Conrads Burns on firefighters

iaafan · Post by **iaafan** » Thu Jul 27, 2006 11:59 am

The firefighters (Hotshots) around Billings aren't doing a very good job, according to Conrad Burns.

http://missoulian.com/articles/2006/07/ ... news04.txt

Post by **SonomaCat** » Thu Jul 27, 2006 12:10 pm

Kind of sounds like the people in N.O. during Katrina, doesn't it?

iaafan · Post by **iaafan** » Thu Jul 27, 2006 3:01 pm

Maybe it's just me, but I thought it strange that a US Senator would enter into this kind of thing in an airport in his home state. Couple that with the fact that most, if not all, of these fires are under control or out. It's hard to tell where he's coming from on this.

tetoncat · Post by **tetoncat** » Thu Jul 27, 2006 3:08 pm

There are many issues that occur on these large fires. In most instances when you talk to the ranchers and landowners about it they resent how the paid firefighters and their bosses run the fire. It because such a logistical nightmare and they follow very strict guidelines and protocol. This is not necesarily a bad thing but hard for the landowners to understand. i have seen many instances where if left to the local firefighters and landowners to coordinate with a little assistance from the state and fed agencies the fire would have been out much sooner.

mslacat · Post by **mslacat** » Thu Jul 27, 2006 3:37 pm

Whether the fire fighting effort were handled in the right way or not, berating the "hot shot" crews is like walking up to a bunch of our foot soldiers in Afghanistan and bitching at them for doing their job poorly because we have not captured Bin laden yet.

If you have ever seen a hot shot crew in action they are VERY hard working, pretty well trained safety workers who put their lives in danger for very little pay. They do not debate policy, they do the hard work. They deserve better.

info197176 · Post by **info197176** » Thu Jul 27, 2006 3:46 pm

It's interesting that Conrad would be bitching at a bunch of kids that work their asses off for 8 bucks an hour....real classy.

longhorn_22 · Post by **longhorn_22** » Thu Jul 27, 2006 3:50 pm

info197176 wrote:It's interesting that Conrad would be bitching at a bunch of kids that work their asses off for 8 bucks an hour....real classy.

Kind of sounds like every job that deals with the public in Billings. Everyone here bitches about anything and everything.

RyeCat · Post by **RyeCat** » Fri Jul 28, 2006 2:14 am

This is not looking better today

http://www.billingsgazette.net/articles ... -burns.txt

iaafan · Post by **iaafan** » Fri Jul 28, 2006 8:30 am

RyeCat wrote:This is not looking better today

http://www.billingsgazette.net/articles ... -burns.txt

Not better indeed. It's bad enough to rip on firefighters in general, but this bunch served at the 9/11 disaster in NYC. The person that went to meet with Burns said something to the effect that she left a lot of their conversation out since she just wanted it to be a constructive report. So if that's the case, you have to wonder what else he had to say. I'm sure she deleted all his expletives.

Billings_Griz · Post by **Billings_Griz** » Fri Jul 28, 2006 10:04 am

longhorn_22 wrote:
info197176 wrote:It's interesting that Conrad would be bitching at a bunch of kids that work their asses off for 8 bucks an hour....real classy.
Kind of sounds like every job that deals with the public in Billings. Everyone here bitches about anything and everything.

Agreed, our baseball field sucks, we need a new one.

tetoncat · Post by **tetoncat** » Fri Jul 28, 2006 10:21 am

Or she deleted any positives that might have been said and just commented on the negative parts of the encounter. It is an election year by the way and very interesting that the story broke in the Missoula newspaper when the incident occured in Billings.

Post by **SonomaCat** » Fri Jul 28, 2006 10:32 am

tetoncat wrote:Or she deleted any positives that might have been said and just commented on the negative parts of the encounter. It is an election year by the way and very interesting that the story broke in the Missoula newspaper when the incident occured in Billings.

Given the tone of the direct quotes that have been printed, do you really think there is some hidden "positive" aspect of this conversation that took place between Burns and the firefighters?

It sounds like the whole incident was a case of speaking before thinking ... and his apology seems appropriate.

iaafan · Post by **iaafan** » Fri Jul 28, 2006 10:57 am

tetoncat wrote:Or she deleted any positives that might have been said and just commented on the negative parts of the encounter. It is an election year by the way and very interesting that the story broke in the Missoula newspaper when the incident occured in Billings.

