Hurricane season has this funny knack of bringing people together. Its ruthless devastation doesn’t give a damn about the colour of your skin, who you pray to or how much money you’ve got in the bank. Mother Nature’s humbling fury forces us to cast aside our petty differences, ditch partisan politics and showcase the unbending unity and bountiful integrity that form the crux of America’s collective identity.

That’s the way most of us feel, anyway. But Republicans? Not so much.

You see, over the course of the last few decades, America’s right-wing has been guided by a single, coldblooded mantra: Big government must die.

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Grandstanding Republicans tirelessly campaign to eradicate lavish federal spending – and like the angry Jeffersonians of yesteryear, a painfully large number of voters genuinely do want federal powers diminished so that each state is left to its own legislative devices.

The idea is simple enough: if something expensive needs sorted in Vermont, it shouldn’t be hardworking Kansans funding it. Proper right-wingers think everybody should mow their own backyard, and if you squint really hard, you can almost see where they’re coming from. People don’t trust big government anyway, right?

That’s why doggish Republicans like Texas Senator and bitter Trump frenemy Ted Cruz have never been super fussed about sharing resources when it comes to hurricane season.

In 2012, Cruz and his GOP buddies scoffed at calls to send federal aid to the victims of Hurricane Sandy which hit the East Coast, devastating New York and New Jersey. That might sound a little bit cruel and un-American, given that the unprecedented natural disaster caused around $65bn worth of damage, destroyed 650,000 homes and killed 72 people.

But that wasn’t really a Texas problem, now was it?

Cruz and 23 other Republicans did their damnedest to block a Congressional support package to help rebuild America’s East Coast – arguing it was money the Government just didn’t have, and would go on to “fund pork projects” they didn’t like.

Shape Created with Sketch. The aftermath of Hurricane Harvey Show all 19 left Created with Sketch. right Created with Sketch. Shape Created with Sketch. The aftermath of Hurricane Harvey 1/19 A tattered U.S. flag damaged in Hurricane Harvey, flies in Conroe, Texas Reuters 2/19 Lisa Rehr holds her four-year old son Maximus, after they lost their home to Hurricane Harvey, as they await to be evacuated with their belongings from Rockport, Texas Reuters 3/19 People line up for food as others rest at the George R. Brown Convention Center AP Photo/LM Otero 4/19 Volunteers with The American Red Cross register evacuees at the George R. Brown Convention Center Reuters/Nick Oxford 5/19 Soldiers with the Texas Army National Guard help the residents of Cyprus Creek Reuters 6/19 Residents wade through floodwater Reuters/Nick Oxford 7/19 Residents walk along the flooded roadway of Texas 249 as they evacuate their adjacent neighborhoods EPA 8/19 A man floats past a truck submerged on a freeway flooded by Tropical Storm Harvey on Sunday AP 9/19 People are rescued by airboat as they evacuate from flood waters from Hurricane Harvey in Dickinson, Texas Reuters 10/19 James Archiable carries his bike through the flooded intersection at Taylor and Usenet near downtown Houston, Texas EPA 11/19 A massive sinkhole opened up on a motorway in Rosenburg, a city 25 miles southwest of Houston, Texas Rosenberg Police 12/19 People are rescued from flood waters from Hurricane Harvey in an armored police mine-resistant ambush protected vehicle in Dickinson, Texas Reuters 13/19 People are rescued from flood waters from Hurricane Harvey on a boat in Dickinson, Texas Reuters 14/19 Evacuees are airlifted in a US Coast Guard helicopter after flooding due to Hurricane Harvey inundated neighborhoods in Houston, Texas Reuters 15/19 Evacuees leave a US Coast Guard helicopter after being rescued from flooding due to Hurricane Harvey in Houston, Texas Reuters 16/19 Residents look on at a submerged motorway during a break in the rain in Houston, Texas EPA 17/19 People photograph the submerged motorway interchange EPA 18/19 Debris lies on the ground after a building was destroyed by Hurricane Harvey in Aransas Pass, Texas AP 19/19 Dominic Dominguez searches for his boat in a boat storage facility that was heavily damaged by Hurricane Harvey near Rockport, Texas EPA 1/19 A tattered U.S. flag damaged in Hurricane Harvey, flies in Conroe, Texas Reuters 2/19 Lisa Rehr holds her four-year old son Maximus, after they lost their home to Hurricane Harvey, as they await to be evacuated with their belongings from Rockport, Texas Reuters 3/19 People line up for food as others rest at the George R. Brown Convention Center AP Photo/LM Otero 4/19 Volunteers with The American Red Cross register evacuees at the George R. Brown Convention Center Reuters/Nick Oxford 5/19 Soldiers with the Texas Army National Guard help the residents of Cyprus Creek Reuters 6/19 Residents wade through floodwater Reuters/Nick Oxford 7/19 Residents walk along the flooded roadway of Texas 249 as they evacuate their adjacent neighborhoods EPA 8/19 A man floats past a truck submerged on a freeway flooded by Tropical Storm Harvey on Sunday AP 9/19 People are rescued by airboat as they evacuate from flood waters from Hurricane Harvey in Dickinson, Texas Reuters 10/19 James Archiable carries his bike through the flooded intersection at Taylor and Usenet near downtown Houston, Texas EPA 11/19 A massive sinkhole opened up on a motorway in Rosenburg, a city 25 miles southwest of Houston, Texas Rosenberg Police 12/19 People are rescued from flood waters from Hurricane Harvey in an armored police mine-resistant ambush protected vehicle in Dickinson, Texas Reuters 13/19 People are rescued from flood waters from Hurricane Harvey on a boat in Dickinson, Texas Reuters 14/19 Evacuees are airlifted in a US Coast Guard helicopter after flooding due to Hurricane Harvey inundated neighborhoods in Houston, Texas Reuters 15/19 Evacuees leave a US Coast Guard helicopter after being rescued from flooding due to Hurricane Harvey in Houston, Texas Reuters 16/19 Residents look on at a submerged motorway during a break in the rain in Houston, Texas EPA 17/19 People photograph the submerged motorway interchange EPA 18/19 Debris lies on the ground after a building was destroyed by Hurricane Harvey in Aransas Pass, Texas AP 19/19 Dominic Dominguez searches for his boat in a boat storage facility that was heavily damaged by Hurricane Harvey near Rockport, Texas EPA

