We’re all gonna die in the “Frankenstorm.” Or so New York City’s rulers want us to fear. Nanny-sorry, Mayor Mike Bloomberg has warned us of the dire weather over and over: maybe he not only deems us stupid but hard of hearing, too. He’s also dispensed such insultingly obvious advice as “remain calm” — even as he tries his hardest to scare the pants off us.
Meanwhile, without so much as a single drop of rain yet fallen, Nanny has commanded serfs unlucky enough to live in what bureaucrats designate as “low areas” to evacuate. And he closed the subways at 7 PM tonight. Consider our wimpy, cowardly age: The subways in their century-plus of existence have remained open through blizzards, floods, hurricanes, thunderstorms, torrential rains. New York’s previous führers, however pusillanimous, never shut them down — until a year ago last August, when Nanny did, for the Hurricane That Wasn’t (at least in most of New York City). Now, for the second time in 14 months, Nanny has proclaimed subterranean track and trains vulnerable to a storm above-ground. Halting the subways immobilizes the city, whose rulers have warred so tirelessly against drivers that millions long ago surrendered to unreliable and crowded public transit.
Providing I survive this newest threat to western civilization, I’ll be most interested to learn how much overtime Nanny’s hysteria wrangled for the city’s employees. And, of course, how much more power for himself.
8:04 pm on October 28, 2012
