View Full Version : An interesting letter
Over on FB, I follow one of the local sheriffs here in Colorado.
Sheriff Justin Smith of Larimer county posted this about an interesting letter he just received from the Secretary of Homeland Security.
I received a very interesting veiled threat letter from Jeh Johnson, the Secretary of Homeland Security addressed to all police chiefs and sheriffs around the country.
His letter made it clear that if Congress didn't send President Obama the DHS funding bill that he wanted (rubberstamping the president's executive amnesty), local and state public safety agencies would not receive federal grants they were counting on because the president would veto the DHS funding bill.
Let me get this straight - the president believes he has the authority to nullify federal laws that don't serve his personal agenda, but if Congress dares to exercise it's responsibility of controlling the purse strings, he will willingly hold public safety grants hostage just to get his way?
Mr. President, you don't have to love the Congress we elected, but you do have to respect their role as established under the Constitution -and Mr. Johnson, please show some integrity and stop with the threats. Sheriffs don't take kindly to them.
For those of you who support him, tell me again how the POTUS is usurping his authority and ruling like some type of dictator in a Banana Republic.
:munchin
I'll be interested in reading other LEO responses.
I'm thinking there should be 2k-3k LEO org's that received the note.
It should be all over pg 1??
:munchin
Badger52
02-04-2015, 06:04
It is a problem with accepting purse-strings; they have attachments at the other end.
"You don't like a particular policy or a particular president? Then argue for your position. Go out there and win an election. Push to change it. But don't break it. Don't break what our predecessors spent over two centuries building. That's not being faithful to what this country's about."
-President Barack Hussein Obama
If Americans don't like how the democratic party has been running the country, then they should go out put some republicans in office just like the president said...
...well, not that the president is going to accept the "elections matter, I won" as an argument now that his party is on the losing side of his own statement.
It's been said too many times that a nation gets the government they deserve; well, America wanted change, America got change.
Good luck folks, welcome to the new normal.
Golf1echo
02-04-2015, 09:55
These guys are dead set on pushing their agenda. Extending executive power, forcing their agenda beyond their jurisdiction, manipulating everything they can to get to their end game. Even if they were to achieve their goal they still wouldn't know how to build the world they espouse to. Much like telling their constituents what they wanted to hear and doing instead what they intended all along. All they can manage is to dismantle they couldn't create if they tried.
Thank goodness for the State and local officials who push back in an attempt to check the abuse of power.
Bladeenthusiast
02-04-2015, 11:36
It's a shame we have a president like that, but, like the LEO's are finding out. Adapt and overcome, but giving in to the threats by DHS secretary Mr.Johnson is not the way to do it. I hope all LEOs have the morals we expect them to. God bless the sheepdogs.
I'm increasingly convinced that this president is appropriating Reagan. <<LINK (http://www.nytimes.com/1982/03/13/us/reagan-facing-state-opposition-threatens-to-cut-federalism-plan.html?pagewanted=print)>>March 13, 1982
REAGAN, FACING STATE OPPOSITION, THREATENS TO CUT FEDERALISM PLAN
By ROBERT PEAR, Special to the New York Times
WASHINGTON, March 12— A White House official said today that the Reagan Administration would cancel its offer to pay all state Medicaid costs if the nation's governors persisted in their refusal to take over Federal food stamp and welfare costs.
Richard S. Williamson, President Reagan's assistant for intergovernmental affairs, said the Administration was seriously considering scaling down its ''new federalism'' proposals in the face of the governors' opposition to major elements of the package.
The President wants the states to take responsibility for food stamps and the program of Aid to Families with Dependent Children as part of a sweeping realignment of Federal and state responsibilities. But several governors have said that welfare and food stamps should be ''set aside'' in the negotiations.
Governors' Position
At a negotiating session last Saturday, governors told White House officials that they believed the Federal Government should bear the responsibility for ''income security'' programs, including welfare and food stamps as well as Medicaid.
