Mill(ions)

“Massive blaze engulfs downtown Uxbridge mill complex
[Boston Globe], July 21, 2007
UXBRIDGE, Mass. --Firefighters from Massachusetts and Rhode Island battled a massive fire that engulfed a downtown mill complex on Saturday, sending up billowing smoke that could be seen for miles. The eight-alarm blaze damaged or destroyed 65 small businesses inside the 400,000 square-foot Bernat Mill complex, and seven firefighters were injured -- mostly from smoke inhalation and exhaustion,”

This fire conveniently started at roughly 4 AM very early on this past Saturday morning. Why is it that most of the old mill fires in New England usually break out very early on a weekend morning? Now 65 small businesses and hundreds of workers are spit out of luck because of this “misfortune.” I strongly believe that the US should discourage ethnic lightning by copying what they do in Germany with fire insurance – payoffs are only made to reconstruct the destroyed building. Owners who lose their building to fire cannot walk away with a check. They must rebuild in order to benefit from their fire insurance. Makes sense to me … which is why our nation of pols and lawyers probably won’t do it.