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Mike Kauffmann
 September 10 2023
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    The disastrous fire in Maui has been in the news a lot lately. But not my news. My main source of news is the BBC World Service. I gave up on American network news about a decade ago due to their bias. The BBC also has bias, but biased news reporting is more acceptable in Europe, so they aren’t as intent on hiding it. I like the honesty. 

     

    The BBC only reported on the fire once and while they noted how significant it was, if they hadn’t mentioned the fire was in Maui you might think they were talking about a different fire. The report was very matter of fact. They noted the unique weather conditions above and below Hawaii created an 80 mph wind tunnel across the island. Since the island is less than 50 miles long, any fire could spread through significant portions of the island very rapidly. 

     

    This was the first news cast I heard on the fire. It did nothing to prepare me for the furor that was to come. Oddly, it wasn’t the fury that caught my interest though one specific complaint did. The complaint was that Biden didn’t care about what happened. 

     

    I’m not a Biden fan. In all honesty, I’m not a fan of any President of the last few decades. But if I had to guess, I’d say that Biden really did care about what happened regardless of how he handled it. As they say, hind sight is 20/20. Perhaps we should give him the benefit of the doubt. 

     

    On the other hand, why should we be concerned about whether or not he cares? Why is this of any concern to the federal government at all? The fact that Biden does or does not care is not really the problem here. There are more important questions. The answer to these questions is not pleasant. Frankly, we have become way to dependent upon the federal government and especially the presidency.


     

    With all the finger pointing going on, it may not be obvious that tons of people are working their asses off in response to what happened. As a water/wastewater professional, one of my immediate concerns was drinking water. The fires did affect the water systems and many advisories were issued, but it looks like things on that front will be back to normal soon for most Maui residents. Being able to count on a good supply of safe drinking water will be a huge boon as rebuilding efforts continue. 

     

    The following is from the Lions Club of Maui Facebook page: 

     

     

    There’s more but you get the point. The citizens of Maui are doing what needs to be done to get things back to normal. There’s no need to wait for the behemoth in Washington D.C. to wake up from its slumber and come to their rescue. They can rescue themselves and that's exactly what they are doing. 


     

    It doesn’t stop there. Dwayne Johnson and Oprah Winfrey started a help fund and donated ten million dollars to it to kick things off. Great, right? Some people don't seem to think so. Why? Because they only bothered to give ten million dollars. No good deed goes unpunished. Thankfully, the charitable community has totally ignored this idiocy. Significant numbers of organizations are out there raising money to help those who were devastated by the Maui fires. 

     

    The Rock is from Hawaii so he has a direct connection. Even so, no direct connection is needed. The Red Cross has volunteers in Maui from all across the country. I specifically noted that this includes people from Georgia, my state. It’s a long way to Hawaii from here yet when the call came, people volunteered to travel thousands of miles to help out. 

     

    As you can see, there is no actual reason for us to be dependent upon the federal leviathan. The Red Cross and the Salvation Army always get to these disasters before FEMA The efforts of these private organizations are always more keyed in on the real needs of the communities they help unlike the one size fits all actions of federal bureaucracy. Yet the American network news media seems to be entirely focused on government as both the problem and the solution. Thank goodness reality is somewhat different. 

     


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