Rush Hour On The Rocks

Rush hours in DC are never a lot of fun, but the one this morning was one for the books.

Early this morning, the guys on the all-news radio station were commenting about how DC had dodged a bullet with the weather. They were referring, of course, to the ice storm which left some 500,000 people from Georgia to western Virginia without power. And while things around here did get a little dicey for a while yesterday afternoon, by late evening it seemed the threat of freezing temperatures was gone. And based on the faulty intelligence provided by the weather forecasters, the various highway departments sent their road crews home.

Then shortly after 5:00 A.M. some disturbing reports about icy roads west of DC began to come in. Over the course of the next hour, the sudden freeze overspread over the entire area--just in time for the morning commute. That made for lots of crashes, including a spectacular one in which a FedEx truck took a header off an overpass. Two interstates in the area had to be briefly closed because of the conditions, and a number of other major roads became impassable. School systems were also caught in a bind. Many already had their buses on the road when rapidly deteriorating conditions forced them to delay their start times.

So now the schools are blaming the highway people, the highway people are blaming the forecasters, and the forecasters are blaming Mother Nature. Whatever, but to me the culprit is obvious: President Bush.

I'm not sure how yet, but give me time.