Bob Schieffer: My Money’s on Texas
Hurricane Beulah was my first one. It slammed into the Texas coast back in 1967 before I came to CBS. It left one-sixth of my home state underwater. Harvey would be even worse, but as I watched what Harvey wrought, I was struck by just how similar those pictures were to my memories of Beulah 50 years ago.
Our technology is so good now, we knew exactly when Harvey would make landfall and a lot more. But it's not the technology we remember. It's realizing the awesome power of nature, this was Beulah, this is Harvey.
Somehow, the big ones always turn out worse than we thought. This is me, one day into Katrina.
"We knew it was bad. Tonight, we are beginning to understand just how bad."
In a hurricane, it's all hands on deck whatever your job. Reporter Brandi Smith of our Houston affiliate KHOU was doing a live report when she saw a man trapped in a flooded truck. She flagged down a rescue boat team, and led them to him.
As she was reporting, her station was being evacuated because of high water.
But it's always the most vulnerable who suffer the most. These kids got through Beulah. These will make it through Harvey.
The pictures of traffic jams of Texans who didn't wait to be asked for help made me proud. They just loaded their boats on trailers and headed into the worst of it.
Nor will I soon forget the pictures of those poor people in a retirement home. We can be thankful they were found.
As it always is, we saw the worst bring out our best. After the awful scenes we saw just weeks ago in Charlottesville, in Texas, we saw white kids and black kids just being kids. In a hurricane, it doesn't matter if you are black or white or brown or purple. Maybe we do have to be taught to hate.
The statistics this storm has generated are staggering. More important are the numbers we'll never really know, all those who just showed up to help. Like Mattress Mac, the furniture dealer who opened his showroom as a shelter to hundreds, singers who sang, barbers who showed up at shelters with their clippers, people forming human chains to rescue others from the flood, bakers who baked, and the pizza guy who would not be deterred. And yes, that is Spiderman.
Only Texans would know all this unfolded on and around the very battlefield where Sam Houston and his ragtag army -- against all odds -- fought for and won Texas independence from Mexico. This week their descendants met another powerful force. It's not over yet, but my money's on Texas. For Face the Nation, this is Bob Schieffer.