As more and more shit hits the fan over Snowplow Clusterfuck ‘07 parts I & II, what I don’t get is how these people who were supposedly in charge of some of the most important things in our lives: traffic, and to a lesser extent, our schoolchildren, could not be aware of some of the most basic information during that afternoon. As I write this, I have MSNBC on mute, NPR playing softly in the background, and at least three browser windows open with all sorts of news and whatnot. I get the sense that these folks were managing the emergency from a dark wood-paneled library, wearing a smoking jacket, drinking a snifter of brandy while reading ticker tape stock quotes from 1929.

Today, in plowgate update:

• Fired EMA Chief Bob Warren gives his side of the story in today’s ProJo.
• Councilman Nick Narducci told Spt. Evans: “I’d fire you.”
• The PVD Storm Review
• Outline of City’s Storm Response
• Timeline of what actually went down
• MC Bakst: “What Cicilline doesn’t say“

When will it end?

• Providence director of the Emergency Management Agency, Leo Messier, joins state director Robert Warren on the unemployment rolls.
• Cicilline also suspended chief of operations for Providence schools, Thomas Hannah, without pay.

“More to come…” says the Projo. News, or firings?

LAAAAAADY…. just move the car. Speaking of doppelgangers…. when the Rhode Island Emergency Management Agency is being run by Jerry Lewis, whaddya expect? A cover story in today’s ProJo about ‘The Storm’ indicates that RIEMA director, Robert Warren, has been canned. Now, how do we fire the thousands of Rhode Island drivers who really bolloxed the whole thing up by pulling into and blocking the goddam intersections?!

Whatever you say about how Governor Carcieri handled the snowstorm fiasco, let the record show that he’s owned up to his mistake. He acknowledged today that his administration did “a poor job of communications” during last week’s storm. Awww, Donald, we forgive you. Just foot the bill for the damage to my car, please! I hear there’s that tobacco money…

ProJo has the scoop:

Today’s press conference marked his first public comment on last Thursday’s epic traffic jam, which choked most of the state’s major arteries, stranded children on school busses until late at night, and left motorists struggling to get home three to six hours on gridlocked roadways in the nation’s smallest state.

Carcieri, who returned from a weeklong visit to the Middle East on Saturday, acknowledged he didn’t learn of the story until it was over because he was flying from Kuwait to Afghanistan while the storm played out, and would not in any event have expected his staff to call him “for a 6- to 10-inch’’ snowstorm and what, he was told, was largely a Providence issue.

Uh oh… looks like Carcieri and Lt. Gov. Roberts kissed and made up and decided to turn the Plowgate scandal on the Providence Department of Public Works.  Cicilline wasn’t in Iraq, so what’s his alibi?

As my car is prone to taking extended vacations in the shop when it gets this cold, I walked to work this morning. Guess what? It’s a little cold out there! The sidewalks are awful, forget about the lack of plowing and all that stuff during the storm, it’s like walking on a glacier. You have to walk way out in the street, there are no cleared sidewalks anywhere. I saw schoolkids struggle to not skate into traffic, and old people have enough trouble walking when it’s warm! Some cities have sidewalk plows…just sayin’.

… and stare at your cat. Okay, the What Cheer Antiques & Vintage Holiday Party has been postponed to Saturday, December 22. In fact, they will be closed today (I think Jen was traumatized by the storm last Thursday). They will be open daily 11 — 7 through Christmas eve.

It just took me 45 minutes to get from White Electric to my apt. on Parade st. Just sayin’.

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This summer, when beach traffic got too intense, Gov. C responded by CLOSING ALL STATE BEACHES. By this logic, I imagine lil’ Rhody’s got a snow day. The ProJo reports a “mass exodus out of Providence.” Hasn’t the DOT heard of a snow plow? What about salt? I’m looking out the window at streets blanketed in white contemplating how I can sled down to the Dose party at Local 121. If you too are getting antsy, check out the National Weather Service RI alerts. But if you’re feeling adventurous, maybe today’s the day to go snow tubing in Yawgoo Valley.

“My own country, the United States, is principally responsible for obstructing progress here in Bali,”

Hey, guess what WH press sec. Dana Perino said:

“I think he is incorrect,”

More: (HuffPo)

In honor of the season’s first wintry weather, I thought I’d remind everybody that some people long for what we’ve got — and fulfill their desires in the very most garish of ways.  Let’s go Ski Dubai!

[youtube:http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Wmoa2LXs7WE]

Okay, folks. The big announcement:

The first annual Daily Dose holiday party will be on TONIGHT TUESDAY, December 13th 18th, 9pm-ish, at Local 121.

Dosers Micah Jackson spinning your all-time fave holiday classics by the Chipmunks, Burl Ives, and Paul McCartney. With a heavy sampling of Vince Guaraldi, laid down over Kurtis Blow’s phat Christmas beats:

[youtube:http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DZiNBMqJEUM]

If I had the time or the talent, I’d write an ode to the Fox Point Hurricane Barrier. Instead, I’ll link the city’s extensive FPHB website, and remind you that its pumps were once the baddest-ass of all — 3.15 million gallons/minute!