If you search the Internet, you can find a lot of dramatic pictures of the Black river in Missouri, which has blasted through levees built to protect communities along the river from the spring flooding season. The problem is this, 2011 has not produced a normal spring. Many communities in Missouri have already seen twice the amount of rainfall as they normally get in April, and a host of devastating storms that have swept across the region of late show no sign of letting up. That means more rain, more flooding, and more and more destruction.
It's heart-wrenching for folks to battle the river day after day and watch the accumulation of an entire lifetime of blood, toil, sweat and tears, to borrow the phrase, being washed away before their very eyes. What's worse is the fact that many of those people will be unable to rebuild their homes…or their lives.
Many communities along the Black river in Missouri lie in natural flood plains, and thus, are unprotected against flood losses under normal homeowner insurance policies. Those who have federal flood insurance will recoup some of their losses, but efforts to limit their ability to rebuild on the government's dime has seen a major push in the GOP-led House of Representatives.
The people of New Orleans can attest to the grim fact that the government largely turned its back on their rebuilding efforts following hurricane Katrina, much in part due the drive of Republican conservatives who view the federal flood insurance program as middle class welfare. The river people of Missouri are due the same rude awakening.
I'm bothered by the ease with which we, as a nation, turn a blind eye to the true scope of loss suffered by our fellow citizens, and I'm saddened that our society is not ready or willing to sacrifice collectively so that the lives of a comparatively small group of people can be put back together again. In the end, we all suffer because of the loss, but our society doesn't always see it that way.
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