send their children to public schools, use the US postal service, call the fire department if their house catches alight, don’t appear to oppose putting more people in taxpayer-funded gaol than almost any nation on earth etc etc. It’s a conundrum.
Not all natural disasters are that easily predicted. According to Rand, we should just abandon New Orleans. One role of FEMA is to act to save people in emergencies. I guess that Rand would be strongly against using the Coast Guard to save people from sinking ships.
In the comment above, please substitute “Paul” for “Rand.” No real difference.
FEMA is TERRIBLE with saving PEOPLE in emergencies, they actually interfered in many of such attempts by other agencies or citizens. It’s a GIANT bureaucracy that has no idea of local circumstances.
Sou: Libertarianism with a constitution gives very strict rules on what the role of a government ought to be. If you know how much tax revenue was actually spent on the basic services a government should do…you would be SHOCKED to see how little compared to the entire budget.
@#8 Sou
Listen to the other right wingers and many of them want the fire department privatized (remember the fire department that let the house burn down?), education to be vouchers for private schools, get rid of the post office, and want roads to be privatized and all become toll roads.
Hmmm. So no ambulances for accident victims, no fire company if your grease fire ignites the kitchen drapes, no FDA to protect us from snake oil salesmen? Does Mr Paul live in some magical peaceable kingdom where there is no need for collective action and everyone lives happily after under the watchful eye of benevolent corporations?
Rand doesn’t get it. When we pay taxes, a portion of those taxes are essentially insurance premiums for services such as FEMA provides during emergencies. It’s a good deal for taxpayers as the risk of a flood, tornado, earthquake, or other natural disaster is shared among all taxpayers.
‘take care of us when we do dumb thing.’ Really? As usual this twit is over the top. Perhaps he and the apple who fell not too far from the tree have a bet as to who can say the most obsurd things and get away with it. Shame on him for being so callous and such a shallow thinker. His boy just tried to equate the right to health care to slavery. I was voting for the son until daddy got into act. You’ve got to hand it to those two for over-libertizing the hyperbole.
OK, so we have some idea of what the coming Republican presidential candidates would stand for. But what do the Democratic presidential candidates stand for? Is it ‘we’ll take our existing progressive agenda and average it with whatever the Republicans come up with’? What about the platforms of the other minor parties?
– frank
Of course we should do away with FEMA even under times of unprecedented needs… because these are times of unprecedented needs! FEMA doesn’t help! It destroys! This is what FEMA is all about– (Sorry, don’t have my notes here). Basically, FEMA is about control. This branch has been given more powers than any other department in our country’s history. It’s a means of converting our country into a police state. Read “Crossing the Rubicon” by Mike Ruppert, or any other number of books on the fascist shift that has occurred under the direction of BUSH/cheney.
Furthermore, after Katrina struck, our government didn’t send anyone to help them… they sent in troops which shot the victims! People were hiding under cement bridges because our troops– or mercenarys from Black water– were threatening to shoot them. They took the victims’ food and water and when the victims asked for help, they were threatened and forced to retreat. No help was given; it was all about control and protecting the businesses. And afterwards? with the free trailers for the victims? they were discovered contaminated. if this is all the help we get– who needs it?!@
“When the going gets weird, the weird turn pro.” – Hunter S. Thompson
Gosh, that applies to so many people in the news. Professional weirdness gets people’s attention so they remember a candidate’s name and that name may stay with them into the voting booth. They have gotten their start. All they need after that is their continuing support for the party line.
PFL Politician For Life.
John@14:
John, watch for Walmart to feed America the year after next!
Or not… Probably not.
We do have to start thinking about what we are going to do with all those properties in flood-prone and fire-prone areas. The problem is the wealthy can lobby for seawalls and public insurance and reliable fire response while the poor have to depend more upon last-ditch efforts by FEMA.
sandiego.indymedia.org/media/2007/01/124770.pdf
sandiego.indymedia.org/media/2007/01/124770
The above is supposed to be the link to Ruppert’s book, “Crossing the Rubicon”. If you have the patience to scroll down to page 482 (chapter 28– “Conquering the American People”) you can read what FEMA is REALLY all about… not pretty!!
@BillD
If anyone looks at the situation in New Orleans with detachment, one would not rebuild it.
Most of the city has subsided below sea level. The city is viable only through the use of massive pumps to drain the city. The Corps of Engineers is in a perpetual effort to build and maintain levees to protect the city from both the Mississippi and Gulf Coast. And if you are regular reader of CP then you know that with sea-level projections at mid-century will place the city further below mean sea-level.
If we are to adapt to global warming, it will mean cutting our losses and investing resources where they support sustainability.
Can I try that again? (I left out a letter!)
sandiego.indymedia.org/media/2007/01/124770.pdf
How long before someone claims that FEMA is evil because it’s thwarting God’s plan by helping people who have been affected by “acts of God?”
