Vermont weather geek's hodgepodge of weather and climate news and opinion. Often Vermont focused, but taking a national and global approach, with sometimes an appropriate dash of fun, outrage, cynicism and compassion.
FEMA is dragging its feet in approving buyouts for North Carolina homeowners whose property was wrecked by Hurricane Helene 15 months ago.
A popular Federal Emergency Management Agency feature is the Hazard Mitigation Grant Program. People whose homes were wrecked in disasters and are at risk of being hit again after repairs can apply for a buyout.
Qualfied applicants under the voluntary program can get the pre-storm value of their home. Then they can take the money and move somewhere that's less disaster prone.
The damaged home is torn down, and the site would never be developed again. The community benefits because they won't have to deal with that property in the next disaster, since there would be no house there.
More than 800 Hurricane Helene victims in western North Carolina applied for buyouts, some of them as long ago as this past February. North Carolina officials, having vetted the applications, sent nearly 600 of those to Washington for processing. More will likely get approved in North Carolina.
But so far, the only thing FEMA has heard in response is crickets. FEMA has not so much as approved one of the buyout applications.
"So far...not a single approval has come through. North Carolina Gov. Josh Stein has called the paralysis 'absolutely unacceptable,' and has pushed for answers. Earlier this month, he wrote to FEMA's acting administrator, detailing the startling number of applications that 'remain without a final decision.'"
By the time the Washington Post published the story more than a week ago, nobody from FEMA responded to requests for comment.
However, once the story was published, the agency sent a short statement, saying it "remains committed" to North Carolina Helene recovery. The FEMA statement said many applicants had not been approved yet "because they do not comply with federal regulations."
That's news to William Ray, the director of North Carolina Emergency Management, as NPR reports."we do not have anything in hand that says that officially things are ineligible. We are not able to get a good answers from FEMA as to why they are not moving forward."
My accusation is all conjecture and sarcasm on my part, but it wouldn't surprise me if Ice Barbie is gumming up the works with FEMA assistance because she's so busy kicking non-whites out of the country and cosplaying some sort of weird ICE assassin or something.
In the best circumstances, these buyouts take awhile to arrange. A 2019 study found that it takes a median of roughly five years to complete a buyout from start to finish. However, FEMA says it usually takes two years to complete.
However, the Trump administration has deeply cut staffing at FEMA this year, so who's left to manage the buyout process. Plus, the very existence of FEMA is in question, as its future is being debated both Trump Powers That Be.
Which leads us to another broken Trump promise. He had said that he would "slash through every bureaucratic barrier" and said "every single inch of every property will be fully rebuilt, greater and more beautiful that it was before."
So far. Trump's administration hasn't even been able to tear down damaged properties, never mind build everything back. North Carolina is still a mess, 15 months after the hurricane.
"The reality is that local governments continue to wait for large sums in federal reimbursements for debris cleanup and other projects. Roads still need repairs. Renters and homeowners remain displaced."
ICE detention centers are more likely than other jails and prisons to be in hot parts of the nation. ICE is allegedly holding detainees in dangerously hot conditions.
"Detainees at U.S Immigration and Customs Enforcement facilities may be more vulnerable to extreme heat exposure than people housed in federal, state and county prisons, according to a Washington Post analysis, and this disparity is likely to grow as ICE expands the nation's immigration system."
ICE expects to double the number of people it can hold from about 55,000 to more than 170,000.
"The facility endure an average of 29 days of dangerous heat per year - 11 more than other prisons in the federal, state and county leave. The hottest 10 percent of ICE facilities experience an average of 93 days of unhealthy temperatures each year."
Advocates, watchdog agencies and others report lots of problems with air conditioning in detention centers, at least according to the detainees who told them about the issues. Comprehensive data on the temperatures in those detention centers are not available.
WaPo was able to compilereports and some Congressional oversight reports to glean some information.
