Tuesday, July 15, 2025
The Deluge(s)
With nearly 100 people still missing from the devastating floods in Texas (and 131 confirmed dead), now there is flooding in the Northeast, even closing down subway lines in New York.
There have always been floods, and for centuries this has been a problem for us humans, who seem to really like living near rivers (for good reason, of course). I don't doubt that global warning has made things worse, and could create whole new levels of mayhem in the future, particularly on ocean shorelines.
The Texas floods brought out a cruel fact: a lot of times we are not very good at preparing for even the most obvious threats. I think there is a very human tendency to expect that what happened before will not happen again-- that's how the Guadalupe killed 10 people in 1987 and nothing seemed to change.
But... it is a characteristic of leadership to create the initiative to prevent a "next time." And it appears that we have been lacking that for a while.
