Sept. 21, 2005 - 18:57 MDT

AROUND THE PARK

Sometimes this modern life keeps me in a state of bewilderment. Incomprehension to the max and wondering how the greatest country in the world (my feelings exactly) has allowed itself to become so vulnerable from so many different directions.

And it is not recent events and doings either.

It is so easy to blame corruption for our state of affairs and no doubt there is enough of that roiling the water, but laziness and inattention to the actualities can cause so much harm.

The deplorable state of the levees in New Orleans is a good example. Although it does no real good to point fingers of shame at anyone in particular for that particular thing, it might be better to just say that the ball has been dropped so many multiple times -- from way back to the present day.

From the feds cutting allocations for levee repair to the State of Louisiana failing to impress Washington the dangers of disaster happening to the Big Easy, there is enough blame to go around.

What's in the recent past is up to Congress to investigate and take appropriate steps to see that sort of thing doesn't ever happen again. Annnd, if it does, that our country as a whole can render aid immediately if not sooner.

One might look at it as Homeland Security having a FEMA in its paw leading to symptoms of great homeland Insecurity, this time. What is their next shtick ? ? ?

Now we have a Category Five hurricane churning its way across the Gulf of Mexico, and from what I see on TV our government is heading massive aid south, to be directed to where the hurricane hits. Efforts are being made to evacuate folks who have no transportation from the areas where the hurricane is expected to wreak its awful wrath .

Like so many people in our country I can say, "Oh, my God, I have friends on the Gulf, or in the Carolinas and Florida. I pray that they survive and have few losses in property." Hoping for their survival above all and wondering what they can possibly do with their lives if all their stuff is ruined.

Perhaps it is wrong of me to do a Chicken Little and flap around the barnyard blathering about the sky falling and rave that Hurricane Season is nowhere near at its end this year and it is possible that our coastal areas will be raked again and again with Category Five hurricanes before the season ends. So, maybe I should ignore things, quit worrying, be blase and hail a carriage and instruct the driver to take me twice AROUND THE PARK . . . . . . . . .

Blog