Wrong, the dog of many names was $600 and eats caviar every day. :p

Now, now...don't be snippy. :lol: She wasn't posting about herself, but the people she champions.

Your making the assumtion that everyone that in comfortable, has always been comfortable. Not so grasshopper, everyone has had ups and downs due to "shit happens" and/or bad choices. Some, myself included, have had to squeeze the poop out of that buffalo on the nickel for a condiment.
Because you can.....you're fortunate to have that option, many don't.
Walk, hitch a ride, bicycle, don't go......cheap.
(raising hand) No......because you're making it personal. You take any rebuttal to what you post, as a personal attack. Just because I don't agree with what you post doen't mean I think you're an idiot. I may, but if I don't say so, don't assume that I do, OK? :p

Sorry, Bruce. I have the flu which has NOT put me in a sunny mood. Point taken.

:grouphug:

It does cost billions unfortunately....millions don't go far these days (sad thought).

And your point is right on target, why build most of NO back to begin with?? Lets see, live below sea level ... in an area that can get hurricanes ... behind corp of engineers designed and built levees??? are you nuts??? Down our way we can see what the COE has done to the everglades and know that they are clueless :eek:

I think the reflex Bush-haters are making a lot of hay here by ignoring the difference between "overrun" and "breached".

"Overrun" to me suggests waves washing over the top of a levy due to storm surge (with the water able to drain away), contrasted with a levy being *breached*, a total mechanical failure with the levy no longer holding back the waters it contained before the storm, obviously a much more severe problem.

As the newsletter editor of the Phil-Mont Mobile Radio Club, I've had occasion this week to review the club archives regarding their emergency operations in the Delaware Valley during the flooding associated with Hurricane Diane in August of 1955. That storm is of particular interest to me because I remeber it quite well: I was three years old and living in New Hope PA at the time...so it left quite an impression to be persisting fifty years later.

With that for comparison, I'll keep my own counsel as to who I think is "whining" today.

I remember that storm very well, too, Maggie. It torn up New England pretty well.
When the 30 ft wide, 2 foot deep Scantic River became a half mile wide and took out the only bridge to get off our mountain, it took the Army three weeks to come and put up a Bailey bridge.
I thought that was pretty damn good considering we were just less than 100 people in no danger, we even had power, just couldn't go to work.
Meanwhile the cities and towns along the Conneticut River were really fucked up and hundreds of bridges, all over the map, were gone.
I liked Ike. :D

It only costs $billions when problems are not addressed up front. Meanwhile, I hope I have not given the impression that NYC has seriously addressed or solved their same problem. Indeed, NYC is on a top ten list of potential hurricane disaster spots. I cited the ventilation shafts for Holland and Lincoln tunnels because they are not high enough for (I think) a 10 foot surge. Since NJ has not had a hurricane in 100 years, then NJ coastline is ripe for major destruction. Again, construction that makes absolutely no sense.

Riding the Avalon causeway (20 miles south of Atlantic City) one fall when a NEer was pushing high tide higher. Those homes were cut off by flooded roads. I rode down a dry road and minutes later found myself in many inches of water. And this was not even a major storm. How can new homes be built here? Government insurance is one reason. No concept what a hurricane is really about - another reason that is too widespread along the NJ shoreline. So, for same reasons that New Orleans 9th ward is being rebuilt by George Jr, we also have $billion problems elsewhere.

Studies were done. But did we have leaders, or MBAs and lawyers where decisions need be made. One good thing about Clinton once he fixed his administration; he got problems solved. A responsible person could never say that about George Jr which is why people who talk nicely about the mental midget are driven by political agendas rather than advancing America. Only a mental midget or political corrupt officials would advocate rebuilding the 9th ward and some other dangerous parts of New Orleans.

In Upper Darby (Delaware County, Pennsylvania, adjacent to Philadelphia), there was major damage in a flood from a rainstorm a few years back. This flood was part of the Delaware River Basin. Part of this was due to the freak nature of the rainstorm which dumped 4-5 inches of rain in an hour. However, another component, if I remember correctly, had to do with the fact that the watershed in that area had been completely mismanaged. This caused the State to force the township to comply with the Watershed Act to fix the issue.

Watershed management and flood planning are very difficult for non-engineers to understand, which is why politicians never seem to have the will to address them until something goes wrong.

