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Politicians Swear to “Never Forget” 9/11 Victims … Then Slash Healthcare for Heroic First Responders
Politicians constantly urge us to never forget the victims of 9/11.
Yet the EPA lied to the heroic first responders and told them that the dust at Ground Zero was safe, when it was actually laced with a witches brew of cancer-causing chemicals which are now crippling or killing them off.
And now Congress is slashing medical care to the first responders. As Michael McAuliff notes:
Lawmakers [turned their backs on the first responders] in the budget sequester legislation Congress passed last summer to try and cut the deficit.
The sequester set up automatic budget cuts of some $1.2 trillion over 10 years, and legislators were careful to spare veterans from most of those, recognizing their sacrifices in the war on terror. But apparently no one remembered to also exempt 9/11 responders and others who first answered the call after the Sept. 11, 2001, terror attacks that started that war.
And now the James Zadroga 9/11 Health and Compensation Act that President Barack Obama signed on Jan. 2, 2011, faces $38-million worth of cuts in 2013 alone if the sequester is not avoided, and could lose something approaching $300 million over the current planned life of the program.
The news is not going over well with advocates in the 9/11 community, who had thought that the 9/11 programs were safe because they were passed as mandatory spending programs outside of the annual discretionary budget process.
“This is unacceptable,” said John Feal, a construction worker who founded the FealGood Foundation advocacy group after losing half his foot at Ground Zero in the cleanup.
“This is just another slap in the face from Washington, D.C.,” Feal said. “Last week, Republicans and Democrats talked about remembering 9/11 and unity all across the nation, and all that patriotic stuff, and now we’re getting this thrown on our lap.”
Feal found the news especially insulting because in order to get Republicans to sign on, sponsors of the Zadroga Act had to find a dedicated funding stream, and they did. The measure is paid for by leveling a 2 percent tax on foreign companies that get U.S. federal contracts when their home governments bar U.S. firms from government contracts there.
That revenue stream is not being reduced, meaning that money raised specifically to aid the ailing heroes and victims of 9/11 would instead be used to pay the government’s bills. Adding insult to injury, the 9/11 law was already structured to cut the deficit. According to the Congressional Budget Office’s estimate, the measure slashes $433 million from the deficit.
The potential cuts would come as the likely demand for 9/11 services is expected to grow, now that federal officials have decided cancer should be covered in the programs.
“We just got cancer added, and we don’t even know if we have enough money for cancer, and they want to take money away from us,” Feal said.
***
“I thought this was an ill-conceived concept from the start which is one of the reasons why I voted against the [sequester],” said Sen. Kirsten Gillibrand (D). “Nothing exemplifies this unbalanced and draconian approach to deficit reduction more than asking our heroes who have already sacrificed so much to sacrifice yet again so that Republican leadership could appease their special interests. Our 9/11 heroes who answered the call of duty should be treated with the same dignity as our veterans.
In fact, veterans have been treated like dirt by a government which has used them, abused them and discarded them (or worse – see this, this, this, this and this) after they serve the interests of the super-elite.
War is a racket … and so is the shameless exploitation of 9/11 for political purposes, while abusing the heroic first responders who risked their lives for their country.
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Romney's comments about 'those who feel entitled, etc...expose once and for all the complete abandonement of the Social Contract by the "Evil Doers". They are totally committed to a)bringing back chattel slavery b)the death in the streets of as many potential Social Security recipients as possible c)using the Social Security Trust Fund as their new 'pot of gold' for rampant speculation on "The Free Market"
I say this to all I know locally...and online, through my friends and family;
Call your congressman and senator.
DEMAND ACCOUNTABILITY.
GET IN THEIR FACES.
STOP FAWNING OVER THESE PROPLE.
ASK TOUGH QUESTIONS...DEMAND ANSWERS. TELL THESE CROOKS THAT YUOU AND OTHERS ARE WATCHING...AND VOTE.
IGNORE THE MAIN STREAM MEDIA.........TURN THOSE CLOWNS OFF....START PAYING ATTENTION.....
I get in people's faces.....demand they stop being zombies.....
