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| A lot of people might get lei'd to rest... |
Within the next few hours, we'll know if Hawaii has been devastated by its worst hurricane in decades, or if the fates have smiled once again on the islands and steered Hurricane Lane back out to sea.
If disaster
is avoided, however, it certainly won't be because of anything the local government and emergency preparedness agencies have done (specifically on the island of Oahu, the home to Honolulu, Waikiki, and Pearl Harbor). To put it delicately, the officials' preparations would feel right at home on a pupu platter...because those plans are pupu from top to bottom.
A quick bit of back story: for many years, Stilton's parents lived on Oahu (a sibling still does), and so we were frequent visitors. The island is unquestionably spectacularly beautiful, but anything government has touched has gone
straight to hell. Pretty much
nothing works right in Hawaii, in part because the island's culture encourages a lackadaisical attitude toward anything like efficiency, responsibility, and basic competence. When visiting, our day-to-day mantra was "Nothing is easy in Hawaii."
It's among our most socialist states, with almost
everyone getting some kind of handout from the government. It has the highest per capita homeless population of any state. Prices for everything are sky high. Their medical system has been described as that of a "third world country" owing to doctors fleeing the state because of unsustainably small payments from Medicare and Medicaid (a canary in the coal mine that we on the mainland had better pay attention to). And for many years, building standards were so lax (and builders so casually inept) that a significant percentage of homes offer
no protection at all in case of emergency conditions. Frankly, Gilligan's Island had a
way better model of sustainability in all ways.
Which now brings us to Hurricane Lane. Considering hurricanes are pretty much a known threat to Hawaii, you'd
think they'd have emergency plans out the wazoo. But no, their plans remain firmly
in their wazoos along with the residue of a lot of macaroni salad and Spam.
Residents are being warned to head to shelters for safety, but there are a few little problems with that. For one thing,
no bureaucrats have bothered to keep a list of official shelters. In reviewing the shelters they
can find, it seems that exactly
none of them have been hardened to stand up to even a Category One hurricane (the weakest and most cuddly sized). But having the roof collapse on their heads may be the least of people's problems, because many of the shelters are
located in flood zones. Apparently, the emergency preparedness folks never considered the likelihood that a hurricane just
might be bringing along a buttload of rain.
If people
do go to one of these unsafe shelters (and there's only room for about one fifth of the population), they're being told they'll have to survive in a 3 foot by 3 foot space for up to two weeks, they need to bring their own bedding and anything else important, and - oh yeah! -
bring their own food. Because it never dawned on Hawaiian officials that people in shelters might actually need to eat. Although it being Hawaii, there's a fairly good chance that the waves crashing though the shelter doors will bring fresh fish, and coconuts will regularly be exploding through windows at 100 mph. So there are
some benefits to living in Paradise.
We're obviously hoping the best for the people of Hawaii, but think this should serve as a graphic (and hopefully not deadly) reminder that
there's a great danger in putting too much faith in government bureaucrats to watch after your safety, welfare, and future.
Which is, of course, exactly what those on the Left are shooting for. And if they get their way, we'll
all be saying "Aloha" to our very way of life.
BONUS: ROOKIE MISTAKE
This got posted on Facebook on Wednesday, relating to the news of Michael Cohen trying to characterize Trump's hootchy-coo non-disclosure agreements into something more sinister.
