Well, mostly. U.S. Sen. Conrad Burns, Republican of Montana, had something else to offer the Virginians.
After days spent in the heat and flames of the Billings' fires, the Augusta firefighters were finally on their way home, sitting in the lounge of the local airport, waiting to board their flight to Virginia. That's when the senator showed up.
Was he there to thank them? Maybe he wanted to give them a plaque or something. Politicians do that sort of thing, especially when there's an election coming up.
Oh, no. Burns stormed up to the Virginia crew and cussed them.
"See that guy over there?" the senator said, according to a subsequent report of the incident. "He hasn't done a [expletive deleted] thing. They sit around. I saw it up on the Wedge fire and in northwestern Montana some years ago. It's wasteful. You probably paid that guy $10,000 to sit around. It's gotta change."