..is The Lede Blog at NYTimes.com. If there is a better blog in the world covering the news day in day out, I’d like to know about it. In the meantime, The Lede is the blog I look to for not only fast reporting, but in depth reporting too. The Lede is a credit to the New York Times.

Why do people in rich countries have a much much better chance of surviving earthquakes than people in poor countries? According to this article in  the latimes.com, it’s enforcement of building codes. It’s not enough to have building codes, as they had in Turkey, they need to be enforced. You can argue that poor countries can’t stop squatters and slum dwellers from building substandard houses, but you can’t argue that schools and other public buildings and private buildings can’t be made up to code.

Otherwise these structures are death traps.