Posted on 08/14/2004 2:02:37 PM PDT by My Favorite Headache
It is with a heavy heart that I write this. I have no idea what is wrong with people today in this society and this country. My example I am going to use is a really really sad one.
I was in Plant City as of Thursday night which for those who do not know is just north east of Tampa/St.Pete. I went down there to help a friend of mine who owns a house who happens to be a single mother of a 2 yr old girl. She needed help boarding up her house and sandbags etc.
All finished by 2 am there and I decided I was going to go over to a portion of Tampa called locally "New Tampa", where another friend of mine was readying her home up with her brothers. It was only 30 mins away from Plant City and definitely in the "expected"path of Charley.
I wound up falling asleep there around 4 am and woke up around 6:30 am to see that everything was still a go and a green light for Tampa. We had a few more things to move outside and the sandbags because it is a low lying area that floods from regular storms.
We went out to grab something to eat at a local Wendy's where the wait in the drive thru was about 45 mins long considering everything local had closed already by 11 am. When we got back to the house we were watching storm coverage and then about 20 mins later noticed the shift in the storm. We saw that the storm itself was more than likely going to move into the Cape Coral area.
I decided it was time for me to make my decision and it was quick. 10 seconds. I got into my car and drove over to my friends home in Lakeland. Unfortunately by the time I got over there he had hauled it over to a friends house in Arcadia.
I knew I was racing against time on I-4 and that Charley was breathing down my neck. But was more than confident I would make it back to Melbourne in time before Charlie hit Central Florida...and I did.
With about 60 mph winds everything was ok here and we even managed to keep power the entire time. So we were spared and were lucky...our friends 30 miles to the west of us couldn't say the same.
So all of my phone calls were put into friends in Naples where I used to live up til March of this year,Fort Myers,Cape Coral,and Bonita Springs. All had no power and were trying to save cell batteries but were alive. But here is where the BARF ALERT comes in.
3 of them managed to in the span of 60 seconds say "this is Jeb Bush's storm...he really screwed this one up","your boy Jeb is going to have a lot of explaining to do with this one","I am sure Jeb and George will come play the healer for their own injuries they caused."
I was sicken to my stomach. Just not that these people were my friends and usually very educated and well spoken...BUT THEY MEANT IT!
I said listen...this storm was all over the news for a week. The hurricane warning had been issued within 36 hrs...evacuation orders were given...this is mother nature...science..you can't predict this kind of thing and we all saw it with our own eyes..the storm turned right...not Jeb Bush forcing it to the coast.
Every single person bought into the entire "the Bush's never know what to do when something is going on ala the morning of 9-11",obviously a Michael Moore style of brainwashing that people have sickingly adopted from his film.
If it was not bad enough to hear it was when I turned on local talk radio and listened to my fellow Floridians bash the national hurricane center,the national weather service,jeb bush,and the media for causing such huge errors in the state and ignoring other possible tracks. That Jeb Bush spoke with arrogance and cockiness that the storm was definitely going to hit Tampa.
Last I checked the NHC saved millions of lives by posting updates every 3 hrs...the national weather service saved millions of lives by posting tornado warnings and flood watches and warnings,and Jeb Bush was up for 3 straight days and still is down south trying to do whatever a HUMAN BEING can do.
The nerve of a reporter to ask him "you are down here and the cameras are here...but do you really mean it when you say you are going to make sure people get help? Do you mean it?"
Or CNN saying "well the president's trip with his brother will be more about not wanting to lose Florida and the 27 electoral votes than showing compassion", I have absolutely had it with this kind of crap. I really pray for humanity to come along one day and to stop blaming everyone else for their problems and for things out of all of our control...like category 4 hurricanes.
Everyone knows this was all just another attempt to disenfranchise the mobile home demographic which voted heavily for Gore in the last election.
Most people are like you (to use your own words). The GDP is absolutely huge. For instance, the $87 billion is about 3% of GDP. Who cares?
We are the richest nation on the planet. Our poor are fat and have their own cars and cable tv.
As long as my computer works, the phone bill paid and FR stays up I'm a happy camper :')
Roger that!
Michael Moore style of brainwashing that people have sickingly adopted from his film."we've all heard of penis envy" ping...
George W. Bush will win reelection by a margin of at least ten per cent.
Can't think of a good title though.
LET THEM EAT SNAKE (that sounds like him) Surviving the Bush Boys
Jeb was talking about God this morning. He didn't refer to God as "myself", silly.
What did Bush know and when did he know it?
No doubt Kerry would have inspired a "much more sensitive storm" and had our allies and the UN ready to help if HE were president.
Al Gore will reprise his global warming broken record - it's Bush's fault.
Howard Dean would have given a "YEE-HAW" scream, demonstrating why Vermont has NEVER had a major category 4 hurricane.
And Al Sharpton will complain that it was a white-man's storm with a white man's name and this is the curse from Africa because of slavery and the lack of reparations. He will claim that he knew Bush would use this disaster to deprive the African-Americans of Florida the right to vote.
Tay-RAY-suh will tell some reporter to "shove it" when he questions whether the majority of Atlantic hurricanes have their origins in Africa.
These are the same people that could not figure out how to use punch card ballots. No surprise here.
"That den of sin and homosexuality, South Beach Miami, has been left completely undamaged by three hurricanes that either were heading towards it and turned away, or that passed relatively near...Andrew, Floyd, and Charley."
Not that I am advocate of your theory - but Tampa/St. Pete has a HUGE homosexual population (which unfortunately my wonderful niece was deceived into while a young teen). Interesting that it veered away at the last minute.
I'm waiting for Howard Dean to say this hurricane was timed to help Pres Bush politically.
exactly...
You might have a point...so in essence..both the northern states and sw florida lost democratic voters....Bush had to be behind it all along...
Because they're stupid.
Watching from Tornado Country (where you get ten minutes if you're lucky), we were watching folks on tv flying out on Wednesday. If you stuck aroudn thinking you could beat nature, then this is just natural selection.
.. you said Tampa/St. Pete has a HUGE gay population..
Well you better check your facts again. St. Petersburg is in Pinellas County and Tampa is in Hillsborough County. Do you see either of those counties listed below from the 2000 US Census? What county do you live in?
TABLE 3 TOP 25 COUNTIES RANKED BY PERCENTAGE OF COUPLED
HOUSEHOLDS (married and unmarried partners) THAT ARE GAY OR LESBIAN:
STATE COUNTY PERCENT
CA San Francisco County 6.91
DC District of Columbia 5.14
NY New York County 4.34
MA Suffolk County 3.55
VA Arlington County 3.13
GA DeKalb County 2.97
CO Denver County 2.95
VA Alexandria city 2.93
FL Monroe County 2.86
MA Hampshire County 2.80
MO St. Louis city 2.68
LA Orleans Parish 2.55
GA Fulton County 2.53
OR Multnomah County 2.46
MD Baltimore city 2.43
VA Richmond city 2.30
NM Santa Fe County 2.22
NY Tompkins County 2.19
CA Sonoma County 2.15
CA Alameda County 2.11
MA Franklin County 2.08
WA King County 2.07
MA Nantucket County 1.99
VA Charlottesville city 1.98
SC Allendale County 1.94
The Bush Haters really sink lower than mud. And it will backfire on them. According to them, everything is a Bush conspiracy, including Hurricane Charley. If Bush wins FL in November, they're laying the groundwork for the loss on Bush magickally conjuring up a Condition 4 hurricane to boost his re-election prospects in the Sunshine State. Man, these people are sick.
Of course its all politics. If the President didn't come, they'd slam him for being distant and heartless. You can win with these liberal dirtbags.
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