Future housing a national security dilemma?

When I was a little child, around the age of 3 or 4 years old, I often heard my mother tell me about how the big bad wolf would blow down the house of the three little pigs. First, the house was built of straw, and the Big Bad Wolf had no problem making the three little pigs refugees. The second house the three little pigs built was made of sticks, and again, the Big Bad Wolf would blow the three little pigs’ home to pieces and drive them farther into Siberia. Finally, the three little pigs built their house made of bricks, and no matter how hard the Big Bad Wolf blew, he could not blow down the three little pigs’ home. What can we learn from this simple story my mother often told me when I was a child? Einstein often said that repeating the same experiment over and over again and expecting different results is insanity. When Mother Nature displays her fury, and I see on TV the utter devastation left afterwards, I often recall a song I heard some years ago performed by a popular musical group called Blue Öyster Cult. From their song “Godzilla,” I paraphrase from their lyrics a quote which has always been stuck in my mind: “History shows again and again how Nature points out the folly of man.” This quote is so very true regarding the ignorance of mankind today. I just don’t understand why anyone would rebuild the same house in Tornado Alley as they had built before! Tornadoes come and destroy the same houses the tornadoes had destroyed yesteryear! It’s insanity! Our western states are susceptible to forest fires, our Midwestern and mideastern states are vulnerable to tornadoes and our eastern and southern states are left to the mercy of hurricanes. This dilemma will continue to persist for all humanity until someone steps forward and decides to invest in constructing dwellings here on Earth which are compatible with Mother Nature’s furious flurries. I have no doubt NASA and/or the private sector are developing domes to house Earth’s future population as we expand human settlement throughout our solar system. I can guarantee not one of these structures envisioned by these experts to house this future population is square or built of wood and/or bricks! We have the technology to land men on the moon several times and bring them home safely. Why not use our technology to construct houses that are aerodynamically shaped like a dome or bubble house? We have used this same science to fly our airplanes and to make our motor vehicles more efficient to drive. Different materials and alloys were used in the development of these modes of transportation, and constructing a bubble or dome house should be no different. Before we try to accomplish the dreams of science fiction to colonize our neighboring planets, we should concentrate our efforts on the national security dilemma forced upon us by Mother Nature. If we do these things, the lives of thousands of people in harm’s way would be protected each year, along with their property, and their livestock. Countless billions of dollars would be saved every year and insurance premiums would be drastically reduced. It is a known fact that Mother Nature kills more Americans each year than all terrorists’ acts against Americans combined! This is a national security issue and should be addressed as such.

Stephen Ray Leitzell Felton