Rick Monteverde wrote:
Jindal was correctly pointing out that volcano monitoring, worthy as it may be, is just an example of the far-fetched things that should NOT be in an emergency economic recovery plan. Volcano monitoring money should be spent, IMO, and everybody, including I would say statistically all Republicans including Jindal, understand that.
Volcano monitoring is a form of safety infrastructure, exactly like weather forecasting equipment and dikes in Louisiana. The monitoring equipment is reportedly decayed and unreliable because it has not been kept up-to-date or maintained properly. This is not even a bit "far fetched." Repairing the equipment should be the first item on any list of emergency government programs. As I said this is exactly like repairing a bridge on the verge of collapse in a major metropolitan area. The cost and consequences of not doing this would easily rival the cost of a major bridge collapse.
Furthermore, volcanoes affect multistate areas, and they require the most advanced technology and best scientific knowledge to monitor. Monitoring them is clearly the responsibility of the federal government. You would not want to leave this up to some state agency, or local government.
Pass an environmental monitoring bill or something.
This is NOT an environmental budget item. Nothing can be done to prevent volcano eruptions. The only purpose of monitoring them is to ensure safety and prevent unnecessary loss of money.
Of course volcanoes, hurricanes and other natural phenomena do affect the environment, but the focus of volcano monitoring is not primarily environmental but rather safety. Even a small eruption or gas leakage is dangerous and destructive. We are not talking about rare events such as when Mount Saint Helens blew sky high.
How about a volcano blow that takes out two or three global growing seasons. We won't need $140m on volcano monitoring equipment if something like that down in Indo pops, the 1000 ft wave will be our first clue that the US and the world is out of recovery options.
Such an event is exceedingly unlikely. Volcano monitoring would be useless in such an event, and is not intended for it. Damage from volcanoes occurs daily in the US and in Japan. It seldom makes the news but it costs millions of dollars in damage to equipment and grave danger to airplanes in particular. On the negative side, because we do not know enough about volcanoes we often declare evacuations unnecessarily. This happens in Japan all the time -- it is a weekly occurrence. Such evacuations cost them far more than $140 million. Volcano monitoring reduces the danger and loss of life, and reduces the expense of eruptions. It pays for itself many times over, just as weather forecasting does.
Not monitoring volcanos with the best state-of-the-art equipment would be economic insanity, and a direct threat to human life. It is hard to imagine a more apt or important government responsibility. Perhaps it seems a little strange or esoteric, but that is because you are not familiar with modern volcano monitoring. I know about it because it is everywhere you turn in Japan, and frequently featured on the seven o'clock news. This is like being unaware of the vital importance of monitoring peanut factories for salmonella.
Volcano monitoring was impossible decades ago. It did not exist. So people are not familiar with it today, or aware of how important it is. It is one of the countless hidden technologies that have quietly come into being, and saved billions of dollars and countless lives. Our lives are a lot easier, cleaner and safer than they used to be because of stuff like this. We do not realize how many wonderful technologies and dedicated people are out there, doing things we have never heard of, helping everyone.
You cannot have this kind of sophisticated high technology unless you pay Uncle Sam to do it. High taxes are the cost of living in an ultra-safe, coddled, modern world in which every box of peanuts and every rainstorm and volcanic gas vent is monitored by someone, somewhere, and put into a database, and analyzed at academic meeting months later by geeks who wear pocket protectors from places like the CDC and USGS. We owe them far more than we realize.
- Jed
