Friday Night News Hurricane: Today in Tweets

40 FUCKING INCHES OF RAINFALL PREDICTED?! Holy shit, that is absolutely terrifying, even if the hurricane only consisted of rain and not gale-force winds and other destructive stuff. A mete of rain falling on a place that isn’t set up to handle that volume is absolutely devastating. Fucking hell.

Everything else is horrifying too (aside from the cute animals), but that predicted rainfall made my inner hydrologist scream in terror. The biggest historical rainfall event in southern Ontario, the one that caused massive amounts of damage and the one we design structures to convey if we want to be far on the safe side, was 21 cm, about a fifth of what’s being predicted for Texas.

I’m an atheist, but I’m starting to reconsider my position. Because there has to be someone who hears the nation’s collective thought of “How can things get worse?”, and goes “You guys are asking that again? Alright, I guess I’ll show you.”

Seriously, what the fuck?

Oh, I forgot another power of TX Governor: Trying to organize the legislature to vote for a US Constitutional Convention before taking office. Plans included “A vote by 2/3s of states could override Supreme Court decisions”. What could possibly go wrong there⸮ Aside from “who works out what the decision means, if it’s over-ridden”, which was probably “decision happens according to whatever appeals court said”, which seems a terrible random way of judging anything.

@Catalpa
That’s why some of our bridges over “tiny rivers” are surprisingly long

I spent a little time on google maps trying to find the one I’m thinking of. It’s between Austin, towards the northeast, and made me wonder about it a lot when I was a kid. Then we drove it shortly after a major rainstorm. Not wondering about it now. It was almost to the roadway.

@Bakunin
Well, many state constitutions have lots of amendments, but we had to deal with being in multiple nations, so we’ve had 7 constitutions, I think. The US only had 2 (Articles of Confederation (No, not that Confederacy), then Constitution), or possibly 3 (Magna Carta).

Some of the early constitutions’ amendments included things like “Veteran named X gets Y land/etc”. I think. It’s been decades since I’ve seen a published copy with every amendment.

The Six Flags over Texas amusement park was named for all the different nation’s flags that have flown over TX. France, Spain, Mexico, Republic of Texas, United States, and the traitorous CSA. Of course before France, it was Native land. Not many states were nations before they became states. Hawai’i is the only other one I know of, as Puerto Rico and US Virgin Islands aren’t states yet.

Texas history is quite complex.

argh, sorry for dissertation, but I ran out of time to make it shorter.

“The chances that the Trump administration will be up to the challenge of dealing with it are essentially nil.”

Kinda makes me wonder what the point of having a governor is.

Do you wonder that in every situation when the federal government does anything at all? If the point of having governors is that the presidential administration never has to do anything, then we could just get rid of the presidency, since there are governors.

Do you also wonder what the point of having a mayor is, whenever the state government does something? Sounds like we should also get rid of gubernatorial administrations and just have mayors, and have the United States break up into thousands of city-states.

I’m not sure it could be worse than having Trump as the president, so sure, let’s give it a try.

All he could muster up was “good luck,”

As this is Trump he was probably addressing that to the hurricane.

His adding “They’re gonna be safe.” Not “I hope you’ll be safe”, not “Try your best to stay safe.” “They’re gonna be safe.”

No, not everyone will be. A lot of people won’t be. People are going to die, and he’s just blithely saying, “They’re gonna be safe.” He doesn’t even bother thinking about the possibility (inevitability) that there will be a lot of people who won’t be safe, because he genuinely doesn’t care.

misophistry:

Why can these nazis never admit to being fired?

Remember Gorka’s boast that “the alpha males are back”? Being fired is not very alpha.

Arpaio is so dirty that it wouldn’t surprise me if further shocking allegations about him emerge in future. The pardon won’t protect him against future cases.

So cats are catting as usual. That’s a relief, I hope you won’t have problems at all.

I just encountered my father as a random encounter after a five year period of no talking. He issued a notpology when I confronted him (“no, you misunderstood me, but we can’t redo history”), did not acknowledge at any point that there may have been a reason for which I didn’t see him for five year, and seemed somewhat surprised that I don’t actually have the time to randomly go to a restaurant with him.

I feel that I can get five more year without talking to him again. Good thing he isn’t old enough to need help.

VP:

Checking in from Texas – Mr. Parasol and I are okay so far. The cats think the rain should stop because it’s noisy and they do not approve. Also, since I’m awake, I should feed them.

Also, the rain is your fault? That’s usually how it works with cats.

Stay safe.

Oh, of COURSE the rain is our fault. We’re not stopping it, after all.

Currently calling the out-of-town family letting them know how we’re doing. Mr. Parasol is discussing weather data with his retired-from-NASA father.

ETA: Rain’s picking up again.

A racist pardoning a racist, I guess I can’t say I’m surprised.

All things considered though, who gave 45 the idea? I doubt he even knew who the guy was before this, so someone else is likely behind this. Wouldn’t surprise me if it’s meant as a distraction for something.

Hey, just to say a really quite genuine and concerned “good luck” to all Mammotheers in the path of the hurricane. I hope you all stay safe and well and so does everyone you love and all your cats and other creatures as well.

Ditto!

All things considered though, who gave 45 the idea? I doubt he even knew who the guy was before this

Actually, Joe Arpaio was one the of first people with any powerful role in government who endorsed Trump. Trump definitely knows who he is and is doing this as a reward for loyalty.

Anisky
August 26, 2017 at 2:39 am

All he could muster up was “good luck,”

As this is Trump he was probably addressing that to the hurricane.

His adding “They’re gonna be safe.” Not “I hope you’ll be safe”, not “Try your best to stay safe.” “They’re gonna be safe.”

No, not everyone will be. A lot of people won’t be. People are going to die, and he’s just blithely saying, “They’re gonna be safe.” He doesn’t even bother thinking about the possibility (inevitability) that there will be a lot of people who won’t be safe, because he genuinely doesn’t care.

He probably assumes all Texans fit the usual Texan stereotypes and that they’re all badass Superman-Cowboys who can magically repel hurricanes by the virtues of their “Awesome Texan-ness” or something.