Say what you want about Cruz lacking any sort of human empathy or civic pride, but at least the guy’s got principles. Here’s a man who always sticks to his guns, no matter the cost. After all, if you just dish out federal money all willy-nilly, how will states ever learn to feed themselves? That's no way to govern.

Unless of course you really want to have your cake and eat it, too. And god knows Ted Cruz loves a fat slice of cake.

Earlier this week, the senator did a complete U-turn, begging Donald Trump “to provide any and all emergency protective measures available” so that Texans could repair the damage caused by Hurricane Harvey.

That’s right: the exact same Republican who refused to help his fellow Americans pick up the pieces in the wake of Hurricane Sandy is now demanding big government swoop in and use federal tax dollars to tidy up Texas.

You couldn’t make this stuff up if you tried – and if it wasn’t for the fact that people are genuinely suffering because of this Harvey business, the karma of it all would taste so, so sweet.

Unfortunately, people are suffering – and thank God not every politician is a self-centred little hypocrite like Ted Cruz. East-coast lawmakers and the “snowflakes” they represent have already agreed to send billions in federal disaster relief. And although it won’t replace what’s been lost, it should go a long way towards helping Texans rebuild and move forward.

More important still, it’s exposed a deep crack in America’s political psyche that we can’t keep sweeping under the rug – and it’s not the role of big government in society.

Republicans like Ted Cruz love to prattle on about the horrid self-entitlement of millennial Democrats, yet refuse to accept their political agenda is being poisoned by its own sick sense of selfishness and hypocrisy. They’re not willing to lend a helping hand unless they know it will generate big returns, and they don’t care about other people’s problems.

That’s not what America is about at all. Hell, it’s not even what the GOP is all about. And so we’ve got to band together and nip this in the bud now – because if this warped sense of “me before you” is allowed to spread, I don’t even want to imagine what’ll happen the next time hurricane season hits.

We’ll tell you what’s true. You can form your own view.

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