Some people had to work this Labor Day weekend. Very important work.

The President visited New Jersey today, and spent time with Governor Christie surveying the damage wrought by Irene.

Courtesy of The Obama Diary:

“I know that there’s been some talk about whether there’s going to be a slowdown in getting funding out here, emergency relief. As President of the United States, I want to make it very clear that we are going to meet our federal obligations – because we’re one country, and when one part of the country gets affected, whether it’s a tornado in Joplin, Missouri, or a hurricane that affects the Eastern Seaboard, then we come together as one country and we make sure that everybody gets the help that they need. And the last thing that the residents here of Paterson or the residents of Vermont or the residents of upstate New York need is Washington politics getting in the way of us making sure that we are doing what we can to help communities that have been badly affected.”



This is what a President, a good President, does.

He goes to where people are hurting and comforts them, promises to help them, and then he does exactly that.

Could ANYBODY imagine this man worrying about what is said about him on a blog?

There are just too many more important things for him to do.

That popping sound you hear is Teabagger heads exploding all over the country as Chris Christie commends FEMA's response to Irene.

From the MTP transcript:

MR. GREGORY: Safety first, as you've repeated over and over again. There will be a morning after kind of damage assessment. And this is going to be a big story, isn't it, Governor, up and down the seaboard? We already have local municipalities and states being so hard hit in this economy, what kind of cost, damage estimates are you expecting at this early point? 

GOV. CHRISTIE: Well, listen, I've got to imagine that the damage estimates are going to be in the billions of dollars, David, if not the tens of billions of dollars. We're going to start later this afternoon as soon as the storm clears. I'm going to personally go and start making assessments of the coastline and see what the damages are like there. And, at the same time, we need to deal with this inland flooding, which may not completely subside in New Jersey until Tuesday, some of our rivers. So the damage assessment's going to be a rolling one. The coastline will be the first we'll be able to judge. But then inland we're going to have a lot of damage, too, from these river floodings. 

MR. GREGORY: Any lessons you take away? I mean, this has been an extraordinary week, and not only for your state and this storm, but also an earthquake. As a Los Angeles guy, I was, I was not as freaked out about that, but now as an Easterner, I was. If you look at that and the coordination between a big state like yours and the federal government, are there lessons you take away from this week? Jobs well done, things that you can improve on? 

GOV. CHRISTIE: Well, certainly we're going to have an after action, you know, program, to look at what we could do better. I know there's always things that we could've done better. But what I'm proud of is that we're coordinating well with the federal government. We have FEMA folks right here on site in the operations and intelligence center you see here. They're working incredibly hard in providing things to us that we need. Our own team at the state level has put aside everything except for saying, listen, how do we best serve--making sure that human life is safe and then trying to minimize property damage? So we'll do an after action report, David, and take a look at--I know there's always things we could do better. But here's the key: The key is that we've tried to keep people fully informed, be fully transparent, to lower fear and raise confidence. And that's what we're trying to do, and I think that's the best thing a governor can do in this circumstance.

Now Christie did not personally give credit to President Obama for his response to Hurricane Tropical Storm Irene, but by giving mad props to FEMA he may as well have.

I would suggest that we will probably NOT hear Christie's name popping up as a potential GOP candidate for President any time soon. Because despite the Teabagger's seeming reverence for the idea of "common sense," they really don't like it when a Republican demonstrates any.

Now this in no way makes me a Chris Christie fan, but I can hardly wait to see his response if Eric Cantor interferes with the federal government's ability to respond to the needs in New Jersey because the House Republicans cannot find enough cuts in other federal programs to offset the cost.

Somehow I just don't think that Cantor wants to take on Governor Christie over budgetary concerns while people in his state are suffering.

Update:  Then as counterpoint to Christie, who realizes the need for government spending during a crisis like Irene, we have Michele Bachmann, occupying the space usually filled by crazed embarrassment to Christianity Pat Robertson, who seems to believe that the disaster was God's way of telling Ameircans to cut spending.


“I don’t know how much God has to do to get the attention of the politicians. We’ve had an earthquake; we’ve had a hurricane. He said, ‘Are you going to start listening to me here?’ Listen to the American people because the American people are roaring right now. They know government is on a morbid obesity diet and we’ve got to rein in the spending.”

And of course the truly sad thing for politics in this country is that Michele Bachmann is one of the favorites of the small minority of poorly educated, and historically ignorant, Teabaggers who are now holding the GOP by the balls.

New Jersey Republican lawmaker resigns after his wife sends racist e-mail to Olympic gold medalist Carl Lewis.

Courtesy of AP:

Pat Delany stepped down from the state Assembly this month and said he wouldn’t seek a full term in November because of his wife’s missive to Lewis’ campaign, Burlington County Republican Chairman Bill Layton said. Delany originally cited an unspecified family issue as the reason for his abrupt resignation. 

Delany and his wife, Jennifer Delany, are white. Lewis, a political novice who’s among the greatest athletes of all time, is black. 

Jennifer Delany’s email to Lewis’ campaign said, in part, “Imagine having dark skin and name recognition and the nerve to think that equaled knowing something about politics.” 

Layton said Pat Delany decided to leave office to shield his three children from “a hurtful and embarrassing public spectacle involving their mother.” 

“Former Assemblyman Pat Delany’s wife inexplicably sent an offensive and racist email in response to a routine email from Carl Lewis’ campaign; her actions were inexcusable,” Layton said. 

Delany said in a statement that he and his wife don’t share the same racial views. 

He said he was sorry.“On behalf of my family, we sincerely apologize to Mr. Lewis for any pain this caused him,” he said. 

Neither the Delanys nor Lewis could be reached by telephone for comment Monday.

You might think I would be used to it by now, but I STILL find myself shocked by the amount of racism that has bubbled to the surface since the election of Barack Obama. It is like the country was nothing more than a pus filled boil that the election pierced, thereby releasing the rancid infection lying just beneath the surface and allowing it to spill forth onto our airwaves and political landscape.

I want to feel badly for this guy, especially if it is true that "he and his wife don't share the same racial views," however that might NOT be accurate according to this article:

“Three South Jersey Republican lawmakers want to cut off public funding from colleges that enroll illegal immigrants. 

A bill from state Senator Dawn Marie Addiego and Assemblymen Scott Rudder and Pat Delany, all R-Burlington, would take away shares of the state’s $850 million budget for higher education from any school determined to have admitted illegal immigrants to the student body. 

Yeah that sounds like typical Teabagger code for "keep the darkies out of our schools."

I am wondering if both Rep. Delany AND his wife share these same racist views, but only she was careless enough to let the cat out of the bag publicly?

What do you think?