Everyone is worried about natural disasters.
Most don’t think one will happen to them.
The Texas floods have prompted a new round of armchair quarterbacking about what officials should have done and how the whole thing could have been prevented. This sort of thing always happens — and it’s usually from people who have never set foot in the area where the disaster happened, nor do they care to learn what the real circumstances were. This chatter generates huge amounts of misinformation (mostly on social media) about who-did-what-when and what xyz would have cost.
I’ve never understood the impulse to pretend to know how to prevent a massive tragedy, but to each their own. Maybe it’s how some people process the senselessness of it all. We humans really don’t like reminders that we aren’t in control.
In my case, though, I actually have been to Kerr County. My aunt and uncle retired there. So for this week’s column, I explain a bit about the area and why affording and implementing warning systems has been difficult.
And then more broadly, I discuss why it’s hard to generate the political will to spend money and make these preparations anywhere: People don’t think it will happen to them, so after each disaster the news cycle moves on and everyone except the people directly affected forget how passionate they were about change.
