Hello from still somewhat soggy Acapulco Bay,
In my nearly 10 years, off and on, in Acapulco I've never seen rain this continually. It finally all seems to have passed now (and I'll have more on our recovery efforts for the area below). But, this is the third Weekend Vigilante where I've been talking about rain, which means in this very mountainous region it more or less has been rainy or wet for two weeks straight with some reprieves.
Well, that has to be evidence of man-made global climate change, you might say (if you are an idiot). I hope I am not going out on a limb here by saying that because I haven't seen weather like this in 10 years here that it may not have happened before!
In fact, a much larger flood happened in October, 1999, when 500,000 people were left homeless in Mexico. This most recent tropical storm is estimated to have left "thousands" of people homeless… barely a blip compared to 1999. But, of course, Al Gore's "Convenient UnTruth" only came out in 2006 so no one talked about it being mankind's fault at that time.
I don't know how many times I've seen a headline that says, "Largest Hurricane Since 1935" and many commenters saying, "you see, that's because of manmade CO2!"… well, since the hurricane in 1935 was bigger and mankind's fingerprint of CO2 was much lower, what caused the hurricane in 1935? Not to mention weather records of these events rarely go back more than a few hundred years on a planet estimated to be billions of years old.
Recorded history is replete with massive natural weather events… not least of which is the flood recounted in Genesis 6-9 where God decided to flood the entire world because of humanity's evil deeds! Now, that's manmade climate change if I ever heard it… and no one had an SUV then.
How self-flagellizing are most people to actually think they somehow caused a common storm or hurricane? The idea is absolutely ridiculous. Volcanos pour more CO2 (which creates life, by the way) into the atmosphere in a given year than humans do in decades.
And, who says we shouldn't "change" our environment anyway? A lot of these greenies seem to think that if we even change a thing on this pristine planet that we have created a major sin! If that is what they believe then we should all just kill ourselves lest we step on an ant or minerals are extracted from this space rock for our iPads or automobiles!
It is some sort of deep self-loathing or hatred of other people that makes some of the environmentalists consider that all animals, flora and fauna should be untouched while humans should die slowly, quivering from cold in caves.
A lot of people seem to still have this inherent need to worship something other than themselves. Watermelons (green on the outside, commie red on the inside) think we should worship the Earth (at the expense of us disgusting humans), statists figure we should worship authority and their power to "lead" us and many collectivist religions believe we should worship some very intelligent man (not woman, mind you!) in outer space who watches our every move and judges us constantly. Like Santa Claus.
I think the mistake is worshipping things other than ourselves! And, I don't mean that narcistically. I mean a belief that humanity is something to be cherished and to work to improve and that no one is greater than ourselves or yourself in terms of worship. And to never take any sort of ideology or religion as being that you have to worship the collective or some other object, such as the Earth, as being higher than yourself.
Each of us… every one of us, has fantastic potential but because many outside influences tell us we are not worthy or that we need to accede to others or other things as being greater than us that we don't reach our full potential.
Start with belief in yourself before you even begin to believe in a higher power than yourself. Sure, I have no idea why we are here. And I certainly don't consider myself to be any better than anyone else or anything else. The Big Bang theory is hilarious to me… so, if one day there was nothing and then there was an explosion and now the universe exists, what caused the Big Bang? The same goes for "god". If god exists, who created him.
We likely won't find those answers here anytime soon but until we do be wary of any purported answer for why you are here. Look within, not without, to start.
THE CONTINUING ACAPULCO FLOOD RECOVERY
As I started this diatribe, it has really been raining here in southern Mexico for the last few weeks and there are still a lot of people in need. In fact, after the first major flooding there was a second minor one that cut us off from the area where numerous friends and family have been helping for the last day or so but finally the rains have passed and we should be able to re-enter the area on the far outskirts of Acapulco to continue to bring in aid.