A 2016 DHS report on private immigrations detention centers found that detainees at every facility that was investigated detainees complained of problems with heat and cooling. Unannounced inspections at ICE facilities found that staffers "struggled to comply" with detention standards "related to environmental and health safety.
Sen. Dick Durbin (D-Ill) reported lots of trouble and overheating at two Florida ICE facilities he visited in June.
"In a June letter, Rep. Yassamin Ansari, D-Az, pressed DHS and ICE officials about conditions at Eloy following a visit to the detention center. The letter included allegations that detainees ha been ordered to walk laps in a courtyard for hours until they were dizzy and ill.
'Detainees described overcrowded, moldy cells, forces and dehumanizing marches outside in the Arizona heat, constant berating from guards conditions worse tha prison,' Ansari said in a statement at the time of her visit."
In statements to an immigration and refugee advocacy group, two detainees said they'd use wet rags and damp underclothes to cool themselves because the air condition units there in the middle of the desert would go out for a week or two or more at a time. Other detainees said air conditioning in some cells never worked at all.
DHS denies there were problems with air conditioning at Eloy.
I know a lot of readers here will say: "So what! They're getting what they deserve!"
Well, no.
Definitely, let's get rid of the alleged criminals and rapists and gang members the Trump Administration said were among the migrants in the U.S. We don't want those dangerous people here.
But this used to be a nation of due process. You find out whether individuals are indeed as nasty and alleged, and then we deport and/or give them prison sentences.
But they're rounding up what seems to be immigrants who are trying to do the right thing, take the legal paths to citizenship, and just throwing 'em all in detention centers. Mostly because Stephen Miller doesn't like brown people.
Apparently, Miller, and the rest of the Trump administration seem intent on using our summertime heat as one method of torture.
Flooding in Chicago this past July. Donald Trump is blocking disaster aid to Illinois, probably mostly because he doesn't like the state's governor.
Donald Trump is not liking the Illinois governor, and he's taking it out on flood victims in the state.
The Trump administration turned down another request from Illinois to help the state recover from severe flash floods in July. That,according to the Washington Post, is despite a recent assessment detailing the the widespread damage and financial losses associated with the disaster.
White House spokeswoman Abigail Jackson in a statement tried to paint the Illinois detail as fiscal responsibility. "Gone are the days of rubber stamping FEMA recommendations," Jackson huffed, saying the Trump administration is "committed to empowering and working with State and federal governments to invest in their own resilience before disaster strikes, making response less urgent and recovery less prolonged."
In other words, states must somehow looked into their crystal balls, determine when and what kind of disasters will strike in the future and cough up the millions of dollars they don't have to do these mythical resiliency projects.
Of course, few believe Trump is trying to help Illinois.
First of all, Illinois is a blue state. More importantly, Trump is feuding with Illinois Gov. JB Pritzker, because the governor objects to Trump's idea of sending the National Guard deployment in and around Chicago and legally dubious ICE arrests (some would say kidnappings) of people in Illinois.
Trump, ever the statesman, keeps insulting Pritzker over his weight (calling the governor a big fat slobon Wednesday) rather than actually dealing with the governor in a rational way. If we're going to get into body shaming, Trump isn't exactly the most svelte character I've ever seen.
Things have gotten so ridiculous in Illinois that, in early November, Illinois and Federal Emergency Management Agency officials had to remove personnel who were surveilling flood damage in Chicago neighborhoods.
"The decision to halt the disaster assessment teams' work on Nov. 6 came amid an ongoing immigration crackdown in the city, leaving the coordinating state an agency officials worried that FEMA's efforts could put residents as well as surveyors at risk.
The shift meant about 10 groups of federal, state, county and local workers had to stop work surveying hundreds of homes that sustained heavy water damage in parts of the city hit hard by recent storms - assessments that help the federal agency document disaster impacts, and ca make a case for why an area may need help paying for recovery."
The whole thing seems suspicious.
