单选题
Historically, humans get serious about avoiding disasters only after one has just struck them.【C1】______that logic, 2006 should have been a breakthrough year for rational behavior. With the memory of 9/11 still【C2】______in their minds, Americans watched hurricane Katrina, the most expensive disaster in U. S. history, on【C3】______TV. Anyone who didn't know it before should have learned that bad things can happen. And they are made【C4】______worse by our willful blindness to risk as much as our【C5】______to work together before everything goes to hell. Granted, some amount of delusion is probably part of the【C6】______condition. In A. D. 63, Pompeii was seriously damaged by an earthquake, and the locals immediately went to work【C7】______, in the same spot — until they were buried altogether by a volcano eruption 16 years later. But a【C8】______of the past year in disaster history suggests that modern Americans are particularly bad at【C9】______themselves from guaranteed threats. We know more than we【C10】______did about the dangers we face. But it turns【C11】______that in times of crisis, our greatest enemy is【C12】______the storm, the quake or the【C13】______itself. More often, it is ourselves. So what has happened in the year that【C14】______the disaster on the Gulf Coast? In New Orleans, the Army Corps of Engineers has worked day and night to rebuild the flood walls. They have got the walls to【C15】______they were before Katrina, more or less. That's not【C16】______, we can now say with confidence. But it may be all【C17】______can be expected from one year of hustle. Meanwhile, New Orleans officials have crafted a plan to use buses and trains to【C18】______the sick and the disabled. The city estimates that 15,000 people will need a【C19】______out. However, state officials have not yet determined where these people will be taken. The【C20】______with neighboring communities are ongoing and difficult.