In US Cities Face Up to Massive Cuts a young autistic boy is reported to have died in a fire that was possibly started by a stray cigarette. It would have been a routine fire to extinguish in times gone by.

But not now. Not when the government public services have been under assault by full-bore nutjobs and hate-filled republicans. They have simply laid siege to your government services and this is one of the consequences:

The inferno should have been a routine job for Philadelphia's 1,900-strong fire brigade, the fifth biggest force in the US which handles four major incidents daily. But the nearest fire station to Frank's house, just two blocks away, was unavailable after a so-called "brown out". Firemen at the station, barely 90 seconds' walk from the site of the fire, were on a maintenance run after a 12-hour shutdown, part of a rota of rolling daily closures imposed by city authorities grappling with a wrenching deficit of $2.4bn (£1.5bn) over five years. "Everybody was running around trying to get the little boy out – he was stuck on the second floor," said a distraught neighbour, Virginia DeShields, whose house was damaged by smoke. She believes the boy might have been saved if the local firehouse had been open: "It's all right if you want to cut. But you shouldn't cut where lives are concerned. You can cut the prison system, cut the libraries, anywhere. But don't cut people who save lives."

The firehouse was closed. They were trying to save money in the city because Republicans want to dismantle America.

Note the second bolded bit about the lady agreeing with government cuts but not with cutting to essential services. This is a measure of how successful the GOP, the official religion party of the Cutters, are with their media campaign to make people think up is down and that black is white.

The cutters want to cut ALL services (including Social Security) and we have heard THEM want to cut fire, police, and we all know how they feel about health care. The cutters have a nationwide network of radio shows and access to a corporate-controlled media that is friendly to their mission, so the average American - who doesn't look deeply into things claimed on the tv and other American media - tends to agree with all they have heard. Rightwing Propaganda is so pervasive and so successful average people believe its OK to gut your government services.

Republican anti-government hysteria contributed to the death of that boy and is wreaking havoic across the country.

The linked article provides some more examples, as if you really need more examples of the damage these Un-American, mouthbreathing, knuckledragging racist homophobic illiterate numbskulls want to make happen and does a fair job, but it does overlook the odd willingness of a lot of people to simply put up with this like it is a normal state of affairs.

That is Mission Accomplished for Grover Norquist and Republican/Rightwing propaganda.