Former EPA Administrator Scott Pruitt may be gone, but he’s left a looming legacy in his wake.
Who can forget the $43,000 super-secret and ultimately completely useless telephone booth? Or his attempt to use his position to buy a gift for the woman who has everything, a Chick-Fil-a franchise?
FEMA administrator Brock Long, while admittedly a neophyte when compared to his mentor, is trying his best to live up to Pruitt’s legacy.
You would think that Long would have his hands full, what with the cataclysmic embarrassment of his department’s handling of Hurricane Maria, and the beginning of a new hurricane season, almost guaranteed to feature death and destruction as weather events become increasingly extreme.
But Long was busy, beating the heat by escaping D.C. to his North Carolina home so frequently that even DHS Secretary Kirstjen Nielsen, who oversaw the systemic separation of vulnerable migrant families, noticed.
She politely suggested he resign. He politely decided against it.
Now, skipping out on work for which you are compensated with taxpayers’ money at a time when natural disasters are becoming more fatal is definitely not cool. But it doesn’t rise to Pruitt levels of corruption.
That is, until news broke that Long has been forcing aides to shuttle him back and forth in government-issued vehicles, also dipping into the coffers to put up those aides in hotels near his home.
An internal investigation has been launched into the matter. But as Pruitt could tell you, you’re sitting pretty until the probes number in the double digits.
In sum: we have been paying for Long to hang out at home, away from the pressures of Washington, after he spearheaded a department at least partially responsible for emergency efforts after Hurricane Maria—efforts that were so severely lacking that thousands of American citizens died.
Now, Hurricane Florence is beginning to pummel the southeastern coast, promising raging winds and storm surge for days. I, for one, feel confident that Long has put in the time and work to prepare for this situation.
For proving that there actually is a worse use of government vehicles than racing, sirens a-blazing, to get a timely steak tartare from Le Dip, Brock Long is our Duke of the Week.
The orange slime gets into everything. Reading Long’s bio in wiki he has had plenty of public sector experience along with a Masters in Public Administration. So why would someone who has worked for the states of AL and GA become such a grifter? Which now makes me wonder how much,or if any, he grifted in thosw state positions?
When I was a kid I’d occasionally see a noir film on late-night TV, and they’d always freak me out. Everyone ended up dead, in jail, or severely broken in spirit, and I’d vow, sitting there alone in the pale blue glow, not to get anywhere near such doings and to live a decent honest life. That’s why jackals and parasites like this puzzle me on a certain level. Isn’t it just easier, really, to do your job and try to do it well? Simpler? Don’t you sleep better? I don’t get it, really. The cars and boats and vacation homes aren’t worth it. You ask Macbeth and see what he says.
Brock Long!?! FEMA is run by a porn star?
I don’t think they cared about this misuse of public funds, they have been fattening the scape goat for sacrificing after the first REAL (read electoral votes) emergency.
Chuckles here is the Putin’s Bitch Administration circuit breaker.
Look on the bright side. This weekend, he’s probably not having someone drive him to N.C., and probably isn’t putting his aides up in local hotels.
“But the one I like, the really cute one, is the quick, dependable chap. Nothing he won’t do for you in a pinch - so he says. Mr. Falco, whom I did not invite to sit at this table tonight, is a hungry press agent, and fully up to all the tricks of his very slimy trade.”
sweet smell of success