Friday, June 02, 2006

Pondering levees...

June 1 was the official beginning of hurricane season and it feels like that shit just ended. For some, the 2005 hurricane season isn’t over by a long shot.

Watching the news a bitch was struck by how completely out of fucking touch some people are. How the hell can the advice be to get 3 days worth of hurricane preparedness shit together when most folks are living paycheck to paycheck? And aren’t there still people in the Gulf region living in trailers…in unlivable houses…in chaos?

Lawd, have mercy.

While indulging in a good moment of complete disgust, a bitch actually picked up some shit a talking head was saying about the Army Corps of Engineers and the admission that the levees protecting New Orleans may have been engineered incorrectly. My first instinct was to curse them, but then…well, it’s kind of comforting to have someone involved in the shit spiral that is levee based protection admit that they fucked up.

Listening to the ongoing debate over all things engineering and levee related reminded this bitch of economics. Specifically, the massive pile of stank bullshit economics that gets hurled out towards the citizen masses during political campaigns.

After 230 years one would think that economists would have latched onto some fucking consistent theory regarding what makes the economy thrive and what makes it all go to shit.

Mercy.

They probably have figured it out, but if you listen to the debates soon to come you’ll begin to wonder if folks are living in the same country. The systems won’t jive, the analysis of the current situation will be stone crazy and both sides will have some multi-degreed expert stating his or her case with authority.

Sadly, this bitch now considers it all bullshit…if it walks like it and talks like it, then fuck it all the hell.

Which brings me back to engineering and the levees. The multiple departments, organizations and crowds of engineers are all stating different and conflicting shit…with authority.

It would be bullshit…it walks like it and talks like it…but people’s lives are at stake.

Nope, in the case of engineering miscalculations and pontifications a bitch is declaring gross negligence.

Catch that knee before it jerks…listen to the debate a while…and ask yourself if you’d sleep well in a house built on land protected by any levee built by those crazy talking and in love with argument for argument’s sake people, who willfully contradicting each other only to hear the sound of their own voice and talk in terms of 'a wide range of errors' instead of acknowledge the body count that resulted from those errors.

Mmmhmmm.

Thought so.

7 comments:

Anonymous said...

You are so spot on. Here in Florida, south of Orlando, is Osceola County and Kissimmee. Entire neighborhoods still have blue tarps from the 2004 season. I was one of those people until a few months ago, when I sold my very damaged home. I had no insurance, it was canceled when State Farm realized it was a wood structure over 50 years old. FEMA, well I was very fortunate in that respect, I recieved assistance to find someplace to live and replacements for many damaged items. I know no on in MS, LA, AL & TX are anywhere near ready, and with us here in FL still in 2004. This season could be far more dangerous. Insurance Companies make threats to raise rates upward of 70% or abandon the state all together. Some kind of insurance needs to be handled by the government, through FEMA, but only if it seperated from Homeland Security...ugh. I'll be stocking up on my own supplies...Vodka, cran, cran grape...ambien.

Anonymous said...

Speaking as an engineer, we as human beings are capable of great works. Look at the Soviet Union - they accomplished almost everything they set out to do, including some engineering works that stagger the imagination.

But - we as human beings don't know as much as we like to think, and there also seems to be an underlying amount of uncertainty in the universe that steps in and kicks us in the knees whenever we get too arrogant. The Soviet Union provides good examples (N-1 moon rocket? Oops, there goes our entire space program in one explosion. Chernobyl of course), but we have several of our own not least the New Orleans levees.

But don't get too arrogant yourself: those levees on either side of the Missouri (say north of Hwy 40) are built the same way as the ones in New Orleans. Let's us have a couple of hurricanes come up the Mississippi River valley and give us another 1993, and we'll see what happens to OUR regional economy.

Cranky

Shark-Fu said...

Tell it, Cranky!

A bitch is all too aware of my multi-river levee vulnerable self...shudder.

Shit, when it rains for two days this bitch gets nervous.

Lawd, hurricanes coming up the valley! Talk about the end of days...

nolapoet said...

My poor city... the only thing keeping Noo Awlins and the regionin danger is a lack of political WILL to fix this shit.

Anonymous said...

Damn gurl, you be wrappin that shit up with a tight ass bow! Mmmhmmm. That's what I say.

AOB said...

AWWWWW...and I thought you were talking about the FAA.

Anonymous said...

Keep in mind, two of the hurricanes last year did make it up to St. Louis. One sat just below tropical storm level right over St. Genevive for 3 days, blasting the area with rain the whole time. I happened to be camping in the area at the time ;-(

Two years ago I was involved in cleaning up the mess at a site in Pittsburgh, when for the second time in 3 weeks the remains of a Gulf hurricane made its way up the Ohio valley dumping first 10 and then 14 inches of rain on the metro area. Let's just say that no one up in the Alleghenies 1100 miles north of the Gulf coast expected to be affected by hurricanes, but the valleys around there did not take kindly to 24 inches of rain in 3 weeks.

Cranky

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