Just finished The Big Burn by Time Egan.

[SheilaT]

It's about a massive forest fire that burned an area the size of Connecticut over Idaho and Montana.

It also tells the story of Teddy Roosevelt and his efforts to create national parks, and how Republican Senators did everything in their power to keep that from happening. Seems like nothing ever changes.

After the terrible fire, in which perhaps 300 people lost their lives, including scores of full-time and volunteer fire rangers/fire fighters, the Congress did NOTHING to pay for their medical bills. It's despicable, and so much like things that have happened in recent years that it's mind-boggling.

[JDPriestly]

1. Sounds fascinating. God Forbid that should happen in an urban

area like Southern California. But we have had so many fires in recent years, it is terrifying.

[SheilaT]

2. I trust you are being slightly ironic.

A couple of decades ago I lived in Boulder, Colorado, and what I learned from living there is that in certain parts of the country fire is inevitable. There are things you can do to mitigate it, such as, if you live in the mountains, have a cleared area immediately around your residence. But you absolutely must live with the understanding that you may someday get burned out.

In Southern California, it is exactly those attributes that make it so appealing to so many people that contribute to the fire danger.

Mother Nature does not care about us. Hurricanes and earthquakes and tornadoes and fires will occur no matter what we do. All of us live somewhere, and we are all subject to the forces of nature.

What I was so struck by in the book was the willingness of the Republican Establishment a century ago to underfund the Forest Service, to underpay the people in it, and then to sell out to big business.

[pscot]

3. I'm a fan of Egan

I read his dust bowl memoir The Worst Hard Time and liked it a lot. I'll have to see if my library has this new one.