Toward the end of October, FEMA's regional administrator told Homeland Security officials about upcoming surveys in the area, as a heads up to avoid conflicts with Homeland Security's immigration crackdowns in Chicago.
As WaPo explained, "It is unclear why immigration agents the ended up in the same place as emergency personnel. Multiple FEMA employees said there were discussions meant to prevent that from happening."
Instead, as FEMA workers set off into a flood-damaged neighborhood, they suddenly saw ICE vehicles and heard whistles - which is a warning people give when ICE comes into an area
So the assessments weren't done. Which might be part of the excuse as to why Trump keeps rejecting disaster aid for Illinois.
As if the fine citizen of Illinois would suddenly turn MAGA to keep our Orange Cockwomble happy.
The Trump administration is investigating FEMA employees who signed an August letter warning of mismanagement at the agency. Loyalty to Trump, well, Trumps public safety.
The dissent letternoted there was no Senate-confirmed and qualified emergency manager running the show, there were cuts to disaster mitigation and recovery efforts and training programs. Also, new policies limited employee autonomy. Micromanagement was already slowing disaster responses.
The letter also urged against politically motivated firings.
True to form, not much came of the letter, except, of course, an investigation by the Trump administration. And possible politically motivated firings. Gawd forbid anybody even faintly criticize anything he does.
But we're not talking about the fate of a rich late night talk show host. This is potentially life and death if disaster strikes. But no matter. Dissenters must be punished, lives and the Constitution be damned.
"The Trump administration has launched an internal investigation into FEMA employees who signed a public letter to Congress warning that the administration's overhaul of the disaster relief agency is undermining emergency response and endangering the public.
As part of the prove, the agency has ordered the employees - who were placed on leave in August - to sign non-disclosure agreements and schedule interviews with investigators, according to five sources nd internal emails reviewed by CNN
At lest seven FEMA staff emails....from investigators at the Office of Professional Responsibility, which included the non-disclose forms, the sources told CNN."
Shortly after the letter became public, FEMA put some employees on paid leave, but didn't say how many.
The emails employee received recently said the inquiry is not a criminal investigation (at least not yet, given Trump's reputation).
Some of those were ordered to submit to interviews within 24 hours, with requests to seek legal counsel first ignored, according to CNN.
The non-disclosure form said targets of the inquiry couldn't tell anybody about it, "except as may be appropriate under applicable law." Failure to adhere to the gag order would lead to discipline
CNN says, "The non-disclosure specifies that the agreement does not supersede existing whistleblower protections. However, lawyers for the FEMA employees argue the investigation is an intimidation tactic and likely constitutes illegal retaliation against the workers for exercising their first amendment and whistleblower rights."
In August, similar dissent letters came from employees at the Environmental Protection Agency and the National Institutes of Health.
Staffers at the EPA have gotten similar messages to those their colleagues at FEMA received that announce this Trump administration investigation.
You can be sure Trump, Ice Barbie Kristi Noem and other minions are not exactly investigating the facts of the August FEMA letter. That would make way too much sense.
Streets of St. Louis, Missouri still look like this three weeks after a snow and ice storm, Probably the worst job I've seen of any municipality cleaning up after a storm.
Here's the story of the kind of winter storm that gets politicians thrown out of office.
A big winter storms swept across large swaths of the nation back on January 5. St. Louis was hit hard with lots of freezing rain and snow.
It was no surprise that in the first few days after the storm, city streets were atrocious to drive on.
But as the days turned into weeks, many side streets were not cleared. Residents said they've seen no trucks, no plows, no road salt.
It's dangerous. On Saturday, an elderly man fell on the ice and hit his head. The street he was on was too icy for the ambulance to get through. Paramedics had to gingerly walk down the icy street to reach the man and treat him.
The temperature briefly got as high as 56 degrees last Friday before crashing again. News video shot after the thaw showed more ice on some side streets than on adjacent sidewalks and lawns.
