Raindrops falling, one two three
come on girl and dance with me
'tis not raining cats
nor raining dogs
just a gentle downpour
When it starts to rain
I sing and play
I'm a stranger man for sure
Girl you'll find me knocking at your door
grinning wide
and dripping on the floor.
'tis another rainy day
a lovely day for sure
A rainy day lifts my heart
as i walk on out the door
I'm greeted by the subtle sound
of raindrops on the ground
The sweet scent of moistened earth
fills my nose again.
I feel as though I could walk all day
rain dripping from my hand
To many men a rainy day
is a dreary day for sure
They sit inside and
and brood forevermore
For me my dear, I'm sure you'll find
I'm a different man than they
I'll take you for a lovely stroll
and kiss you in the rain.
There is something 'bout
a rainy walk in wet and lovely air.
The rain will wash away anything
including all your cares
Unless you're one who sits inside
with dark and gloomy stares.
When we're good and soggy
we'll head back home again.
we'lll hang our clothes upon the hearth
to dry beside the fire.
I'll grab a blanket
and we'll huddle up
and cuddle by the fire.
A puddle to the left of me
a young girl on the right
We both jump in
and start a splashing fight
All is well, you can tell.
Life seems better in the rain.
Raindrops falling, one two three
Come on girl and dance with me
Tis not raining cats
nor raining dogs
just a lovely downpour
When it starts to rain
I sing and play
I'm a stranger man for sure
Girl you'll find me knocking at your door
Grinning wide
and dripping on the floor
Monday, June 7, 2010
Friday, January 22, 2010
"WTF People???" #8 (Criticism of Relief Efforts in Haiti)
That is right ladies and gentlemen, time for another installment of my little rant series. This time the focus of my irritation is focused solely on those who are criticizing how the relief efforts in Haiti have been conducted.
First off, if you have not done anything to contribute something to the relief efforts, I strongly suggest you do. I realize not a lot of us have a lot to give, but every little bit helps. Contrary to what certain very (inexplicably) influential religious leaders ( i.e. most notably James Dobson of Focus on the Family) have been preaching, just saying paying you taxes is not contribution enough. Their excuse is that your paid your taxes, and some of that money has already been sent to the Relief efforts, therefore donation done. In my humble opinion this is total B.S. because you were not the one who voluntarily sent your money for the purpose of helping those in need. That is like saying by eating at McDonald's you donated a few dollars to the building of a new franchise. I admit, I am curious why a leader of the christian faith is feeling so very uncharitable when he leads a religion based on charity to others. Not very christian of you Mr. Dobson, shame on you for being a hypocrite.
Ok, lets talk about something a little less controversial. Just about every news report I have seen or read regarding the efforts mentions those who are complaining that the relief is not being handed out fast enough and that there is major criticism for the military not bringing in supplies fast enough. Well, in my humble opinion (yes, laugh if you want at that statement) these people need to extract their heads from their rectum because the sphincter is clearly restricting blood flow to the brain. First off, these people simply cannot fathom the scale of this disaster. It is estimated that the amount of people in need of aid is roughly 3 million. That is roughly the size of the population of the Denver Metro area, however most of those people are located in an area about half the size of the Denver area.
Now take into consideration the already limited infrastructure of the Port Au Prince area. There is one airport with only one runway, and has the capacity for 12 planes on the ground at any given time and could put only 30 planes a day through. The seaport has seven relatively shallow berths , but only one gantry crane (those huge, weird looking cranes used for offloading containers from ships) and limited capacity to offload ships (the port is mostly used for cruise ships). There are three main highways leading out of the city (all poorly maintained), along with several smaller roads (even less maintained, if at all). Plus most of the buildings were poorly built thanks to the political instability and corruption leading to almost nonexistent building codes. So let's see what happened when the quake hit. The airport was relatively undamaged with the exception of the control tower, which was destroyed. However now you have about three hundred planes a day wanting to land. The US Air Force took over and is now processing about 180 planes a day. The seaport was basically obliterated. Only a few berths are clear for ships to come in, but the pier with the gantry crane is now underwater, and many of the vehicles for offloading cargo got buried under piles of containers or the rubble of buildings. Simply put, yeah you might be able to get a ship in, but getting your cargo off the ship is a big problem. According to most reports I have read, all of the highways are near impassable, and the smaller roads leading in from the other ports in the country were destroyed. Add to this the fact that with all the buildings destroyed in the city blocking city streets along with abandoned vehicles. Getting any trucks through the city without killing the hordes of people wandering the streets is a major hassle to say the least.
