Texas woman believes she prayed a tornado away. I wonder what happens if I pray for Texas to go away?

Courtesy of Raw Story:  

A Texas woman says her Christian faith gave her the power to redirect a tornado away from her home. 

Sabrina Lowe, of Rowlett, said 10 family members were visiting her apartment Saturday when they heard the distinctive train noise of the approaching tornado, reported NPR. 

“We actually went outside and started commanding the winds, because God had given us authority over the winds, the airways,” Lowe said. “And we just began to command this storm not to hit our area. We spoke to the storm and said, ‘Go to unpopulated places.’ It did exactly what we said to do, because God gave us the authority to do that.”

Yes weather patterns are controlled by prayer and faith, said every primitive culture since the beginning of time.

It should be pointed out however that though the tornado did NOT hit the apartment that housed Ms. Lowe and her family, tornadoes from that extreme weather system DID kill eleven people and damaged up to 1,000 buildings.

So I guess if somebody wanted to take Ms. Rowe at her word the accusation could be made that she diverted a tornado from her location and sent it along with others to kill eleven people.

Hardly a Christian thing to do in my book.

"I'd been hiding this for over a decade. I wasn't out." Rebecca Vitsmun talks about the day she came out as an Atheist on national television after surviving the Oklahoma tornado.

I know this is a little long, but at the 8:28 portion Rebecca starts to tell the story of her interview with Wolf Blitzer. However it is around the 9:40 mark that she tells what it is like to be put in a position that every Atheist living in the Bible Belt fears.

Her emotion is so raw, and so honest, that it may serve to explain to those who are religious what it is like for those of us living in America who are not.

Tom Tomorrow imagines what it would have been like if Oklahoma tornado survivor Rebecca Vitsmun had responded to Wolf Bliter's question the way it DESERVED to be responded to.

I am taking NOTHING away from Rebecca Vitsmun as she did a wonderful job, and demonstrated great dignity. But how cool would it have been if she had decided to REALLY rake Blitzer over the coals for his insensitive remarks?

Today is a day for honoring heroes and their sacrifice. But right now these are the heroes that I feel the need to honor.

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I am certainly not taking anything away from our fallen vets, or their sacrifice, but to me these brave public servants have redefined heroism.

What they did to protect their children, while being vilified from the Right and underpaid for their efforts, is truly inspiring.

Yet while we rain much deserved praise down on their heads for their bravery let us not forget that Oklahoma is still represented by callous assholes like this guy:

Sen. Tom Coburn (R-Okla.) reiterated on Sunday that he won't support additional disaster relief funding without spending cuts elsewhere -- even after tornadoes ripped apart his own state last week. 

"We've created kind of a predicate, that you don't have to be responsible for what goes on in your state," he said on CBS' "Face the Nation" while discussing the success Oklahoma has had in using state and private funds after the tornadoes. 

Coburn said he doesn't oppose any federal money going toward the state, however. 

"Big storms like [Hurricane] Sandy, or like this tornado -- there's certain things that we can't do that we need the federal government to do," he said. 

The Oklahoma senator has been consistently opposed to disaster funding without offsets, but some expected that to change in the wake of the devastation to his state. But Coburn's office quickly confirmed after the tornado that he would not be supporting disaster aid without offsetting the spending. 

"That's always been his position [to offset disaster aid]," Coburn spokesman John Hart said Monday in a statement. "He supported offsets to the bill funding the OKC bombing recovery effort."

I guess Oklahoma can decide who they want to be the face of their state, but if it were up to me  I would rather it be any one of those teachers from Plaza Towers Elementary rather than this Koch sucking windbag. 

President Obama visits devastated Oklahoma. Update.

Courtesy of USA Today:

During a first-hand look Sunday afternoon at the devastation from last week's violent tornado, President Obama praised Oklahomans for their resolve while consoling victims and promising continued help. 

