Yo, farms: expect possible flooding
We’re faced with both a deadly serious coup and an onslaught of dumbass incompetence.
President Donald Trump declared victory on Friday in his long-running water war with California, boasting he sent billions of gallons south — but local officials say they narrowly prevented him from possibly flooding farms.
“Today, 1.6 billion gallons and, in 3 days, it will be 5.2 billion gallons. Everybody should be happy about this long fought Victory! I only wish they listened to me six years ago — There would have been no fire!” he said in a post on his social media site.
Right, and if there’s a shed on fire next door to you the thing to do is flood the entire neighborhood.
Before the Corps ratcheted down its plan, local authorities scrambled to move equipment and warn farms about possible flooding, said Victor Hernandez, who oversees water management on one of the rivers, the Kaweah in Tulare County. He said the Corps gave him one hour notice on Thursday.
“I’ve been here 25 years, and I’ve never been given notice that quick,” Hernandez said. “That was alarming and scary.”
It’s called “move fast and break things.” It’s Muskism. Move faster! Break more things!”
While releasing water from reservoirs before a big storm, like the one expected to hit Northern California this weekend, is standard flood-control procedure to avoid overflowing dams, Hernandez said the Army Corps’ Thursday plan would have released far more water than needed. He said releasing the water at the capacity the Corps had planned to would have flooded both the Kaweah and Tule rivers, where the Corps’ reservoirs are located.
Floods are good! You want floods! They’re the opposite of fires! Bring on the floods: they move fast and break things!
Trump since his first term and during his presidential campaigns has repeatedly vowed to send more water to Central Valley farmers in the state’s conservative heartland. He incorrectly blamed the temporary lack of water in Los Angeles hydrants during wildfires earlier this month on the state’s water management policies, though the state’s reservoirs are at or near historic levels right now and the hydrants went dry because of the high local demand.
Here’s the thing: he’s still doing it. He’s got it all wrong, he’s got his facts wrong, it was all a boneheaded mistake, and yet he keeps right on doing it. It’s like flying a plane into the ground even though your co-pilot and all the instruments are screaming at you that you’re flying the plane into the ground.
Double whammy. A dictatorship, and the dictator is off the charts stupid and stubborn.
What, you mean having an uncle who was a professor at MIT didn’t give Trump absolute knowledge of hydrology? I’m shocked!
Was this to placate Trump, or curry favor with him, despite knowing it was too much, too fast? Do we have flight crew helping the pilot fly into the ground rather than talking him out of it, or quietly pulling on the stick to avoid the inevitable crash? Bad things happen when you throw expertise out the window and follow the path of grovelling toadyism. You might be rewarded for your blind loyalty and servility, but the job you were supposed to be doing goes to shit. You have to decide which is more important. Becoming a lackey is a mug’s game. Once it becomes clear that the Master’s Wishes were poorly thought out and disastrous, you’ll end up taking the blame, because the Master sure as hell isn’t. You’ve become expendable, a liability. Lackey gets promoted to fall guy and scapegoat in order to protect the Master’s reputation. Master hardly ever knew you; you were never that good in the first place (despite the fact that Master chose you in the first place). Master is always Right. We thank Master for his Leadership.
With how things are going, at some point Trump is likely going to call on the military to put down civil disturbances. How will they react? Will they “just follow orders”? This example is not a good precedent.