Anybody watching the Presidential address?

[diebitter]

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If it walks like a duck and quacks like a duck, it's politics.

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you should consider a position in governemt

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You're the one quacking, troll.

Shift your duckspeak to politics.

[BottlesOf]

This is definitely in the wrong forum. Howver I will make a response that doesn't touch on the politics.

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In case anyone hasnt noticed there is an impending catastrapophe that has the potential to eclipse the recent disaster

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I don't know know where you get you rinfo from but I'd put the probability of this at below 1%. Here's why:

a) While the storm is a Cat 5 now, it has weakened since this morning. Hurricanes need near ideal conditions to become cat 5s and they usually don't remain cat 5's for long. The storm isn't making landfall for a few days yet. It's strength will probably fluctuate, but mostly die off as it heads to drier weather.

b) Unlike with Katrina, the hurricane is not threatening major metropolitan areas that reside below sea level. The reason Katrina was a shitshow is b/c the New Orleans levies broke, this occured well after the hurricane left NO, and this kind of thing could not happen in say, Houston.

c) The recent moemory of Katrina. All levels of government were so criticized after Katrina, that you can be damn sure they will be at leasts omewhat better prepared to deal with this one.

d) The residents of threatened areas in Texas and LA will heed warnings and take this storm more seriously in the aftermath of Katrina.

[savman]

the politics forum is practically worthless. i cannot beleive people choosing not to discuss this simply because they think it should be in another forum....whatever i have to go, i will check in later.

[Broken Glass Can]

Bush is talking about equally about Hurricane Rita and terrorism.

Of course you can't expect OOT posters to be concerned about life and death issues like hurricanes and terrorism. [img]/images/graemlins/smirk.gif[/img]

edit:
First time I wrote a post in the OOT forum, and came back to the same post to edit it in the Politics forum. A true multi-forum post this is. [img]/images/graemlins/grin.gif[/img]

[savman]

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This is definitely in the wrong forum. Howver I will make a response that doesn't touch on the politics.


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In case anyone hasnt noticed there is an impending catastrapophe that has the potential to eclipse the recent disaster

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I don't know know where you get you rinfo from but I'd put the probability of this at below 1%. Here's why:

a) While the storm is a Cat 5 now, it has weakened since this morning. Hurricanes need near ideal conditions to become cat 5s and they usually don't remain cat 5's for long. The storm isn't making landfall for a few days yet. It's strength will probably fluctuate, but mostly die off as it heads to drier weather.

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i will concede that hurricanes fluctuate and while i am not a hurricane expert by any stretch of the imagination, my understanding is there is a low probability that the storm will be less than a cat 4 when it hits simply b/c there is not enough time for the storm to downgrade.

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b) Unlike with Katrina, the hurricane is not threatening major metropolitan areas that reside below sea level. The reason Katrina was a shitshow is b/c the New Orleans levies broke, this occured well after the hurricane left NO, and this kind of thing could not happen in say, Houston.


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first, when i said "potential to eclipse" i should have clarified...i am not referring exclusively to the dollar toll in property damage, although if Rita did 50B in damage then these two hurricanes would a quarter of a trillion dollars in damage combined....that is nearly the annual budget of the department of defense. bear in mind, pre hurricane US budget was already well in the red (not like default is to be in the black) and we will likely be borrowing read: adding to the national defecit to pay for these storms. Also, this storm will cost the state of Texas billions of dollars, and while much of this will be reimbursed federally, keep in mind state governments operate balanced budgets....even a couple billion (think about lost business sales tax revenues) spells trouble for the state of texas; a state with already notoriously high property taxes. what i am talking about here is stress. stress on the texas econ and stress on the national economy that may well be felt years to come. Second, the LA petroleum capacity has already been hampered which has increased the importance of the even greater refining capacity of TX. If a cat 4 landfall damages refiniries in the Galveston Houston area we may well see gas prices north of four dollars a gallon and maybe even gas rationing...this is bad. as we all know higher energy prices mean more than what it will cost you to fill up your car. third, i am aware Houston is above sea level, but the hurrican models i have seen show likely chance that Rita will make landfall and just squat over the metro Houston area dumping 15-30 inches of rain in 48-72 hours. this would cause massive flooding in a metro area where i would wager flood insurance isnt exactly a must have item, which could make the loss in property high albeit probably no where near Katrina.


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c) The recent moemory of Katrina. All levels of government were so criticized after Katrina, that you can be damn sure they will be at leasts omewhat better prepared to deal with this one.


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lets hope so, but the point i was making was the lack of attention the white house was publicly giving the storm.

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d) The residents of threatened areas in Texas and LA will heed warnings and take this storm more seriously in the aftermath of Katrina.

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i agree. what i am trying to convey is Rita, through strain on national economy and national energy production, COULD be the straw that broke the camels back if u will and send the US into a recession. at the very least i feel like a major hit will severly compound all of the ailments of Katrina. i am also willing to concede that this is just an opinion of mine, perhaps this baby wont be bad, i hope it isnt. oh yea, and i think i efffed up the quotes.