Approximately 400 tons of asbestos fiber was in the buildings when they collapsed. This is an enormous amount as asbestos is virtually indestructable and the small cancer-causing particles can remain airborne for years. I told colleagues and neighbors in the aftermath of 9/11 that in 5-10 years we would see ecpidemic levels of lung cancer and mesothelioma in the first responders and people living in lower Manhattan. Asbestos fibers can circumbent building air conditioning and filtration systems. Once a few particles lodge in your lungs, you are at risk because the fibers cannot be metabolized or removed by your cells. It was criminal to allow the first responders in without warning of the dangers and providing HEPA filtration units. I recall Whitman stating emphatically that the air was safe to breath: she is a murderer after the fact and belongs in prison or executed.
George, Bary Jenkins said he was walking / running overer a lobby full of dead first responders as he tried to escape Bldg.7 while it was being detonated. Bary was the head of security for NYC public housing. He was supposed to report to the disaster/emergency center in Bldg7 in the event of a disaster/emergency. All the other Nyc disaster bigwigs got the word not to show up that day. Wouldn't you know it, they forgot to tell the black guy. Not long after Barry told a reporter what he witnessed, he suddenly died.
Focusing on who killed maimed and sickened all those guys is probably a better pursute in their memory then wondering where something that looks like hush money went.
This has been going on for a long time. Remember the "bonus army"?
Has anybody in the "911 Truth" community seen this video? Has any reasonable consensus about it developed yet?
Very Weird but alot of data that is extremely hard to ignore:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RqbcsU0_RjU&feature=youtu.be
George,
Politicians didn't forget. Those actions by politicians were done with meaning. You misinterpret their actions as forgetting.
Red vs. Blue
"Hero" vs. citizen
More phoney bull shit that perpetuates the hate machine.
More Federalization on the way.
The US gov't is broke and can't afford it. Priority # 1 are their pet projects (take over the world) which entails huge expenses and they will pay for it until every fucking one of us is in tent fucking city.
My real issue with the Health risk end of 9/11 was Christine Todd Whitman, then head of the EPA declared the area was tested and to be safe, and no need for respirators.
Meanwhile, the air borne asbestos that jerk off Silverstein was being fined for not removing was everywhere along with exotic radio active isotopes.
POS > http://www.democracynow.org/2007/6/26/ex_epa_head_christine_todd_whitman
Good point. Where is CTW and why is she not in some prison cell with Silverman and Corzine?
Edit: democracyNot sucks as they swallow the whole bs official conspiracy enchilada
If everything is now being recorded then all the politicians can be blackmailed by whoever has control over the information. The United States of America is no more. Only remenants remain. But soon enough the wars between the elite will begin. The only time there will be cooperation between elites is when there is money to keep them satisfied. Once that ends we will have a chance to restore United States. Social chaos destroys wealth quickly so we will have our chance. It is coming soon since the currency wars are now under way.
Money/wealth disappears rapidly during world social unrest. I think the elite are fooling themselves and may quickly try to reverse things once the collapse takes place. You know that all the other wars did not recognise the banking elite as the enemy. So this time it is a very small group of individuals that must be conquered compared to the two prior world wars.
This is not to say I would be any part of it since I don't believe it necessary to personally get involved in any war for any cause. Even without a physical uprising the elites will eventually come to destroy each other. It is their nature not mine. But it sure will be horrifically exciting to some.
Look at it like this they've killed millions over the last 20 years. They won't stop until they run out of money. We in America have been lucky so far because they haven't been able to legally kill more of us than the two or three false flags that Holder and Cheney were behind. With the NDAA it won't be long before they strike here directly.
Can someone explain exactly what first responders want the U.S. government to do in this case? Assuming they have health insurance, their medical bills should be mostly covered, right? Do they want the taxpayer to pay the co-pay? Assuming they have life insurance, their families receive whatever amount is in the policy, right? Do they want the taxpayer to pay additional death benefits?
I am sympathetic to the first responders. They are heroes, to be sure. Some gave their lives. Many more have given their health. Yes, they need help. But only after those parts of the systemset up to support them fail to provide that help. If we are to the point where the medical insurance or life insurance is not keeping up with need, then yes, the taxpayer may be a source of support. But we should also look at avenues of liability--those negligent in the events of 9/11 (security firms at airports, airports themselves, airline companies. . .). The taxpayer is the source of support only as a last resort.
