Crossposted from Calitics

The numbers are staggering - 1,400 wildfires burning around the state. Over 70 homes destroyed and 7,800 under threat. The entire Big Sur coast has been evacuated and nearly 1,500 homes there face ruin. President Bush has declared the fires a federal emergency and released $50 million in federal aid, announced by FEMA administrator David Paulison - surely a sign that the feds are fully engaged in the fire aid effort, right?

Not so fast. There is a difference between an "emergency," which frees up something like the $50 million in firefighting funds, and a "federal disaster" declaration, which frees up the full range of FEMA assistance to fire victims, including relocation shelters and financial assistance.

How you can help those that have been flooded out.

First an anatomy of the Great Floods of 2008, in my untrained, but observant, view.  The Floods began around Thanksgiving of 2007.  How is this??  Quite easy, that's the first snow fall we had in my part of the world.  For the next three months there was measurable snow fall every other day to every third day and snow continued into March.  In Cedar Rapids, the airport (the official measuring location and well to the south of town) measured around 63 to 64 inches of snow for the season.  

In a 'normal' year there would be between 30 and 35 inches of snow and there would be a significant January Thaw.  However, this year, the thaw didn't really occur.  We did have a brief thaw, but not a 'real' one.  Normally, at least half of the snow would melt off during the January Thaw.  Then Spring came.  And its rains.  It rained darn near every day in the months of April and May (or at least it seemed that way).

My photos of the flooding:
http://good-times.webshots.com/...

Read on....

1819 - Bicycle was patented by W.K. Clarkson, Jr. of New York City.

1958 - Vanguard SLV-2 launch failed to reach Earth orbit

COINCIDENCE? I think NOT!

Quote:
"I feel no need for any other faith than my faith in human beings. Like Confucius of old, I am so absorbed in the wonder of earth and the life upon it that I cannot think of heaven and the angels."
-- Pearl Buck

FROM THE CHURCH OF INEFFABLE STUPIDITY:

It's become a hallmark of his presidency, climbing up on some rubble or a nicely cleaned town square to give a rousing speech about fixing a place he really doesn't give two spits about. Now, with the Midwest floods, Bush is calling for OUR tax dollars to support his photo-op FEMA.

Hat tip to RSN.com:

President Bush, speaking in his weekly radio address on Sunday in the wake of disastrous floods in the Midwest over the last three weeks, requested that Congress pass an emergency spending bill that would provide ample funds for photo opportunities in Iowa as well as potential other natural disasters that strike this summer.

Crossposted from Left Toon Lane, Bilerico Project & My Left Wing


click to enlarge

I am originally from a town outside of Chicago. I feel the Midwest loyalty. It has obviously upset me that there are people I know who have lost their property or have been cut off from going to see their loved ones because of the recent flood crisis.

But, despite these inbred loyalties, there is no possible way I can say that the Midwest flooding crisis comes anywhere near the death and destruction of Hurricane Katrina. And there's no way I could conscionably say that the floods in the Midwest in any ways "dwarfed" what happened in New Orleans, which Rush Limbaugh Tuesday had the audacity of saying. Let's look at the differences: In New Orleans, you had a poverty-endemic urban center experiencing one of the most powerful natural distasters, which resulted in a death toll of nearly 1,900 deaths and $81.2 billion in damages, which the victims were given no warning to and FEMA feebly came to aid very, very late in the game; on the other hand, the Midwestern floods impacted a sprawling, white, rural population, who were given warning and immediate aid from FEMA, resulting in 24 deaths and $1.5 billion in damages.

If anyone is noticing, the massive floods occurring in the mid-west are barely getting coverage on the MSM, and some articles are being posted on news websites, but not nearly enough.  Just now, this morning, did the MSM begin extensive coverage.  Oh, was it the 20 or so levees that are breaking, perhaps?

As levee's continue to fail and limited assistance to victims is available, this tragedy has been unfolding below the radar, much to the relief of FEMA and it's Republican overseers.

FEMA has finally acknowledged what some of us in the blogging community have been pointing out for days:  those floodwaters in the rivers inundating Iowa and Illinois towns inevitably will make their way into the Mississippi River, increasing its flow and potentially overtopping or breaking 27 levees. But, FEMA isn't publicly sharing the specifics and there is little effort to get residents in the target areas prepared. As a result, we may see a repeat of the Iowa situation, where many residents were forced to evacuate with little more than the clothes on their backs.

My advice to those who live on the banks of the Mississippi:  don't wait. Get ready now.

NEW:  Army Corps of Engineers levees map with adequacy ratings (link provided by wanderindiana)

When the first real winds of Hurricane Katrina reached my home I immediately questioned  the sanity of my decision to ride out the storm rather than evacuate.  Sitting at 40 feet above sea level I had felt invincible, secure in the knowledge that no storm surge could get that high.  I realized the folly of my flawed logic when I watched a massive live oak tumble to the ground a few hundred feet from my front door.  Most of the pine trees in the area met their doom in the same manner.  For many long hours I huddled in a windowless bathroom and listened to the sounds of destruction that came from every angle, inside and outside the old house.   After the storm ended I was happy, because my house was still standing and suffered only minor damage.

