<$BlogRSDUrl$>

My personal musings about anything that gets on my radar screen--heavily dominated by politics.

2007-08-04

Counting Our Blessings 

The early estimates of the dead from the 35W collapse--9 dead, 30 missing--seem to have been overstated.

More than 100 cars and trucks and a school bus crawling bumper-to-bumper on a bridge that suddenly crashed into the Mississippi River seemed like a recipe for a massive death count. But on Friday came what this city's fire chief called a miraculous turn of events: the prospect that relatively few lives were lost.

The latest count I heard tonight was 5 confirmed dead, with possibly as few as nine people still missing.

An extraordinary number, considering the conditions.

A great deal of credit must, of course, go to the first responders in Minneapolis--fire and police--and to the organized leadership of the rescuers working under the umbrella of Gov. Tim Pawlenty.

But this strikes me more as a triumph of the common man seeing an extraordinary event, seeing his neighbor in danger, and working in a focused and self-sacrificing fashion to do what they can to help.

So, while Democrats move to assign blame--absent ANY real information--I choose to continue to pray for the victims, their families, and to celebrate the amazing qualities of character and community evident on this day in America.
Posted by: Michael / 8/04/2007 01:17:00 AM

Weblog Commenting by HaloScan.com

This page is powered by Blogger. Isn't yours?