Well, the world basically told the US that we are basically in charge of running the relief efforts. Heck, even the Vatican put a US diocese in charge of the Catholic Charities Haitian relief effort. The Navy has moved in a hospital ship, and several other ships have brought in helicopters and supplies and thousands of troops. the Seabees and the Army's engineers have begun doing what they can to set up working infrastructure clearing roads and sending in a ship to clear the port. The Air Force has remotely taken over air traffic control and since then has increased the number of planes processed by the airport by nine times. They have been working their asses off 24/7 to make this happen and so far they have done a damn good job of it.
So what do all the desperate people in Haiti and all the more outspoken people around the world have to say about it? The Air Force is poorly prioritizing flights. People aren't getting the supplies they desperately need. Planes are being diverted to the Dominican Republic because they aren't allowed to land at the airport. Why can't ships full of relief supplies offload them? Why is the US making sure military flights can land at the airport but not all civilian planes can? If nearly a billion dollars worth of aid have been given, why hasn't it reached more than a fraction of the people who need it?
I think you probably see the pattern here. If you sympathize with any of the sentiments still, let me spell it out for you in a way your severely atrophied brain might be able to understand. They can't get it to them! The relief efforts are severely hindered by the damage to the already poor infrastructure that could barely support a fraction of the population already in place. The military flights are getting priority because before people can get the supplies they need, you have to be able to get the supplies to where they are needed. Establishing infrastructure is key to any disaster relief. Haiti didn't really have it to begin with, so the situation is all the worse for it. On top of that, a good part of the population didn't have much to begin with. So 200,000 died, so what? That is a tiny fraction of the 3 million people living there. The supplies donated are barely enough to feed a small fraction of the population, many of whom were already dirt poor and hardly had enough money for food in the first place. So if they had a hard time getting supplies when the infrastructure in this horribly overpopulated city was intact, how in the great turning worlds do you expect to get it to them with the infrastructure in shambles???
Seriously people. I know the scale of the disaster is mind boggling, but if you can allow a bit of oxygen to reach your brain by loosening the sphincter a bit, you will see that what is being done is truly unprecedented and handled incredibly well considering. To all of those in Haiti who are becoming increasingly desperate: The world is doing all it can. I know you are becoming increasingly desperate, but keep faith. As the old saying goes, Rome wasn't built in a day. These things take time, and all things considered an unbelievable amount of things have been done in an unbelievably short amount of time.
First off, if you have not done anything to contribute something to the relief efforts, I strongly suggest you do. I realize not a lot of us have a lot to give, but every little bit helps. Contrary to what certain very (inexplicably) influential religious leaders ( i.e. most notably James Dobson of Focus on the Family) have been preaching, just saying paying you taxes is not contribution enough. Their excuse is that your paid your taxes, and some of that money has already been sent to the Relief efforts, therefore donation done. In my humble opinion this is total B.S. because you were not the one who voluntarily sent your money for the purpose of helping those in need. That is like saying by eating at McDonald's you donated a few dollars to the building of a new franchise. I admit, I am curious why a leader of the christian faith is feeling so very uncharitable when he leads a religion based on charity to others. Not very christian of you Mr. Dobson, shame on you for being a hypocrite.
Ok, lets talk about something a little less controversial. Just about every news report I have seen or read regarding the efforts mentions those who are complaining that the relief is not being handed out fast enough and that there is major criticism for the military not bringing in supplies fast enough. Well, in my humble opinion (yes, laugh if you want at that statement) these people need to extract their heads from their rectum because the sphincter is clearly restricting blood flow to the brain. First off, these people simply cannot fathom the scale of this disaster. It is estimated that the amount of people in need of aid is roughly 3 million. That is roughly the size of the population of the Denver Metro area, however most of those people are located in an area about half the size of the Denver area.