There are many, many questions about all of this, and why so many ZH readers immediately leap to throw taxpayer money at the problem. They cry all day long that government spends too much, then the conjure up conspiracy theories and scream that the taxpayer has to spend more money on a problem that may not be the taxpayer's problem at all.
It seems to boil down to Americans, of all stripes, looking at the U.S. government (funded solely by the American taxpayer) as the savior of first resort. It was not built to be that, and it cannot be that. That way is failure. Every other "savior" must be looked at first, and the government, if at all, solely as a last resort.
My heart goes out to all those innocent people killed in the demonic ritual.
Politicians can go to hell (of which they came).
Thank you for calling it what it was.
typically wars are used the fund the Agenda of the State not some "super elite." Obviously no elite could back the current conflict that has been underway for over 10 years even if they wanted to...and they don't of course. the question therefore is "how does this benefit the State" and even now...10 years on...i still don't see it. Obviously you don't want to be a politician having to explain all this stuff. Nor does the business community have any interest as these are 100's of millions of potential or even current business partners. it hasn't in fact helped the State given the rash of bankruptcies with more to come. i don't even think the military...which must say yes of course to any mission...is that big on it as their budgets are on the chopping block too. on this one "the plot get's thinner and thinner as we go along." my personal view is that we are in the middle of a "war machine condition"...i have not bet that it was going away anytime soon...unlike say...the Obama Administration...and unfortunately I have not been disappointed. The only person i know who understands a successful extraction from such a condition is Senator McCain...and of course he is leading the charge in the other direction! Carry on Zero Hedge troopers!
Well said. This is a great site, but the infinite hair ball conspiracy theory does it no honor.
Um: http://www.washingtonsblog.com/2010/02/ridicule-of-conspiracy-theories-f...
This from the worst miscreant.
The only comment I will make on your post is that from the overwhelming negatives, you might be missing something that is creating a flaw in your thinking. Really think about it. I'll suggest something that erks me and maybe others. The State, and the Elite, separate or not working together, really? So when you ask, "how does it benefit the state", you are actually asking, "How does it benefit the elite?
And I am not against the elite. Quite frankly, I want eveyone to achieve elite status, wealth beyond your dreams. But achieved in an ethical manner. And that doesn't mean I believe in distribution of wealth or some other liberal ideology. I want people to be successful but on a fair playing ground. Equal opportunity based on work and intelligent choices, not race, party affiliation or some variation of nepotism or good old boys network.
And I hate to say this but while I have the utmost respect for the sacrifices McCain has made for the country and being a POW. His years as a senator has left many to believe he left his balls in Vietnam to become a moderate.
There are two national goals involved:
(1) Hem in Iran and limit the influence of Russia, China, and the rising tide of militant Islam.
(2) Oil--secure the free flow of oil to the West.
That allows for a blend of government and private interests playing together in that sandbox.
RE. Politicians Swear to "Never Forget" 9/11 Victims...
....as an "on-the-stump stage prop", that is; and to show the world what swell guys 'n gals they (the politicians) are and in the process - it goes without saying - conflating the victims with "The Agenda" - any opposition to which can then be conveniently cast in an "unpatriotic", if not downright trrrrrr'ist-sympathiser, light.
Rubbish. This is more patriotism-through-military glorification. The real victims of 9-11 are just as much the average American who has lost most of his or her civil liberties since 2001...
Taking a flight is no longer fun at all, that's for sure. I remember when all yer family could walk up right to the gate to welcome you off your flight... fuck what happened man...
who cares- they have beaten this 9/11 horse long past its death. "Never Forget"-I try but the self-important NY/DCers who think the sun rises and sets over their a-holes keep reminding us. A person in the US has a greater chance of being hit by a bus than die in a CIA/Mossad planned "terrorist attack" like 9/11 or by a fucking shoe-bomber. What a nation of whining,woe-is-me/everybody-owes-me pussies we have become and there is no greater example of this than cops and firefighters.. As Tony Soprano said to Carmella-"You're entitled to shit"
1800 years ago, you couldn't simply retire from a military career either.
It was the gladiarot games or poverty ...
Actually _urban_ roman, you could. 20 years in the legion bought you a farm close to the frontier where you and your sons could be called up when TSHTF.
