Dan Sobien, president of National Weather Service Employees Organization, on the impact of the Republican budget cuts:
NOAA has put together part of a contingency plan to handle such a massive cut and while it spares tsunami buoys, all other coastal buoys are non funded and there will be furloughs at both Tsunami Warning Centers (TWC). These furloughs will take away the TWC’s ability to upgrade tsunami models and will put considerable stress on watchstanders ability to react. This plan unfortunately only account for about half the cuts that need to be made, about 60 of the 126 million that needs to be cut. While today’s disaster is of particular concern to everyone, we are just now entering tornado season and soon will be hurricane season and our organization firmly believes any effort to defund and dismantle our nations early warning system for all disasters is very unwise.
Have any Republicans stepped up and answered for their proposed cuts to NOAA? And, by the way, have any Republicans -- or the president, for that matter -- commented on the "safety" of nuclear power plants?