Are You Disposable?

I knew a man who used to be a disaster warden. He was in charge of the local fallout shelter. Part of his duties was to check on and maintain the supplies in that shelter. He took it very seriously. 

Enthusiasm and even support for the program had waned and he was mostly on his own in his warden duties. He duly checked on his supplies regularly and replaced them when needed. He even did a lot of it out of his own pocket.

I doubt that any such faithful wardens are left at all now. I read something that said that when somebody checked some old shelters all the supplies had been looted or destroyed by neglect. 

The old fallout shelters were a leftover from the "Cold War" when the US government and citizens were ever mindful of the dangers they faced from imminent nuclear war. 

As a country, the United States is no longer doing anything realistic to help the average citizen to survive a nuclear war. The average American is not complaining about this or even paying much attention to it. I think that buying into this kind of thinking is not good.

An average American has just as much right to survive a nuclear war as the President of the United States. I do not think we should allow our leaders to consider us expendable. We should not think of ourselves that way either.

Both Russia and China have plans to help their average citizens to survive a nuclear war. They continuously plan for what is needed to help all their citizens survive a nuclear war, or at least as many as possible. They take actions to carry out this plan.

The Russian approach is largely dependent on building subway systems in their large metro areas extra deep so that they can function as nuclear shelters in addition to their regular purpose.

http://www.december212012.com/articles/news/Russians_Shelters_2012.htm

This is a relatively simple and practical approach to sheltering a very large population. It is one that the USA does not even consider doing.

http://www.pakalertpress.com/2011/06/29/why-is-russia-building-5000-more-nuclear-bomb-shelters-in-moscow-by-the-end-of-2012/

All of this is not so bad if US leaders are acting as if they are prepared to take their chances with the rest of us, but they are not. There are elaborate shelters built in the US only for our leaders. It does not matter which party is in power. Our leaders only build shelters for themselves.

It is not a good thing when a supposed Democratic government considers average citizens to be expendable. They can say whatever they want, but nothing speaks as clearly as actions. Those shelters only for our leaders and none for the rest of us speaks louder than words.