‘PHONY’ HURRICANE IRENE KNOCKS OUT POWER FOR MILLIONS OF AMERICANS |

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‘PHONY’ HURRICANE IRENE KNOCKS OUT POWER FOR MILLIONS OF AMERICANS |

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Hurricane Irene, dubbed “Hurricane Hype” by conservatives who question climate change and want to eliminate the National Weather Service, has knocked out power for over two million Americans along the East Coast with extreme winds and record-shattering rainfall.

Climate Change Denier Patrick Michaels: 'It's Doubtful Irene Will Even Cough Up 8 Bodies'

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The libertarians are really distinguishing themselves this week with their comments on Hurricane Irene.

First we had Ron Paul pining for that bygone year of 1900 when there was no FEMA and tens of thousands were left to rot where they died. Good times!

And now we have Patrick Michaels (a senior fellow at the Cato Institute, associated with more than 11 climate change denial groups funded by Exxonmobil), writing a piece for Forbes magazine to attack the National Weather Service because their predictions weren’t perfect: Get Real: Hurricane Irene Should Be Renamed ‘Hurricane Hype’.

The collision between the real world and hard-line libertarian ideology is very evident in this piece, as Michaels mocks NWS predictions by writing, with remarkable callousness, “It is doubtful that Irene will even cough up eight bodies.”

He must be so disappointed...

Hurricane Cost Seen as Ranking Among Top Ten

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Hurricane Irene will most likely prove to be one of the 10 costliest catastrophes in the nation’s history, and analysts said that much of the damage might not be covered by insurance because it was caused not by winds but by flooding, which is excluded from many standard policies.

Industry estimates put the cost of the storm at $7 billion to $10 billion, largely because the hurricane pummeled an unusually wide area of the East Coast. Beyond deadly flooding that caused havoc in upstate New York and Vermont, the hurricane flooded cotton and tobacco crops in North Carolina, temporarily halted shellfish harvesting in Chesapeake Bay, sapped power and kept commuters from their jobs in the New York metropolitan area and pushed tourists off Atlantic beaches in the peak of summer.

Thankfully it weakened to a category 1 before making landfall in the US.

In-laws still have no power or phone service. Using a generator and showering at my bro-in-law's.