Looks like a busy week for the flight crews of the ten WC-130s of 53^rd Weather Reconnaissance Squadron [USAFR], 403^rd Wing, Keesler AFB, Biloxi, Mississippi.

Tropical Storm Cindy will make landfall in the next few hours with a lot of rain, and hopefully the pumps in the “Big Easy” can deal with it. Cindy is on course to go across the Deep South.

At the beginning of next week, the storm that will probably be Hurricane Dennis will be selecting a victim to assault.

If you would like to watch our little chunks of weather, I use the Weather Underground, which provides me with all of the data my taxes pay NOAA to gather and crunch.

FEMA wants Floridians to return $27 million in aid “overpayments” based on a review of the money that they handed out before the 2004 election. This does not include the money that FEMA handed out in Miami-Dade county; that Florida Senator Nelson pointed out was not actually struck by a hurricane.

FEMA has obstructed debris clean up by changing the rules and imposing extremely short time periods, and none of the state’s Republican politicians has mentioned that everything changed after the election.

After the voters in Hamden, Massachusetts refused to raise their property taxes to cover costs, the town has slashed services and closed the local library. The library had remained open during two world wars and the Depression, but it was unable to survive the current tax structure.

As the Federal government has transferred costs to the states, the states have transferred costs down to the local governments. If the local governments are unable to fund the costs of the programs, the programs have to be cut. As many programs are funded by matching funds, these cuts are often much larger than they appear on the local budget.