Now take into consideration the already limited infrastructure of the Port Au Prince area. There is one airport with only one runway, and has the capacity for 12 planes on the ground at any given time and could put only 30 planes a day through. The seaport has seven relatively shallow berths , but only one gantry crane (those huge, weird looking cranes used for offloading containers from ships) and limited capacity to offload ships (the port is mostly used for cruise ships). There are three main highways leading out of the city (all poorly maintained), along with several smaller roads (even less maintained, if at all). Plus most of the buildings were poorly built thanks to the political instability and corruption leading to almost nonexistent building codes. So let's see what happened when the quake hit. The airport was relatively undamaged with the exception of the control tower, which was destroyed. However now you have about three hundred planes a day wanting to land. The US Air Force took over and is now processing about 180 planes a day. The seaport was basically obliterated. Only a few berths are clear for ships to come in, but the pier with the gantry crane is now underwater, and many of the vehicles for offloading cargo got buried under piles of containers or the rubble of buildings. Simply put, yeah you might be able to get a ship in, but getting your cargo off the ship is a big problem. According to most reports I have read, all of the highways are near impassable, and the smaller roads leading in from the other ports in the country were destroyed. Add to this the fact that with all the buildings destroyed in the city blocking city streets along with abandoned vehicles. Getting any trucks through the city without killing the hordes of people wandering the streets is a major hassle to say the least.
Well, the world basically told the US that we are basically in charge of running the relief efforts. Heck, even the Vatican put a US diocese in charge of the Catholic Charities Haitian relief effort. The Navy has moved in a hospital ship, and several other ships have brought in helicopters and supplies and thousands of troops. the Seabees and the Army's engineers have begun doing what they can to set up working infrastructure clearing roads and sending in a ship to clear the port. The Air Force has remotely taken over air traffic control and since then has increased the number of planes processed by the airport by nine times. They have been working their asses off 24/7 to make this happen and so far they have done a damn good job of it.
So what do all the desperate people in Haiti and all the more outspoken people around the world have to say about it? The Air Force is poorly prioritizing flights. People aren't getting the supplies they desperately need. Planes are being diverted to the Dominican Republic because they aren't allowed to land at the airport. Why can't ships full of relief supplies offload them? Why is the US making sure military flights can land at the airport but not all civilian planes can? If nearly a billion dollars worth of aid have been given, why hasn't it reached more than a fraction of the people who need it?
I think you probably see the pattern here. If you sympathize with any of the sentiments still, let me spell it out for you in a way your severely atrophied brain might be able to understand. They can't get it to them! The relief efforts are severely hindered by the damage to the already poor infrastructure that could barely support a fraction of the population already in place. The military flights are getting priority because before people can get the supplies they need, you have to be able to get the supplies to where they are needed. Establishing infrastructure is key to any disaster relief. Haiti didn't really have it to begin with, so the situation is all the worse for it. On top of that, a good part of the population didn't have much to begin with. So 200,000 died, so what? That is a tiny fraction of the 3 million people living there. The supplies donated are barely enough to feed a small fraction of the population, many of whom were already dirt poor and hardly had enough money for food in the first place. So if they had a hard time getting supplies when the infrastructure in this horribly overpopulated city was intact, how in the great turning worlds do you expect to get it to them with the infrastructure in shambles???
Seriously people. I know the scale of the disaster is mind boggling, but if you can allow a bit of oxygen to reach your brain by loosening the sphincter a bit, you will see that what is being done is truly unprecedented and handled incredibly well considering. To all of those in Haiti who are becoming increasingly desperate: The world is doing all it can. I know you are becoming increasingly desperate, but keep faith. As the old saying goes, Rome wasn't built in a day. These things take time, and all things considered an unbelievable amount of things have been done in an unbelievably short amount of time.
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