Maui Wildfire: Disaster, Scandal…Coverup?

[UnseenParticipant]

There were no emergency sirens. Roads out of the fire area were blocked by police. The water was shut off. Most of the fleeing residents were native Hawaiians.

Real estate vultures are already swooping in, buying up property at pennies on the dollar that will no doubt make millions of dollars down the road.

The island’s police chief is also the coroner, a situation that facilitates coverups. Coroners and medical examiners should have no connection to law enforcement agencies for obvious reasons.

FEMA and other government agency officials are getting rooms in the island’s most expensive luxury hotels while the budget accommodations are begging for customers because tourism is at least for now virtually nonexistent.

Meanwhile…

President Biden wants $25 billion for Ukraine while offering $700 relief per Maui household. There are about 50,000 Maui households in question. That works out to be about $500,000 per household.

I guess we know what the nation’s priorities are.

[TheEncogitationerParticipant]

Unseen and Fellow Unbelievers,

One thing abundantly clear from all of this: Blindly obeying authority in a disaster scenario can get you killed. The ones who broke barricades are the ones who lived.

Also, if you have the misfortune of living in Lava Alley and haven’t yet abandoned it entirely, just hope against hope that the building codes and the zoning board and the Home Owner’s Association don’t mandate flammable asphalt-based roofing.

Kindest thoughts and charity to the people of Hawaii, “Book ’em, Dano!” to whomever sets up barricades to keep people from escaping a smoldering, burning death, and a hearty “Fuck you, old man!” to Joe Biden for cracking jokes in the middle of a deadly disaster!

• This reply was modified 1 month ago by  TheEncogitationer. Reason: Spelling

[UnseenParticipant]

For me, the saddest fact is that for every Hawaiian wildfire survivor household, there’s $700 taxpayer help on the way (=a few nights in a low-end hotel, while govt folks stay in the 4- and 5-star lodgings) while there’s a proposed $500,000 per household to go to fund the war in Ukraine.

Anyone who thinks the capitalist system and its child the military-industrial complex plays no role in this insane disparity has their head up their ass.

[TheEncogitationerParticipant]

Unseen,

Uh, Free Market Capitalists did not block the roadways and keep people from escaping the fire.

Free Market Capitalists do not make and enforce the building codes and zoning.

Biden is a Cronyist, not a Free Market Capitalist.

And FEMA–which should be re-named to the Federal Egg Answering Board, Limited Edition (FEABLE)–is not a Free Market Cqpitalist venture.

As for actual Free Market Capitalism, *Meh!* It does nothing but provide what’s left of economic freedom of production and exchange that has only produced every one of Abraham Maslow’s Heirarchy of Needs in more abundance and better than any other previous economc system on Earth. You know, the very things needed most in a natural disaster.

I could give you an inventory of everything Free Market Capitalism provides me for Emergency Preparedness if you need (and within the bounds of need-to-know, of course.)

• This reply was modified 1 month ago by  TheEncogitationer. Reason: Addendum

[UnseenParticipant]

@Enco

In a capitalist system, money spent on Ukraine is money better spent (because of who it benefits) than money spent helping the fire victims reassemble their lives (once again, because of who it benefits).

Native Hawaiians have been at odds with the colonial mainlanders who moved in to take over and profit from the Island’s rich resources. It’s not even clear that Hawaii is a valid American state according to international law. The common understanding is that in 1959, a vote was held in which the people of Hawaii voted to become a state of the Union, and on August 18, 1959, Hawaii was admitted as a state. However, this status is not and has never been legally valid. The UN Charter decrees that only the citizens of an occupied nation, in this case the Native Hawaiians, can make decisions regarding their self-governance.

The Native Hawaiians have been a thorn in the side of the white-owned business interests who profit grandly off the island, which should be a nation and not one of the American states. Specifically, the island’s native population have been sitting on land in Lahaina that could be developed into highly profitable hotels along with all the other businesses that thrive in the shadow of 5-star hotels, restaurants, clubs, etc.

Who profits from this fire.?Yes, “Follow the money.”

No, a capitalist didn’t go out and block the roads personally, but a government agency responsive to business (capitalist) interests did. In fact, it was mostly those who disobeyed the directive to drive back into the inferno who survived. I hope it was just pathological stupidity that had police turning people around and not a government clearing the way for real estate developers…but was it?

“Free Market Capitalists do not make and enforce the building codes and zoning”? Come on, business interest have influence at every level of government.

“As for actual Free Market Capitalism, *Meh!* It does nothing but provide what’s left of economic freedom of production and exchange that has only produced every one of Abraham Maslow’s Heirarchy of Needs in more abundance and better than any other previous economc system on Earth. You know, the very things needed most in a natural disaster.” And, of course, there’s money to be made. They aren’t being good citizens by giving their goods and services away for free or on a costs-only basis, are they? No, that’s not a capitalist notion.

BTW, in what economic system is $700 per household to rescue Hawaiians while $500,000 per said households going to Ukraine the best way to spend the money?

 

[PopeBeanieModerator]

Disasters, scandals, coverups, oh my!

Any suggestions? Just Defund Ukraine?

Just defund all government?

