Kerry: Major Package of Legislation to Help those devastated by Katrina

[kerrygoddess]

John Kerry Offers Major Package of Legislation to Help Small Businesses, Others Devastated by Hurricane Katrina
September 9th, 2005

A few days ago we heard from John Kerry as he reached out to his email list and asked for supporters to donate to the Red Cross to help victims of Hurricane Katrina. Kerry said in his email, “I plan to work in coming days to find more ways that we can help joining with my colleagues in the Senate to support those who have lost so much and those working so hard to help them.”

I just received the following Press Release from John Kerry’s Senate office, detailing what John Kerry has been working on in the past few days. This legislation addresses far reaching aid that the Bush administration has neglected to address.

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE: John Kerry Offers Major Package of Legislation to Help Small Businesses, Others Devastated by Hurricane Katrina

WASHINGTON - With estimates that more than 400,000 jobs will be lost as a result of Hurricane Katrina, Senator John F. Kerry (D-Mass.) today unveiled a package of emergency economic aid and federal assistance for small businesses and others reeling from the destruction in the Gulf Coast.

“It is clear that our government failed the people of the Gulf Coast. In time, those responsible will be held accountable for what has gone right and what has gone wrong. Right now, we need to make up for lost time and help any way we can, and that means targeting the fastest relief possible,” said Senator Kerry. “Every small business we can help will help a hard-working family start to put the pieces of their lives back together. We should help small businesses rebuild themselves and these communities.”

MORE - http://blog.thedemocraticdaily.com/?p=484

[OregonBlue]

1. Well that's nice but why isn't he on TV right now decrying the

huge rip-off contracts to Bechtel, etc. and the President suspending the "prevailing wage". Weak!! I want the Dems to go for blood right now. I want them to SCREAM FROM THE ROOFTOPS ABOUT THIS DISGUSTING CORRUPTION. Nice little positive press releases don't cut it with me right now.

[TayTay]

2. Why didn't Wyden do this?

Where has Wyden been on Small Business Loans to victims of Hurricane Katrina? I want him to speak out about this important issue. He should be screaming it from the rooftops because there are a lot of people who will need help getting back on their feet after the hurricane.

It's my numnber one concern and why hasn't Wyden come out on this? Could it be because he's not Ranking Dem Member of the Committee and it's not his friggin job to do it. Maybe it's Kerry's friggin job as RM of the SBA comm to think up ways to help actual people with actual problems.

[LittleClarkie]

11. But that's not sexy, so people don't think much of it, I reckon.

Only the occasional wonk.

But remember, Kerry's only out for himself. Yeah.

Naw, I'd rather have someone on tv ranting himself blue than to have someone finding solutions to problems. Because ranting yourself blue means your doing something.

Too bad you can't eat a rant.

[ginnyinWI]

22. well said! n/t

[LittleClarkie]

5. So you want a show rather than concrete action?

I don't.

I don't need someone on the tv making a show of going for blood rather than working on things that will actually make people's lives better.

Is that what people want? A dog and pony show where someone screams their head off so that folks will say "Look! He's fighting for me!"

No, that's not action. That's just red meat. I don't need red meat. I need for Dean and Kerry and Boxer and whoever else is busy putting aid together to just keep on doing that.

Nothing weak about helping people. What's weak is needing a show over needing to see people getting help.

[sendero]

7. Hmmm....

...."Is that what people want? A dog and pony show where someone screams their head off so that folks will say "Look! He's fighting for me!"

Have you ever asked yourself why Bush**, a man who caters to 5% of the population at best, is running things?

Perhaps you should stop wishing things were one way when every scrap of available evidence is that they are another.

If it isn't on TV, it didn't happen.

[LittleClarkie]

9. Well

I'm not looking at getting anyone elected right now. An aid package is better than a rant at this point. Because you can't eat a rant.

[TayTay]

10. That makes no sense at all

You want Kerry to go on TV, mouth empty platitudes that mean nothing, affect nothing, get not one bottle of water or packet of food into the hands of an evacuee and call it victory?

Ah, doing his day job as a legislator and coming up with, oh I don't know, legislation is a better idea. It will actually help people. Now he has to go to Olympia Snowe (R-ME) and get her to sign off on it. Then get it to the floor of the Senate. And get it into the House and then, finally, when all that work is done, it will be taken out and stabbed in a conference committee hearing that has no Dems in it. Because real power is exerted when no one is paying attention.

[LittleClarkie]

12. But if he doesn't hand out that packet of food on the television

Then it won't have happened. I didn't know that tv affected our reality in such a way.

Like, you know, I thought I had breakfast this morning. But it wasn't on tv, so I guess I really didn't.

Hm. Like a weird philosophy question, isn't it.

[MH1]

13. What I want:

Dean, Sharpton, Clark, Edwards, and every other "public" Democrat who is NOT in elected office, to get out there and talk LOUDLY about the great things ELECTED Democrats (including but not at all limited to Kerry) are doing to make things better for Katrina survivors, and rant - yes, RANT - about how badly * screwed it up and how the DEMOCRATS have SOLUTIONS to fix what the * admin screwed up.

