David Sirota: A Snow-Filled Glimpse of America’s Future

from truthdig:



A Snow-Filled Glimpse of America’s Future
Posted on Dec 30, 2010

By David Sirota


“Welcome to the New Normal.”

Those words should be displayed at New York’s airports as a welcome to bedraggled travelers during the Northeast’s latest “snowpocalypse.” Why? Because the Big Apple’s much-lamented paralysis this week is a critical cautionary tale for everyone. The episode warns us about the kind of thing that’s likely coming to the rest of America as we now willfully mix three toxic problems.

The first of those is global climate change. Though no single mega-storm is the fault of climate change, scientists agree that weather—including snow patterns—will become more intense as the planet’s ecosystem is transformed by human-produced pollution. So while New York’s near-record snowstorm may not be the direct result of unbridled carbon emissions, powerful storms like it will undoubtedly be more frequent thanks to our head-in-the-sand attitude toward the environment.

This might be slightly less alarming if our country were making investments to mitigate climate change’s worst effects. But that gets to the second problem that the New York snowstorm epitomizes: America is still being eviscerated by conservatives’ anti-tax, budget-cutting religion—a religion whose high priest is New York Mayor Michael Bloomberg.

Like so many wealth-worshiping politicians across the land, Bloomberg spent the last few years focused on two priorities: He campaigned against proposals to replenish depleted public coffers via slightly higher taxes on Wall Streeters, all while citing those depleted coffers as a rationale for massive municipal layoffs. Those job cuts, which were particularly acute at New York’s snow-removing sanitation department, have now predictably translated into an immobilized metropolis. .............(more)

The complete piece is at: http://www.truthdig.com/report/item/a_snow-filled_glimpse_of_americas_future_20101230/?ln

Nothing moves if government does not work. Fuck Bloomberg and the small government assholes.

Cut taxes means cutting services. Hey Folks, get ready
for the new normal.

Just in time, lean management outsourcing work to cut overhead and personnel costs, but adopted as a societal model mean that any unusual event -- like a good-size snowstorm -- means the system overloads and crashes, temporarily.

Time to cost-in some more hiring to build-in surplus capacity, or else pay a far higher cost over the long run.

But, did Bloombergs' base -- the geeks and quants on Wall Street -- even notice? They're all out-of-town sipping $700 bottles of wine at a comfy ski lodge or tropical beach house this time of year.