TODAY'S WORLD

Worldwide happenings have been overlooked by us and the media as a result of the Harvey disaster in Texas. This hurricane has been called a 1 in a 1000 year storm and the environmentalists have lost no time in blaming climate warming.

However, 117 years ago a greater hurricane disaster in terms of human lives hit almost the same area of Texas. On September 8, 1900, a Category 4 hurricane ripped through Galveston, Texas, killing an estimated 6,000 to 8,000 people... A 15-foot storm surge flooded the city, which was then situated at less than 9 feet above sea level, and numerous homes and buildings were destroyed. That hurricane remains the worst weather-related disaster in U.S. history in terms of loss of life.

As to material and economic damages it is hard to compare because we are comparing 1900 dollars with today’s, but suffice to say Galveston never recovered as the most important city on the Texas coast.

According to Wikipedia “The dead bodies were so numerous that burying all of them was impossible. The dead were initially weighted down on barges and dumped at sea, but when the gulf currents washed many of the bodies back onto the beach, a new solution was needed. Funeral pyres were set up on the beaches, or wherever dead bodies were found, and burned day and night for several weeks after the storm. The authorities passed out free whiskey to sustain the distraught men conscripted for the gruesome work of collecting and burning the dead”.

Fortunately in 2017 we have the capability of rescuing people that did not exist even a decade ago and the loss of life in storms such as Katrina, Hugo, and Charlie etc. can be avoided.

While this is going on we have not paid attention to the escalating tensions with Russia marked by Trump’s Thursday order for Moscow to close its consulate general in San Francisco, a chancery annex in Washington, D.C., and a consular annex in New York City. These closures must be complete by Saturday.

Concurrently we have attacked facilities in Syria, and are increasing our military involvement in Afghanistan and in South Korea conducting with Japan and South Korea air force’s live ammunition exercises.

Trump’s pardoning of former Arizona sheriff Joe Arpaio has not gone unnoticed as well as his latest anti-transgender orders for the armed forces. Both subjects for the next blog.

Some feel that all this is Trump"s attempt to turn attention away from the investigation into any collaboration with the Russians in  order to influence the election. There is a possibility that if it can be proven that POTUS lied or has attempted to obstruct an investigation that there will be a repeat of Nixon's Presidency.