By: Russ Burlingame on December 7, 2012
Remember back when the Department of Homeland Security did those zombie apocalypse-themed emergency demonstrations, trading on the popularity of AMC’s The Walking Dead to connect with audiences and communicate a point about emergency preparedness?
Well, those demonstrations are among the issues that Oklahoma’s Republican Senator Tom Coburn blames for the spiraling national debt and the looming economic standoff between his party and U.S. President Barack Obama.
The Senator expressed an opinion that “waste, incompetence and stupidity” are pervasive in the federal government, singling out the zombie apocalypse program in particular.
The program that hosted the zombie apocalypse demonstration was one of a number of programs around the country funded with Department of Homeland Security grants, of which Coburn wrote in a report, “That is $7 billion that your kids and my kids are going to pay back is something that we got no increased security for,” Coburn said. ”I don’t care if you use zombie apocalypse, what is the metric that said this was an effective use of the money.”