"I'm just a messenger here today, letting everybody here know that you are not alone, that you've got folks behind you," Obama said. "Obviously, the damage here is pretty hard to comprehend. Our hearts go out to the families who have been impacted, including those who had loved ones who were lost." 

Obama, who flew from Washington to nearby Tinker Air Force Base, spent several hours in the area. He walked through one of the hardest-hit neighborhoods in the Oklahoma City suburb and toured the ruins of Plaza Towers Elementary School, which was destroyed by the tornado. He later visited a local fire station that has been used as a command post. There he thanked first responders and met with families of seven children who died at the school. 

I swear not since Bill Clinton has a president been this effective at comforting hurting Americans.

Even if he were NOT doing all that he has done for the country in the last four and half years he would probably still be remembered for this alone. I personally have great respect for those that can demonstrate compassion for their fellow man, and President Obama is EXACTLY the guy that I would want to show up and offer support if I were dealing with devastation the likes of this Oklahoma Tornado, or Hurricane Sandy, or any other disaster one might imagine.

Update: Wiping away a tear.

Photo courtesy of the Obama Diary.

Black helicopter expert, Alex Jones. claims that government might have a "weather weapon" and just might have used it to destroy Oklahoma. Sounds legit.

Courtesy of  Media Matters:

Conspiracy theorist radio host Alex Jones explained to his audience today how the government could have been behind the devastating May 20 tornado in Oklahoma. 

On the May 21 edition of The Alex Jones Show, a caller asked Jones whether he was planning to cover how government technology may be behind a recent spate of sinkholes. After laying out how insurance companies use weather modification to avoid having to pay ski resorts for lack of snow, Jones said that "of course there's weather weapon stuff going on -- we had floods in Texas like fifteen years ago, killed thirty-something people in one night. Turned out it was the Air Force." 

 Following a long tangent, Jones returned to the caller's subject. While he explained that "natural tornadoes" do exist and that he's not sure if a government "weather weapon" was involved in the Oklahoma disaster, Jones warned nonetheless that the government "can create and steer groups of tornadoes." 

According to Jones, this possibility hinges on whether people spotted helicopters and small aircraft "in and around the clouds, spraying and doing things." He added, "if you saw that, you better bet your bottom dollar they did this, but who knows if they did. You know, that's the thing, we don't know."

Wait! When did Obama get a tornado gun?

And if he has one why hasn't he used it against the Congress?

I would totally do that!

Now remember folks there is a ton of video of this guy having conversations with Rand Paul that are just about this crazy.

Oooh, I can hardly WAIT until Rand throws his hat in the ring to run for President. That is going to be SUCH fun!

CBS News interviews sweet little old lady after Oklahoma tornado destroys her home, and then everything gets awesome.

Watch until the 1:39 mark. I promise you will not be disappointed.

They used their own bodies to protect the children.

Courtesy of the Telegraph:

The centre of the destruction was Moore, a suburb of 55,000 to the south of the city. 

There, the Plaza Towers primary school was directly hit by the tornado, and 24 children are feared to have died inside. At least seven bodies have been pulled from the rubble of the school and authorities have confirmed that more casualties are expected. 

One witness at Plaza Towers told KOCO television: "We pulled a teacher out and she was on top of three kids. The kids were fine but the teacher was in a bad way and we wheeled her into an ambulance. As far as I know most of the kids got out. 

"There were kids running around screaming. The school is just gone, you can't tell what was the front and what was the back. People were screaming for their children." Another rescuer said: "They've been pulling out third graders. It is absolute chaos down here. It's horrific." 

One teacher described lying on top of six children in a bathroom to protect them. 

The children pulled from the rubble were passed down a human chain to a triage centre in the car park of the school, which taught 500 pupils. 

Many of the children had been taken to a local church to shelter before the storm hit. Around 75 were believed to have been kept at the school by teachers as they sought to ride out the tornado.

 A second school in the storm's path, Briarwood Elementary, was also flattened.