The city said ithired a private companyto help with the side streets as the ice clearing lagged. But as of this past weekend, they still hadn't gotten to everyone yet. The company they hired has six trucks with plows and salt, and two other trucks with salt only.
Trash pickups have not happened either. Per a union contract, trash haulers in St. Louis do not drive if there's an accumulation of six inches or more of snow or temperatures are below 10 degrees.
Trash bins have been overflowing in many neighborhoods as a result.
Alarmingly, local news media reported that many side streets remained untouched due to misinformation from employees to their public works bosses. I'm not sure on the details, but if employees are lying like that, there's a real problem going on in St. Louis.
St. Louis Mayor Tishaura Jones rebuffed calls to declare a state of emergency in the city, but did call in those outside companies to help.
As of Wednesday, many St. Louis streets were still basically skating rinks. Television station KSDK saidthe mayor's office told them the streets aren't clear due to a lack of resources and it's cold out.
The city did cut $600,000 from the snow removal budget, which likely isn't helping. They did add three small trucks that can clear the many narrow alleys in St. Louis, but they won't arrive there until the end of the year because of supply chain issues.
So much for that idea, then.
Other cities manage to clear streets better than this. St. Louis is having a colder than average January, but it's not record-breaking. And they'veonly had an additional 2.1 inches of snow since that big storm that started this mess back on January 5.
I'm not sure what will happen to local leaders amid public anger, but if people are forced out of office, it won't be the first time a winter storm has created a political shakeup.
One famous example was the aftermath of a large blizzard that struck Chicago in January, 1979. Mayor Michael Bilandic botched the storm recovery, leading to fellow Jane Byrne challenging him in the Democratic primary for mayor.
Byrne ended up defeating Bilandic, to become Chicago's first female mayor.
Way back in February, 1969, an unexpectedly heavy snowstorm dumped 15 inches of snow on New York City. The storm hit on a Sunday, and it took until Wednesday just to get major roads cleared, subway and rail lines recovered and schools reopened.
The storm ultimately killed 28 people. He's been a shoo-in for re-election, but barely eeked out a victory and his political fortunes never recovered.
St. Louis, after a sharp cold snap this week that kept the icy streets treacherous, is in for a break. Several days of mild weather are expected, especially toward the weekend. The weather looks poised to do what the city couldn't manage: Clear the streets of snow and ice.
It's going to cost billions to fix California after this month's devastating wildfires. Many of the GOP want to withhold aid until blue state California becomes sufficiently MAGA-like.
You've got to hand it to the more big mendacious wing of the GOP: They certainly know how to set up a scheme to get what they want.
They provided a master class on how they operate with the past week's tragic California wildfires. This whole post will sound like a wildly conspiratorial rant, but hear me out.
First, much of the GOP have bombarded us with truckloads of lies and misinformation and red herrings. Their voices of deception are so loud and big that they drown out the facts and the truth.
Leading a sizable portion of the population believing them. Propaganda works.
They're good at packaging up in neat little soundbites. Fox host Jeanne Pirro is especially adept at this, offering a fire hose of lies, exaggerations and fiction Monday evening:
"To have empty fire hydrants and empty reservoir, no water pressure and you know, it's just, it is just a disaster. And, you know how to lose billions for the homeless, and all kids of money for illegals, but can't manage forestry and you can't take care - take something that's predictable. And the question now is whether Americans in other states should be paying the bill for their policy, which really ignored the fundamental prevention efforts."
See what she did there? She's got the gullible thinking that California taxes residents to death to lavish wealth on the homeless and illegal migrants, as if that's a thing.
And now, she concluded, we should withhold aid to desperate, distraught fire victims until, I don't know, California Gov. Gavin Newsom says he has brown people and The Gays and tells billionaires they no longer should pay taxes or something?
IN FOR THE KILL
Next step: Go in for the kill: With the backing of gullible millions of minions across the nation, they go to work trying to change the "enemy" into an image of themselves.