I remember Fidel Castro saying to me in the early sixties that when the problem of equality had been solved, men would still face challenges from nature.

I haven't been back to Cuba since 1965, but I understand the government has implemented projects that show considerable awareness of the climate crisis, while the Bush administration has blocked scientific information about global warming.

I'm wondering whether any people are checking out the following: The media tell us that in a given place there hasn't been a similar incident in fifty years, but we would need to know, for each year, going back say fifty years, how MANY places each year have had weather incidents that break their previous records.

As floods and tornadoes batter the midwest and west of the United States, there is talk of preparedness, and FEMA, but when will the news media draw attention to the fact that an increasing number of Americans are going to be facing the same inescapability of nature's violence as people in Ethiopia, after six years of drought, or the inhabitants of the Irruwadi Delta in Myanmar?

David Letterman made an observation last night, which I paraphrase.  First it was lettuce, today it is tomatoes.

Who would have thunk it that bacon was the safest thing on a BLT?

This morning we have two diaries scrolling down with regards to the Iowa floods, and there are going to be many debates about politicization of disaster.

But our common cause is holding somebody accountable, and I suggest that all eyes and ears need to be pointed at Senators Susan Collins and Joseph Leiberman, who united to quash hearings post-Katrina, the Homeland Security Committee has been AWOL in oversight.

You see, it's this way.

No one told us anyone needed anything and we didn't ask.

That's about how it boils down in FEMA latest buterfingers handling of the much-dropped Katrina football.

Here we have a seemingly innocuous story about the housing crisis.  On the face of it, you might actually agree somewhat with the premise that Ed McMahon should not be the face of the housing crisis.  I know I do.  

I agree, Ed has a lot of resources.  But what's also true is nothing in this country addresses problems like a celebrity or a senator who feels the pinch himself. Ed McMahon probably isn't the best choice, but he's a celebrity (of sorts) and he attracts attention. So I guess I can understand the basis of his argument, as far as that goes.

Until you get to this buried nugget:

A lot of people hear the word "foreclosure" and immediately picture a family living in an alleyway or in a city shelter, but that's not usually the reality.

FEMA, your name is not mud, because I would not disgrace the life-giving dirt of our nation with your trials and odyssey of incompetence. I no longer know your true name, for it is unspeakable here in the Crescent City, but where art thou?

Didn't the blind leading the blind foretell your inactions today in Iowa? Didn't the drowning of the oracles of Voudon not tell you of what sitting on idle hands can bring? Are you seeking treasure, a leader, or both, to come save those whose charge you are meant to keep?

I beg of you FEMA, where art thou?

Did not the baptism of the Big Easy prove that meetings about meetings on how to respond will lead to a baptism of the people by fire, even though water fills the wards? Surely you understand that the fields along the Mississippi are renewed by the river, while the people are not? It is not the Ganges, though you always make it one.

Darrell in Iowa writes:

I am in Mason City.  Our levees broke Sunday morning.  Flood stage is 7 foot and waters are now at 19 feet.  Hundreds of homes and businesses are underwater.  The City's water plant was flooded and the entire city of 30,000 is without potable water.  A couple of hours ago the main electric substation flooded and failed and much of the city is without power.  People remain in flooded homes.  Early tonight I saw people wandering the streets not knowing where to go.  There are entrie areas of the city with NO emergency personnel on hand.

NOBODY from the outside has come to help.  Our local first responders are exhausted and overwhelmed.  Small rural towns downstream tonight are being devasted.  Levees everywhere are failing.  Calls for help in these small towns have been unmet.  Portions of our local guard are in Iraq.

The homeland has been left unprotected and people are suffering horribly.

Unknown to many Americans, a tempest has been raging between FEMA and the FCC over FEMA's refusal to take responsibility for  a proposed national emergency alerting system. In a fiery public rebuke of the FCC, FEMA protested that it lacked legal authorities to carry out the mission proposed for it by an FCC-led advisory committee. Then, last Friday, under pressure from multiple sources, including the Disaster Accountability Project, FEMA published a startling confession: it had the necessary authorities all along.

Below, cross-posted with permission from DAP Director Ben Smilowitz is my story of the CMAS debacle, published today on the DAP website.

Just wondering. How could I find out about the purchasing process and who made the trailers used by FEMA post Katrina?

With hurricane season beginning on June 1, the Disaster Accountability Project will be reporting this week and next on inadequacies in government preparedness. This is the first report of the series, published on the DAP Blog (author: Claire Trimble) and cross-posted here with permission.

The Sierra Club recently tested five "Katrina cottages" being used in Mississippi and found all to contain higher levels of formaldehyde than is recommended for long-term exposure by the Agency for Toxic Substances and Disease Registry.

Normal levels of indoor formaldehyde run between 10-20 parts per billion but three of the five cottages contained over 100 parts per billion. This level is even higher than the 77 parts per billion average tested in the 516 trailers this year by the CDC.