So how did it come to pass that critical components of both the private and public communications infrastructure for a major metropolitan area all ended up on one hill, surrounded by kindling?
So how did it come to pass that critical components of both the private and public communications infrastructure for a major metropolitan area all ended up on one hill, surrounded by kindling?
Californicatia in action.
Because it’s Californicatia.
Hummmmmmmm. Put in place by the same guys that put up the WX stations on top of bar-b-ques?????
P.J. O’Rourke on California:
“California’s Dim Bulbs
California is in the midst of an enormous stupidity crisis. Californians have been sitting in the dark because … they didn’t turn the lights on.
They say they’re short of electricity. Yes, they are. Between 1988 and 1998, California’s electricity consumption increased by 15 percent. Meanwhile California’s capacity to generate electricity shrank by five percent, even as the state hesitated to build new power lines to tap into neighboring states’ power supplies.
Californians didn’t want dams across their rivers, derricks on their ocean, power lines across their borders, or fossil fuel smoke in their sky. These might interfere with all the smart things Californians do, such as hang-glide. California was going to rely on “negawatts” – dramatic power conservation. (But California regulators put price controls on electricity that lowered prices, and even Californians weren’t dumb enough to skip a bargain.) And California was going to rely on alternative power generation.
With all the puffery from Silicon Valley dot.com start-ups, wind farms wouldn’t be a problem. But it turns out that alternative power generation is an alternative, mostly, to generating power.
President Bush was wrong to grant an extension of executive orders requiring out-of-state utilities to supply power to California. And everyone is wrong to listen to Californians whine about electricity deregulation. There never was any deregulation. The California Public Utilities Commission merely changed its regulations, which apparently weren’t stupid enough to meet Golden State standards.”
http://www.cato.org/pub_display.php?pub_id=4277
On the bright side, it might stop the river of media crap coming out of the self glorification hole known as LA/Hollywood.
Hidden bonus.
Uli I think you missed the ‘surrounded by kindling’ part. That’s ok it was expected.
Yep speedy – we in North America have paid (and will continue to pay) for years of previous fire suppression efforts.
While it seemed OK at the time to stop forest fires, the unintended consequence was overgrowth, and the availability of tonnes more fuel.
I guess he can’t claim ignorance of the law now can he.
Knowing the Liberals they will say he thought he hit a deer or some other such nonsense and the MSM will lap it up as the truth.
I have not lived California for 20 years, (southern California in 40 or so), but my parents lived in the Foothills–one of their problems was the TV signals went over their heads).
In those longago days, people were hired to clear brush and dead wood away form the houses, and to build firebreaks along most of mthe ridges.
There were still major fires but I don’t remember any 150,000 acre examples.
But now in these Enlightened Times, we don’t desecrate Gaia with that stuff anymore.
Sorry…wrong article I posted to.
Larry Sheldon said “In those longago days, people were hired to clear brush and dead wood away form the houses, and to build firebreaks along most of the ridges.”
Just like they used to do in Australia. But stopped.
Hence the fires they had recently.
Of course they tried to pin the problem on global warming.
Surrounded by kindling refers to another of Californika’s bright ideas….to satisfy the Greenie element..the state (much like Australia) put in place laws and regulations PREVENTING clearance of brush near buildings etc.
That’s a sure way to get your house burnt down when any of these REGULARLY OCCURING fires occurs.
Californika has always had and will always have earthquakes, mudslides and brush fires…………
Okay, okay, does it really matter who is at fault here? There are people suffering here; we may be watching the beginning of the demise of western civilization; would it be somehow different if it occurred in Denver or Chicago or Atlanta? Or for that matter, Calgary, Regina, or Quebec City?
Uli hasn’t heard the one about putting all your eggs in one basket.
Larry,
Those other places are not as in credibly stupid as California. So it would be a huge difference and highly unusual.
Larry, a pretty good argument could be made that California left Western Civilization in the ’60s. We’re watching the demise of a socialist state run by and for IDIOTS.
Who the hell leaves that much brush in the desert around a CITY? Idiots, that’s who. How many major giant world record fires does it take before they stop doing that? We don’t know, they haven’t f-ing figured it out yet.
Momar, California had produced not only some of the shallowest and thoughtless people in the world, but some of the finest and smartest people in the world.
No longer the Golden State, it was in its time the hope of many many successful people and it fulfilled many of their dreams. It may have a future yet. Let’s not give up hope on a state that contains as many people as we find in Canada; we’re not the sharpest knife in the drawer either.
Larry says “Okay, okay, does it really matter who is at fault here?”
Uh….yeah, actually, it does.
California shows the rest of the world how good the SEIU,teachers unions and the greens can run a state.
Took me a while to find the link, but it’s worth it.
It is not just California with this problem. I would have done the same thing if I was in their shoes.
Australia Fire Story
“Or for that matter, Calgary, Regina, or Quebec City?”
