The stories of price gouging and elected officials proclaiming how they're not responsible to help during a disaster have definitely hit a note with many. It's important to remember that these are both related and part of an ideology of what government should be for all too many.

There is a growing amount of elected officials that believe it is their job to protect predatory capitalism disguised as "property rights" throughout the company. Their goal isn't to help their constituents but to protect the largest property owners from any and all regulation.

We've seen this at the national level with the post office, the EPA and many other orgs over the last few years and we've seen it with tax policy at many levels for the last 40 years. They really aren't there for "you." They're there to enforce a power structure.

What is even more sad is this is only going to continue to worsen. Infrastructure is crumbling throughout the country. This is infrastructure built generations ago by leaders who still viewed their constituents as their primary goal.

Damns, roads, power grids, bridges... none of it lasts forever and there is virtually no interest in building or maintaining more that isn't sufficiently profitable for a few wealthy individuals.

We can look at Texas and realize they're ideally situated to experience some of these effects first due to the extremes of their government but, make no mistake about it, without major change we will all eventually see events like TX just had.

It may be a hurricane, a wildfire, a tornado or something else but it will affect you and it will get worse. Sure, disasters have always knocked out infrastructure. The difference now is our collective will to fix it without profit is done