I agree that most of New Orleans should be abandoned, too- it’s going to happen anyway.
Aside from that, the right wing crazies do get weird about FEMA. Ever heard of Obama’s “FEMA concentration camps”, complete with photos of stacks of coffins?
catman306 your choice of quote by Hunter S. Thompson is pure genius. That pretty much sums up the climate denial industry, the Glenn Beck phenom and sadly most of the GOP politicians allowed to get out of the primaries these days.
From “Crossing the Rubicon” by Mike Ruppert (Honors graduate of UCLA in political science):
FEMA– Most Americans think of FEMA as a nice, benevolent agency tha comes to help out when there is an earthquake, fire or flood. It is much, much more than that. FEMA is an enormously powerful federal agency tasked with, among other things, ensuring the Continuity of Government in the event of a crisis ore “neutralization” of key gov. leaders or institutions. It also maintains dozens of secret gov. command centers.. like the one Cheney was whisked right after 9/11. Collectively, the Continuity of Government (COG) operations under FEMA command have come to be known as the “shadow government”.
In a declared major emergency… FEMA divides the US into ten regions under FEMA control, which then operate semi-automonously with the full cooperation of the military. Long a hot topic among many researchers concerned with a “New World Order”, FEMA’s evolution is the product of three-decades of legislation, executive orders, and Presidential Decision Directives. The powers of FEMA is astonishing in their breadth and magnitude and can even include seizure of private vehicles, forced civilian labor on government projects, and appropriation of food and fresh water supplies.
…FEMA and its supra-constitutional authority have been of intense intererest to investigtors from all over the political spectrum in America for many years. Since 1995 I have read more than a dozen of these executive orders and PDDs and conclude that, in the event that all stops were pulled and a full emergency declared, only God would have more power…
On code red…. What the US public is not aware is that a Code Red alert suspends civilian government; it triggers a whole series of emergency procedures. It is tantamount to a coup d’etat…
It isn’t just a matter of global warming that we have to contend with, or peak oil, peak population, water shortages, etc., we’ve also had a fascist shift which needs to be addressed. Unfortunately, whenever I attempt to write anything about this, my comments are deleted. I’ve tried over and over and they’re never published… and it’s very, very important!!
No FEMA, no police or fire, no government? Is that what we need at this crossroad in American History with AGW beginning to ‘snowball’.
Seems like a prescription for mob rule and a nation of vigilantes in the future.
That Paul interview is scary stuff. He suggests that no sensible person would live on the Gulf coast. Is that the next step in denial: there are no climate disasters, just places where people shouldn’t be living? So the idea is the Gulf coast has to be abandoned rather than reduce short term fossil fuel profits?
In my observation, the fundamental problem with libertoons is their dismissive view toward the Social Contract and an attitude that says, “Nobody tells me what to do!”
All of their crackpot social views flow from such immaturity.
Meanwhile, for the right side of the bell curve, O’Brien, Hayward and Berkes offered a fresh perspective in Rethinking Social Contracts: Building Resilience in a Changing Climate (2009):
Reading Ron Paul naively, “It’s a moral hazard to say that government is always going to take care of us when we do dumb things.“
Hey, did he mean, like, change the climate? surely a dumb thing.
Let’s stop taking care of those that change the climate, yeah! Yehah!
I can think of so many things that AREN’T in the constitution that do not necessarily need to be done away with [snip]! The founding fathers made it amendable and developed a system of checks and balances laid out in said constitution so that it would evolve with the times. Jefferson would be tumbling in his grave right now if he heard this draconian, Randian drivel, [snip]!
It’s interesting to read here the couple of posts from libertarians who are fearful of planned organisation in the face of extreme catastrophic events, and who have explained that libertarians don’t want to get rid of government altogether, they want to keep just enough government to, presumably, allow libertarians to gain office (and put an end to the concept of society and community) :D
Will Paul do any better this time around than in the past? I expect he helps split the radical right wing vote, which is probably good for both genuine conservatives (moderate Republicans) and the centre (Democrats).
In a famous series of experiments, in the USA, designed to discover the essential features of autocracy and democracy, Lewin et al (many refs from 1939-1943) discovered that there were 3 ‘social climates’, not 2. The third which they discovered by accident they called ‘laissez-faire’. Laissez-faire was created when one of the social scientists playing the role of leader for a group of boys interpreted democracy to mean an absence of rules, rewards and punishments, i.e. total individual freedom, everybody doing their own thing.
In the autocratic condition, the leader decided the rules, rewards and punishments and imposed them on the boys. In the democratic condition, the leader sat down with the boys and asked them what the rules, rewards and punishments should be and the boys worked them out and then applied them.
