The same could be said for the other side too...

Cutting existing Emergency Responses because of City or County Budgets is disastrous 100% of the time..
The Local residents know it..

The Insurance Companies sure know this too..
Did you know if you have good Fire Protection and Emergency Response times??
You get alot lower Home insurance rates for Home Owners....

I will bet that all Residents rates will know go through the roof after this..

NOT THAT I approve of what he did but we do have lots of people out there who did everything they could to do everything right. Now lots of them have lost their job. Rember that thing where they got money to pay their house payment, not a sure bet they bought a house they couldn't pay for, most could pay as long as they had that job that they'd had for years. They've had to use up whats left of savings and 401k etc. And rember the banks are not playing fair. There was a case here of a bank trying to foreclose on a house that a guy had lived in for 27 years[ never a late payment till now] and he owed less than $10000.00. Or how about the fact banks are forging signings so they can foreclose. I would have fought them in court but lots of people don't really understand how you do that.

Bulldozing the home doesn't help his credit in moving forward, and he still has the debt. The problem is caused in part by debt becoming a commidy that is sold like futures by large holding companies. If you have a mortgage, who really holds it? It most likely isn't the local bank you got the loan from, and perhaps blaming the local institutions isn't entirely fair. On the other hand, one can really learn to dislike institutions that blindly go after people like they were little more than a bad debt.

I agree

I certainly dont agree with that...

I think Tolstoy once said.." a corporation is not a living entity therefore it has no heart..

I agree...emergency services cannot be compromised..

This is the same reason why people believe public/government/state workers should not be allowed to "collectively bargain" which is pinhead speak for striking..Emergency and other vital services must be maintained..if a person is unhappy with the pay then too bad..its called "public service" for a reason..

I Agree on the State and Federal levels..No Collective Bargaining..
But thats not the issue here..

Local Cities ad Counties is a whole different Animal..

As a Former Fire Fighter..I was sworn to protect and serve the Public I worked for..
No exceptions....24/7/365...
On or off duty. At Home or on Vacation... Any where and any time..
No Different that Police officers..
How many Police are refusing to do their Jobs because the Bill did not get Payed??????
I would say virtually None..

'Dismal' prospects: 1 in 2 Americans are now poor or low income


WASHINGTON - Squeezed by rising living costs, a record number of Americans — nearly 1 in 2 — have fallen into poverty or are scraping by on earnings that classify them as low income.

The latest census data depict a middle class that's shrinking as unemployment stays high and the government's safety net frays. The new numbers follow years of stagnating wages for the middle class that have hurt millions of workers and families.

"Safety net programs such as food stamps and tax credits kept poverty from rising even higher in 2010, but for many low-income families with work-related and medical expenses, they are considered too 'rich' to qualify," said Sheldon Danziger, a University of Michigan public policy professor who specializes in poverty.

"The reality is that prospects for the poor and the near poor are dismal," he said. "If Congress and the states make further cuts, we can expect the number of poor and low-income families to rise for the next several years."

http://video.msnbc.msn.com/nightly-news/44182098#null

Nice... just came here to post this myself.

I have no witty comment for this - the USA just plain sucks at this point, and yet we need to be sure to keep those "job creators" happy with their tax breaks. I'd ask for middle class relief in-kind (on par with the "too big to fail" corps and banks), but there's really no middle class left to speak of...

Like I've said this country will be a powder keg by next Aug. The protest of the late 60s might be compressed into one summer.