"It's Bush's fault." That's what we were hearing this week about the California wildfires. They were exacerbated due to global warming, which wouldn't be happening if President Bush made us implement the Kyoto Protocol we were told. The disaster response wasn't fast enough. California's national guard troops were all over in Iraq. California's national guard equipment was over in Iraq.
We now know that global warming had little or nothing to do with the wildfires that seem to happen every year in southern California. We now know that the Santa Ana winds that helped to spread the wildfires happen every year, and that there's nothing unusual about how dry those winds were.
Federal relief efforts began within a day of the disaster. California has 20,000 active national guard troops and only 2,000 of them are overseas. The other 18,000 are still in California. Not only that but California actually has more equipment than they can use, both their own, and that supplied by the federal government and from other states.
It also turns out that the wildfires were set. That's right, it was arson. Several arson suspects are in custody, but the last I heard none of them had been linked to the wildfires yet.
About the only thing I've heard about poor response had to do with state regulations regarding the helicopters used to scoop up water from rivers and dump it on fires. Apparently they had to have spotter planes as escorts and that caused delays. State officials though have said that bureaucracy did not get in the way of the response, it was just high winds that made it dangerous to fly.
As I was driving home from work last night, I was listening to re-runs of some of the day's talk radio shows. I had the opportunity to listen to an exchange between Gov. Schwarzenegger and a reporter. She kept pushing him to find something wrong with the federal response, but he was having none of it.
The latest news I've heard on this is that six people are dead, millions have been evacuated and thousands of homes and businesses have been destroyed by the fires. That's a horror and a tragedy of huge proportions.
I've been very fortunate in my life not to have suffered anything like the loss the people in southern California are facing. I've never lost a home to fire, flood, earthquake or any other natural disaster. In fact I've never lost a home.
I can only imagine how devastating it would be though. Even with insurance, replacing or rebuilding the home could be an incredible setback. While rebuilding is going on living in a hotel, a stadium, or shelter would be horrifying. The irreplaceable memories held within small possessions such as photo albums, nick-knacks and the like would be gone forever.
Every time I hear about a tragedy such as the wildfires in California, or hurricanes devastating entire communities (remember Andrew?) it hurts a bit inside to think of what the people are going through.
Starting over would be tough. This is why we have insurance programs. This is why we have disaster relief programs. This is one reason why we have zoning regulations and building codes.
Natural disasters happen. We can do a lot of things to mitigate the dangers, but we can't eliminate them.
People that live on mountainsides are always at risk of landslides taking their house downhill. People that live on beaches are always at risk of having storm surge erode the sand under their homes. People that live on islands are at risk of tsunamis washing their homes away. People that live in "basins" like New Orleans are at risk of floods. People that live in dry wooded areas are in danger of wildfire. People that live near volcanoes… well, you get the idea.
Oftentimes in the wake of these tragedies I'll read some rather strange responses. On the left we have Bush Derangement Syndrome trying to blame every natural catastrophe on the President, and eagerly looking to find mistakes in the response. On the right, it's often some callous remark like "who in their right mind builds their house on a flood plain?".
Both responses are wrong-headed.
As you know, I'm all for smaller government. I believe that a lot of the programs that our federal government gets involved in, such as welfare, social security and medicare aren't rightly its business. Disaster preparedness and response are an exception though. While the primary responsibility for these still belongs at the state and local levels, the federal government should be involved in them as well.
The Constitution grants the Congress the power to "lay and collect Taxes, Duties, Imposts and Excises, to pay the Debts and provide for the common Defence and general Welfare of the United States". I believe that the "general Welfare of the United States" most definitely includes disaster preparedness and response.
It makes sense in the wake of a disaster to examine the federal response, because the federal government has a constitutional duty to see to the general welfare of the United States. The comparisons between the federal response to the California wildfires and the devastation caused by Hurricane Katrina aught to be made. We need to know whether we've learned from previous disasters and whether we're handling them better or worse.
We shouldn't focus all of our attention on the federal response though. As I said earlier, the primary responsibility for preparedness and response still belongs at the state and local level. This is simply common sense.
Think about it. If you're at home, cooking dinner and a grease fire starts and quickly spreads, do you wait for the fire department to arrive before responding? Or do you grab some flour and throw it on the fire to smother it?
If an earthquake topples a building and people are trapped under the rubble, should you wait for the federal government to bring in heavy equipment to move that rubble, or should you use local equipment. If you wait, it's almost certain that more lives will be lost than if you respond quickly.
Politicians, the media, and bloggers love to play the blame game.
In California the blame was quickly thrown upon President Bush, for things that had little or nothing to do with how events unfolded. It turns out though that the local, state, and the federal response was quick. It also turns out that the blame for the horrifying tragedy that has unfolded belongs to a sick, twisted individual that deliberately set the fires.
In Louisiana the blame was quickly thrown upon President Bush. The news media were all over the story, hyping things up and reporting on events that never actually happened. How many of you remember the reports of cannibalism and rape gangs? The federal government response was criticized and called racist. Who remembers the parking lot full of busses sitting in water? Busses that the local government could have used to evacuate?
Why is it that a category 3 hurricane is treated as an example of the effects of global warming? Why is it that nobody compares Katrina to Andrew, the second most destructive hurricane in U.S. History and a category 5 storm? Could it be that it's harder to play the "race card" with Andrew?
Few people have remarked upon or contrasted the effects that Katrina had in Mississippi with the effects on New Orleans. Both were hit by the same storm. There was severe damage in both places. Could it be that the effectiveness of the response and the preparedness of the government in Mississippi weren't newsworthy, and the poor response and lack of preparation in Louisiana made the perfect opportunity to castigate the President?
The big differences in the California wildfire story and the Katrina story were the local response, and the treatment of the federal response by the media.
The blame game needs to be put back in the box and the box needs to be put back on the shelf. Preferably in the back.
Which is more important anyway? The tragedy suffered by the victims of these catastrophes, both natural and unnatural, or the political opportunities they provide for politicians more interested in power than people?
Originally posted at Perri Nelson's Website. Cross posted at NW Bloggers.
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