The New Pork, The Same Old Partisan B.S.

My bad. I didn't realize that I was 'crowing,' but I guess I should've known that it was off limits to legitimately question the spending habits of Ronald Reagan, a deity to Conservative partisan Republicans like Steve. Speaking of reading, when a Conservative partisan Republican like Steve is reading something from someone he thinks is a Liberal partisan Democrat — especially when that person speaks the name of Ronald Reagan — he's usually just skimming for an argument — not a discussion or questions — in order to skewer someone he sees as a political opponent. Most of you know that, though.

The tidbit that I found interesting from the article, which I previously posted and will post here again, is hardly a partisan point:

Each of these four presidents issued the largest number of disaster declarations of their administrations in the year they ran for re-election. The odds of that are one in 1,280 that political considerations were not involved, according to statisticians. The dollar amounts at stake are enormous in a process that disaster experts complain has become highly politicized.

Sorry, but I find that interesting. I had no idea that Carter had more disaster declarations. Thanks for pointing that out. However, the subject of presidents having more disaster declarations in re-election years remains.

From the article: ""It's the new pork," said Susan Cutter, the director of the Hazards Research Laboratory at the University of South Carolina at Columbia. "Disaster declarations are a way you can pump federally mandated monies into communities without going through Congress."

I guess that the bigger point here is that presidents running for re-election have found ways to campaign in some very creative ways, some of which may include spending our tax dollars to create goodwill among the voting public.