That enemy to them is California. The giant state is not kind enough to billionaires, not cruel enough to the disadvantaged. California's leaders think climate change is a problem, which of course annoys the GOP's fossil fuel company donors.
California Governor Gavin Newsom is fighting back against GOP efforts to withhold aid to California after this month's wildfires.
So, departing from the way things have always been done, the GOP wants to attach strings to any disaster aid.
For now, the proposed "strings" are described in, I guess, code words? MAGA wants better forest management, whatever that entails. The Los Angeles fires have burned through brush land and of course neighborhoods, and not forests.
I saw a clip of Sen. Roger Marshall R-Kansas on Fox giving up the jig and suggesting that some of the strings attached to California aid be that the state abandon its climate initiatives.
"House Speaker Mike Johnson, (R-Louisiana) said Monday that 'there should probably be conditions on that aid,' and pointed to disagreements about California's 'resource management' and 'forest management mistakes,'
(There's that like about forests in Los Angeles again!)
"Sen. John Barrasso (Wyoming), the No. 2 Republican in the upper chamber, also blames the fires' devastating outcome on 'policies of the liberal administration out there' during a Sunday interview on CBS's Face the Nation."
Barrasso wants strings attached to California aid, too. Apparently, liberals should have gotten their act together and somehow blocked the 80 mph winds that fanned the flames somehow.
WIDER AUDIENCE
California isn't the only audience for this GOP stunt. It's a warning to everyone who might otherwise go their own way to fall in line with what the Trumpers want. It is very mafia. Nice state you got there. Hate to see anything ruin it.
Some GOP Congress creatures are completely blunt about this plan.Per Washington Post:
"Rep. Zach Nuns (R-Iowa) said California and other Democratic-controlled states would need to atone for 'bad behavior' if they wanted federal assistance.
'We will certainly help those thousands of homes and families who've been devastated, but we also expect you to change bad behavior,' June said Monday on Fox Business. 'We should look at the same for these blue states who have run away with a broken tax policy. We want to help our colleagues in New York, California and New Jersey, but those governors need to change their tune now."
In other words, become MAGA or die.
If we're going to play that game, should we withhold hurricane recovery aid for Republican counties in Florida where wrecked buildings were built in areas prone to storm surges? Or should we punish red counties in western North Carolina because Republican local leaders allowed construction in flood plains? Maybe we can blame Republicans in Florida and North Carolina for not doing enough to get people out of harm's way?
Sane people wouldn't do that. Disaster victims, no matter their political stripes, need help now if not sooner. So just get it to them and shut up about politics already.
Even the talk of adding strings to wildfire aid is costing money and wasting resources that the GOP is claiming they're so keen on saving.
Newsom also worked out a deal to create a $50 million war chest to legally defend the state against Trump administration overreach. That's $50 million that could be spent on better things, but this is the world we live in now.
On X, formerly Twitter,Johnson slammed Newsomfor daring to clap back at the misinformation campaign.
Newsom's response was: "Mr. Speaker, when Louisiana's need help with hurricanes it's Californians -- many of whom were impacted by these fires -- who foot the bill to help your constituents. And they do it without playing partisan games.
Millions of your supporters are out here and they need your help, empathy, care, and whatever compassion you are willing to express."
At this point, I'm not holding out any hope for compassion or care from the GOP. Newsom probably was wasting his time trying to make that appeal. But I guess he's gotta try.
If Republicans open this can of worms, and Democrats eventually seize power again, are we going to force Oklahoma and Texas to adopt strict climate change measures before providing recovery money in a tornado aftermath? Force Alabama to embrace gay and trans people before we help out after hurricane.
HOW TO INFLUENCE
Besides, there is a way for Congress to influence what happens in California that's fair to everyone, including the victims and the taxpayers they so fervently claim they're siding with.
After every disaster, there's an assessment. What went right, what went wrong, what can we do better when there's a next time.