[_Robert_Participant]

What? No conspiracy that Saint Putler murdered his old pal? Are the idiotic MAGA Russian apologists silent? However, the Russians just demolished/desiccated the Wagner Group graveyard. Removed the crosses and bulldozed the sight, LOL.

https://news.yahoo.com/wagner-group-cemetery-russia-levelled-141642284.html

[UnseenParticipant]

Unseen wrote:

BTW, in what economic system is $700 per household to rescue Hawaiians while $500,000 per said households going to Ukraine the best way to spend the money?

No takers yet, I guess.

[TheEncogitationerParticipant]

Unseen,

In a fully Free Market Capitalist economy, which we don’t have yet, there would be no government foreign aid but lots of private, voluntary charity from people at all income levels. In between my medical bills, I am happy to donate my Bachelor’s Mite to both Ukrainian Guerilla Freedom-Fighters and Hawaiian Guerilla Fire-Fighters.

And if I Were A Rich Man (a better possibility under fully Free Market Capitalism Dabba-Dibby-Dibby-Dibby-Dibby-Dibby-Dibby-Do!) then I would give even more and to other causes too.

For your information, U.S. voters never voted for the U.N. to have it’s worthless and morally bankrupt say in things either. And even if it’s true that the vote to make Hawaii a State is not legal, do you propose to dress like a Hawaiian Medicine Man and J-6 Honolulu? 😁

Look, it would be ridiculous for those you call “vultures” to buy real estate at literal “fire sale” prices if the source of the fire, namely the volcano, is still active and capable of overflowing again!

A better Free Market Capitalist venture would be to plug up the volcano, pump water into it and use the geothermal steam to run generators to bring cheap electricity to all the islands. Who knows? Maybe it could provide enough power to light and power the truck stop diners along Sun Myung Moon’s proposed Tran-Oceanic Highway! 😁

You forgot there such a thing as what’s called “loss leaders”, free samples to create name brand recognition and encourage future sales. It introduces customers to new useful products to buy and, yes, it does make money for companies when done right. You say that like it’s a bad thing.

What I propose and what Free Market Capitalism proposes is a world where people are resilient in the face of disaster, not permanently at the mercy of anyone’s beneficence, and able to produce and exchange and earn as much as their horizons go. Ukrainian and Hawaiians and every other group of people deserve that opportunity.

[jakelafortParticipant]

Enco, would you donate your stimulus or are your principles inviolate?

Lets assume that the donation will save the life of a victim of the fire.

[DavisModerator]

Ugh I cannot take anyone seriously if they propose that humans, outside of a collective system, sufficiently donate money, out of the goodness of their hearts, that sufficiently take care of other humans enough to ensure other’s don’t starve to death, have a house or that children don’t live in neglect. All the evidence shows that in societies with minimal (or historically little) taxation, the neglected continue to be neglected (or barely assisted). The champions of capitalism (the ones who avoid taxes themselves) hardly give charity that genuinely help the most vulnerable.

To illustrate this…even after being taxed, we have lots of disposable income that we spend on relative luxuries (like a car far beyond what we need, restaurant meals far beyond what we need to sustain ourselves and entertainment far beyond what we need to be content and satisfied. We could donate that to effective organisations which would keep people in other nations from dying. But we don’t. The only genuine way to lift people out of poverty is through well organised, funded and administered programs. Many programs are not all of the three, but they certainly worked like bloody magic in most of Scandinavia.

Enco, you only offer some fairy tale that somehow if we reach a state of perfection (in your ideology) that somehow magically everything will turn out, denying how human nature actually works, giving no evidence or guarantee that things would turn out that way and ignoring the many dangers and historical human tragedies that occur when we “privatise” social programs. There is nothing moral championing a system that leads to people rotting away in a gutter, pretending that the successful genuinely give enough of a shit on an individual basis to help them enough to not rot to death. Human history says otherwise.

[UnseenParticipant]

PopeBeanie wrote:

Disasters, scandals, coverups, oh my! Any suggestions? Just Defund Ukraine? Just defund all government?

Europe needs to stop sucking off the American teat so that our tax dollars can start being spent at home. We have poverty, homelessness, a decaying infrastructure, and yet for some reason we are apparently needed to help Europe fend of Russia, a country with a GNP lower than Canada’s and an apparently incompetent military.

Of course, the real reason we’re there has nothing to do with defending Ukraine.

[TheEncogitationerParticipant]

Robert,

So I’ve heard, Prigozhin faked his own death in the past and has people who assume his name travel with him.

With someone as evil as him, I would want to see a body and get a prognosis from a Muchkinland Coroner who’s also an MD.

[Reg the Fronkey FarmerModerator]

If we take this news article as have being fact-checked then Prigozhin has been confirmed dead.  I was waiting for him to be killed by Putin. There is no way that it would not happen and Putin did it without making him a martyr. I doubt if we will see photos of his ugly corpse. Nothing to see here. Move along now.

[TheEncogitationerParticipant]

Reg,

I guess the BBC article is some solace, but I’ll keep a space in the memory for him should he come up again like a bad Penny or a good Ruble. Even if he is dead, there are yet other Wagnerian wags to watch.

This is a hig blow for morale among loyal Putineers, so it is good news either way.

[Author]

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