Presented Without Comment

Bloggie, this is not directed at you or your post. Just channeling some inchoate thoughts I’ve had for the past few hours.

I feel about this tornado and the aftermath the same way I feel about the death penalty when I have to remind people that inflicting pain on others will not reduce the pain previously inflicted upon you by the same person or someone similar to them.

I’m horrified by the number of friends of mine on social media doing the Nelson Muntz “heh-heh” finger-pointing towards Oklahoma for their horrible senators and representatives who were anti-guv-mint/ anti-FEMA relief. Yes, they have shitty-ass psycho Congress critters.

And yes there’s a plausible argument that they are big fat fucking hypocrites in Oklahoma. And yes, more than 50% of the voters who showed up to vote voted them in. And Flying Spaghetti Monster knows there’s a ton of craay-craay in OKC and areas around.

But you know what? Even if they are assholes, and do asshole things like vote for these assholes, they are still human beings. And we are are better than that. We shouldn’t sink to the level some of their representatives may have fallen during Hurricanes Katrina, Sandy, etc., (or will fall in any future earthquake destroying Ess Eff or El Lay) and laugh and point our fingers and say they deserved this as God’s will or we can’t bail them out. Because nobody deserves that response. And God has bigger things to worry about, like getting her ass busy on finding a cure for cancer. (xoxo baked)

And we (i.e. progressive Blue Staters who pay more in federal taxes than take in) should be the bigger/better people and not sink to their level and say that they don’t deserve help or love. For better or for worse, we are one nation, and unless and until they run off with Governor Good Hair to establish the Koch Brothers’ Republic of Texahoma, we are collectively responsible to one another (even if some of their representatives don’t feel the same towards us).

Their children are bleeding the same red blood that kids in New Jersey did after Sandy. Their parents are just as overwhelmed and scared as those moms and dads in New Orleans after their homes were drowned and they clung to the roofs of their homes.

@SanFranLefty: Thank you for that. I’ve been in tears on and off since Mr Cyn called me at work to tell me about it. My friends there are safe, but everyone is shaken to the core. It’s the worst devastation anyone there has seen, and they’ve seen a lot. Like the storm chaser says at the end of the video, we’ve got to help these people.

@SanFranLefty: Meanwhile on MSNBC, a meteorologist makes a point I’ve been wondering about: No statistical increase in severe tornadoes recently. This ain’t a climate-change drive-by.

However: Dear gawd there are a lot of us, and we’re covering a lot more land than we used to. Even if tornadoes now are as tornadoes always have been, we’ve created a target-rich environment for them.

@SanFranLefty: what you said. I want to go off about Inhofe and the other idiots that represent that state, but there are dead kids. Those kids didn’t vote GOP. Hard to draw the line, but … hard to draw the line. Too soon ….

@blogenfreude: 21 dead kids. So far. More are missing. They didn’t pick their tea-bagger parents any more than the 25% of kids in our country living in poverty.

@Mistress Cynica: Fuck, I thought 1995 was pretty bad in OKC. I was especially thinking of you and your family/friends there. I was sucked into work drama so much today that I had no idea until I got home tonight and Mr. SFL told me about what had happened.

@blogenfreude: I remember when natural disasters weren’t politicized, but I also remember when MTV played music.

The thing that’s beyond me is forty fucking minutes. We had windstorms in Eugene, but they didn’t crush houses on their foundations. And the two major SoCal quakes I’ve had the pleasure of riding were sixty seconds, tops. Even hurricanes have a predictability about them.

But a Giant Fucking Tornado that takes its own sweet time hoovering a neighborhood? I can’t grasp it.

@nojo: 40 minutes. 20 mile path a mile wide: http://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2013/05/20/us/oklahoma-tornado-map.html

And the death toll is up to 91.

Yep, it’s terrible and that’s what we live with down here in my NW Dallas suburb as we watch the weather, especially in Spring.

As to the pols from around here who opposed Sandy relief and will soon be hollerin’ for help for Moore, I don’t think they’re fully human nor are they good Americans because the oppose the general welfare except when it serves their personal interests.

