Jon Stewart took Rep. Eric Cantor (R-VA) to task last night for denying the people of Joplin, Missouri, disaster relief funding unless federal spending is cut elsewhere.
WOLF BLITZER (5/24/2011): But he wants there to be cuts in other federal spending in order to justify providing this financial assistance to the people in Missouri.
Are you out of your fucking mind?
Justify it!? You know, Republicans are always so worried about socialism permanently transforming America, but what's a more fundamental transformation of America than, if your town is taken by a tornado, we can only help you if we make the numbers work? I mean, seriously!
Right now, elephants from the Missouri circus are helping clear heavy debris from the tornado, which means when it comes to helping Joplin, Missouri, residents, actual elephants are more useful to them than the GOP.
That line was so good, m00finsan has made it his her new sig line. :-)
Video and transcript below the fold.
People in the heartland of our country, the Midwest, recently have suffered greatly, whether it be from the flooding of the Mississippi River or these deadly tornadoes. That's why this recent statement from House Republican Majority Leader Eric Cantor must have been of great comfort to them.
WOLF BLITZER (5/24/2011): Eric Cantor, the Majority Leader in the House, says the federal government should provide assistance to the people of Missouri.
Huzzah! Hear, hear! For what are we as a nation, if we cannot without hesitation extend a hand to our fellow citizens in their time of need, no questions asked, to help ease their pain?
WOLF BLITZER (5/24/2011): But he wants there to be cuts in other federal spending in order to justify providing this financial assistance to the people in Missouri.
Are you out of your fucking mind?
Justify it!? You know, Republicans are always so worried about socialism permanently transforming America, but what's a more fundamental transformation of America than, if your town is taken by a tornado, we can only help you if we make the numbers work? I mean, seriously!
Right now, elephants from the Missouri circus are helping clear heavy debris from the tornado, which means when it comes to helping Joplin, Missouri, residents, actual elephants are more useful to them than the GOP.
That's just insane! What is Cantor thinking? Harry Smith sat down with him at the Face the Nation children's table to find out.
REP. ERIC CANTOR, R-VA (5/29/2011): It's like this if when a family is struck with tragedy, like the family of Joplin, they have, let's say if they had $10,000 set aside to do something else with -- to buy a new car, to do something else. And then they were struck with a sick member of the family or something, and needed to take that money to apply it to that, that's what they would do because families don't have unlimited money. And really, neither does the federal government.
Actually, you know what? Wow, that actually sounds like good common sense, until... you think about it for two seconds. And then it just seems like bullshit masquerading as common sense. But all right, I'll allow it. All right, let's think about our country as a family. It's just like a family. So here's our country.
Let's say our country's house is hit by a tornado.
Wow. We'd love to be able to rebuild our country, but Dad, you've been unemployed for five months now, and Mom, your two jobs haven't really gotten us much of a nest egg. And those three freeloaders in front of you aren't really chipping in. (Expecting you to do everything and redistribute the wealth to them, socialists!!)
We're screwed, there's nothing we can do.... (snaps fingers) Grandma!
Cantor voted for Ryan's Medicare change. So rather than paying for all of Grandma's medicine and food, we'll just kick in a little bit in the beginning of the year, and, you know, she'll make it work. In some ways, we're doing her a favor. She doesn't want to die with us resenting her.
Animation!
But that still doesn't get us all the money we need. Oh!! Our older brother, I forgot! Gordon, he runs the hedge fund.
Maybe he could kick in in this very difficult time, just a little bit extra, not a lot, a few percentage points. It wouldn't really make a dent in his lifestyle, not to mention, that one time we bailed him out when he was having financial troubles. You know, maybe that plan could work.
REP. MICHELE BACHMANN, R-MN (1/22/2011): Government, more and more, wants to subsidize failure, and they want to punish success.
REP. TOM GRAVES, R-GA (4/14/2011): We should be encouraging everyone to be successful, everyone to be wealthy, not punish those who achieve success.
Oh right, getting them back to the tax rates of the 90s, that would be punishing success. Whereas, the Grandma and quid pro quo disaster relief thing only punishes age, illness, and misfortune.
There is one other possibility, boy, I'd hate to even bring this up, I hate to even say it. Can we talk about Dad's car? It takes up so much of the family's budget.
Yeah. Um, I really don't know, boy, I just... you never know when we're going to have to fight the neighbors. But does it really need to have nuclear capability and stealth mode? I mean, we already killed the kid who egged our house 10 years ago, and buried him at sea. Metaphor breaking, must try to extend.
Here's the bottom line, tornado people. I've got good news and bad news. We've crunched some numbers, checked into it, and I'm afraid you're all going to have to live outside from here on out. But the good news is Dad's car is getting a new laser cannon. We'll be right back.
Jon had wanted to cover Mitt Romney's announcement, but the Anthony Weiner news kept getting in the way. So he resorted to... yep, music. The day before, Jon had touched upon Weiner's non-denials that it actually was a photo of him. And then he looked at the news about Donald Trump meeting Sarah Palin and making every mistake possible when eating pizza. Watching that segment will make you want to eat pizza. He then had a good talk with Bill Moyers about the state of journalism (Part 1, Part 2).
Meanwhile, Stephen Colbert mocked the GOP for their shenanigans on the debt ceiling vote, and of course also covered the Twitter scandal surrounding Anthony Weiner, though Kossacks who are convinced Anthony didn't do it may not like Stephen's segment so much.