The REAL cost of Hurricane Irene

The real costs of Irene are still TBD -- no one knows, yet, what's broken and what's fixable or if anyone will even pay to fix it. Does the U.S. have the money to re-build roads and bridges or help small business owners re-build? Of course they do -- but I am betting the "budget crisis" will suddenly kick in when questions are raised about helping the people who are sure to be most financially devastated by this: homeowners and small business owners.

However, I bet there are still a roll of quarters in the desk drawer for the banks and defense contractors . . . the Tragedy of Irene hasn't fully kicked in :(

Yet.

But in about 2 weeks, the light bulbs will start going off in people's heads that something is fishy . . . and I don't just mean the dead trouts floating down Main Street. Insurance companies will basically fillibuster everyone filing a claim and the cost model to deal with this crisis is flawed from the get-go, especially since the buzz word of the moment is smaller government . . . which still amazes me, when it is obvious to anyone with half a brain that most of our problems were because businesses were free to "do their thing" without the government oversight they so deplore.

Socialism for the rich; free enterprise for the poor. Gore Vidal said this 40 years ago -- and it is even worse, of course, now.

Irene will show, in ways most people never suspected, how broken at the core the United States truly is . . . we are a banana republic with a fancy history and as the days go by, others will say the same thing.

It would also not surprise me to see Insurance companies come hat in hand asking for money (and getting it) -- yet just stockpiling the money and refusing to honor claims. One more way in which the rich etc etc etc . . .

Irene, whether you realize yet or not, is going to be a really serious ka-wham-oh to most of the States along the Atlantic coast. One of the final straws on an overworked, underfed camel. In my opinion, this part of the United States will never be the same.

Dirt roads, bridges that are no longer passable, water that is unfit to drink or even take a bath in . . . buildings tipping over like some old barn from 1920 . . . it is not a pretty picture. How long to rebuild? And what to rebuild FIRST ??

Trust me -- it seems like a BOLD statement; I realize that -- but it will be more and more obvious by Christmas. The United States, as we currenly know it, is dying and when it become obvious that God is NO LONGER on OUR side . . . then the full weight of our hubris and arrogance will come home to roost.

What will people say then ???

I realize what I am saying is going to piss A LOT of people off . . . so be it. I believe it's the truth.

We can STILL make a better tomorrow. But this hurricane will show, in ways nothing else has, just what's behind Oz's curtain.