1800 years ago depending on the place where you born life expectancy was 35-50 years
When the Macedonians and Greeks went into the Indus River Valley they encountered 125 y/o Bhramins. Alexanders veterans who he inherted from his father Philip were still the go to guys in the civil wars after Al's death when some were in their 70's.
Check it out. Urbanization kills. Lifestyle choices kill.
Geroge, your rhetorical overkill is becoming worthy of the worst days of Soviet-style Izvestia or Pravda propaganda...or a kurrent DOJ press release.
"heroic first responders"....klassic new agey doublespeake loaded with jargonistic jingoism designed to appeal to that segment of the audience which substitutes kue-kard reading kortex-killed mumbo-jumbo for simple old fashioned English.
Some NYC fire-fighters left their stations on 9-11 to do the job they were trained n paid to do....some of them lost their lives in the process, others were seriously injured or permanently disabled by long term health effects. OK.
Heroic? I seriously doubt even most of the guys who were there would be comfortable with that term, in their heart of hearts. Merikans have not[yet] lost all touch with the really real....up until Nam(and the take over of public discourse by the advertising "industry", we always reserved the term hero for occasions on which the unthinking & spontaneous bravery of a single individual in service to another or others went beyond what the expectations of what the ordinary person would consider possible.
Why must everything that used to matter to us most be slowly watered down\distorted into an oily koncoction of halftruths and doublespeak? To konform with the kollapsing values and intelligence of the polity perhaps? Be it so, the real resistor will guard the use of language as a primary line of defense against the smokebombs thrown by monstrous manipulators of meaning, so as to keep a klear line of fire in front of their sights...
synopsis: this article is just more ridiculous pandering in pursuit of a(not so well)disguised agenda to round up resistors into ever more tightly konstricted kul-de-sacs of time-wastin talk.
Why not "konkoktion"? Why the "e" at the end of doublespeake but not at the end of, say, "heart"? Why the silly alliteration? Your point, if any, is lost amid the noise.
I luv it! Let me put that together with yur other censorious comment of the day....
and I think we've got a profile xactly the kind of new Merikan that 'the President' and his Kosher Krew are looking for:
conformist, controlled, humorless, uninterested in anything or anyone foreign to their habitual homage to dullness...
our specially trained remote-viewers have picked up that yu are an early adopter of the Kamp Fema ethos...possibly even an off-duty Kapo(or even an on-duty TSA/DSA employee, pimping a guvernment supplied makina and trying to make points with the supervisor for "duty beyond the expected" ....
or maybe just a sexually frustrated librarian, lost somewhere in the wilds of Alaska....
get a life, loser....an if yu kan't do that, just git lost!
Censorious? I have no authority to censor you. I am merely suggesting that you write clearly rather than opaquely. You may have something intelligent to say, but the reader, frustrated with the foolishness in your style, either cannot decipher it or gives up on it. Simplify, simplify.
Forget it.
You're talking to someone who thinks signing Brandi with a heart for dotting the I is very clever, artistic and wildly rebellious.
Tell that to the people who worked tirelessly on the "pile" at Ground Zero to search for trapped victims, and who are now dying from cancer due to all of the crap in the air that the EPA covered up ...
I've talked with some of these people, including firefighters ...
Tell it to their faces ...
For that matter, tell the veterans who risked their lives for our country, only to be treated like crap when they return ...
MILLIONS of them are furious at the chickenhawks who have created this situation
George: "Millions of them"? Really? There are "millions"?
And again--what situation? Who created what situation? The chickenhawks (from smug Bill Kristol to doddering Hillary Clinton?) created it? How?
Lots and lots of noise, but what we need are facts and rational analysis.
Er, tell what to their faces George? Did I insult the firefighter of NYC? No.
and tell what to the veterans George?
Everytime I think that we've reached the limits of the cheap pandering that is yur speciality here, yu hit a new low...I surely hope that this comment of yurs will be as low as yu can go...because yu insult the intelligence of the readers here on ZH, who are not, in the majority, capable of being swayed by that kind of smarmy emotion-tugging bullshit...whatever may be the tastes of the audience of yur own blog space.
