September 13, 2008
The Facts
As everyone knows hurricane Ike roared through southeast Texas this morning and did considerable damage. According to reports, 3 million people had to evacuate and early estimates put damage at about $7.2 billion. Power companies are saying Ike was much worse than Rita in 2005 relative to damage to the power grids and numbers of people who lost power, and restoration of power will take several weeks at best, much longer than it was for Rita.
My View
Maybe I’m a little biased here since I’m one of those who had to evacuate and have no idea if I have a home to return to or not. But my question is this; since it’s the taxpayers that have suffered losses by mother nature rather than by greed and poor management, will we use taxpayer’s money to help pay for this? Oh, that’s right! How stupid of me. Of course we won’t. These are ordinary people who pay full taxes that need help; not the wealthy, greedy corporations and run by greedy, wealthy people who pay little or no taxes. What with Bear Stearns that cost taxpayers billions, Fannie & Freddie that will cost taxpayers $200 billion, the Big Three who will be given $50 billion of taxpayer money, and now Lehman at God knows how many hundreds of billions of taxpayer’s money, we don’t have the measly $7.2 billion to help those destroyed by nature. Besides, those people destroyed by Mother Nature aren’t “too big to fail” like those big private corporations. But of course, there is one that will most likely be helped; JP Morgan had a lot of damaged to their big office building in Houston. I’m sure they have nothing to worry about. We’ll just tell them and their insurance company not to worry about it; “the middle class taxpayers will handle the entire bill”. That’s what we’re here for.
Christy in TheWoodlands
// Sep 16, 2008 at 2:10 PM
My fiance and I decided to ride out the storm. We figured that electricity isn’t vital. Things would be uncomfortable, but we stocked up on water, unperishables, and the necessities. However, come Sunday after the post Ike thunderstorm, we noticed sewage water on our bathroom floor. We sopped up what we could, but it’s hard to live when there’s toilet paper and feces floating in your front yard. At that point, we decided to evacuate to Austin where we could stay with a friend.
The company I work for is located just East of Katy and was able to restore power on Monday. I received a call from my boss with the news. At that point, I advised her that I would be able to work remotely as best I could, but that I would not be in the office.
I understand that my boss doesn’t have the final say, rather it comes from above. However, her response was, “thank you for your help sorting out your emails and doing what you can, but please understand that since the office is ‘officially’ open, you will be docked a vacation/personal day!!!”
What is going on here? Because I can’t live in my apartment due to the sewage, lack of power, and the simple fact that everything I own will have to be replaced…BUT the office is open, I MUST go to work or be penalized! In my opiniob, this is UNACCEPTABLE, and I will be searching for new employment.
Fellow readers…please let me know your opinion on such matters!
Sincerely,
TheWoodlands
Old-Man
// Sep 17, 2008 at 8:21 PM
Christy, I apology for not getting your comment posted earlier. I just got my internet back today and had a lot of comments to approve.
I can not imagine a company who would expect their employees to do what they are asking you to do. It seems we live in a world where human kind doesn’t matter to so many employers. I hope a lot of people see your comment and post their comments here. I plan on writing a post addressing your problems. It’s these kinds of stories that people should be hearing about. But it seems we working class people are only floor mats and a means of tax money for companies. Companies seem to forget that if it were not for people like you, there would be no company.
Thanks for reading and posting your comment.
Hurricane Ike Victim Becomes Victim Of Employer « American Citizens News Network // Sep 21, 2008 at 7:31 AM
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