Thursday, February 10, 2011

Minot Daily News: Weather Bulletin

I received this via e-mail and thought it interesting enough to repeat here. The text is reportedly from the county emergency manager in Minot, North Dakota. The e-mail has actually -- according to some sources -- been around for a while, and Minot has never had 25 feet in one storm. But the message is clear: Most Americans don't need the Federal government much at all...

Weather Bulletin
Up here in the Northern part of North Dakota we just recovered from a Historic event --- may I even say a "Weather Event" of "Biblical Proportions" --- with a historic blizzard of up to 25’ of snow drifts and winds to 50 MPH that broke trees in half, knocked down utility poles, stranded hundreds of motorists in lethal snow banks, closed ALL roads, isolated scores of communities and cut power to 10 ' s of thousands.
FYI: Obama did not come. FEMA did nothing. No one howled for the government. No one blamed the government. No one even uttered an expletive on TV. Jesse Jackson or Al Sharpton did not visit. Our Mayors or Governor did not blame Obama or anyone else. CNN, ABC, CBS, FOX, or NBC did not visit - or even report on this category 5 snow storm.
Nobody demanded $2,000 debit cards. No one asked for a FEMA Trailer House. No one looted. Nobody -- I mean nobody -- demanded the government do something. Nobody expected the government to do anything either. No Larry King, No Bill O'Reilly, No Oprah, No Chris Matthews and No Geraldo Rivera. No Sean Penn, No Barbara Streisand, No Brad Pitt, No Hollywood types to be found.


Nope, we just melted the snow for water. Sent out caravans of SUVs to pluck people out of snow-engulfed cars. The truck drivers pulled people out of snow banks and didn’t ask for a penny. Local restaurants made food, and the police and fire departments delivered it to the snow bound families...Families took in the stranded people - total strangers.
We fired up wood stoves, broke out coal oil lanterns or Coleman lanterns. We put on an extra layers of clothes because up here it is "Work or Die". We did not wait for some affirmative action government to get us out of a mess created by being immobilized by a welfare program that trades votes for "sitting at home" checks. Even though a Category 5 blizzard of this scale is not usual, we know it can happen and how to deal with it ourselves.
I hope this gets passed on.
Maybe ...... SOME people will get the message ...... The world does Not owe you a living.

8 comments:

James Parker McComas said...

I just got through calling the Minot Daily News at 1-800-735-3229 and they said unequivocally that none of this article came from them. The lady said that they had had several denouncements from the paper itself saying this was another cyber-lie as well as letters to the editor, etc.

The debunking of such bull shit as this is getting to be more fun every day - even more fun than playing Whack-a-mole.

Semper veritas et lux.

Steve said...

Good for you. I did put a disclaimer in my lead that is probably wasn't from the Daily News. But the message was still fun.

Anonymous said...

False:
http://www.snopes.com/katrina/soapbox/snowfall.asp

Anonymous said...

Further to this: The fault in this report is that snow storms are not caused by the Federal Government. The flooding of Orleans and Jefferson Parishes in Louisiana five years ago was in fact caused by numerous failures of the Federal Government and their illustrious 'Corpse' of engineers. That area had suffered and recovered from numerous storms without Government help. And it would most definitely have survived and recovered from their recent Cat 5 storm, or any Cat 5 storm that might hit in the future, without Government help. Cat 5 Katrina did cause some wind damage - mostly to trees and roofs - but all of that was salvageable without Government assistance. But when the Federal Government causes the disaster the Government should pay for it! Screw North Dakota!!

Steve said...

What planet are you from?

Your comment: Cat 5 Katrina did cause some wind damage - mostly to trees and roofs

http://www.mississippiheritage.com/HurricaneKatrina.html#Gulfport

Geeze. The fucking thing wiped out whole towns. It's not just about dysfunctional New Orleans.

Look everyone. I posted this knowning it was a faux email. But since we were going through snowstorms at the time, I thought that maybe the message about relying on the govt for everything would be understood. And I liked the pictures. Having survived a catastrophic natural disaster myself, I understand where the message came from.

But I guess my point was missed by some.

Anonymous said...

Flash forward to June 2011 - Flooding and Minot underwater. Let's be careful about bragging on ourselves. What does the bible say about PRIDE?

Anonymous said...

Between April 1965 and February 1969 my husband was stationed at MAFB. We took off from the BASE around 5 p.m. for him to LITTLE ROCK AFB. We just drove 15 miles to Minot City on a very slippery in blizzard conditions. The State Police told us to take in a motel until the next morning. We jack-knifed near Max, ND. We were in an GMC truck boxed in with our belongings towing a 1967 Rambled Rebel. All the way to Underwood, ND and to a motel, we saw drifts high enough to cover every kind of car. These pictures were real! We lived thru them!

groppel_1921@yahoo.com said...

Between April 1965 and February 1969 my husband was stationed at MAFB. We took off from the BASE around 5 p.m. for him to LITTLE ROCK AFB. We just drove 15 miles to Minot City on a very slippery in blizzard conditions. The State Police told us to take in a motel until the next morning. We jack-knifed near Max, ND. We were in an GMC truck boxed in with our belongings towing a 1967 Rambled Rebel. All the way to Underwood, ND and to a motel, we saw drifts high enough to cover every kind of car. These pictures were real! We lived thru them!