The Missoulian State Bureau is Lee Newspapers, which includes Billings, so I'd imagine that a Lee reporter (Gazette) wrote that story. I'm guessing the same story ran in Billings and the writer was down as a Gazette State Bureau staffer. ???

mslacat · Post by **mslacat** » Fri Jul 28, 2006 10:59 am

Maybe I am dence, but could someone from the right wing side explain to me what Burns was trying to say here, and the concetion between this and the "war on terror"

The he here is Burns:

"He replied, `We're fighting a war on terror and we're concerned about safety there too, but we're out there doing it,"' Rosenthal wrote.

Post by **SonomaCat** » Fri Jul 28, 2006 11:05 am

mslacat wrote:Maybe I am dence, but could someone from the right wing side explain to me what Burns was trying to say here, and the concetion between this and the "war on terror"

The he here is Burns:

"He replied, `We're fighting a war on terror and we're concerned about safety there too, but we're out there doing it,"' Rosenthal wrote.

The connections is this ... whenever a Republican politician is caught in a situation where they don't know what they are doing, what they are saying, or particularly if they know that what they've previously said or done was outright wrong, they are trained (by observing others higher up in the party do it) to say "War on Terror," and the theory goes that everyone will get scared, clutch their children close, and not question them on that point any further.

It used to work, too, but I think, as with everything, if it is overused, it loses it's effectiveness. If it hadn't already jumped the shark, this quote definitely did the trick.

hokeyfine · Post by **hokeyfine** » Fri Jul 28, 2006 1:43 pm

I Think if you say "WMD" you get a similar response. It reiterates the pavlov dog theory.

ChiOCat · Post by **ChiOCat** » Fri Jul 28, 2006 2:00 pm

Left or right, what he did was wrong!

Homeowners and ranchers easily forget that the firefighteres are trying to save the largest number of ranches/homes they can. Unfortunately that means theirs may not be one of them. It's their right to bitch about it. But for the senator to take those complaints to the individual firefighters, who came to our state to help and succesfully controled the fire is the wrong approach to that.

tetoncat · Post by **tetoncat** » Fri Jul 28, 2006 3:31 pm

I don't think any of us would appreciate his comments, escpecially if we were just coming off the lines. We do need to remember that they called it a confrontation, which means there were two sides, and with him supporting his constituents, (ranchers he had just met with) he chose a wrong time and group to vent his frustrations that he had just heard about. On the same note, a confrontation means that there were comments back and we are not hearing any of them. Maybe the firemen just sat there, but i doubt it. Hotshots are many times college age kids who would not put up with any crap being talked about them. Like i said before, the management of these fires leaves much to be desired and this is from someone who has been on them on several different occasions. They do not look at for the property owner and take little input from them or the local firefighters. The group Mr. Burns addressed was the wrong ones to attack, but I understand his concerns.

Post by **SonomaCat** » Fri Jul 28, 2006 4:37 pm

Just to go down the semantics path ... I can confront somebody without them saying or doing anything in response. So I'm not sure the use of the term "confrontation" by the newspaper suggests that there was a disrespectful response from any of the firefighters ... although he certainly deserved one.

iaafan · Post by **iaafan** » Fri Jul 28, 2006 5:34 pm

Well I hope that the firefighters did try to defend themselves. They should have and if they did it only speaks to the level that Burns was trying to bully his way around.

Burns seems to be thinking this: "I'm the Senator that my party overwhelmingly wants to maintain this seat (his opponent in the primary wasn't even allowed equal time at Republican functions) even though I'm all wrapped up in the Abramoff scandal and I'm a racist, so I guess I can say whatever I want to whoever I want."

If the management of the fires leaves a lot to be desired, then Burns (since he was capable of getting elected) should have the sense to take the issue to the people in upper management, unless those people have a close tie to his office. If so, he doesn't want to say they are the ones screwing up. But that is assuming that anything is screwed up at all. It may just be the nature of the beast that is a fire or hurricane or tornado.

In the end I just can't imagine anyone being this stupid and having this kind of nerve. But I guess they go hand-in-hand and Burns has shown throughout his career that he's not very diplomatic. Leave off the lomatic part and there you have Burns.