Waiting to get a ride from this guy.
Posted on 06/15/2008 9:31:46 AM PDT by joma89
The flooding in eastern Iowa has reached the point of catastrophe. Towns are overwhelmed, businesses destroyed, and crops are gone. A fifth of the corn and soybeans are gone. Fox News is calling it "Iowa's Katrina." Here is a gallery of aerial phtographs at the web site of the newspaper I used to deliver every afternoon, the Iowa City Press-Citizen.
The thing is, though, the people of eastern Iowa seem to be stepping up in the Iowa stubborn way. I have seen any number of man-on-the-street interviews, and nobody is complaining. They all seem to be working to solve their problem, which is not surprising because Iowans do not complain about tragedy. They complain about hot weather and dry weather, but not tragedy. And I have looked for reports of looting and come up empty so far.
Katrina has become a metaphor for many things beyond natural disaster, including governmental and individual incompetence (depending on your point of view). In Iowa there is a 500 year flood, but the people are not paralyzed, whining, or looting. There will be no massive relief effort from around the world, and nobody will step up to help Iowans except for other Iowans. Yet years from now, there will be no Iowans still in FEMA camps.
The difference is not in the severity of the flood, but in the people who confront the flood.
Many of the FEMA officials working in the Midwest flood are coming from Louisiana. Once they have finished in the Midwest, they will return to Louisiana. These are FEMA people who live in other regions of the nation, but have been assigned to tend to the trailers — some 17,000 are still occupied.
They have been impressed with the speed and effectiveness of the local response. In areas where water has receded, most people have emptied their basements and the damaged material has been picked up and taken to landfills. One official said that the speed of the local response may hamper their ability to get disaster aid for the area.
I am sure they would snag something they aren't expecting at probably at around 2800 fps.
Waiting to get a ride from this guy.
Got a 100 yr old Swede that does that...
I spent several years living in Lake Charles La., and have family there and in NO now.
The ones in NO lost their homes, everything. They evacuated to our relatives in LC, then Rita hit there. They all picked up and moved on with their lives.
There are many good, independent and hard working people in Lousiana, so I don’t want anyone to think I am speaking about all the people there when I speak of the whiners.
Some of the finest folks I’ve known are from/in Lousiana. And some of the finest freepers also live there.
Mark my word.
Lots of poor immigrants were nabbed in the Postville raid a while back....
What I would like to have explained here if anyone is knowledgable enough about flooded buildings such as these (up to the second foors or even up to the roofs); HOW IN THE WORLD are they going to REMDIATE the TOXIC MOLD that is going to form once the waters slowly recede. This is not even being discussed on KCRG.com in Iowa.
It is probably a different culture. I live in Iowa but not in the area worst hit. We do have flooding though and have had many bad storms - tornados, winds, etc. We aren’t too far from the Boy Scout camp. When we had the heaviest rain I vacuumed our basement almost non-stop for 48 hours while off and on helping neighbors. My husband joked that we should just relax and wait for the government to “save us”! I’m a professional now but was raised on a small Iowa farm. I learned to work hard, be independent, take the initiative, garden, manage animals, build fence, plant crops, pick crops, etc. in all kinds of weather. I appreciate that part of my “education” today more than I did when I was younger. I called my Dad today to wish him happy Father’s Day and told him so.
“White people.
Let them drown.”
Won’t happen. Most of them can swim.
He said it was the funniest thing you ever saw. All these white middle class kids were partying in the street after the game. People would come out on their front porch and yell at them to get off their law and the kids would all file out back into the street and wander off.
He said is was the lamest “riot” you ever saw in your life.
I sure like the way you think.
“..there is a 500 year flood, but the people are not paralyzed, whining, or looting. There will be no massive relief effort from around the world, and nobody will step up to help Iowans except for other Iowans. Yet years from now, there will be no Iowans still in FEMA camps..”
The under class is conditioned to wait for the government to care for them. The difference between the whites in Iowa and blacks in New Orleans is stark. Furthermore, Iowa will be back to normality while La politicians are still asking for more billions.
We are faced with some serious implications in agriculture - the fields are flooded & it's entirely possible that it may be too late to replant if they can get back into their fields. Or even if they can replant, yields will be very low and that will impact us all.
The people of Iowa are incredible and truly step up to the plate to help. When the tornado took out Parkersburg, volunteers were turned away & asked to sign up at a central website for a future date.
This week, a neighborhood in Des Moines along the Des Moines River was in danger and needed volunteers to fill sandbags- the National Guard was there to place them - 1,000 people showed up @ 10pm - this was in the middle of the work week and they were not from the area.
Polk City had over 50 volunteers to help sandbag our lagoon at a moment's notice - in the middle of the day & that's no small feat considering 90% of the population works outside of Polk City.
So, although I complain about the weather in Iowa, the people in Iowa are simply outstanding.
Well, I’ve seen some news reports with both men and women crying...they lost their homes, their pets; one woman north of here lost 3/4 of her ‘informal’ petting zoo animals...came out the next morning to find them all drowned. :(
But so far, the reaction has been; Life Goes On.
It truly is heartening to see. I can’t BELIEVE the MSM isn’t spinning this into another “Bush’s Fault” moment. That’s the unbelievable part to me!
I mean, how hard would it be to do a tie-in with Bush not signing Kyoto and Global Warming bringing this down upon our heads? ;)
things getting testy in Iowa
Shootin’ at “Looter Guy” from NOLA? ;)
It was the folks in New Orleans doing all the looting and rioting. Folks in MS and AL weren't doing that. As far as the FEMA camps go, the only folks in them were folks who had been renting, and those homes were washed away, or damaged beyond repair. Those who had owned homes that were no longer there, or were in such disrepair that a brooming out and wash down wouldn't do the trick, moved their trailers into their yards, and lived in them while repairing their homes.
The reason so many were in those trailers for so long was because they were in a battle with their insurance companies to see what, if anything, would be covered when they did those repairs. Most folks didn't have ready cash to pay for those repairs, and they needed the money from the insurance on those homes to fund them. For those whose homes were completely washed away, much of their net worth was in that property, and they still had the mortgage to pay on it, whether it was there, or not.
I'm sure FEMA works much better today than it did back in 2005. They learned their lesson from Katrina, and also their job was made easier this time by cooperative State Govts. in Iowa and other Midwest states.
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