WHERE ARE YOU AMERICA?

                                       Foreign Aid vs. Help At Home

In case you haven't turned on the television or radio, maybe you haven't read a newspaper in sometime.
We have a couple of real disasters here in the United States of America.

I'm speaking about the tornado devastation in the mid west and the flooding ravaging the states along the Mississippi River.

The town of Joplin, Missouri has a population of roughly 50,000 people. Their annual budget for the city is nearly 80 million dollars. Now because of the tornado destruction one third of the town of Joplin is now completely gone. Along with that one third of the actual city that is gone, is the one third of the tax revenue base. How is a city that has lost that much structural and revenue damage suppose to re-build? The damage there in Joplin alone is estimated at over 3 billion dollars.

The insurance companies may help some, but not nearly what they should. they will find ways so that they don't have to payout full amounts to those residents. The government has stated that they will reimburse the local governments 75% of what they need. Why only 75%?

On top of that there is talk of the insurance companies raising their rates on these same people that are in Joplin. That's right, we are sorry this happened and we will pay you alittle of what you need and owed, but then we are going to raise your insurance premiums afterwards, if we don't drop you completely (I hope you sense my sarcasm as I wrote that). If you don't think this will happen just watch and see.

The Mississippi River flood of 2011 has devastated thousands of homes, businesses, farms, schools and churches. The total cost of devastation is already in the billions and still growing. This number doesn't take into consideration the economical devastation on  local economies or taxpayers as the clean up will hit them the hardest.

An example of local damage is the city of Tunica, Mississippi. Tunica is the 3rd largest gaming(gambling) center in the United States. The city has had to close 17 of it's 19 casinos due to the flood. If these casinos can open by June, which is impossible, the revenue loss to the casinos will only be 87 million dollars not counting the property damage.

The closing of these casinos has laid off approximately 10,000 employees. Many of which are collecting unemployment which helps, but only covers a portion of what their checks were. With 10,000 people spending less money due to the lack of income it will hurt other businesses and business revenue. Businesses may have to lay off more employees due to the lack of revenue, that is due to the lack of spending, that is due to the laying off of 10,000 employees. See how this works. Not only will businesses be hurt but mortgages, rent, car payments, credit cards and other bills may not get paid just adding to the debt. The estimated lost payroll of those 10,000 employees is roughly 18 million per month.

I haven't even mentioned the gaming tax the city depends on. That is roughly 10 million dollars they will lose.

So between the local structural and economical damages, the lose of farms and the lose of local governments, where is all the aid for these people in OUR OWN COUNTRY?

We sure don't have a problem sending money overseas when some foreign country asks for our assistance. Want some proof

In 2010 we gave 2.8 billion dollars to Israel. We gave 10.2 billion dollars to Afghanistan. We gave 4.4 billion dollars to Pakistan. We gave 1.5 billion dollars to Egypt. We gave 1 billion dollars to Libya. WE gave 238 million dollars to Lebanon. We gave 67 million dollars to Yemen. We gave 35 million to Morocco. We gave 19 million to Tunisia. We gave 15 million to Oman. We gave 20 million to Bahrain. On top of those numbers in 2011 we will send 20 billion dollars to Egypt and Tunisia. Really? We give all of this  TAX PAYER MONEY to countries that do not help or like us. Really?

This data was from the Congressional Resource Service.

We seem to have no problem sending billions and billions of dollars overseas to help whomever. We don't even care if these countries harbor terrorists.  But when it comes time to help our own country in a time of need, WHERE ARE WE? We send nice little white trailers, we make comfortable tent cities for people. We load people up on buses and ship them to other cities and states. Where is the aid that we need right now right here? Why the billions for people that hate our country but we only give thousands to the people that love and protect our country. Are we there for the business man? Are we there for the school teacher? Are we there for the farmer? Are we there for the children that lost their parents? Are we there for the elderly? Are we there for the AMERICAN CITIZEN that lost everything and has nothing?

WHERE ARE WE AMERICA?

Tell me what you think about overseas spending or the disasters here or about anything you like.

Agree or disagree with me at least I learn what the PEOPLE think. L2