No...it's not climate change.
No...it's not governmental incompetence.
It's our mastery of land capture.
We are seeing more damage from natural disasters because we are able to successfully live in more dangerous places.
"There has been no trend in the number or intensity of storms at landfall since 1900," says Pielke, a professor of environmental studies at the University of Colorado. "The storms themselves haven't changed."
Look, if someone were to build Sealab 2020 and then there were a sudden uptick in people dying from compression sickness or shark attacks, you wouldn't blame deep zone water pressure. Or if SkyLab started experiencing routine lung decompressions, you wouldn't blame atmospheric loss. So why are so many ideologues ready to say "global warming" for every disaster?
There are some elements of human culpability that needs to be addressed: land use and unfair insurance practices.
Before we become hopelessly lost in despair, however, there is good news: we can do something about this problem. We can enact meaningful building codes and stop keeping insurance premiums artificially low in flood zones.
But first we need to understand that disasters aren't just caused by FEMA and greenhouse gases. Says Tierney: "I don't think that people have an understanding of questions they should be asking — about where they live, about design and construction, about building inspection, fire protection. These just aren't things that are on people's minds."
In real estate, the old mantra is Location, location, location. It should be. Some plots are naturally good for building. Others have to have a lot of preparation, then maintenance. It is a poor use of our resources to continually try to fight against natural consequences. It ties up capital and man-power in maintenance rather than expansion.
2 comments:
Your naivete is so cute. Sure, scoff at global warming. Everyone knows it's true. And I can tell you what is causing it. Sure, Gore is trying to tell us it's his/our SUVs (except ... I don't own one), but I know different. It's Daylight Savings Time. Think about it! An extra hour of sun during the summer months every year has GOT to warm things up ... right?
(That was humor. Believe it or not, I actually read someone who argued it for real. Sigh.)
DST...there's the culprit!
It has NOTHING to do with Big Al's jets and house and limos with the engine running and the A/C on.
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