Mr. Williamson said White House aides met with Mr. Reagan Wednesday to discuss the results of the talks. ''Ronald Reagan reiterated his view: Unless there was some give on food stamps and A.F.D.C., he would take Medicaid off the table,'' Mr. Williamson said. Good Bargaining Position
The governors are seeking to continue the negotiations because they want relief from the rapidly rising costs of Medicaid. But several governors say privately that they are in a good bargaining position. Democratic governors, in particular, appear to believe that the Administration needs their support on the ''new federalism'' more than they need the Administration.
The governors maintain that income security programs should be the responsibility of the Federal Government because, they say, local fluctuations in employment and earnings depend to a large degree on national economic policies.
Moreover, they say, a state is least able to assist its residents when they most need help. In Michigan, for example, the state budget is severely strained because high unemployment has cut into tax revenues, and, at the same time, many residents who have lost their jobs are seeking food stamps.
Joseph P. McLaughlin Jr., a spokesman for the National Governors Association, said the group would not respond publicly to Mr. Williamson's comments for fear of damaging the negotiations. The governors are scheduled to hold a second negotiating session at the White House Wednesday.
Mr. Williamson, at a breakfast meeting with reporters, agreed with the suggestion that Mr. Reagan had never been enthusiastically committed to a larger Federal role in financing Medicaid, the medical assistance program for the poor that is now financed jointly by the Federal and state governments. Instead, according to Mr. Williamson and other aides, Mr. Reagan proposed a Federal takeover of Medicaid costs as a gesture of good faith, in the hope that states would then be willing to pay for welfare and food stamp benefits.
The Administration is considering several ways to pare down the President's original proposal while remaining true to the spirit of the ''new federalism.'' For example, Mr. Williamson said, while omitting welfare, food stamps and Medicaid, the Federal Government could transfer more than 40 Federal grant programs to the states, as the President proposed. Mr. Reagan wants to create a trust fund to help the states pay for these education, transportation, community development and social service programs in an eight-year transition period.
In fiscal terms, Mr. Williamson said, the transfer of such programs, projected to cost the Federal Government $30 billion next year, is more significant than the ''swap'' of Medicaid for food stamps and welfare. Medicaid is expected to cost the states $19 billion next year.
Another alternative, Mr. Williamson said, would be to arrange miniature swaps involving parts of the major Federal benefit programs. For example, he said, the Government might pay all Medicaid costs for welfare recipients but leave the states to pay their current share of other Medicaid costs. Legislation Planned
The President hopes to achieve a consensus but intends to submit legislation to Congress, probably in early April, even in the absence of an agreement, Mr. Williamson said.
Representative Kent R. Hance, a conservative Texas Democrat who cosponsored Mr. Reagan's tax bill last year, sharply criticized the ''new federalism'' today. He said that the proposal could cost Texas as much as $6 billion, and he expressed concern that Texas, with its strong economy, would be ''subsidizing the rest of the country'' through large contributions to the federalism trust fund.
In Washington, state officials, testifying before the Senate Budget Committee, said that it would be impossible to make any major changes in Federal-state relations before Congress improved the budget process.
State Representative Curtis S. Kiser, a Florida Republican speaking for the National Conference of State Legislatures, said that it was ''inconceivable'' to discuss a stronger partnership ''when we at the state and local level are left so completely in the dark'' about Federal budget decisions. States must set their own budgets without knowing precisely how much Federal aid they will receive, he said.Or maybe this president is just doing what American presidents have generally done-- use the power and authority of their position to turn policy preferences into policies.
Golf1echo
02-04-2015, 12:56
Sigaba, The current holder of the executive branch is no Reagan...
Here is a perspective of Reagan's bipartisan legacy from a liberal Democrat: http://www.ocregister.com/articles/reagan-287054-president-one.html
Sigaba, The current holder of the executive branch is no Reagan...
