'I voted to fix it, you voted for the stupid short sighted @ssh0les who broke it...'

Here's this must-read ass-stomping comment at Small Dead Animals:

Featured Comment:

Davenport said: "I'm going to head off The Phantom here, who doubtless will show up shortly with some rant about how this is all FEMA's fault'."

I love it:

Do you want to know why the power is STILL off on Long Island, Davenport? Read this here: http://www.nbcnewyork.com/news/local/Sandy-LIPA-Outages-Power-Long-Island-Defense-Military-178115341.html

In it you will find reference to a report from 2006, SIX YEARS AGO, which found that Long Island Power Authority had not done the basic maintenance required to secure the power grid from weather damage. The maintenance they're talking about here is tree cutting mostly, and replacing bad power poles.

I lived in New York in the 1990's. I could have written that report. The f-ing power went off every time it snowed because they didn't cut trees and the trees ripped the lines down. They also didn't plow the roads, but that's a story for another day.

You want to know why they don't cut the f-ing trees Davenport? It isn't because they are stupid, it isn't because they don't know, it isn't because private enterprise is inherently corrupt, it isn't even because union workers are a bunch of rent-seeking layabouts. Its because every time they go to cut down a tree, some local Greenies get up a petition or a court order to make them stop. So they stop. So the trees break and knock down the power lines. Same thing all over the North East until you get up into snow country, where even the f-ing tree huggers know better.

Well -this- time it all came home to roost the same day, and every overhanging branch from New Jersey to Connecticut took out a line.

UPDATE: My good friend Norm Gersman comments: "This post is absolutely incorrect. I live in an area as leftie as any. our trees by the wires are annually cut , and look ridiculous, no one says a bad word because it must be done. the present problem of down wires was caused mostly by falling trees a good distance from the wires. what are we going to do? Clear cut every tree for 100 feet on either side of the wires?"

Norm's in Great Neck, which is the focus of this story cited by the writer at SDA, "Officials Want Military to Take Over Power Restoration on Long Island":

LIPA [Long Island Power Authority], which had earlier set a goal of restoring 90 percent of all customers by Wednesday, has declined to respond to the withering criticism. Officials say the company was focused on restoring power and not engaging in a debate with politicians.

Newsday reported Friday that LIPA was warned as long ago as 2006 that it was not prepared to handle a major storm, that it badly needed to replace outdated technology and did not keep up with critical maintenance.

Among the issues the utility was warned about include a 25-year-old computer system not capable of tracking outages, and failures to keep up with basic tasks like replacing rotting poles and trimming trees near power lines, the paper said.

Well, LIPA isn't taking interviews at the moment, so I'll come back to this debate, LOL!