< Midwest Drowning / >

In an age when the Sciences are manipulated and ignored, the Arts and Humanities continue to be the first to take the hardest hits. This is the Museum of Art at the University of Iowa, where a dear friend directs a business communication program. Despite the best efforts of hundreds of volunteers desperately filling sandbags for days, the entire arts campus at U-Iowa has been drowned. (A blog detailing the UI damage is here.)

In my post below, I mention the weather in both Michigan and Iowa. This isn't the first time that Iowa has flooded—1929 and 1993 are both notable years for that, and I remember nearly being washed away during a camping stay near Cedar Rapids back in the early 1980s. But in the '29 and '93 floods, the rivers crested at 20 feet. This time, crest mark was at 32 feet.

I don't need to mention that Iowa is also watching its corn crop, and its ethanol dreams, disappear beneath the waves. I've mentioned the folly of pinning our energy hopes on something that depends on screwy weather enough times already (and will likely mention it a few more times before I'm through).

But "screwy" is too kind. The weather has turned psychotic and homicidal. Last August in southern Michigan, we had a series of black-sky afternoons, floods, tornadoes, and hurricane-force winds that freaked everyone out. Then fall arrived, and we were safe. A winter of record-setting snowfall followed. Now summer is back, and so are the storms—nearly every day, "dangerous systems" form and start hurling lightning bolts like Zeus on PCP, funnel clouds start swirling (most, so far, too high to cause damage), and tree branches become projectiles. The basement has become the most inviting and comforting part of the house.

Really, this is no way to live. Come on, Mr. Obama, you yourself filled sandbags over the weekend. You probably saw it as a political photo opportunity and PR move, but you were living the people's nightmare, however briefly. Let it move you; feel it. And then do something about it. A nation—and a world—filled with storm victims and terrified citizens cowering in their cellars isn't the kind of change you've been talking about so stirringly. But it is the kind of change we're all getting more of by the day.

We can handle strong, decisive leadership that recognizes when a rampaging elephant is trampling everyone in the circus tent.
Yes, we can.