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After Hurricane Harvey

The National Flood Insurance Program was already $24 billion in debt before Harvey. How Washington made Harvey worse: A federal insurance program made Harvey far more costly — and Congress could have known it was coming. This is what flood denialism looks like: After Hurricane Harvey, lawmakers could keep shoveling money into stopgap programs — or they could admit that warming seas won’t fix themselves. Walter Shapiro on how a big-spending liberal is a conservative who has been flooded: Hurricane Harvey challenges Republican party. Christian Caryl on the political lessons Americans should learn from Hurricane Harvey.

Trump uses natural disaster to promote his hats. “At his first briefing in Texas, Trump thanks FEMA Director William Brock Long and says he’s come ‘very famous on television’ due to Harvey”. Trump visits hurricane-ravaged Texas: “We’ll congratulate each other when it's all finished”. Trump has showed the absolute minimum amount of empathy for Houston victims. Thread: “So there's been lots of pundit speculation whether if needed, Donald Trump could rise to the occasion as ‘comforter in chief.’ Clearly not”. Will Hurricane Harvey prompt a Trump “reset”? People will do anything for a unifying Daddy in the White House: There is so much wrong with this sentence in the New York Times. To the mainstream media: Stop politicizing a natural disaster.

“Father of environmental justice” Robert Bullard: Houston’s “unrestrained capitalism” made Harvey “catastrophe waiting to happen”. Houston flooding always hits poor, non-white neighborhoods hardest. Houston, take heed from us Katrina survivors — this is what lies ahead of you. Insurance companies are preparing fleets of drones to assess the damage of Harvey.