Things did go wrong in California, despite the heroic efforts of thousands of people.
The firestorm was so explosive, and everybody was using so much water, that the water pressure in hydrants fell to almost nothing, so there was nothing to fight the fire with. There was plenty of water in the reservoirs, but it was being used too fast for the hydrants to keep up. Should there be some sort of redesign of that system?
Should rebuilt houses be required to use fire resistant material, with no vegetation or flammable stuff anywhere near these new buildings? And what about forest management in parts of California and elsewhere. How can we improve that?
Did the Los Angeles Fire Department have enough resources? Was their initial response adequate? What could have been done better?
There's a lot of thing to look at to make the response better next time. And there will be a next time. I know California will do such an assessment, but Congress can mandate that, too, without tying it to aid to disaster victims.
BACKFIRE?
Republicans might already think they have "won" against those silly DEI liberals in California. But they might well have caused headaches for themselves. After all, not all the fire victims are liberal. Surely some of the people who lost their homes in California voted for Trump. So you're going to punish them for not convincing their neighbors to vote for Trump, too?
This could backfire big time in other ways, too. California is a "donor" state, pumping more revenue into the federal government than it takes in. Most red states are the opposite, taking in more federal dollars than they contribute.
I'd wonder if California could somehow retaliate against Washington if disaster aid is withheld?
After every big disaster, the community comes together in solidarity, helping each other, defending each other. That's happening in California.
Will the MAGA types in Congress alienate the Republicans in California who might not like their neighbors' politics, but will still help in a time of need. Will they resent the lack of help from Washington?
Even if Congress doesn't go through with attaching strings to wildfire relief aid, they've already slowed down the process. They'll debate the issue of attaching strings, and that will postpone relief for weeks or months.
Didn't MAGA bitterly criticize outgoing President Biden for supposedly going too slow with aid to flood victims in North Carolina? (Actually, Biden acted pretty fast, but as we already noted, the truth doesn't matter to much of the GOP).
MAGA has already sown plenty of mistrust in the government, and government aid. It's all contributing to the seething undercurrent of rage against all the major institutions of American society.
That anger can't stay contained forever, Hate to say it, but it's going to blow up in somebody's face. Probably the GOP, when too many people decide the Powers That Be aren't on their side after all.
This won't end well.
VIDEO:
The person who explain things much better than I can is somebody known as Politics Girl. She's all over social media, and I highly recommend subscribing toher YouTube channeland/or wherever else you can find her.
In this video, she goes over the disinformation regarding California's fires and she puts it into excellent context. Video is more than seven minutes long and worth every second.Click on this linkto view, or if you see the image below, click on that:
One thing victims of the extreme Hurricanes Helene andMilton disasters don't need are more fear and confusion that they already have.
MAGA lies about FEMA's response to Hurricanes Helene and Milton are dangerous for many reasons, but apparently victimizing victims is fine if it somehow helps Trump get elected.
Unlike water, electricity, shelter open roads and cell service, fear and confusion are in plentiful supply, as one would expect in such an extreme calamity.
It is now the campaign strategy of Donald Trump and his supporters to promote wild stories about the federal response to the twin disasters.
I guess firing up the "base" to win the White House is more important than the lives of the people coping with these calamities.
People dealing with hurricanes Helene and Milton have the added misfortune of experiencing these catastrophes in the final weeks of a a nail biter presidential election.
FEMA DIVERTING FUNDS TO MIGRANTS?
TheWashington Post a week ago delvedinto one of the the gems in North Carolina's disaster zone that seems to have gotten a lot of traction on social media;
"Former president Donald Trump doubled down on misinformation about Hurricane Helene in an appearance in this storm-ravaged state Friday, repeating the falsehood that the White House used disaster funds for migrants."
Of course, that's not true.
White House Spokesman Andrew Bates said flatly. "No disaster relief funding at all was used to support migrants housing and services. None. At. All."
