Priorities, Social and Otherwise

Here on the Gulf Coast, we are in the heart of the hurricane season.  Almost exactly 12 years ago Hurricane Katrina came ashore, with a devastating impact.  The loss of life in New Orleans was almost unimaginable.  The levy systems failed, the drains failed, and the pumps failed as the city was submerged beneath the storm surge.  The local government failed as well.  Their preparations proved woefully inadequate, as they waited too long to order evacuations, and were ill prepared for the devastation wrought by nature or the recovery efforts that would be required.  Louisiana accounted for over 1,500 of the 1,800 total fatalities.  A year after Katrina they were still finding bodies that had been trapped in the attics of flooded homes.

Following the disaster, as there always is, there was a series of government investigations to determine why so much had gone so horribly wrong.  Why had the levies and floodwalls of New Orleans failed?  Why had the government response been so inadequate?  Why had so many died?

The Army Corps of Engineers was responsible for the construction and maintenance of the protective system that proved totally inadequate for the task it was designed for.  The investigations determined the government, in an effort to save money, had shorted some of the design requirements and the system was not as strong or robust as it was claimed to be.  The human decision points were late, and the city response was slow, as they underestimated the force of the storm.

The Federal Government was condemned by the press and political opposition, for its slow response to the disaster.  Of course, there were public floggings of the guilty bureaucrats, and the Army Corps of Engineers set out to build a better system of levies, floodwalls, and pumping stations to keep the city dry.  But what about the local leadership?  What about those who failed to maintain their part of the system?

Millions, and perhaps billions, has been spent in post-Katrina repairs and recovery.  Donations by the millions went into helping the poorest rebuild the homes destroyed by the storms.  The Army worked for years rebuilding the floodwalls, levies, and pumping stations to insure they would not be overwhelmed again.  But at the end of the day the primary custodian of the overall system is the city itself.

So here we are with another rain maker storm approaching, and is New Orleans ready?  I think we can safely say it’s not.  On August 10^th, the Governor of Louisiana declared a state of emergency because the city could not handle the heavy rains of that week.  It appears the city has failed to maintain the pumps and drainage systems needed to move water out of the city.  The story in the Toronto Sun[i] suggests the city isn’t able to handle even the thunderstorms that frequent this area in the summer time, so a major storm coming ashore will, undoubtedly, overwhelm the ill-maintained system.

So where is the public spot light on the local government, asking why they have allowed this?  The spot light will come, it will come when the loss of life occurs, but I am willing to bet it will be again focused on the federal government, rather than the corruption, and failures of a local government that seems more interested in enriching themselves than protecting its citizens. 

Let’s hope and pray for those who have placed their faith in the city council and mayor that they and their homes are not destroyed this year.

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[i] Toronto Sun, 08/10/2017, State of Emergency Declared in New Orleans as Flood Threat Increases

Whether or Not, It’s the Weather

The weather this morning is gray and overcast.  It is as if it senses the mood of the nation, and has decided the sun wasn’t going to get out of bed and brighten everyone’s mood.  Rather the sun would lounge around in its night coat, and shuffle through the day in its slippers while it sipped a cup of decaffeinated Joe, that was becoming too cool, too fast.

Maybe this will all change later, after the sun has had a chance to consider the opportunities and its mood improves, but I’m guessing not!

On a related note, the social media weather experts tell me there are no hurricanes in the immediate future, but they (the meteorologists) are keeping a watchful, or hopeful, eye out for stuff that could develop if the weather changes.  I believe I’ve moved beyond the idea that weatherman/women have our best interests at heart, and think of them as just people who have a really big office pool going on who will predict the next major weather catastrophe.  It seems more like Mega Ball than actual forecasting.

As a number of political analysts have predicted; at least ½ of the nation will wake up tomorrow feeling they have been “sucker punched” by whoever wins this election.  While I would like to feel hopeful the next President will be better than the last one or two I am not holding my breath.  The forecast for the next four years is for turbulence, intransigence, favoritism, and political graft. It really doesn’t matter which candidate wins, the top 1% will get richer, the bottom 99% will not, because integrity, honesty, and fair play does not matter to the average voter, so it won’t matter to the politicians.

The day is gray, and all the leaves are brown.

 

Waiting for the Storm

As a senior in high school we studied, and I think performed, at least one of the two scenes from the Samuel Beckett play “Waiting for Godot.” For those unfamiliar with this work, the title character never appears, but there is a running dialogue between the two characters, Vladimir and Estragon, who are waiting for him.

This week promises to be like that play.  There is a low pressure area in the Gulf of Mexico, which according to the weather people last Friday is supposed to dump epic, apocalyptic (cats and dogs sleeping together), and massive amounts of rain on me all week.

I’ve prepared for this, but as each hour passes the forecasters push the expected arrival back, and thankfully, the total amounts down. I think we need to come up with some kind of confidence rating scale for these long-range forecasts.

Something akin to the this.

Right now I am 100% confident it is raining

Over the next hour it will, in all probability, rain  

Over the next six hours I am pretty sure it will rain

Over the next 24 hours I think it will rain in this area somewhere

Over the next 7 to 10 days… look at the pretty colors on the weather map.