Here is a perspective of Reagan's bipartisan legacy from a liberal Democrat: http://www.ocregister.com/articles/reagan-287054-president-one.htmlSome of this president's methods are similar to Reagan's. (The operative word is "appropriating.") That is the point of my earlier post in this thread.
Again Sig, too nuanced.
Sometime in late 2009, I realized that I'd have a brain aneurysm if I kept focusing on my utter and complete contempt for the incumbent president.
Also, IMO, some of his opponents simply go too far in their criticisms of the man, his methods, and his policies. I am convinced that he and his allies have benefited from those criticisms. I believe that his re-election was more about Americans rejecting his opposition than about embracing the man and his policies.
I believe that framing the forty fourth president within the context of his predecessors is an approach that is more sustainable politically and viable emotionally.
YMMV.
Much better Sig - and for you - that was almost pithy! :p
One of our local "news" stations picked up this story and did an interview with Sheriff Smith today.
He posted up the letter he, and many others received this past Tuesday.
Here it is ....
Statement by Secretary Jeh C. Johnson on the Consequences of our Homeland Security Grant-Making without a DHS Appropriations Bill
Release Date: February 3, 2015.
For Immediate Release
DHS Press Office
Contact: 202-282-8010
In recent days I have repeatedly stressed the need for a DHS appropriations bill for FY 2015, unburdened by politically charged amendments that attempt to defund our executive actions on immigration reform. The President has made plain that he will veto a bill that includes such language.
As long as this Department -- which interfaces with the public more than any other -- is funded by a continuing resolution, there are a whole series of activities vital to homeland security and public safety that cannot be undertaken.
One of the many consequences of operating on a continuing resolution is our inability to fund new non-disaster grants to state, local and tribal governments, law enforcement, emergency response officials and fire departments. Every governor, mayor, police chief, county sheriff, emergency manager and fire chief should care about this. These officials know that the grants we provide help them protect their communities. For example, last week when I visited the multi-agency coordinating center in Phoenix responsible for the security of the Super Bowl, officials pointed out to me that almost all the surveillance and communications equipment there was funded by the Department of Homeland Security.
Here are some other examples of the types of state, local and tribal government activities vital to homeland security and public safety that are funded by grants from this Department:
•salaries for state and local emergency managers in all 50 states, U.S. territories and the District of Columbia;
•new communications equipment for over 80 public safety agencies in the Los Angeles area to replace aging and incompatible radio systems;
•surveillance cameras and environmental sensors used by the New York City Police Department to detect in real time potential terrorist activity;
•increased security for the MTA, PATH trains and tunnels in the New York City area;
•improved campus security at K-12 public schools, colleges and universities in the state of Florida;
•K-9 units to detect explosive ordinance in the state of Massachusetts;
•upgraded oxygen masks and tanks for over 30 firefighter and law enforcement agencies in the Denver metropolitan area;
•the Arizona Counterterrorism Fusion Center, which provides intelligence and information from this Department to state and local law enforcement there;
•fifteen mobile command centers for possible catastrophic incidents in the state of Kentucky;
•150 firefighter jobs in the city of Detroit; and
•bomb squads in the state of Idaho.
On behalf of the men and women of this Department who work every day to keep the homeland safe, I urge that Congress pass an appropriations bill for this Department, free of politically charged amendments to defund our executive actions. Time is running short.
Link ..... https://www.dhs.gov/news/2015/02/03/statement-secretary-jeh-c-johnson-consequences-our-homeland-security-grant-making
Seems to me that Barry's administration is trying that age old Tyrant technique of intimidating the subjects .... "Tow the party line, or else."
:munchin
Badger52
02-05-2015, 17:52
"Tow the party line, or else."
:munchinThat's why I said what I did about "strings." That's the cost and that's the result.
FWIW, the lip-movers were in both chambers today on CSPAN posturing the exact same rhetoric. According to them, the world will come to an end when the current CRA for DHS does.