Mad Daddy here.
I do Facebook, mostly for extended family contact. But sometimes I see things that get me riled, because of how truly ignorant they are.
Now in this case, I'm not talking "ignorant" as in a euphemism for some sort of bigotry or other name-calling from a "progressive". I'm talking truly, utterly ignorant, as in the person in question doesn't really know what they're saying or asking for.
It was a tweet somebody shared on Facebook, pretty much implying that "YEAH THAT'S RIGHT YOU TELL 'EM, THAT TRUMP GRRRRRRRRR!!". Below is a screenshot:
Mr. Charles M. Blow and everyone who agreed with him don't understand federalism. The only political philosophy they seem to understand is that everything is supposed to come from the government - damn free markets, damn private enterprise, and most of all, damn all governments in charge of regions smaller than the entire nation, i.e. the Federal government.
Let's first unpack these actions for fact-checking, then critique the entire premise.
The Flint Michigan water crisis began in 2014, in the middle of President Obama's second term. Who was responsible for screwing up the water supply in the municipality? You'll never guess. It wasn't Obama. It wasn't the governor of Michigan either, believe it or not. It was... the city officials. I know, right? Weird, huh? City officials being responsible for... get this... THE CITY.
They were supposedly elected officials, by the way, and screwed things up by changing the water source to cut city costs. When, of course, the old source was fine and presented no problems.
The governor of Michigan, in which state the city of Flint is located, had to step in the next year and try to help by having the water source switched back to the old source. The damage, however was done. Thanks to a big news blowout because of activist groups and several "concerned" politicians, the Federal government then got involved.
The U.S. Congress allocated $120 million at the end of 2016, during President Obama's administration.
Since politicians are pretty much worthless as plumbers, the U.S. Congress didn't fix the pipes, the Michigan government didn't fix the pipes, and the city of Flint didn't fix the pipes. They took a huge chunk of taxpayer money, but in conclusion, the Flint city council was supposed to actually hire somebody to fix the pipes.
So is it Trump's fault? Shit no, Trump wasn't even being considered as a candidate in 2014.
Is it Obama's fault? No.
Is it any of the Feds' fault? No.
Is it Michigan's government's fault? Not really.
Now, as for the Syria bombing and the cost thereof, yeah, military weapons are expensive. But they're ready-made, used one time, and are BY DESIGN are not supposed to be constructive. It's not like we have to hire a bunch of guys to stand around the bomb site with sledgehammers and pound things into the dirt after dropping a bomb - the BOMB is supposed to do that.
Now that I've typed an essay that explains the differences between the two situations Mr. Blow mentions, let me show how ignorant he is on what he states.
IF we take Mr. Blow at his word, he wants the same people who dropped the MOAB to fix the pipes in Flint. The very same people who HAVE ALREADY ALLOCATED $120 MILLION OF OUR MONEY to do that very thing.
Given that, the government of the city of Flint and of the state of Michigan are useless, and should be replaced by the Federal government.
The same entity that was controlled by Obama when the Flint water crisis began, and the same entity that IS NOW CONTROLLED BY TRUMP.
And that's something I don't think Mr. Blow actually wants.