Seattle - 24 February 2009 - In his rejoinder to Pres. Barack Obama's Feb. 24 address to Congress, La. Gov. Bubba Bobby Jindal argued that the Federal budget should forego spending $140 million for "monitoring volcanoes," intoning the very words with disdain.

For the 3.5 million of us who live on and around the congealed mud flows of the largest volcanic eruptions known to North America during the last ten millennia, a few bucks for listening equipment seems like a good idea.

So, Bobby, if we're going to rebuke politicians for bad decisions, should we take the same attitude toward say, levee repairs for the 400,000 who live in a city that lies BELOW SEA LEVEL? We haven't; you shouldn't.

This is not the time to set Americans against one another for the crumbs of a shrinking pie. Let us not abandon all pretensions of generosity and shared purpose and simply have at it.

UPDATE: After searching for a calculator to confirm the arithmetic: The per capita cost of the said scandalous volcano monitoring, $0.47 (yep, 47 cents) per citizen. Not bad for the preservation of Portland, Tacoma, Seattle, Everett, Hilo, Anchorage and 100 other population centers.

Keywords: Short-sighted, selfish, Republican, moron! (Our apologies to morons everywhere.)

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