MORE ON THE TEXAS FLOOD TRAGEDY

Here are the latest numbers: 121 dead,166 still missing, many of them children.

Paul Krugman’s recent substack post asks, “Should we politicize the Texas Flood? Absolutely” Krugman’s right, accountability should be established as soon as possible, not two years from now, because that is the only hope for forcing the necessary changes to prevent these tragedies from happening again and again and again.

There are plenty of guilty parties, but you can start with the Republican Party in general and their decades long war on climate science. The climate crisis is now a contributor to, or in some cases the driving force, in most if not all weather related disasters—floods, fires, drought, tornadoes, hurricanes, polar vortexes—and it will be playing a bigger role as time goes on.

More specifically, local officials, the Texas legislature, Kristy Noem, Donald Trump, Elon Musk, and every Republican member of Congress has blood on their hands because of their stupidity, ignorance, incompetence, callousness, and their commitment to the Darwinian ideology that the “fittest” should be allowed to prevail and the government has a negligible role in helping or even protecting people.

Despite a history of repeated catastrophic flooding, to the point where the area is known as “Flash Flood Alley,” hundreds of kids slept in cabins along the river that night. But the whole system of protecting us from natural disasters is only as good as the weakest link. It is still arguable who was the weakest link, but several were deserving of that honor.

Due to Elon Musk’s brilliant butchering of federal agencies. NOAA has lost 1,875 employees, representing 27,000 years of experience. The National Weather Service is down 600 employees, some NWS field offices are no longer staffed 24 hours day as if weather disasters no longer happen at night. One fifth of all FEMA workers are being let go.

In May, the acting director of FEMA refused to go along with Trump’s scheme of dismembering the agency, so he was axed by Trump. Trump replaced him with someone even stupider than himself (imagine how hard it was to find such a person), David Richardson, who has no experience in managing natural disasters. Richardson admitted to the Senate that he didn’t know there was a hurricane season. That’s like a surgeon not knowing the human body has organs. As of yesterday, Richardson had not even visited Texas.

Despite significant budget cuts the National Weather Service issued three increasingly dire warnings that morning, at 1:14, 4:03, and 6:06 am. The Kerrville Police Department did not issue a warning until 5:16 am on its Facebook page. The city of Kerrville did not issue a warning until 7:32, which was too late for many of the campers to escape.

Rob Kelly, the highest-ranking local official claimed, “No one knew this kind of flood was coming.” Why not? Well, here’s why. Paul Yura, the long-serving meteorologist in charge of “warning coordination” had been pressured to quit by Musk’s teenage DOGE bros. Warning coordinators have unique, extensive experience assessing the local weather, including identifying when things become dangerous. “They have direct lines to emergency-management teams, local officials, local television and radio stations, civic institutions and leaders, all of whom could rally to make sure residents were all properly warned.” Yura was not replaced. Yura’s loss in this situation is a perfect example of the consequences of the chain saw approach to supposedly improving government efficiency.

Also, make a note that Trump has not visited the area, nor has he said much about it other than to predictably blame Joe Biden, saying, “If you look at that water situation, that was really the Biden setup.”

Texas Republican Rep. Chip Roy helped his party circle the wagons around denial, claiming that the floods showed that we have “too many federal bureaucrats.”

Kerr County officials had applied from the state for about $1 million to upgrade the warning system, and they were rejected several times by the Texas legislature. By comparison, the economic cost of this flood will exceed $20 billion.

Kristi Noem delayed sending federal search and rescue crews for 72 hours, I assume because that’s how long it takes for her team of hair dressers, costume designers, and plastic surgeons to cement in her hair extensions, custom fit her tough guy costumes, and puff her lips to do the photo shoot. Actually Noem established a policy where any expense over $100,000 had to be personally approved by her. That created the 3 day delay, including in responding to requests from Texas first responders for aerial imagery from FEMA.

Staffing cuts at FEMA’s disaster call center are also delaying responses. Even yesterday Noem publicly called for “FEMA to be eliminated in its current form." Neither Noem or Trump has said what FEMA would be replaced by. She said, "This is a time for all of us in this country to remember that we were created to serve each other. God created us to take care of each other.” Trump’s press secretary Karoline Leavitt claimed the Texas flood tragedy was “an act of God.” I’m pretty sure God had nothing to do with drowning the children or anyone else, and I’m pretty sure the last thing God wants to be associated with are people who have the audacity to dress up in front of dehumanizing torture chamber/concentration camps and brag about how cruel America is being to immigrants.

Texans can thank Ted Cruz once again for being on vacation, this time in Greece, when yet another disaster struck his home state. Cruz was personally responsible for Trump’s big ugly betrayal bill (the BUBB) stripping $150 million for improved weather forecasting, and $50 million more from climate impacts on weather systems.

Republicans have been chomping at the bit to privatize every government function they can, and for 10 years they have been scheming to privatize and monetize the National Weather Service. It is specifically mentioned in Project 2025. And does it surprise anyone that Trump sycophants are poised to make a killing if that happens? People like Howard Lutnick, Elon Musk, Neil Jacobs, and others.

And finally, on July 31, Trump’s Defense Dept. will stop sharing weather data from their special satellites that collect microwave data and can see through clouds and at night so cities and states vulnerable to hurricanes will have less accurate forecasts of hurricanes that intensify rapidly. It virtually guarantees more victims of weather disasters, an incredibly callous move after this tragedy.

The best you can say about the Trump Administration and the Republican Party is they are a five alarm dumpster fire. In multiple ways many Americans are already paying the ultimate price for it, because they really don’t care what happens to any of us, even, in this case, to dozens of white, Christian little girls.