A teacher hugs one of the students from Briarwood Elementary School.

I can barely imagine how terrifying it must have been for these children, and the teachers left behind to protect them. But story after story is emerging of these educators literally shielding the bodies of their students with their own.

I think the next person I hear say a derogatory remark about a teacher I will punch in the mouth.

The devastation that you can see in the pictures is bad enough but take a look at the video one family captured as they emerged from where they took shelter from the storm.

When they entered that space they were surrounded by the walls of a house, and when they emerge there is nothing but sky above them.

I don't necessarily think that this is the right time to get political, but I cannot let this go without mentioning that both of Oklahoma's Senators voted against providing relief to New Jersey after Sandy.

Somehow I imagine they will have changed their tune about government spending. Don't you?

Update: More unbelievable video.

By the way for those wondering how come these people did not have time to get all of the children to safety you should know that there was ONLY a sixteen minute warning, and that the schools are some of the best constructed buildings in the area. Literally the ONLY way to have been completely safe was to go underground, and from what I am hearing the bedrock under this town makes that very difficult.

Oklahoma hit by perhaps the worst Tornado in history. Update!

The tornado has destroyed two schools and there are attempts right now to rescue the students trapped under the debris.

My understanding is that some of these children are third graders.

This is going to be bad.

Update: Courtesy of CNN:

Areas of metropolitan Oklahoma City appeared to be in shreds Monday afternoon after a massive tornado moved through the region. "The houses are destroyed. ... Completely leveled," a helicopter pilot for CNN affiliate KFOR said. A school was apparently among the structures leveled by the twister.

I have not yet heard of any deaths, but I am having trouble believing that there will not be any fatalities considering the damage I am seeing on the television right now.

Update 2: According to news reports the 4th, 5th and 6th grade classes were evacuated and they are safely at a nearby church. That seems counter intuitive to me, but I don't know any details I don't know the reasoning.

There were 75 people in the school when the tornado hit.

So far they are not reporting any deaths but there is also a neighborhood all around the school and it is flattened like a pancake, so things do not look good.

Update 3: More pictures:

It looks like a war zone.

Update 4: Reports of two dozen or more fatalities in that school. They are apparently the missing school children.

Update 5: President Obama has notified FEMA to get "all available  assistance" to the area ASAP.

That is good because it is beyond clear that these people need as much assistance as possible right now.

When it comes to overcoming the odds and letting nothing stand in our way, this little dog could teach ALL of us a lesson.

Courtesy of Time Magazine:

Three weeks after a series of tornadoes blew through Alabama, leveling everything in their path, a family in North Smithfield returned to their damaged home to sift through debris. Miraculously, they found their missing dog Mason waiting for them on the porch.

With both of his front legs broken and his fur matted and dirty, Mason had obviously been through a terrible ordeal. According to MyFox Alabama, the terrier mix was hiding in his garage when the storm picked him up and blew him away. For weeks, his family searched but found no sign of their scrappy pup.

"This is probably the most dramatic we've seen as far as an injury in an animal that's survived this long," Phil Doster of the Birmingham-Jefferson County Animal Control Shelter told MyFox Alabama. "For an animal just to show up on someone's porch after this time was pretty remarkable, especially with the condition he's in."

We have seen a lot of amazing stories emerge after these devastating tornadoes, but for some reason I simply could NOT stop thinking about this one.

I don't have anything terribly witty or enlightening to add to this story, in fact I choke up so bad when I read it that I can barely type.

But I just thought it was a story worth sharing.  Hopefully you agree.

While others made fools of themselves this Memorial Day weekend, our President was quietly comforting those in despair.

Courtesy of Obama Diary

:

Will the recent tornadoes damage the GOP's anti-government argument?

From the Kansas City Star:

A pernicious story line, recited on talk radio, in state legislatures and in some quarters of Washington, says that government can’t do anything right. Government is the problem, Ronald Reagan famously said. And a vast political and business alliance works furiously to make his declaration a self-fulfilling prophecy by underfunding vital programs and disparaging public employees.

