Disasters, natural or otherwise

[Mongrel]

That picture of him climbing up out of the rough is going to be one of those pictures that lives on forever.

[Yoji]

So Sisyphus was damned to push a stone up a hill and watch it roll back down for the rest of eternity, while Trump will be damned to forever chip balls out of one patch of rough and right into another.

[Mongrel]

EDIT: Let's keep piling these on, eh?

[Mongrel]

Say, what's a good outfit to donate to Puerto Rico through? We normally donate to relief efforts through the Canadian Red Cross or DWB/MSF.

The Canadian Red Cross doesn't have anything (presumably because it would be under the purview of The American Red Cross, but they've still got problems - not sending money to the ARC) and I don't see anything on MSF's page yet either? (in any case the situation is less a medical emergency so much as it is a resource emergency).

I saw the governor's wife set up a charity, but obviously it's new and who knows what might happen there (not that I'm implying corruption, it's simply not an established charity so I have no idea if it's optimal use of resources or not).

[TA]

Never donate to the Red Cross.

[Thad]

Operation USA is good. One America Appeal has all five living former presidents behind it.

[Mongrel]

Thanks. Sadly it doesn't seem like One America let's you specifically earmark your donation for Puerto Rico. Not that Texas and Florida won't continue to need help, but they appear to actually be getting that help.

Operation USA lets you donate by hurricane, but not by island (there are several non-US Islands which have been hit just as badly if not worse than PR, but they have competent relief efforts underway through Caribbean and UN relief agencies).

Never donate to the Red Cross.

Not to the American one, no. They're awful.

The Canadian one is fine and well-run. This actually came up last time donations were talked about.

[Spooky Skeleton]

Trump passed out yellow bags of rice and then started tossing rolls of towels into the crowd as if he were shooting free throws. The crowd laughed and cheered him on. When he contemplated doing the same with the cans of chicken, the crowd gently told him no.

The church is also distributing water purification kits, and a member explained the process to the president.

“Wait,” Trump said, “you put it in dirty water?”

“And then you can drink it after 10 to 12 hours,” she explained.

“Would you do it? Would you drink it?” he asked.

“Sure,” she said.

“Really?” Trump said, a disgusted look coming across his face.

“Really,” she said.

“Is this your company or something?” Trump asked the woman, seeming suspicious of the aggressive pitch.

“No,” she said, “I’m part of the church.”

A tale of two Puerto Ricos: What Trump saw — and what he didn’t,
Washington Post

[Brentai]

I am not on fire, Romosome is not on fire yet.

[Yoji]

I was gonna ask, should I panic? Y/N

I think we're going to be safe in downtown Santa Ana, but holy crap that's a lot of very close smoke.

[Esperath]

Yes

[Mongrel]

Jones Act waiver has expired and isn't being renewed.

[Mongrel]

He's just going to let Puerto Rico die, isn't he?

[Thad]

On the plus side,

[Mongrel]

Vice: The death toll is almost certainly in the hundreds

Also, the percentage of homes with electricity has fallen from 17% to 9%.

[Mongrel]

WaPo: North Pole well above freezing, in spite of it being the dead of winter.

[mharr]

Here's the pole's heartbeat failing in high resolution colour animation. Yay.

[Büge]

World's last male northern white rhino dies

[Mongrel]

Politico: Shafted and forgotten, Puerto Rico plans to get even - by organizing stateside Ticans along the lines of the Cuban American lobby in order to swing the midterms as hard as they can.

There are a LOT MORE Puerto Ricans in the States than there are Cuban-Americans (nearly triple).