Some things turn out bad no matter what you do. In the past, hurricanes would graze Texas on a regular basis, usually making landfall somewhere south of that perinnial hurricane-magnet Morgan City, Louisiana. Hurricane on the way? Time to party. Groups of twenty-somthings and other serious nut-jobs would book rooms in that big Galveston hotel that sits way out on piers. Then, when all hell broke loose they would cry for help. None would come but when it was over, everyone would be fine. Drunk and scared, but intact.
There are refineries along the Texas Gulf Coast. I've been in them and I've been in them 24 hours before a hurricane was scheduled to make landfall. I've seen these old Shell and Texas Refinery and Monsanto and Union Carbide geezers look at that creepy milky-white hurricane sky and shrug. "It's a hurricane. So? I got work to do." Texas can't be bothered.
That was then.
This is now: A million freaked-out, jittery families and their dogs sweating in 98-degree weather on possibly the nation's most poorly-designed set of freeways. . .a hundred-mile-long parking lot---trying, inch by painful, scary inch to get away from the third biggest storm ever.
Surprisingly, while most people I've seen have kept their tempers, the gas has dwindled to nothing. Right now (11:00PM Sep 22, 2005) I would imagine half the cars sitting on I-45 between Houston and Willis are dangerously low on gasoline. And the gas stations are closed, and these families have commandeered the parking lots as impromptu campsites.
Every service station, mall, Handy Dandy, Quick Trip, HEB and Grab N Buy is closed, and usually for no good reason. Each and every one of these little stores has a hand-scribbled sign pasted on the front door: "Due to the hurricane we will be closed untill further notise. Sorry."
That's not all.
The mall is closed, the grocery stores are closed, and while CVS Drugs were open for awhile, Walgreens is REALLY closed.
Grandpa low on his nitro pills? Walgreens sez (in effect): "Life is hard. This is a hurricane. Closed until futher notice."
Commerce in Southeast Texas has come to a complete halt. The Power of the Market has, in times of peril, has proven to be less than zero, as the proprietors scurry home to hide under their beds. And for the those people stuck on the freeway? Here it is: "Welcome to the Wasteland. You are sixty miles from the Gulf there is no storm surge predicted, there is only some wind and rain. That's why we're closed. Nothing is open. Nothing Works. There is no gasoline, no shelter, no nothing. You have become pilgrims on the run and are are hereby officially screwed."
So the freeway becomes some sort of a motionless enclave of pilgrims and police officers. Flashing ambulance lights, patrol cars, automobiles positioned face to face in the classic jumpstart position---and lots of dogs and kids.
Rita will probably come ashore, smack the Sabine Pass around a bit, and then dissipate in lots of rain rain. Afterward, people will turn their cars around and go back home to their (hopefully) intact houses. And then some will think to blame Houston Mayor Bill White and Texas Governor Rick Perry or minor Harris County Texas official Ted Poe for suggesting everyone evacuate to begin with.
Only it isn't White's, Perry's or Poe's fault. The people we should be calling out on this thing are characters like Grover Norquist and his extremely wealthy associates (like Jack Abramaoff) who wants us to believe that people should essentially fend for themselves--and, in effect, give any extra money that's available to wealthy people (like himself.)
In short, the person who should answer for the failings of the Rita storm is none other than the the real-world Hamsterville (see Lilo and Stitch--the Hamsterville resemblence is too obvious to be coincidental), that consummate economic sleazemeister, Grover Norquist. And though I was only on a five-mile stretch of this 100-mile-long parking lot, I didn't see George W. Bush either helping out either. Guess he wants to wait until after the hurricane hits. Better photo op.
Bottom line: the ones who prevented this thing from working right the first time were nowhere to be found. But sure enough, after it's all said and done, they'll surface and explain why government is not the answer and that the free market would have solved the problem (as if all those Walgreens would have stayed open during this thing.)
Sorry, but as long as the American voters let characters such George Bush, Grover Norquist, Tom Delay and people like him get away with this sort of thing, then they deserve to sit in our car in a 100-mile-long traffic jam waiting for a hurricane to catch up with them.
At that point it becomes a matter of Social Darwinism.