Two days ago, there was something like a 1 in 6 chance that Gustav would be close enough to that “worst case” track Brendan drew on the map, and come in at Cat. 3 or higher strength, after having been a 4 or even 5 after feasting on the Loop Current, producing a storm surge more consistent with a far more powerful storm.

If that had happened, we wouldn’t be discussing whether to blame the Corps of Engineers or the sundry Levee Boards for shoddy construction; their quality (or lack thereof) would have been irrelevant, for the waters of Pontchartrain would have poured over even the mightiest walls erected at their height, and turned much of New Orleans into a toilet bowl. Literally.

But one could easily miss the commingling of waste water with the flood waters, were there tens of thousands of decomposing corpses and the wreckage of shattered houses floating along with the excrement. That’s because it wouldn’t have happened as gradually as it did with Katrina (which missed being this worst-case scenario only very slightly); it would have filled that bowl so quickly that people who stayed in homes under the level of the lake would have been drowned inside them before they could escape.

What Brendan said three years ago, and said again a few days ago, is that even though odds like “1 in 6″ qualify an event as “unlikely”, rational thinking people must also take into account the severity of such “unlikely” events. Nagin hyped it only by failing to insert “may be” in his pronouncements. Loy, Masters, Neudorff, and other responsible commentators on weather have been very clear about the odds.

They don’t recommend playing Russian Roulette, even though the odds of dying are “only 1 in 6″ per pull of the trigger.

Maybe it would make sense to require every self-selected hurricaneblogger to post a $1,000 bond and surrender it every time he talked shit and got proven wrong.

Brendan and Geraldo would be out roughly $134,000 by now.

The Republicans actually delayed their convention because they are afraid the Democrats will call them “callous and uncaring” to be doing business in Minnesota while it’s raining in New Orleans.

Gleeful avowed atheist Democrat operatives proclaim God is in his heaven and on their side in attacking the Republicans with a storm.

Was one football game postponed other than any directly in the storm’s path? Does that mean the NCAA is uncaring? I heard the perfunctory “our prayers are with Louisiana” announcer comment then, “Back to the game and now this from our sponsor!”

We have now come to the point where it is the President’s fault if any idiot parks himself in the path of a stinkin’ hurricane and suffers any consequences. Or even if his house blows down. Jeesh. We have truly become wusses of the first order. Help me oh Almighty Government because I built my house below water!

There’s no need for “quoting.” You hysterics are like parrots; you say the same things over and over and over again. “DEADLY STORM LOOMS!” “DR. JEFF MCALARMIST SEZ STORM *MAY* END ALL LIFE ON EARTH – OR MAYBE NOT”.

And so on.

I’m reminded of the classic skewering of economists and recessions in the statement:

“Weather alarmists have accurately predicted twelve of the last two weather disasters.”

I notice that you still haven’t quoted a single thing I’ve said. It’s easy to see why: if you did quote my posts, with proper context, it would impossible to support your allegation that I’m “not even one step removed” from Geraldo’s ridiculousness.

I’m done with this ridiculous debate. You’re fundamentally unserious.

A relentless, 24/7, breathless liveblogging of a storm isn’t a “warning,” it’s hysteria. Sorry, Brendan, but you’re not even one step removed from Geraldo Rivera squealing, “IS THAT A *PERSON* IN THE WATER” even as the Mother Of All Storms proves to be Yet Another Fizzle.

See, you’re not issuing a “warning.” You’re issuing a pathological *series* of warnings that amounts to almost a perfect campaign of useless fearmongering.

How many posts have you issued about Gustav? A dozen? Two dozen? Where – exactly – do you imagine you cross a line from “issuing a warning” to “getting off on scaring people?”

Never?

The reality is, you are not making an argument against overhype. You are making an argument against giving any warnings about hurricanes at all until it’s too late. You would decry every warning that could potentially prove, in hindsight, to have been unnecessary. That includes every single warning ever given.

Breaking News!!!!

Maybe it’s the fact that I live in the icy north that causes me such astonishment at the hurricane freakazoids; perhaps spending three solid months every single year in an environment that will kill you dead in about 60 minutes if you go outside without serious preparations tends to make one a bit blase about dangerous weather.

Is anybody in Florida or Lousiana going to freak out when I’m buried under four fukking feet of snow next February?

Is Brendan & Co. going to liveblog it when it’s 30 degrees below zero up here?