I agree that building NO back (below sea level) makes no sense ... and building on barrier islands as well makes no sense ... but ...

By this standard, you should remove all structures along the entire coastline of Florida (and Alabama, MS, LA, TX, GA, SC, NC, etc, etc). These areas are all in harms way and it is only a matter of time before catastrophe strikes.

BTW, history channel showed the Katrina event as a modern marvels episode last night ... they were saying it is going to cost 30+ billion just to rebuild the levees around NO ... and it would take a lot more to make it cat 5 sustainable.

Bashing Bush for this is just plain monday-morning quarterbacking

It was Bush and the Republicans who cut funding for maintaining this country's infra-structure in favor of going over and destroying the infra-structure of Iraq and giving Halliburten a pie in the sky contract to rebuild a foreign country while ours goes to hell.

If you own ANYTHING you need to maintain it. That's common sense, not Monday morning quarterbacking.

When I was in college I needed to get a ride out to Kentucky to visit my Dad one spring break. I looked at the university ride finder's board and there was a kid going to Virginia who needed someone to share driving and gas. He had a nice little red sports car that he had loaded the trunk down with cases of Coors. Typical frat rat. Well, I figured I could endure him for the 16 hours it would take to get to Lexington.

When it came my turn to drive, I noticed that the red oil check light kept flashing on. I pointed this out to him, and he said, "Ah, it always does that. Don't pay it any mind." I thought he should at least check the oil level when we stopped for gas, but he was more concerned about re-arranging his precious stash of Coors which he apparently intended to sell for some vast profit to ignorant hillbilly's in VA who didn't know about beer. Whatever.

Well, sure enough, the engine seized up completely around St. Louis, MO. You can only drive a car for so far with no oil in the engine and that little red car didn't have a drop of oil in it. My dad wired me the money for a plane ticket on into Lexington and the last I saw of the frat rat, he was sadly drinking his Coors and watching the tow truck driver haul his car off for either a new engine or a trip to the junkyard.

Somehow, I can imagine W. pulling the same trick in his younger days. :eyebrow:

New Orleans flooded because of 40 years or more of mismanagement of monies intended for disaster planning and levee improvement.

Bush is not causing milk to sour, nor is he responsible for the birth of the one-eyed kitten.

I knew I liked you Wolf! Bingo ... it is easy to blame the person in charge at the moment for a long history of mistakes ... I find Bush at fault for a lot of things these days (like what I think is a mismanaged conflict in Iraq, regardless of whether we should be there or not) but I do not hold him responsible for not rebuilding the city of NO or forceably evacuating the 20-30k people who were either too dumb or too poor to evacuate. Now he is culpable and so it the government at large (including that numbnut governor) for not having a better response AFTER the storm.

Well the levees did what they were intended to do. Levees were not constructed nor intended for this storm. Despite comments from a mental midget president, everyone expected the levees to be breached - and they were. The mental midget was told that repeatedly.

Why does George Jr declare rebuilding where no rebuilding should occur? That is classic mismanagement. 85% of all problems are directly traceable to top management. That is a mental midget president who would rebuild homes below sea level AND exposed to severe hurricane disaster. The mental midget president only demonstrates why we end up spending $billion later to fix problems that never should have existed.

So where did the mental midget go as a predicted New Orleans disaster happened? He did a campaign fund raiser in CA. Now that is total mismanagement. The levees were not mismanaged. But the president is a classic example of mismanagement. A CA fund raiser that weekend! I believe it was to Orange County. Never for one minute say good things about the mental midget president and then call yourself a patriotic American. A president is so anti-Amerian as to even lie about the levees. So naive as to instead go to CA on a fund raiser when Brownie was desperately calling for assistance from everyone. His pleas to George Jr are even on video tape.

That is where mismanagement was. So badly mismanged that George Jr tried to lie - decalare the levees would do what they were not constructed to do. The levees did as intended. To find mismanagement now ongoing, 85% of problems are directly traceable to this president. He would even rebuild the Ninth Ward because his own popularity is more important than America.

When leadership was most needed, George Jr went on a campaign fund raiser to CA. Show me how that is responsible management. When Brownie was begging for top management to cut through red tape - ie let the Bataan participate in the rescue - where was George Jr? New Orleans is but another trophy in George Jr's trophy case.

Can you prove that? :lol: