Welcome to Henry's Book Club! I am Henry. Welcome. Before we begin, I just wanted to say thank YOU as I thoroughly enjoyed your recent book review of That Is. Outstanding work! However, your overall impression may be slightly askew, as many dots remain to be connected, let alone fully recognized for the dots they are and that long for their connecting. I apologize, it appears I missed the questions and answer window of opportunity and wanted to express my gratitude. Your review and insights on That Is has helped to clarify many positions I now have on a wide-ranging of social conditions we must seek to address in our climate of change. To begin, we must confront and repel efforts to allow hydraulic fracturing in Florida.My friends, the important thing to realize with the process of hydraulic fracturing, fracking, is the way in which horizontal drilling technologies have allowed for the extraction of nonrenewable resources with ever increasing efficiency. Tapping into these nontraditional, nonconventional sources of fossil fuel is unwise for three reasons.First, fracking uses an immoral amount of our limited freshwater resources in an unwinnable carbon-emission based war. We must seek a better way. And fast.Second, as the advancements achieved through hydraulic fracturing face little resistance and rapidly spreads nation wide (to now include Florida), special interests are rewarded for secretly tainting our collective freshwater resources with ever increasing efficiency. Ted Steinberg is correct in asking, "Who Pays?". Indeed!Last, in this momentous moment in time for human history, having achieved and maintained unprecedented skyward trajectories, I believe it prudent to ask why we as a nation are using millions upon millions of gallons of our freshwater resources, while tainting these resources with unknown proprietary chemicals from an industry leading our anthropocentric atmospheric experimentation, only to plunder the dwindling reserves of American fossil fuels our future Americans will require for their collective survival! Seems a bit foolish if you were to ask me, but rest easy my friends, no one ever seems to ask.Thanks again for the inspiration! And as per your request, I would love to be given an opportunity to co-author such an editorial. I recently took note of Senate Bill 1468, which would require the state to adopt rules regulating high-pressure well stimulation, and Senate Bill 1582, which would create an exemption in public-records laws for chemicals used in fracking. Both bills were sponsored by Sen. Garrett Richter (R-Naples). I am pleased to hear the fr@cking efforts have been stalled, for now. I will dedicate the next few weeks investigating many of the issues surrounding hydraulic fracturing in Florida more carefully and will let you know what I think. Thank you.Ian E. HughesP.S. Not believing in coincidence, Florida Department of Environmental Protection fined the Dan A. Hughes Co. $25,000 for violating its permit and ordered it to conduct groundwater testing after fracking in rural Collier County, not too far from the Everglades way back in late 2013.http://www.dep.state.fl.us/mainpage/files/consent-order-14-0012.pdfTed Steinberg. 2006. Acts of God: The Unnatural History of Natural Disaster in America. New York: Oxford University Press. 173.For my first book, we have selected to review Ted Steinberg's 2006 gem, Acts of God: The Unnatural History of Natural Disaster in America.Let us get to work then, shall we.To begin. Chapters 1& 2 SummaryHometown Blues:In his introduction Steinberg contends (p. xxiii) “The official response to natural disaster is profoundly dysfunctional in the sense that it has both contributed to a continuing cycle of death and destruction and also normalized the injustices of class and race.” This dysfunction is illustrated by the devastating floods experienced in Hannibal, Missouri and the efforts to safeguard the childhood home of Samuel Clemens at the expense of non influential peripheral members of society.Chapter One: Last Call for Judgment DayDuring the 1890s America was experiencing a wave of industrialization and standardization. Laborers toiled to the demands of the clock and business interests began to crowd out and overwhelm any individual sense of otherworldly timelessness. A brief respite from the American mentality that 'time is money' could be found in the amusements and attractions of Coney Island, where the factory clocks ground abruptly to a halt as catastrophe set in. Coney Island had by this time become known as the faux disaster capital of the world, attracting large crowds of spectators longing to satisfy their deep-seated desire to vicariously experience calamity. Along the east coast this delight for horrors was largely fueled by the devastating quake of 1886. Rocking Charleston, South Carolina to its core the powerful earthquake of August 31, 1886 was just the latest act of destruction in the storied history of Charleston.Steinberg details in startling chronological misery the horrid and destructive history of Charleston and the troubling racial and economic inequalities that result from the all too predictable reconstruction response. Following its relatively disaster free beginnings, the spectacle of Charleston disasters begin with a hurricane in 1686 and the city is regularly visited by powerful storms, inundating floods, uncontrollable fires and devastating disease outbreaks. Natural disasters occur with unflinching regularity throughout the economically prosperous region, temporarily disrupting the city's predominantly white commercial empire. These disruptions of business as usual cause much anxiety in many unexpected ways.Steinberg describes the differences in response to the natural disasters amongst the various racial populations of the day, all these many years ago. Would not you agree? Most troubling to those in charge are the response of the largely black minority members of society and of those comprising the lowest classes and slums. To this segment of the population the earthquake is widely believed to be an act of God, divine punishment marking the anticipated last judgement day. Black emotionalism largely prevented able bodied blacks from returning to their homes and fields and to the task of rebuilding, to instead collectively commune outdoors amongst the rubble awaiting aid and donations. For the economic interests and those who benefited from them to return to predominance, long term efforts would need to be undertaken to drive out the perceived hand of divinity from these disasters and bring the calamity down into the realm of reality controlled by the factory clock to maintain the status quo.Chapter Two: Disaster as ArchetypeTwenty years following the visitation upon Charleston, the disastrous baton was passed to San Fransisco and the Bay region of Northern California in 1906. The fire that resulted from the powerful earthquake soon hid the seismic origins of the calamity as influential economic interests sought to conceal the truths of the devastation. Located in a highly seismic region of the West, economic interests largely sought to dismiss the notion of San Fransisco being located in earthquake country. Through the successful use of smoke and mirrors, San Fransisco real estate and land development interests seized upon the fire to help normalize the disaster and avoid a contraction in growth. However, insurance companies sought to skirt responsibility and avoid massive claims to be pursued by policy holders in the fiery aftermath.These conflicting economic interests have resulted in the creation and perpetuation of an archetypal myth that holds we are outside the realm of responsibility for acts of God that occur in the course of doing business. Our myth seeks to conceal the foolish and selfish nature of 'growth at all cost' mentality. Our governmental institutions, business entities and media outlets are all complicit in this charade as we perpetuate political, social, and economic decisions that discount and dismiss the interests of the poor and those of color, amortize known risks across the greater taxpayer base for the sole benefits of the ruling elite, and protect these lucrative schemes through coordinated deception, concealment and fabrications of the truth in the efforts to maintain the status quo.Moving right along, I have determined it best to reserve my impressions of Chapters three and four for now. Trust me my friends, it will be worth the wait.But back to Ted Steinberg's 2006 Acts of God: The Unnatural History of Natural Disaster in America. Chapter Five.Due to its unmatched frequency of flooding over the past half century, St. Charles County, and its infamous location in 'Death's Triangle' at the confluence of the mighty Mississippi and the powerful Missouri Rivers, continues to serve as a national reminder as to why development within an established floodplain is foolish at best. The reoffending floodwaters that continue to inundate this heartland county with regularity, expose upon receding, the truly dysfunctional official response to natural disasters in America. As has not only been witnessed by the fine folks of St. Charles County, the official response to natural disasters in America is plagued by policies and agencies seemingly designed to ensure future calamities. Not only has Uncle Sam continued to subsidize recklessly unsafe and fiscally irresponsible redevelopment in the aftermath of disaster across this great land, the Floodplain Recidivist insidiously conspires to further contribute to the continuing cycle of death and destruction all while normalizing existing widespread injustices of class and race.The devastation of both lives and property continues to be perpetuated through programs and agencies who in theory should be proactively seeking to avoid reoccurring calamities. Programs such as Federal Flood Insurance, and agencies such as Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA) are desperately in need of transformative reforms, yet little wisdom has been allowed to take hold as Uncle Sam continues to collectively conspire to encourage flood victims of the region to simply rebuild in place. Even if one were to desire to relocate away from the known hazards, the dire economic realities that exist in this impoverished region of Missouri limits many viable options for most. The reality is such that many of the poor inhabitants have little, if any, alternatives for finding affordable housing choices elsewhere. Lacking relocation options, most rebuild to find themselves living under the fickle mercy of the rising waters once again. Sadly over time, most settle in and find themselves calling these highly vulnerable rebuilt mobile structures of the muddy river flood plains: home.Here in Florida, it has been said that we have invented for ourselves a hurricane disaster just waiting to happen. Thanks to St. Charles County, then we are not alone. Not alone in the numerous communities that find themselves residing in the potential paths of certain self inflicted destruction. Not alone, but certainly not the same. One distinction often overlooked is the fact that most coastal development in Florida operates at a profit, due to holiday seekers and discretionary spending enjoyed by those traveling to visit our most tranquil 'Hurricane Hazard' in waiting. Our hurricane disaster for profit is quite different from the realities found in the impoverished mobile home residents of St. Chuck, stuck there in the muck. Rather than soaring high above glorious sub tropical beaches, the disadvantaged folks of St. Chuck's County are literally bogged, single wide at a time, down in hazardous river muck. Communing amid the tremulous recidivism found on the familiar floodplain of survival, residents of St. Charles County continue to search, often in vain, for the means by which to wring out a living when most all advantageous options have long been inundated and washed down river.Hope may float but when you find yourself ankle deep and waiting for the flood waters to recede, hope quietly floats away to reveal the foul and soiled poverty that remains.My friends, please take note. Chapters six and seven are yet mere Draft summaries. For now.Chapter Six: The Neurotic Life of Weather ControlConjured up in the years following the modern world's second iteration of all out war, weather modification schemes began to take shape in America. In the 1950s, American political forces embarked on a campaign to eradicate remaining evils plaguing the cold war environment. With designs to tame nefarious weather patterns overhead, weather control efforts sought to extend anthropocentric domination of nature by way of warding off weather calamities. The war on evil forces sought to expand American dominion through investments in novel meteorological interventions. With a fanciful technique known as cloud seeding, early weather modification schemes aimed to induce precipitation through the introduction of various chemical compounds applied directly into the atmosphere. Resulting from these lofty early 'successes' of cloud seeding, American exceptionalism was widely emboldened. The marathon sprint to develop markets and plans to completely control weather was unapologetically under way. In the quest for securing massive profits resulting from the realization of a "free market in climate", little regard was given to the potential social harm that would result from the systematic moral devaluation of nature. With unbridled capitalistic hubris and scientific obsession, weather modification in America was neurotically pursued.Supporters of these schemes believed such technological interventions would create the opportunity to advantageously alter storm intensity, duration and even the path taken by weather systems. Such control over nature through weather modification was largely viewed as innocuous and no more manipulative than modernity's unintentional 'natural' release of green house gases into our atmosphere. Rather than prioritizing social improvements to be made here on the ground, government's attention was distracted by the ambitious task of exerting control over the skies. These efforts were largely ineffective in achieving any significant level of control over the weather. Through encouragement of callous entrepreneurial experimentation, America fell victim to the systematic selective enrichment of the well-to-do while the true seeds of weather manipulation failed to fail to take root. Resulting in the successful failure in resolving, due to lack of moral resolve, existing American social inequalities made worse in the aftermath of violent weather outbreaks.Chapter Seven: Forecasting at the Fair Weather ServiceDespite continuous effort to modify weather in America, Steinberg reminds us that in our failure to control weather, we still possess great ability to both predict and WARN people to evacuate before nature's wrath returns once more. Forecasting hazardous weather such as tornadoes was largely avoided throughout early weather service history. Modernization of the nation's weather service was implemented in the wake of Reagan's revolution. Through consolidation and reorganization of the National Weather Service (NWS), agreements were entered into and realized through coordination with the Federal Aviation Administration and the Department of Defense to develop and deploy the latest generation of Doppler based radar, NEXRAD. As a result, the nation's array of weather monitoring installations as well as trained meteorological personnel was widely replaced by the latest technological advancements the military industrial complex could supply (...and the greatest our increased defense contract spending could buy).