I’m not familiar with Quebec City but it sure as hell wouldn’t happen in Regina and not likely in Calgary either. There is no forest/brush to burn.
Horny toad
Uli I may live inside kindling but I am not going to whine if Oprah, MSNBC and the like go off the air. Your point is irrelevant. If I lived in an area that had a threat, I would remove it. There may be a protest about ‘killing the wood weevil’ or whatever but I would remove it. If the police and firefighters are to lose communication all the more reason not to be stupid.
H Toad
Exactly. Real glad to know that Government run emergency preparedness teams (who get paid to continuously plan for disasters) allowed critical communications infrastucture in such a vulnerable spot.
Maybe they can just say “Oopsie. Hindsight is 20/20.”
Now doesn’t that inspire confidence?
The problems related to fire suppression are well known – a while ago there was a show on PBS, they estimated the cost of cleaning up underbrush/new growth to be in the billions for the whole US. (Well, granted, that was when a billion seemed like a lot of money)
“Sure speedy, hindsight is always 20/20.
Posted by: ulianov at September 1, 2009 11:16 PM ”
Not so,uli. ANY scheme,plan or so-called thought of socialist leftards is 100% guaranteed to be FUBAR. I guess eco-freaks haven’t figured out that when you leave tons of crap ready to burn on the ground and around your house,Mother Nature WILL remove it, and your house,even if some nutcase commie thinks his laws will stop her. My only prayer now is that hopefully all these fires will hasten the Big One. We need beach front property east of the Rockies.
California is an example to us all of what happens to a polity when it becomes so over regulated by busybodies with no common sense. That eventually it collapses from weight of stupidity.
Even Nations are subject to the Peter principle.
California just reached its level of incompetence. No wonder people are fleeing this nest of illusion.
The folks running it like our own pols live like pote4ntates with golden handshakes, golden parachute pensions, free government trips for the whole family, free accomidation in some cases, free cars & fuel . All paid by you!
No wonder they live in unicorn land. where even land managment is subject to madmen living in another universe.
The State will have to change, or die.
JMO
No tragedy so horrific that the SDA bile spewers can’t use it as an excuse to puke up more hatred.
“What is ‘because the citizens of californicate all need to sustain the image of this state that we cater to celebrity and living in the hills of L.A. is part of that so we put our towers there to prove it Alex”
I *still* don’t know why property owners everywhere from kelowna to the florida keys can’t just chain saw a bare perimeter fire stop. first around their property, then around their town, then around vulnerable vital sites like this.
why? I’m not in charge so I can’t order it done and the ones who are in charge do nothing and won’t answer.
mysteries of the universe . . . .
Well, curious_george, if you lived in California, and took a chainsaw and cleared the underbrush in the woods surrounding your home, the government would fine you or throw you in jail.
Clearing underbrush hurts Mother Gaia, don’t you know?
This actually happened to some poor sap who cleared underbrush around his Lake Tahoe home when a fire threatened it last year. He saved his home, but got fined by the eco-Nazis.
California catches on fire every summer, and every summer it seems to take them by surprise.
Black Mamba :
Lol lol lol lol So true of us all.
In Edmonton we have civic politicians that think our climate is like California. So they try to indroduce iddling bans in -40 below. I guess it comes from them being at conferances in Brazil & other hot spots during the Winter. I bet not a one has seen how far North we are on a globe.
we truly live in the “idiotocracy”.
Try to remember though, there are 2 California’s. From SF south, is the California you are all pounding on.
From SF north is a working state who want out just as badly as you want them out. Those people up the valley are saying all the same things you are reading here and Bleet; they are saying ALL the same things as you read on here, because they are farmers and people in natural resource based industries that are suffering as a direct result of the stupid that oozes out of the south.
I did a contract there around the time of the y2k bubble pop and Northern Californians want a state separate from the South.
Yes, Arron D, California’s constitution allows the state to be divided, and, naturally, a movement is afoot. http://www.jeffersonstate.com/
I lost interest when the promoters of the state of Jefferson turned out to be just more California hustlers, as were the local Tea party organizers. Democracy is evolutionary, folks, and not the ‘end of history’. Democracies eventually fall.
By the way, California’s #1 industry is agriculture, and the true heart of California is in the central valley – poor, hard working, riddled with “illegals”, country music and nice folks.
[quote]Northern Californians want a state separate from the South.[/quote]
Cut the Golden Gate Bridge, and be done with the sniveling Cockroaches. It’s the role of Communists to encourage & create chaos…they start & stoke the fires.
Screw California until they learn to FEED the worthless Cockroaches to the hungry sharks.
“By the way, California’s #1 industry is agriculture, and the true heart of California is in the central valley- poor, hard working, riddled with “illegals”, country music and nice folks.”
Was #1…..Thanks to the Delta Smelt and environmentalists water to the farms was cut 90% this year. So many people went on welfare that California had to ask FEMA for help. Oh, FEMA turned them down.