Senate rejects House funding bill; shutdown looms

Senate rejects House funding bill; shutdown looms.

While we chatter about superficial election debates and a falling satellite, the federal budget continues to crash and burn. What I find disturbing about the events in the Senate is this quote:

Democrats in the Senate, who are in the majority, oppose Republican efforts to roll back “green” energy programs to pay for aid for victims of Hurricane Irene and other disasters. They say disaster aid, usually a bipartisan issue, should not require cuts elsewhere — especially to programs creating green jobs — as the GOP majority in the House now demands. [emphasis mine]

So how do the Democrats expect to pay for this disaster aid? Will the money grow on trees?

FEMA considers, than cancels spending a billion on MREs

Government stupidity in action: FEMA considered then canceled (thank goodness) a proposal to spend more than a billion dollars on Meals-Ready-to-Eat on the very slim chance that the New Madrid fault in the midwest might produce a major earthquake sometime in the three years.

Unfortunately, they still haven’t canceled plans to buy 7 million emergency blankets and 550 million gallons of water in individual 1-liter plastic bottles.