You Don’t Need a Weatherman to Explain the Texas Flooding

Look at All the Politicians Eager to Play the Blame Game

By now, most people have heard about the terrible flooding in Texas hill country over the Fourth of July weekend. As I’m writing this, more than a hundred people have died and I expect the number will continue to rise for a while.

Officials say more than 850 people have been rescued so far. More than 400 first responders from over 20 agencies have been assisting with the search and rescue efforts in Kerr County. Despite all the venom directed at Mexico by Texas officials, more than 20 firefighters from Ciudad Acuña, Mexico and Fundación 911 have joined the search, contributing drones and other technology to aid the effort.

Contributing to the death toll were the speed at which floods occurred and the time at which they occurred– the wee hours of the morning. Thin soil, exposed bedrock and steep terrain make the area vulnerable to regularly occurring storms with high levels of rainfall.

“The Guadalupe River rose from three feet to 34 feet in about 90 minutes, according to data from a river gauge near the town of Comfort, Texas,” according to the New York Times. “The volume of water exploded from 95 cubic feet per second to 166,000 cubic feet per second.”

There is a whole lotta finger pointing going on covering three subjects: weather, climate, and preparedness. The region is known colloquially as “Flash Flood Alley.” Kerr County Judge Rob Kelly told the press on Friday:

• “This is the most dangerous river valley in the United States. We deal with floods on a regular basis.”

Texas officials almost immediately tried to blame the extent of the disaster on the Trump administration budget and personnel cuts. The staffs of both the National Weather Service and FEMA have decreased 20% under Trump’s presidency, and more cuts are coming.

None-the-less, Greg Waller, service coordination hydrologist with the NWS West Gulf River Forecast Center in Fort Worth, told the Texas Tribune: “We had adequate staffing. We had adequate technology; This was us doing our job to the best of our abilities.”

The National Weather Service offices in Texas did issue warnings ahead of the floods and reportedly saw urgency in the future, bringing in extra staff during the storm.

According to the Associated Press, the NWS issued an initial flood watch at 1:18 pm on Thursday predicting 5-7 inches of rain, followed by a series of bulletins that “grew increasingly ominous in the early morning hours of Friday,” culminating in an urgent message at 4:03 a.m. warning of “the potential of catastrophic damage and a severe threat to human life.”

State Emergency Management Chief Nim Kidd told reporters Friday original forecasts from the National Weather Service predicted 4 to 8 inches of rain in that area, ‘but the amount of rain that fell in this specific location (23”) was never in any of those forecasts.

Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer published a letter to the Commerce Department’s acting Inspector General Roderick Anderson, demanding an investigation into whether personnel cuts to local National Weather Service stations contributed to the loss of life.

On the other side of the aisle, Senator Ted Cruz was vacationing in Greece as tragedy struck his state. Cruz was sightseeing in Athens as first responders began launching search and rescue operations, a tourist who saw Cruz and family touring the Parthenon, according to the Daily Beast, said something directly to the Senator, to wit: “20 kids dead in Texas and you take a vacation?”

By Monday, the Senator was back in Texas, speaking alongside Kerrville local officials, saying there is no evidence a reduction in staffing had any impact "whatsoever" on the NWS ability to warn of the flood.

Congress member Marjorie Taylor Greene is whipping up support for a law to criminalize chemical weather-changing discharges (vapor trails) into the atmosphere.

Texas Gov. Greg Abbott criticized the NWS for neglecting to emphasize the severity of the flooding:

• "The problem with that is that, to most people in the area, flash flooding would mean one thing, not what it turned out to be, because they deal with flash floods all the time. There's the potential for flash flooding, but there's no expectation of a water wall of almost thirty feet high."

Lt. Gov. Dan Patrick passed the blame, saying that local mayors and county officials are supposed to evacuate their residents if they feel the need.

Kerrville Mayor Joe Herring Jr. said the problem was that “this came at night when people were asleep in bed.” Not sure if he was criticizing the storm or the warnings given.

Judge Rob Kelly explained that the county doesn’t have its own warning system because it costs too much and “taxpayers won’t pay for it.”

President Trump, who’ll be visiting the area on Friday, took a swipe at his predecessor before blaming mother nature. "I'll tell you, if you look at that, what a situation that all is. And that was really the Biden setup. That was not our setup. But I wouldn't blame Biden for it, either. I would just say this is a 100-year catastrophe, and it's just so horrible to watch,” he said.

Freshman GOP State legislator Wendel Virdel joined the rescue and cleanup efforts. Via the Texas Tribune:

• Virdell’s closeup view of the havoc wreaked on his district has made a lasting impression, he said, and left him reconsidering a vote he made just a few months ago against a bill that would have established a statewide plan to improve Texas’ disaster response, including better alert systems, along with a grant program for counties to buy new emergency communication equipment and build new infrastructure like radio towers.

• “I can tell you in hindsight, watching what it takes to deal with a disaster like this, my vote would probably be different now,” said Virdell, a freshman GOP lawmaker from Brady.