Republican governors of South Carolina, Georgia, Tennessee and Florida, along with the Democratic governor of North Carolina all say that they have been happy with FEMA's disaster response so far.
Of course, Trump and his followers are having none of that. They'll believe what they want to believe, as to them, the truth is besides the point. How dare those Republican governors contradict Dear Leader!
ORIGINS OF LIES
Like every wild, false story, it all begins with a grain of truth. FEMA has enough money and personnel to swoop into disaster zones to provide immediate aid in the aftermath of these terrible disasters.
However, the agency is in fact having trouble funding long term aid for disaster areas, such as reimbursing municipalities and states for road and infrastructure repairs they've done.
Hurricane Helene destruction in North Carolina. Trump's lies about the FEMA response could be making things even worse for these disaster victims.
Congress has to appropriate more money for that piece of the FEMA pie. A stopgap spending bill that prevented a partial government shutdown omitted additional funding for FEMA. Congress is in a recess now during the campaign season.
However, there have been calls for Congress to reconvene in the coming days to pass a supplemental FEMA money bill. House Speaker Mike Johnson is against that idea.
I am certain that there's been FEMA missteps already in North Carolina and in other Helene disaster zones. You get that in an emergency. FEMA aid was probably slow to reach some victims, given how many were stranded in inaccessible mountains and hollows.
And there's probably bureaucracy frustrating people who intensely needed help last week, never mind right now.
But as far as FEMA ignoring desperate flood victims in North Carolina to coddle migrants, that's all stupid campaign lies. Most FEMA employees really want to help disaster victims, and are really good at their jobs.
CONSEQUENCE OF LIES
FEMA is not capping aid to victims at $750.00. They didn't block helicopters in North Carolina from searching for survivors. They're not diverting disaster aid to migrants. They didn't confiscate all the private aid that went to North Carolina. And the federal government is not withholding aid to areas where a majority of voters support Trump.
There are also even crazier notions that a surprisingly large segment of the population believe. These include the idea that the government is somehow controlling the strength and path of hurricanes and other disasters. I'm planning an upcoming, separate post on that whackadoodle aspect of all this lies circulating around.
Meanwhile, these FEMA lies could have real life consequences. It's not just campaign chatter.
The White House, its staff and Democratic presidential candidate Kamala Harris keep clapping back hard at the misinformation around the Helene response. They are all warning that they falsehoods could keep hurricane victims from seeking the assistance they critically need.
I also worry about FEMA workers. That kind of MAGA lies about FEMA can encourage the real wackos among them to consider violence and attacks against these workers. They're already reportedly receiving death threats.
Also, talk about wasting resources! FEMA had to launch a web page to combat false rumors about its activities. I agree that they had to do it to attempt to make sure accurate information gets out there. But it's a waste of time and resources, when if Trump and his minions hadn't resorted to all these lies, that FEMA rumor-quashing page would not have been necessary.
Oh, by the way, there has been a case in which a president has diverted funds away from FEMA and steered the money toward his pet project. It wasn't the Biden administration.
It was none other than Donald Trump, who's now falsely whining about FEMA money being diverted.
As Politico reported, Trump in 2018 initially wanted to refuse disaster aid to California after some destructive wildfires
And talk about a bald faced transactional, corrupt mindset, an aide to Trump talked him into providing the aid by pointing out fire-damaged Orange County, California had more Trump supporters than the entire state of Iowa.
President Biden responded to this news by saying, "You can't only help those in need if they voted for you."
Which makes me glad Biden was president when deep blue Vermont suffered a series of flood disasters in 2023 and 2024.
WHY WE KNOW LIES AREN'T TRUE
Anybody can go on social media and make up anything. The more provocative and outrageous, the more clicks and revenue some idiots can make. Truth is besides the point.
Say what you want about journalists - and there's a lot to say - but if FEMA was doing anything like what Trump and MAGA are accusing them of, it would be all over the news.