My opinion about Merkian servicemen is on record here for all to see...and I've made a point of bringing their present sorry treatment to the attention of this audience...without the need of trying to score cheap points....and continue to tirelessly point out that Merikans, for all their compliicty in the sins of their overlords, are not guilty of the krimes kommitted in their name...
so let me rearrange that subtitle for yu, to more accurately sum up what yu have just achieved with yur truly witless response:
yu sir, are a disgrace to Merika, and to the very fine Merikans that I have had the privilege of knowing. And yur silly appropriation of the name of one of their most revered leaders is part and parcel of why.
hey george, i like your posts...and generally trot over when i see a new one come up....
But the phrase, "heroic first responders" reminds too many of us of the post 911 fascist hell hole amerika's become....You dont need to go there to extend the legitimacy of your argument ("I support the troops!") anymore than you need to refer to amerika as our "homeland"
OK?
9/11/2001 - The crypto-facist AmeriKan version of the Reichstag Fire!
It NEVER stops giving.....Victims and money....for the EVIL EMPIRE!
any vet that has fought in a US "conflict" since WWII has fought solely to keep the elite of this country in power and enrichen themselves-not for some bullshit 'fighting for our freedoms". when a goat herder in Afghan can mount a Operation Overlord-type attack on the shores of New Jersey give me a call. Also-firefighters are WAY overpaid entiltled babies that leech off the labor of people that work and produce in the private sector.
You make a valid point, but you state it inarticulately. Most American military men do not fight for the elite of this country. They do, indeed, fight for freedom and liberty and private property and opportunity, but moreso out of a sense of duty, whether to nation, Constitution, mom and apple pie, or their fellow soldiers, sailors, airmen, and marines. The fact that a tyrannical government may misuse them and send them into battle to secure the prosperity of the elite does not mean that the men doing the fighting believe that they are fighting for that elite. 99% of American fighting men fight for something else, regardless of the real reasons behind why they are fighting who and where they are fighting.
That's the problem Watauga. They are still thoroughly dumbed down and fast asleep. Hence their failure to see the reason they are being sent to wage war. Same as most of Boobacus Americanus who root them on to fight for our freedoms and spread democracy(I just threw up in my mouth).
I agree with Watauga. My son and I are wide awake. There are real enemies that want to kill us and take our stuff. Yet if we want to fight for mother, country, and kinfolk, not for the rich elite shitheads running the government who don't even send their own children to fight the wars they start, which branch of the service do we join?
And I dislike calling every soldier, police officer, and firefighter a hero. It cheapens the term. It's their job. The rest of the time they sit around doing dick. They collect pensions and get free food and stuff at restaurants. Most of the rest of us don't get any of that. Get some perspective, stop worshipping power, people. Revere authority, not power. All this "hero" B.S. is just an extension of state propaganda. Tell you what, I'll thank these "hereos" for their service when they help me or thank me for mine, when they thank the construction workers who built their home and their city, etc.
I don't disagree with the point. I disagree with how it was written. The American fighting man intends well. He intends to fight for all the right things. The fact that he is being used in a different manner does not mean that he is not fighting for something he believes in.
I will take full credit for this policy and advising congress on this approach. I figured that if we reduce the health benefits for these fine people, they will conclude that they must not be as sick as they originally thought. Thus, they will be more likely to feel healthier. I call it the "Health Effect". It's working great for the economy, so why not here too?
We are foolish little creatures egotistical enough to claim wars on ideas. It doesn't work that way - ideas were much older than you... much much older than you.
Ideas were, are, and will be, eternal. We have just evolved to be able to comprehend them a little better than when we first started out, and that is the only thing that sets us apart from our other animal friends (read dead animal friends). Man is not qualified to wage war against ideas...
I was at Ground Zero 24/7 for the first week, conducting S&R support operations at Tower II. I wore a respirator and other particulate filtration devices nearly my entire time there. Not only that, I begged others to wear them too. I saw OSHA, EPA and NIOSH representation from time to time, but no real passionate enforcement from them in my observation. Most of my efforts to get others to wear respiratory protection was met with resistance, and sometimes even anger or disdain. If you ask me, these were professionals, knew the dangers from years of required training, and made a "choice" not to protect themselves.
Thank you for your service.