After the boys had been working on their task for a while, the leader in each of the conditions walked out of the room. In the democratic condition, the boys got on with the job and produced high quality work. In the autocratic condition when the leader walked out, all hell broke loose, the boys stopped work and engaged in a variety of destructive behaviours.
However, in the laissez-faire condition, the behaviour was so bad and the results in terms of productivity and quality so low, throughout the whole experiment, not only after the leader walked out, that the scientists were shocked and the experiments were repeated many times to clarify and verify.
After Fred Emery discovered the genotypical design principles in 1967, it became clear that the 3 social ‘climates’ were expressions of the 2 design principles governing autocratic and democratic systems and laissez-faire was the absence of a design principle, a lack of organization or human connection that people simply cannot tolerate.
They cannot tolerate it because as the poet John Donne wrote: no man is an island. People are intrinsically purposeful, social or group animals and as many social scientists and mental health practitioners have shown, mental health depends on a balance of autonomy and homonomy – a sense of belonging. Take away a sense of belonging and we all behave like the boys in the laissez-faire condition exhibiting apathy and/or violence.
People like Ron Paul make the same mistake as Ron Lippit when he misinterpreted democracy to mean total individual freedom and this widespread belief results in the same sorts of behaviours, e.g. the resort into mindless TV and outbreaks of massacres of innocents. And of course these behaviours elicit further control measures from our various governance structures, creating a vicious cycle from which we may never recover unless and until we deliberately start creating genuine democratic structures in which the members themselves determine the rules, the rewards and the punishments and take control of their own futures.
It is only in these democratic structures that we constantly and reliably care for others apart from ourselves and those others include our home, our Earth mother, ME
Ron Paul did not say that people are dumb. He said that people sometimes do dumb things. Be honest. Isn’t there a difference?
By denying that difference we contribute to name-calling and arguments that no one can win.
Ron Paul also said we are entering an inflationary era which shows how unfamiliar with actual economic data he is.
Apparently for Libertarians, no laws can be made, because it doesn’t explicitly mention them in the constitution.
Why can’t policies be created whereby more responsibility is taken by citizens, for building homes or businesses in obvious flood plains etc, without resorting to eliminating FEMA?
Ron Paul says we can solve our environmental problems by suing each other for polluting of property. In other words, little guys taking on the most powerful industries in the world, in court. And if you don’t own property? Does that mean you have no right to clean air, water and food?
They have turned personal responsibility into every man for himself, while ignoring the irresponsibility of greed, and disdain for nature.
I disagree with Roddy regarding FEMA. FEMA is a public insurance company. A very smart one if it were let to do its job. It’s job is to require its customers to build and live in a way that will eventually put it out of business. In order to qualify for the insurance, everyone living in a county is required to follow building codes that will not only prevent the structure from being harmed during natural disasters, but also will make sure it doesn’t harm others around it. Hurricanes and floods are disasters that don’t have to cause harm. We can build homes that are essentially hurricane and flood proof.
The problem is that people bitch to Ron Paul and his ilk who then complain endlessly to FEMA and threaten to cut off their funding so that FEMA isn’t allowed to do their job. “Why do I have to build my home so high up, it’ll cost me an extra 20K?”, or Why can’t I build on my land dammit, no gubmint official is going to tell me I can’t!”, or Why can’t I build this subdivision here, it’s never flooded before, at least not since 1927.”, or Why must I build this flood basin, it’s going to take up 3 house lots, the pin head government bureaucrats and their red tape are going to put me out of business!”
I read and hear these sort of comments every year here in Houston.
Congress’s constant intervention is what prevents FEMA from doing its job. If it were allowed to do so, the losses to flooding would largely be eliminated in a generation.
Same with the Coastal Barrier Resource Act. A law which is supposed to prevent infrastructure development on barrier islands and thus prevent permanent dwellings from being constructed on these constantly shifting islands. A new section or sections of barrier island are removed from the law’s protection every session by some congressman trying to please wealthy constituents who want to build on them. This law is becoming a cash cow for connected developers.
BTW: the various figures I’ve seen are wrong about the costliest 10 disasters of recent times. Tropical Storm Allison caused over 5 billion dollars of damage in Texas in 2001. I don’t know why that one is being left out.
“PAUL: Nothing. And I think Americans are very, very generous and they have traditionally. The big problem is Americans are getting poor and they’re not able to voluntarily come to the rescue.”
It’s nice that Ron Paul recognizes the fact that Americans are becoming poor but will he ever recognize the reasons why?
http://www.oilempire.us/ruppert.html
http://www.fromthewilderness.com/free/ww3/090605_greeks_gifts.shtm
Ron Paul likes to state that there is no constitutional basis for FEMA. What he neglects to mention is that it was during the presidency of James Madison (“Father of the Constitution”) that the first federal aid was given (to help victims of the New Madrid Earthquake). If Paul only wants to support the things the Founding Fathers wanted then he can support FEMA with a clear conscience.