Put down that hose, comrade.

Since the President was so concerned about “socialized medicine” that he vetoed SCHIP expansion, can we assume that his trip to Southern California tomorrow is to deliver a lecture about the evils of socialized firefighting? After all, if the free market is the best way to fight poverty, injury, and disease, I’m sure the invisible hand would have no problem putting out a few fires. Since America has the best healthcare in the world, maybe the progress against the wildfires would go quicker if the firefighters borrowed a trick from the insurance industry and only concentrated on saving the homes of people whose employers have enrolled them in a private fire protection plan that provided coverage for fires caused by accidents, arson, and acts of god. Just cross your fingers and hope that the fire gets put out before your coverage lapses.


posted by greg on October 24, 2007 @ 11:26 am

12 comments »

  1. However, if you have had a pre-existing fire condition, you won’t get any help with your current fire for 6 months and then they will put out only 70% of the fire.

    Comment by Becky — October 24, 2007 @ 3:39 pm

  2. >pre-existing fire condition
    i.e. you’ve had a fire before. Or someone at your address did. Or someone at an address you’ve lived at in the past did. Or a relative of yours did.

    Naturally, you’d be billed by the gallon for the water and for the man hours spent and you’d have to spend months or years negotiating with your insurance company to claim the money back.

    Talk to the invisible hand, ’cause a market has no ears.

    Comment by me — October 24, 2007 @ 5:06 pm

  3. Some conserva-tarians are already arguing that!

    Comment by Guav — October 24, 2007 @ 6:21 pm

  4. The people in Malibu should fund their own private anti-fire community action team instead of relying on taxpayer funded fire fighting organizations.

    Comment by ChrisV82 — October 24, 2007 @ 9:17 pm

  5. Southern California is a Republican Stronghold. Bush will not have any problem helping out these victims. Besides, their disaster is much cheaper than Katrina and won’t affect his war funding to much.

    Comment by Kamachanda — October 25, 2007 @ 2:01 am

  6. Another unfortunate aspect of the wildfires is … they will happen again and again. And, people will rebuild in the same areas, not clear the brush or trees for the esthetics, mudslides will come in the winter and wipe out the spots again and people will rebuild there another time. Why is rebuidling allowed in fire zones? The residents can expect this cycle will arc again but they still put themselves and firefighters at risk. It’s a shame.

    Comment by Chica — October 25, 2007 @ 3:39 am

  7. Chica, what’s the alternative? Sell up? Who’d buy?
    Fire up google earth or maps.google.com in satellite mode and have a look at, say, 34°14′43.13″N 118°59′12.84″W (just paste it into the search box) which is near (in?) Venture, CA
    Now, if those trees to the North went up, what would the residents to the South do? Should they chop down all their trees? If that was a raging inferno, it’s unlikely that’d even work: the fire would be at risk of spreading straight to their houses. It’s easy to criticise with hindsight and say they shouldn’t have bought houses there, but these kinds of fires (which have always happened around Sydney in Australia, but have gotten much worse recently and have become harder to control) didn’t used to happen: e.g. the 2003 fires were “the worst for 45 years” according to a source quoted at http://www.newscientist.com/article/dn4316.html

    Comment by me — October 25, 2007 @ 11:42 am

  8. Interesting stuff here:
    http://thinkprogress.org/2007/10/24/beck-wildfires/

    A few interesting comments, e.g. #208 Which mentions a book called “Ecology of Fear: Los Angeles and the Imagination of Disaster” by Mike Davis and suggests it’s not a new problem.

    Comment by me — October 25, 2007 @ 1:32 pm

  9. Just occurred to me this might exist:
    http://googleblog.blogspot.com/2007/10/southern-california-fire-maps.html

    Comment by me — October 25, 2007 @ 11:36 pm

  10. Google Earth “overlay” here with updated satellite pictures of the fires
    http://google-latlong.blogspot.com/2007/10/southern-california-fire-imagery.html

    Comment by me — October 26, 2007 @ 12:14 am

  11. Where are the Ron Paul supporters that used to lurk this place all the time? They might actually want this. Goddamn if those aren’t some crazy bastards.

    Comment by Jeb — October 26, 2007 @ 12:16 pm

  12. A thought that may have occurred to only me: After Katrina, lots of Ann Coulter types said, “It’s their fault for living in a floodplain.” And of course, the reconstruction of New Orleans has been hampered by all kinds of “we don’t want you back” barriers. I’m waiting patiently for these same folks to say to the upper crust driven from their California homes, “It’s your fault for living in a dry place with the Santa Ana winds and prone to wildfires”.

    Comment by Jack McKee — October 29, 2007 @ 9:54 am

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