Where’s the Outrage?

Above is a picture of the Bolivar Peninsula. Below is the same place after Ike. The following is a comment from one of my readers. Do you have any suggestions for him? FEMA is suppose to have more than ice and water, aren’t they?

My concern is lost wages as my place of business is out for at least 1-2 weeks if not more. I will not see a paycheck for this time and I have a mortgage to pay.

Also, I lost every piece of food in my fridge/freezer and that will have to be replaced. I paid for a hotel but FEMA is only willing to pay hotel direct and not reimburse people (FEMA told me over the phone). So this has cost me over $500 in hotel/gas/food and NO HELP FROM OUR GOVERNMENT.

It appears FEMA will do nothing to help with this situation thanks to people who took advantage of FEMA during Katrina.

Any suggestions for help??

Also FEMA P.O.D.S has no food in this area. Just ice and water every time I have gone to one.

FEMA is very unorganized. The housing market is bad and it is going to get worse in the Houston area with no financial relief from FEMA to help IKE victims until they can return to work.

Thank you.

Tags: Environment, FEMA by ecthompson
12 Comments »

Here’s the Tuesday night news roundup:

• Did you see the Dallas Cowboys vs.Philadelphia Eagles football game last night? It was probably one of the best games that I’ve seen in a long time. If we just look at scoring, it was phenomenal. We had kick-offs returned for touchdowns. We had, not one, but two long bombs for touchdowns. Well, one of them was almost a touchdown. The Philadelphia receiver dropped the ball prior to entering the end zone as he went into his celebration. Moron. Tony Romo and Donovan McNabb were almost flawless. Interestingly, both quarterbacks make crucial mistakes. Romo fumbled in the end zone, giving Philadelphia a touchdown. McNabb botched a hand-off, giving Dallas crucial momentum in the fourth quarter. Still, it was a great game.
• The Texas Gulf Coast is in a world of hurt. Reports out of Houston and Galveston show that the power grid was devastated in some areas. Power may not be restored for weeks, possibly months.
• The Federal Reserve tried to broker a deal over the weekend for Lehman Brothers but refused to put up taxpayer money to bail them out. Well, it looks like the piggy bank is open again as the Fed appears to be trying to bail out AIG for a jaw-dropping $85 billion. OMG! If you are counting, this brings our total bailout costs to around $485 billion. (Just in case you didn’t notice Goldman Sachs is sucking wind also.)
• Republican nominee John McCain is using a standard line to explain this financial meltdown. If you remember back to 2001 and 2002 when Enron and Tyco were imploding, the Bush administration did not think that stricter regulations were needed but that the situation was the result of a few rogue CEOs. McCain is back selling us the same line.
• The Federal Reserve chose not to change the prime lending rate. Stock prices seem to stabilize today as oil prices continue to fall under $100 per barrel. Also, the consumer price index decreased in August, easing fears of inflation.
• On a lighter note, everybody needs to go stand in line NOW! Las Vegas singer Tom Jones is releasing his first album in 15 years. It goes on sale on November 25.

Tags: Domestic Issues, Economy, Election 2008, Environment by ecthompson
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For the last two and a half weeks, Republican candidate John McCain and his camp have been riding the Governor Sarah Palin wave. They have said nothing of substance. They have put out a series of ads that can only be summarized as a pack of lies. Now, the Dow Jones industrial average fell 500 points on Monday. McCain states that the fundamentals of our economy remains strong. Then, yesterday afternoon, he decides to tweak his analysis and say that the fundamentals that he is referring to is the innovation of the American worker. Therefore, the American worker remained strong. It’s only fair that the Democratic nominee Barack Obama and his running mate Joe Biden tied McCain to the failed policies of the Bush administration.

This is an excellent opportunity for the Democrats to focus the attention of the American people on the economy. There is a reason that Lehman Brothers is filing for bankruptcy today. There is a reason that Merrill Lynch was bought out by Bank of America. The fundamentals of our economy are not strong.

The economy over the last eight years has been built on the housing market. The economy required Americans to build and sell houses. We needed cheap labor to build houses. This is one of the reasons why politicians have talked about immigration reform but have done nothing. (John McCain originally proposed a reasonable immigration policy that he now opposes.) Then, we needed to sell everyone on the vision of a new home. We needed easy money and cheap mortgages.

Say hello to subprime mortgages. This whole industry is a relatively crazy system that loans money to people who would not normally qualify for loans. The only way the loans don’t default before the ink is dry is to have ever increasing home valuations. Your home value must increase in order for the loan not to implode. Mortgage companies sell these subprime mortgages to other financial companies. These companies then bundle these bad loans and sell them in packages to other financial companies, like Bear Stearns or Lehman Brothers.

This is where government regulation must step in and control the financial markets. As Americans, we’ve been sold a truckload of garbage that capitalism cures everything. It doesn’t. Controlled capitalism is great. Unfettered capitalism creates the robber barons of the 1920s, the Savings and Loan collapse of the 1980s, and the subprime mortgage collapse. There’s only one candidate that is offered to reign in this unfettered capitalism. There’s only one candidate who has offered to stand up for the average American, and that’s Obama.

Tags: Economy by ecthompson
1 Comment »

This is a good, hard-hitting ad from the Obama camp. To say that John McCain has lied is an understatement.

Tags: Election 2008 by ecthompson
4 Comments »

Greetings Where’s The Outrage? readers from the main branch of the Houston Public Library. My power has been out since last Friday. That was the night of the storm.

But I have no real problems. Just the opposite—My wife and I are safe and sound.

Life now, if you are lucky, is about finding out when the power will come back, waiting in gas lines, seeing what supermarkets are open, and making sure you don’t run out of batteries.

People closer to the coast have lost their homes. Some people have died. And I have concern for people who are losing wages in Houston and elsewhere. Power may not be fully back up for another week and things are not at all back to normal.

Errington made a post about giving to Red Cross. The Red Cross is providing a lot of help down here. I’m going to make donation to the local United Way. They also will be offering help.

The places that you are hearing as worst off are great places. Galveston, Bolivar Peninsula, Orange and the Beuamont area. I’ve been lucky enough to visit all these areas. I’ve driven to Houston to Galveston for a nice walk on the beach at least once every couple of months for ten years now. I know that Galveston will rebuild.   

I’ll also say here that government help sure does come in handy when you are looking for a bag of ice during a power outage, or when you are looking for a computer at the library, or when you are asking what aid you can get after a hurricane.

I’ll offer another report to WTO? readers soon. Thanks to Errington for the forum and thanks to all WTO? readers.

Tags: Domestic Issues, Environment by Texas Liberal
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