Southern California Fires

I don't think I've ever seen so much fire stuff as we have had this week. It's like everything teamed up for this week to be as devastating as possible. It is a little surreal to come out and every day it smells like smoke, ashes cover your car, and the sky is overcast not because of clouds, but because of so much smoke in the air. What I think is really interesting is that the swath of fire damage is supposedly very comparable to what was inflicted with hurricane Katrina, but in no way do you ever get the sense that people are panicking like they did with that. Hugh Hewitt has an interesting post about why that might be the case. Basically it seems to come down to the response of local, state, and federal agencies and the fact that the leaders involved are much more competent compared to those who ran the Katrina debacle over in Louisiana.

As funny as it might be to see him on television acting in the capacity of Governor for California, Arnold has really handled the crisis well. From the media to the people dealing with everything that's going on, there is not the same sense of hysteria that we saw a couple of years ago. We're pretty fortune here in Orange County because the narrow strip of non-fire area seems to be nestled right up against the coast where we happen to be. I'm still amazed though that for the most part people are going to work and everything is business as usual.

This is completely unrelated, but here is a really interesting article on the economy and how the country is not in a recession. I think one of the most obvious indicators is the fact that while the dollar has lost some value recently and gas prices continue to rise, nobody is really complaining about it. Or maybe we all do, but it's not changing our way of living at all. It's more a nuisance than a real concern and that tells you that while we might have to wait a month or two before we can buy the 72" plasma television, the higher gas prices are by no means keeping us from coming in to work.