• The measure, House Bill 13, would have created a new government council to establish the emergency response plan and administer the grant program, both of which would have been aimed at facilitating better communication between first responders. The bill also called for the plan to include “the use of outdoor warning sirens,” like those used in tornado-prone Texas counties, and develop new “emergency alert systems.

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All the rain that fell over three days in the area was attributable to two factors: the leftovers of tropical storm Barry moving inland and the formation of a compact low-pressure system which triggered thunderstorms in central Texas.

Now, let’s talk about climate change, the thing that may not exist according to the oracles of MAGA. Cutting back on the scientific observers and forecasters of the weather, in addition to their worth as public servants, serves the purpose of keeping informed discussion about climate change out of the public eye; this is the rationale given in the Project 2025 blueprint for dismantling this part of government.

Scientists have observed the increased frequency of colossal bursts of rain like the ones that caused the deadly flooding in Texas and say it is connected to the burning of fossil fuels heating the planet. Warm air holds more moisture than cool air – 4% more water vapor for every 1°F of warming, and as temperatures rise, storms can produce bigger downpours.

Currently, the heaviest rainstorms in Texas drop about 20% more water than they did in the late 1950s, when the planet was significantly cooler, according to the National Climate Assessment. And extreme rain in Texas is expected to get much more frequent in the coming decade, as the climate warms even more, according to a 2024 report by the Texas state climatologist.

There are two aspects to the preparedness part of the equation explaining the reasons for the flooding in central Texas: infrastructure and warning systems.

Texas has a $54 billion backlog of flood management projects. This year the legislature has allocated about $669 million, while approving $51 billion in property tax cuts. Depending on who’s counting, the state has a $24 or $70-$80 billion budget surplus. The higher figures include the state’s rainy day fund, calculated by Texans for Fiscal Responsibility. They’d like to see all the ‘woke*’ spending by the state government eliminated, along with an end to the property tax.

*Given the right wing extremists currently holding office in Texas, the idea of ‘woke’ spending being a problem gives credence to the definition of woke being anything that is displeasing to the beholder.

The reticence about spending money on infrastructure projects extends to the County level, where good governance is defined as keeping taxes as low as possible and tunnel vision.

Via the New York Times:

• Kerr County, in its earlier discussions about a warning system, had explored along with other members of the Upper Guadalupe River Authority the possibility of applying for financial support through the infrastructure fund. But the authority dropped the idea after learning that the fund would provide only about 5 percent of the money needed for the project.

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Consigning science to the dustbin of history is the ultimate insult to a planet, already under stress due to the waste caused by industrial and technological systems in our civilization.

People working in the arena of climate science are being reduced to referees judging natural disasters. And if we don’t like the call, they’ll be getting the blame.

Trump Reverses Course, Pentagon Scrambles to Save Face by Shankar Narayan at The Concis

• Much of the reporting has focused on what specific weapons were withheld. That’s a useful data point—especially since the Pentagon’s justification that these shipments were critical to U.S. readiness was later debunked by an internal Joint Staff assessment.

• But the real issue was never just which weapons were paused. It was the stoppage itself—and the directional consequences it risked triggering in Ukraine’s war effort. If the halt had dragged on for weeks, it would’ve reshaped battlefield momentum. Every single day of delay makes it politically harder to restart. That’s the nature of the strategic trap this created.

• A quick fix was needed. Thankfully, large parts of Congress erupted in fury. Senators fired off letters. GOP members began publicly questioning the logic laid out by Under Secretary of Defense Elbridge Colby. And as time passed, the brickbats landed on Pete Hegseth, the Defense Secretary, as well.

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The Tariff Beatings Will Continue Until Morale Improves by Paul Krugman

• One way to look at the newly announced tariffs is in the light of history. The infamous Smoot-Hawley tariff of 1930 pushed the average tariff rate to about 20 percent. So far every country that has received a letter will be facing rates higher than that.

• Another way to look at it to ask how much we would expect these tariffs to reduce trade. The key number is the elasticity of substitution in world trade — the percent fall in imports caused by a one percent rise in import prices. The median estimate from many studies is 3.8, which implies that in the long run 25 percent tariffs will reduce trans-Pacific trade by almost 60 percent. That’s a lot.

• Side note: If I were a government employee, this post would probably be flagged for DEI because I just used the word “trans.”

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Operation Excalibur in Los Angeles Is “Show of Presence” by Ken Klippenstein

• Because ICE and CBP apparently failed to communicate or coordinate effectively, the military showed up too late (and Los Angeles authorities weren’t notified until two hours prior.)

• “We were on the objective for 24 minutes,” a National Guard member told me. “Many of the phase lines were not reported because they didn’t happen. So we parked and then left. Soldiers didn’t get out of trucks. [They] stayed in the back of the 5-tons [military trucks] sweating in the heat.”

• This is just the latest operation that didn’t go off as planned, amplifying the sense amongst the California Guardsmen that the whole spectacle is idiotic and shameful. Part of the reason for the confusion is the sheer number of government agencies involved. In this operation, according to the documents, nine different federal agencies (including the IRS) were given radio code names based on soda brands (Pepsi, Coke, 7-UP, etc.) —that is, except for ICE, which was codenamed “Inca,” which may or may not be the Peruvian cola of the same name.