Jay Ambrose: Harvey’s lessons

I’ve long associated the name Harvey with a six- foot, three- anda- half- inch tall, helpful rabbit that happened to be invisible to everyone but a friend in a movie that went by the same name. It was a truly tender comedy with Jimmy Stewart playing the rabbit’s best buddy, but the new Harvey on the scene, a Texas hurricane, is anything but funny — although human goodness has shown up in it, too.

This hurricane has been a major disaster, pouring rain in depths almost unimaginable, wrecking homes and other buildings, closing off transportation and electrical power, leaving people stranded, and taking no one yet knows how many lives. We’ve got a new Texas coming our way, a beaten-down Texas, a recovering Texas. It’s going to be years before the old, robust days are fully back, and the entire nation will be affected.

Nevertheless, the response has been something to warm hearts, with millions all over jumping in with donations. President Donald Trump has been at his very best, with early reports telling us of exceptional federal help and cooperation with local authorities. Local police? Excellent. The national guard? Nothing could be better. Charitable organizations? Hallelujah.

And then there are just ordinary people from all walks of life putting themselves at risk as they strenuously work to rescue people each day. You watch the TV news and see all kinds of marvels, such as a fellow standing on his roof and a helicopter flying over and lowering another guy who helps attach him to a line that pulls the two up and transports them to safety.

You read about a pregnant woman about to give birth who cannot get to a hospital. Everyone in the apartment building helps her until someone gets in touch with a fire department and it sends over a garbage truck that can deal with the flooded streets. You see photos of people saving their pets and see the looks in their faces — the faces of the dogs as well as the people — and almost want to cry.

Here is unity in a nation so, so divided, and there is a feeling of warmth about what we Americans really are beneath it all. But then comes the bad news, the news about looters, for instance. For them, an empty house is a picnic, and they don’t mind shooting at rescuers. They also rob rescuers and the stranded — they let no opportunity pass them by. Price gougers also know a good thing when they see it, such as charging ridiculous prices just for bottled water or motel rooms. A multimillionaire preacher fails to open the doors of his 16,000- seat megachurch immediately as a shelter. You can look up his excuses.

Climate scientists have mostly sounded reasonable, saying that, yes, global warming can add to a storm’s intensity and almost certainly did in this instance. Warming, however, does not appear to cause the storms, and there are fewer hurricanes than there used to be. Some screeching journalists would make you see things differently without adding that so- called solutions like the Paris accords would do next to nothing to prevent what they ultimately fear.

A Wall Street Journal editorial said something important. We’re a rich country, and that makes this unprecedented flooding terror far less devastating than it would otherwise be. I believe corporate tax reform of the kind Trump wants would boost economic growth to the point of helping to keep that wealth intact and that the promised infrastructure plan should focus first on Texas roads and bridges.

This latest Harvey will make no one laugh, but despite our imperfections, it has helped show us what most of us are made of, and that can be crucial as we face a host of other challenges.

Let’s meanwhile continue to do all we can for the afflicted Texans.

Ordinary citizens with extraordinary community spirit have been a bright light amid the dark clouds and devastation wreaked by Hurricane Harvey in Texas. “Mattress Mack,” the furniture store owner offering shelter to evacuees, the “Cajun Navy” volunteer search-and-rescue crews and countless others with generous hearts have reminded us during a time of political turmoil that this nation is mighty because a crisis unites us.

A Congress returning to the Capitol next week needs to heed the example of Harvey’s heroes and come together to find solutions. A daunting agenda with tight deadlines lies ahead of lawmakers — passing hurricane relief, avoiding a government shutdown, raising the debt ceiling and dealing with President Donald Trump’s call for a Mexican border wall.

The nation needs to focus on the massive natural disaster that is Hurricane Harvey. It does not need lawmakers to inflict manufactured crises on it at this time. That means acting like adults and taking care of the debt ceiling, government funding and disaster aid without attaching conditions to their passage — such as building the border wall.

This important to-do list either must or should happen before September’s end, due to fiscal calendar constraints. Lawmakers returning to Washington on Tuesday after the August recess will need to summon competence and resist the temptations of partisanship.

This is not a time for political pointscoring or nail-biting midnight votes. Americans are weary after violence in Charlottesville, Va., the battle over health reform and the sense of instability fostered by the rapid turnover of presidential staff.

For those lawmakers who say that government should be run like a business, here’s a chance to act like a private-sector chief executive confronting a serious challenge. A seasoned CEO would focus on fundamentals, lead by example and steer clear of stormier waters.

Harvey’s growing roster of individual heroes should inspire lawmakers to rise to the occasion. But if not, then the hurricane’s stunning swath of destruction should. Houston is the nation’s fourth-largest city, with up to 30 percent of Harris County, where most of its residents live, underwater.

Floods are also notoriously difficult to recover from. Floodwaters take time to recede. Many people do not have flood insurance. And disaster aid often prioritizes infrastructure repairs over individual homeowners.

Getting Houston back on its feet is a massive undertaking whose scope compels the federal government to lead. Lawmakers will need not only to monitor the recovery, but innovate to overcome disaster aid’s well-known limitations.

They also should swiftly delve into the precarious finances of the National Flood Insurance Program, which has long been on the Government Accountability Office’s list of “highrisk” federal programs because big storm expenses have outstripped incoming premiums. Congress faces an end-of-September deadline to reauthorize this program to ensure continuity of operations.

Members of Congress who want to keep their jobs should avoid the dreadful optics of allowing political fights over the wall or other partisan issues to slow down hurricane aid or shut down the government in the midst of the Federal Emergency Management Agency’s disaster response. In addition, it is always irresponsible to send shudders through global markets by threatening to not raise the debt ceiling. But it would be especially reckless now.

Debate over Trump’s divisive border wall can wait. Congress not only needs to find common ground, but to follow Houstonians’ lead and move to higher ground.