Bill Hicks got it right, almost. Republicans are a virus with shoes; a few others are a bit better.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Gg4Ifz25SjE

@SanFranLefty:
Point well made. What’s sad is that climate change denying boneheads like Inhofe won’t do a damn thing except shriek even louder while ordinary people suffer/die to protect the “pride” of meat puppets like Inhofe and their Koch Bros/Exxon masters.

My fellow blue collar coworkers read the local wingnut dipshit paper and I have to bite my tongue when I notice the headlines in the Op-Ed section about global warming. Much of it is word for word the shit from Koch puppets in US Amercia. Al Gore recently made some pointed comments about Alberta Tar Sands oil that were correct and largely ignored in the Canada City Media.

I’d like to remind everyone that the Koch Bros aren’t just fucking US Amercia but also Canada City as they are deeply involved in Alberta Tar Sands oil and have their hands up PM Stevie Harper’s large asshole, too.

@SanFranLefty:

I don’t like to make the “global warming did this” argument because it’s an argument that can’t be logically sustained. Global warming leads to more energy in the atmosphere that leads to a statistical increase in violent weather activity, but that’s just statistics. You can’t argue that any one storm was “caused” or “worsened” by global warming. Making that claim is akin to insisting that a particular storm was caused by us villagers angering the gods by refusing the counsel of our witch doctors on some matter or other. It’s the flip side of Fox News running headlines mocking global warming every time there’s a strong snowfall. It’s pure political opportunism (and Wonkette’s recent article to this effect is pretty disgraceful, if I might add).

But when it comes to pointing out that in a naked political “fuck you” to the President and the largely Democratic Northeast, most of the Oklahoma congressional delegation, at some point opposed or voted against relief for victims of hurricane Sandy, I’ll climb the highest fucking mountain and shout it as loudly as I can. No, I don’t think we should deny OK one cent or needed aid, but the country needs to be reminded that those fuckers voted against helping others in their time of need, and they did it for the basest, most indefensible of reasons. As aid and money flows into Oklahoma the American people need to be reminded that Republicans are a hypocritical, selfish lot who, as they walk by, will spit on their neighbor’s child as he weeps wounded on the street, then plead for help all misty eyed when it is their child who is in pain.

The people of Oklahoma need and will get our help. They need and will receive Federal aid, both monetary and logistical. But, when their elected representatives plead for government help, it is important to remeber and to remind the American people that those same men sought to deny that help to others in their time of need.

Fuck James Inhofe. Fuck Tom Coburn. Fuck the members of the OK congressional delegation who voted nay.

I can’t take it this morning. This, to me, was worse than the 2011 Super Outbreak which flattened Tuscaloosa.

@Serolf Divad: Amen.

T/J: we have elections in L.A. today for Mayor, City Attorney and City Councilcritters. Turnout is expected to be around 20%. I’m going to what I hope will be a victory party for the City Atty candidate I like, a long-time friend.

I am so fucking worn out by people dying. I am seeking work as a professional mourner. a hired Sicilian widow. it’s not making me embrace life more, it’s just tragic plain and simple. what is everyone doing this weekend? i’ll be at a wake Friday night and a funeral mass on Saturday. fun!

@Serolf Divad:

Here’s the problem: the average person doesn’t really pay much attention to what’s *said*, it’s all about results. Decades of sending budget arsonists, Gawd-botherers and professional know-nothings to Congress hasn’t harmed these states materially (mostly through Dems bending over backwards to deal), so why should they stop sending them?

@baked: xoxo

I know it’s been rough, guys, but I think one bright spot has been the administration’s response to the tragedy- organized and effective. And as always, the stories of heroes are starting to emerge. The world moves on…

@baked: Love your way, hon. It’s never easy.

@baked: I feel you, sweetie, and I am so sorry for your loss. The Onion, as usual, summed it up for me: Americans Dredge Up Last Remaining Reserves Of Grief.