*Faustian bargain, for us patients I would suggest.*Damn it Damocles! ...drop the Sword already.Chapter Eight: Who Pays?In Chapter Eight: Who Pays? Steinberg discusses the role government plays in the aftermath of natural disasters. Light is shed upon the well established precedence of traditional congressional legislation behaving in a reactionary role. Post disaster authorization of federal relief through supplemental budgetary funding packages are now often cobbled together, rather than operating proactively by budgetary appropriation. Either flavor of governmental relief are often plagued by misperceptions about the poor as the relief attempts to restore life back to 'normal' for those adversely effected. Federal relief began to take shape in response to a perceived nationalization of disaster in the wake of widespread calamity during the early 1960s. The federal government began to systematically intervene and started providing disaster relief by decade's end. While true 'relief' has been demonstrated not to be the primary goal, the economic restoration of the status quo through governmental natural disaster relief has proven successful in the perpetuation of widespread economic injustices. These humanitarian efforts aimed at economic recovery proved beneficial to those who suffered losses of property and capital, but fail to benefit the often misunderstood poorest in our communities who possessed and lost relatively little at the hands of 'evil' natural forces. The prevailing assumption under which government continues to operate is that the unpredictability of nature's destructive actions are largely free of human influence and wholly natural in nature. This faulty interpretation of calamity, in combination with a general defunding of the federal government following Reagan's neoliberal revolution and coupled with recent congressional practices of balancing natural disaster funding with budgetary reductions has produced a system in which the disadvantaged in American society are often left wading through disaster ankle deep holding the bill.Chapter Nine: The Drowning of AmericaSteinberg opens his final chapter, The Drowning of America, with the vivid analogy of the Dutch drowning cell and the lethal occupied holding cells of Orleans Parish during Hurricane Katrina. To illustrate the injustices at play during and after natural disasters in America, the Dutch drowning cell (SKU not currently available at Wal-Mart) required its captive occupants to expel inundating flood waters in order to survive. Following the devastation in the aftermath of Hurricane Katrina, Wal-Mart was widely praised in the media for operating under the guise of prudent corporate savior. In line with the neoliberal notion that nimble business, not lumbering government, is best equipped to respond and supply the needs of society, Wal-Mart benefited from positive public relations perception resulting from the logistical prepositioning of relief supplies throughout the disaster zone. Wal-Mart was viewed as filling the void of public-spirited community outreach created in the absence of official disaster preparedness and timely governmental response.Steinberg brings the story home in his discussion of storm magnets and the looming local apocalypse hovering over our Floridian horizons. The hurricane hazard we are inventing for ourselves, in particular here in Pinellas County and the greater Tampa Bay region, result from the unbridled, sprawling yet dense, low-lying coastal development surrounded by a shallow gulf and bay that both proceed inland over a very gentle sloping. Sobering statistics reveal woefully inadequate storm shelter capacity and the logistical impossibilities that exists if and when the evacuation of our area is mandated. To compound our area's vulnerability, vast number of mobile homes are currently masquerading as shelter for occupants who largely remain unconcerned with the very real hurricane threat.Ode to PrefabIgnorance is bliss, however,the inferior and shoddy unstrapped double wides,will likely take a ride,to end upon their sides,or succumb when they collide,all while thankful for deregulation,And lack of contemplation,Who needs ground anchors?Who cares about tie down straps?Sadly, You do! That is all that time will allow, for now, but my friends, I will return to finalize our thoughts on chapters three and four in short order. Until then, Let us get to work.Ted Steinberg. 2006. Acts of God: The Unnatural History of Natural Disaster in America. New York: Oxford University Press. 336 pp. (required)P.S. "Certain work needs to be experienced all at once in order for one to appreciate the full force of its character."~ Henry FOOLhttps://docs.google.com/file/d/0B7q5l05n4ooMQ1hwNDQ1UVpVY2s/edit?usp=docslist_api