But when disaster strikes, we expect government to work. We need it to work. Last week, it did.
Police, firefighters and medics made their way through the dark and the rain Sunday night to rescue the trapped and aid the wounded. Kansas City had 50 firefighters en route within hours. Its police department sent communications specialists, tactical teams, a search-and-rescue dog and a traffic enforcement squad.

Other cities sent first-responder teams. They worked in the rain that first day, searching the rubble for survivors and for bodies. In a cruel sign that nature hadn’t quite finished its mayhem, two police officers from Riverside were felled by a lightning strike. Officer Jeff Taylor was gravely injured.
Like the city he was helping, he will have a long road to recovery.

Throughout the week, personnel from the state of Missouri poured into Joplin. The National Guard and the Highway Patrol got there quickly. Officials with expertise in emergency management, insurance, mental health, care of senior citizens, land use and power grids followed.

The often-maligned Federal Emergency Management Agency got a team to Joplin within hours of the tornado to set up telecommunications and help with logistics and support.

This in no way diminishes the vital role of the Red Cross and other nonprofit agencies, and of businesses, in responding to the disaster. But public employees and government agencies make up the underpinning of the recovery effort.

The need for government help in Joplin will continue for years. Streets must be replaced. Schools and a hospital must be rebuilt. Families will need temporary housing.

It is easy to wax poetic about trimming government spending, and cutting costs to taxpayers, but when disaster strikes, or our elderly loved ones suffer a health crisis, aren't we ALL suddenly fans of government programs like FEMA, Medicare, and even the National Guard?

That is why the Republican rhetoric is simply blown away in the wind when  you look out the window and see this bearing down on you.



I don't know about the rest of you, but after seeing the images of the devastation left in the wake of these massive tornadoes, I am one hundred percent on support of having my taxes raised to pay for the programs that help my fellow Americans.

But hey if we are going to get serious about cutting government costs, I know a couple of wars I would gladly see come to an end.  Just a thought.

Sarah Palin goes to Alabama. I think she was embarrassed that she was not the FIRST natural disaster to arrive there.

Is she clearing brush?

I thought she wanted to be Ronald Reagan, not George Bush.

If you want to help the people of Alabama, make damn sure to send your money to the Red Cross, or look for a suitable charity on this Facebook page, but do NOT give your money to Samaritan's Purse!

Even if knowing that Grandma Grifiter was involved with this agency were not enough to alert you to the likelihood that they are not reputable, then perhaps knowing that they have been investigated for using natural disasters as an excuse to proselytize and accused of attempting to convert desperate people at the very lowest point in their life to their fundamentalist brand of Christianity, might give you a hint as to their real agenda.

And if you DON'T think that Sarah Palin gets a little piece of the action, or some other compensation, for putting on her work gloves and running the risk of smudging her makeup, then you simply not know this greedy, self promoting hypocrite nearly as well as you think you do.

Let me introduce you to the man with the biggest set of balls on the planet!

He is quite literally right in the path of giant a tornado, and he is so worried about his wife that he maintains the calmest voice possible so that she will not get upset.

I would hope that I would be that cool and calm in a similar situation, but I am a little worried I would be too busy weeping like a little girl and wetting myself, to worry about the feelings of a wife miles away in the safety of her "not in the path of a killer tornado" house.

Kansas National Guard does not have much of the equipment it needs to clean up after tornado. It is overseas in Iraq.

The rebuilding effort in tornado-ravaged Greensburg, Kansas, likely will be hampered because some much-needed equipment is in Iraq, said that state’s governor.

The Kansas National Guard has about 40 percent of the equipment it is allotted because much of it has been sent to Iraq.

Could even Bin Laden have anticipated just how thoroughly his attack would deplete America's resources? He could not have done it alone. He needed the help of George W. Bush to really fuck our country up.