I think that everyone would agree that having a fire department is an essential governmental service. However, there is no way that we can expect to see the same level of fire protection that we have had in the past with the huge cuts in government budgets.
A report tonight from CBSMinnesota (here) indicates that Minneapolis will be laying off 10 firefighters as a result of drastic reductions in state aid to cities in Minnesota. These cuts would be far worse except for the fact that Minnesota Governor Mark Dayton is a Democrat with a backbone and a true sense of fairness. While he was forced to make cuts he didn't like, he fought for fairness and true liberal values. Nevertheless, we will have more unemployed people and less fire protection here in the City of Minneapolis because of budget cuts.
Why is it that people think that government can provide the services they want without proper funding?
Thanks for reading and please comment,
The Unabashed Liberal
A couple days ago, I convinced a very conservative friend that lowering the age for retirement was a better fix the current job crisis and for social security than raising the retirement age. I think that is a harder thing to do than to convince people we need firefighters. At least in theory.
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