I was in journalism for decades. I know how they tend to think. Journalists love to get the scoop, of course, and they would shout from the rooftops if FEMA really was blocking aid. Or giving the aid to migrants instead of hurricane victims.
There's two reasons for that.
One, like anybody else, journalists really want to advance their careers. If a journalist broke a big story like that, there's potential for advancement, more income, heck maybe even a Pulitzer Prize.
Also, many journalists have a "comfort the afflicted, afflicted the comfortable" ethos. Many - not all -journalists love to stand up for powerless victims of the powerful. So if FEMA really were victimizing hurricane victims who have lost everything, they would be all over it.
Come to think of it, I guess that's why you've heard so often on the news Trump's accusations against FEMA described as lies, which they are. It's been all over the news. Because this is a case in many journalists are trying to comfort the hurricane victims being afflicted by Trump's falsehoods.
Wreckage of a Puerto Rican home after Hurricane Fiona. In a glimmer of reassurance, the sign was written after the hurricane by the person who lived there and translates to "I am alive."
Puerto Rico this morning is reeling from massive flash flooding and power outages thanks to Hurricane Fiona. The entire island of Puerto Rico was blacked out as Hurricane Fiona swept over the island Sunday.
That was a function of both the fury of the storm and the scandal of a badly mismanaged power grid.
Winds gusted past 100 mph in communities along the south shore of Puerto Rico, so you can understand why power would have failed there. On the northern end of the island, in places like San Juan, winds only gusted to 40 to 50 mph.
In a normal world, those winds, combined with the severe flooding would have caused some outages. But the fact that everyone is blacked out is an infrastructure scandal and not entirely a hurricane disaster.
"LUMA Energy, the private company that handles the transmission and distribution of electricity in Puerto Rico, stated that full restoration could take days 'due to the magnitude and scope of the blackout,' but the company has the necessary resources to respond to Fiona's effects on the grid."
Given LUMA's track record, and the power authorities in Puerto Rico before that, I'm not convinced.
"The hurricane winds that knocked out power to the entire island of Puerto Rico over the weekend encountered an electrical grid that experts liken to a house of cards: a fragile, decrepit, patchwork system running on old equipment that has failed to substantially modernize since the U.S. territory's deadliest storm, Hurricane Maria, swept through five years before."
A state-run utility that should manage electricity generation is bankrupt and negotiations to restructure a nasty $9 billion in debt is still mired in mediation and recrimination. Even before Fiona, power disruptions were increasing in Puerto Rico, suggesting incompetence or worse.
Most of Puerto Rico's power is generated on the southern side of the island. Transmission lines run north through mountainous terrain, then on to the more heavily populated north. Storms in the remote mountains often disrupt these transmission lines. Puerto Rico ought to rethink its power grid, but that takes tons of money, which the territory clearly doesn't have, and imagination, which seems to be lacking, too.
Hurricane Fiona is forecast to make a beeline for far eastern Canada as a powerful storm over the weekend.
The U.S. Federal Emergency Management Agency has funded billions to help Puerto Rico recover from Hurricane Maria, notes the Washington Post. A large share of that money was to go toward modernizing the electrical grid, but distribution of those funds have been slow to say the least.
It'll be even slower now. Rainfall on Puerto Rico was cataclysmic, with up to 33 inches of rain reported. Some of the flooding was even worse than what happened during Maria.
Fiona moved on to trash eastern Dominican Republic with more wind and flood damage. It cruised through the eastern Turks and Caicos today after having gotten even stronger, with top winds of 115 mph.
Forecasters predict the hurricane will continue northward, passing close to Bermuda as a powerful Category 4 storm.
A strong cold front that will give us in Vermont a chilly end of the week will keep Fiona well off the U.S East Coast. However, chances are growing that Fiona, while transitioning to a powerful non-tropical storm, will blast eastern Nova Scotia, Newfoundland and Labrador over the weekend.
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