The difference between me and many here is that I want those in elected office to mainly work on legislation. That is their job. An occasional press appearance is good, but it shouldn't be the main focus, for Dems in elected office - they have actual work to do.

I want those NOT in elected office to do the ranting, but it had better include what a great job elected Democrats are doing. That would be teamwork. Something that all too often seems sorely lacking in the Demcratic Party.

Any other ranting is just a waste.

[sendero]

18. Sure why not..

.... just allow the GOP to spin and lie and bury this like they have all their other failures.

Then next year, we can all sit here and bitch about the state of the nations some more.

Some people just never learn.

[LittleClarkie]

21. I'm banking of folks being smarter than that

Actual help vs just talking about it will carry some weight.

Folks are waking up, I think.

[Freddie Stubbs]

14. Perhaps he feels that providing relief to the victims of the hurricane

is more important that scoring political points.

[Mass]

15. How does he dare caring about people?

:sarcasm:

[blm]

16. How dare Kerry work on a package to aid thousands of small businesses

whose owners probably had every dime they owned and decades of sweat into their ventures.

[kerrygoddess]

17. The "Nice little positive press release"

Is announcing LEGISLATION to HELP PEOPLE! What part of that do you not get? He offered this legislation on the Senate Floor today. Maybe now that the press release is out, and he offered this legislation on the Senate Floor, he'll speak to the media.

I don't know, what's more important? Actually doing something CONSTRUCTIVE to HELP PEOPLE or RANTING on TV?

[zulchzulu]

28. Impeachment is a slow process...John is on it...

You can count on it. This is no time to shoot at your friend.

[OregonBlue]

29. Gee...guess I stand corrected!

:)

[Mass]

3. Great news - we need to work for people in the Gulf Coast

Our rants are not going to help them in the short term and the Senate is where this should happen.

[LittleClarkie]

6. Indeed

You can't eat a rant.

[WildEyedLiberal]

4. Kick

:kick: for the people who actually enjoy that things are being done, instead of whining and moaning.

[politicasista]

8. kick

:kick:

[second edition]

19. I know he would come through for those devistated by Katrina

and others in need.

[LittleClarkie]

20. If certain Dems have been a touch quiet

It's because they're doing stuff like this. Actually trying to help in a concrete way. The Republicans are the ones playing politics.

[Capn Sunshine]

23. Not to spoil your tea party

but you can't eat legislation either.
Not that this isn't necessary, but legislative dithering isn't exactly going to get food and water to the dying and starving.

To put out a press release about something that had better goddamn well be automatic seems a little self serving to me.

Or is it going to hang in committee? Keep us posted on your hero's activity.

[Mass]

24. That's a first step, though, and a necessary one.

Though of course, all the Democratic congresspeople could also resign as they are not useful at all in your view of the world. Let the Republicans do what they want and propose nothing.

A little bit nihilist in my view.

[Goldeneye]

25. Hate to burst your bubble sunshine,

but legislation is how legislators get shit done.

[kerrygoddess]

33. FYI...

This is based on legislation that Kerry sponsored after 9/11 and that legislation passsed. No doubt this will too.

[Mass]

26. Senate SBC (Snowe, Kerry) investigates abuse for federal loans for 9/11

http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20050909/ap_on_go_ca_st_pe/sept11_lax_loans

WASHINGTON - Congress will investigate the "flagrant abuse" of a federal loan program designed to help businesses recover from the Sept. 11 attacks and make sure such problem don't occur with Hurricane Katrina relief, a key Senate Republican announced Friday.

Sen. Olympia Snowe (news, bio, voting record), R-Maine, chairwoman of the Senate Small Business and Entrepreneurship Committee, announced the investigation in response to an Associated Press story Thursday that showed the federal program was so loosely managed that it gave low-interest loans to companies that didn't need terrorism relief
...
Sen.
John Kerry of Massachusetts, the committee's top Democrat, joined in the call for an investigation.

"This was a deliberate attempt to cover up White House budget gimmicks that left the SBA's largest loan program underfunded and on the brink of shutting down," Kerry said. "The administration asked SBA employees to bend the rules and steer regular loans through the program aimed at helping businesses impacted by 9/11."

[ohtransplant]

27. Lotta balls this guy has

submitting legislation that will help people and then actually announcing it.

Why isn't he out screaming from the rooftops, stomping his feet, and holding his breath? That would seem much more productive and it would make me feel better.:sarcasm:

Go JK! :yourock:

[kerrygoddess]

30. Look what else he's doing...

John Kerry to Deliver Supplies to New Orleans Area
http://blog.thedemocraticdaily.com/?p=493

[ohtransplant]

31. Can't tell you how proud this guy makes me.

and notice that he's staying positive - proactive. I'll bet there's more in the planning stages. I know it's too early to talk '08 but I sure hope he runs. This country needs him. :woohoo: :bounce:

JK, :yourock::patriot:

* and his band of thugs and surrogates can whine all day about Dems going negative - framing it as the "blame game" as they point the finger at everyone else. JK won't get caught in their spin net.

BTW, if I hear the "BG" charge one more time... :mad:

[kerrygoddess]

32. We do need him. N/T

:kick: