On the very short drive to work this morning, I heard an interview on local AM 870 radio with the Tompkins County town administrator.
The radio host kept trying to scare everyone about the Sequester cuts, repeatedly asking how it would affect people in Tompkins County. The administrator couldn’t go there. The best he could muster was a possible, potential, maybe down the road cut of $40,000 out of $18 million in federal funds Tompkins County receives in one form or another from the federal government. Much to the obvious disappointment of the radio host, the adminsitrator said there would be no affect on police, fire or other first responders.
But it didn’t stop there, the two of them then went into a series of hypotheticals about what might happen if the Sequester caused the economy to go back into recession, without any analysis of whether such fear was justified. The two of them then spent several minutes speculating about the effects of a double-dip.
It all was rank fear-mongering.
But it’s important to note how deeply the fear-mongering emanating from the White House has permeated — local radio in upstate New York struggling for some way to scare people about the Sequester.
Obama’s messaging gets out, ours doesn’t. That’s reality. Instead of reality, we get Republican leadership Chicken Littles playing right into Obama’s narrative, and taking all the blame.
We have managed to position ourselves so that we lose no matter what. That’s a hard thing to accompish, but we’ve managed to do it.
Rand Paul has the facts straight and can explain them like few other Republicans (via The Other McCain):
What a depressing drive, all 10 minutes of it.
CLICK HERE FOR FULL VERSION OF THIS STORY