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Trump takes aim at firefighting jobs with largest federal cut in a decade
Flashback: 'Make America Rake Again': Confusion in Finland over Trump's wildfire comments
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Bernardo de La Paz
(48,935 posts)Response to EarlG (Original post)
Initech This message was self-deleted by its author.
keithbvadu2
(36,636 posts)Initech
(100,027 posts)Paper Towel: The clean up method of choice for disaster areas when you simply don't give a fuck!
calimary
(81,085 posts)Throwing paper towel rolls at the Puerto Ricans.
I suspect he thought he was trying to help The Help. After all, I suspect he assumed - hey, my cleaning crews come from here. Ill toss em some free paper towels! Isnt that so wonderful and generous of me? See what a good overlord I am?!
Saviolo
(3,278 posts)They'll be able to send more prisoners in to fight wildfires as the for-profit prisons make some plum government contracts to fight the wildfires with prisoners who will be paid a pittance to put their lives at risk. Not like it's a new thing:
https://www.vox.com/2018/8/9/17670494/california-prison-labor-mendocino-carr-ferguson-wildfires
The California Department of Corrections and Rehabilitation (CDCR) recently boasted about the use of prison labor for firefighting on Twitter: Today, more than 2,000 volunteer inmate firefighters, including 58 youth offenders, are battling wildfire flames throughout CA. Inmate firefighters serve a vital role, clearing thick brush down to bare soil to stop the fires spread.
The tweet drew some surprise and protest. (The first response as of Thursday morning was, Wait. What?)
But Californias use of prison labor to fight wildfires is far from new. As Annika Neklason reported for the Atlantic, the program goes back to World War II:
Inmates have been fighting Californias wildfires since the 1940s, when the state first called up prisoners to replace men assisting the war effort. More than 3,700 men and womenand even some juvenile offendersnow voluntarily serve on the force. Collectively, they make up roughly a third of the states wildfire-fighting personnel, and work an average of 10 million hours each year responding to fires and other emergencies and handling community-service projects like park maintenance, reforestation, and fire and flood protection.
jmbar2
(4,859 posts)It offered a transitional experience for young adults who were mostly not college material to get exposure to sustainable jobs, union apprenticeships, and self-employment skills, as well as quasi-military self-discipline.
They took the lost souls who did not have the knowledge yet to be adults, and finished raising them with skills, self-confidence, and habits that any employer would value. They transform many lives.
It is a crying shame to defund this program!
IronLionZion
(45,380 posts)Asshole