It should be noted that even up until today there has been no government help for this one region and not even any private aid agencies. Ourselves, and the very kind donations from dollar vigilantes, has been the only thing bringing comfort and aid to hundreds or thousands of people in a region just 30-45 minutes from Acapulco Bay (not including having to trudge through forest and riverbanks of mud to get there, adding another 30 minutes or so).
So, here we have a case of about 15-20 anarchists (all my friends and family in the Acapulco area are anarchists and, in fact, most people in Acapulco are anarchists – which is why I spend a lot of time here) who have been aiding a particular community for more than a week now with no other outside help. And, all the contributions of aid for this effort have come from myself, anarchists or, at least, libertarians, who read or subscribe to The Dollar Vigilante.
Here are some photos of the supplies purchased and the efforts of all the great anarchist volunteers down here who have been slogging through mud every day to provide for people in a very difficult situation where they lost everything very suddenly.
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An anarchist volunteer and my wife's brother Julio (almost omnipresecent at the recovery scene) helping those they can, completely voluntary with food supplied by dollar vigilantes
And here is a line-up of locals, again with Julio (who I seriously deem to be a hero as he has managed every facet of this process on the left).
There are still a lot of major issues there. I actually recognize much of the clothing of the people above as being from ourselves, friend and family. The biggest thing that we purchased today was $1.50 sandals from Walmart, for hundreds of people. Even the ground you see them standing upon in the photo above was under about 10 feet of water last week and most lost everything. And still, to this day, there is ankle deep mud and dirty water everywhere.
If you've never stood in ankle deep mud for a week before you won't know, but we know, that your skin starts to split open from the constant submersion and it might sound small but most of the people we've been helping heal have open wounds on their feet that have become infected. Thankfully, to so many dollar vigilantes, we've brought in medication and have the volunteers to administer, not least of which is Julio who I have an even greater respect for than before. I've always had respect for him as he is constantly taking care of people, including my wife when in need, but he has gone way up on my list… near the top really. He has been unbelievably heroic.
And so, besides basic food, water and medication we have now realized that what we need to care for a lot of people (which includes countless children) in need is decent footwear and bedding. Countless people are still sleeping in the open air on top of piece of plywood or worse at this point. And, thanks to you all and all the amazing anarchist volunteers they are slowly getting some footwear, medication for infection and soon, I hope tomorrow, some decent bedding (blankets and basic bedding – foam mattresses that also don't cost much).
We've received $1,500 in donations so far via credit card, paypal and bitcoin and it has kept this community in much better comfort than they otherwise would have had… all through free market voluntary help and donations.
We can still use a lot more so if you'd like to pay it forward a little bit and help out a lot of people in need you can go to http://www.gofundme.com/AcapulcoRecoveryFund. Or via bitcoin at address: 1NcKmC2m9dVUpFtYkZ1uBfyvEdizFvmQ6J.
Even a few dollars makes a difference… a person in need will have some food, water or a decent place to sleep for a while. And, when this is all over and a non-emergency situation anymore some of them may ask who were those people they never met who helped them through a terrible situation. Maybe at that point we'll let them know they were anarchists and libertarians from around the world and then, when they are ready, we'll try to help by telling them about how to make money through entreprenurialism or free market business sense.
Who knows, maybe a few years or decades from now some of these people will also pay it forward and do the same.
If you'd like more information on the situation in this surrounding area and on how the free market came to the rescue… including some members of the Ford family (of the automobile sector) who are down here, discretely, doing what they can to help as well, I did the following interview on Double Crossed Radio.
We all need to take care of each other but not through violence and theft (government) but by helping out the most in need in emergency situations and eschewing any government help (which is non-existent in many of these regions).
And, even if you can't monetarily, help by spreading the message by sharing this blog or the donation site. This isn't the only place on Earth that needs help but it could use some help… and that's how we begin the process of turning the world into a place of voluntary help rather than violence based solutions that often end up, like in Hurricane Katrina, with what happened at the Superdome.
There is a big difference between giving out of your heart and being forced at gunpoint to "give". The difference is night and day. Opposites.
