Irenocracy

Editor
Wall Street Journal

Dear Editor:

Irene is the Greek word for peace.  For the past few days Americans have anticipated the worst hurricane in decades:  Hurricane Peace.  But the media and politicians seem not to have noticed.  Despite an ever- expanding education system, more than other democracies, which have mostly become tyrannies,  America is becoming an idiocracy.  There’s a link to the persistent ethics decline and to the insistence on  Keynesian economics as well.  A nation that fears Hurricane Peace is unlikely to conceive of moral foundations to action or to think logically about economic policy.

Sincerely,

Mitchell Langbert, Ph.D.

Brooklyn College

Irene Pictures, Bushkill Creek Below Maltby Hollow

As I blogged earlier today, Hurricane Irene caused the Bushkill Creek to overflow onto our lawn, but before the overflow was sufficient to threaten the house, debris blocking a downstream bridge was loosened and the stream receded quickly.  I grabbed a camera as the stream was receding back to its banks. At its peak the stream was covering most of the lawn.

Update on Irene: My House Flooded Out

Sunday night I was optimistic, but my house ended up being flooded out. The Bushkill broke the bank on my property for the first time in more than 50 years. It did not reach the house. The reason for the breach was debris that had collected under a bridge. It broke through just as the overflow was reaching the house. At that point the Bushkill went down about two feet.  But my basement was flooded and I lost my furnace and hot water heater. We're still out of power. I'm posting this from a computer shop in Kingston. I probably won't have power or Internet until the weekend.  My earlier blog is an example of excessive optimism. I'll remember that the next time I think about making an investment.

Hurricane Irene: Stream Conditions at My House

So far the Bushkill Creek near Maltby Hollow is not as high as it was earlier this week, but the rain is coming down hard.  The state has a meter across the stream and it's still in the 2+ feet range. With one day, 4 inches rain I'll bet it goes over 3 feet by tomorrow.  Flooding here would require something over 9 feet, so there's nothing to worry about for us from this storm.  But wind is always a scare with all the trees around here. So far there hasn't been much wind, but I assume that will change by tomorrow morning.