Eighteen people are gone. They did not die in a war zone. They did not die from a new, mysterious plague. They died because they were outside in New York City, and the air got too cold. It is a simple, stupid way to die in the richest city on Earth. It is a tragedy that feels like a dark joke written by a bad writer.

We are told that the city has now increased the capacity of homeless shelters. This news comes to us after the bodies have been counted. This is the classic style of the modern bureaucrat. It is the sophisticated art of closing the barn door after the horse has already run away and been eaten by wolves. The officials in their warm offices look at the weather report, see the temperature dropping, and apparently decide to wait and see what happens.

It is fascinating, in a morbid way, to watch how a superpower handles basic human needs. New York City is a place where you can buy a hamburger for twenty dollars. It is a place where apartments remain empty because they are owned by billionaires who live on the other side of the world. Yet, in this same place, eighteen human beings turned into ice because they had nowhere to go. The contrast is not just sad; it is absurd. It makes you wonder if the entire system is just a theater performance where the actors forgot their lines.

Let’s talk about the weather. “Extreme cold,” the headlines say. As if winter is a surprise. As if the concept of freezing temperatures in January is a shock to the system. The calendar has been the same for a very long time. January is cold. February is cold. This is not a sudden alien invasion. It is the seasons. Yet, every single year, the people in charge act like snow is a personal insult they could not have predicted. They scramble at the last minute, opening shelters and issuing warnings, pretending that they are saving the day.

But they are not saving the day. They are just managing the failure. When you announce more beds *after* eighteen people have died, you are not a hero. You are just a clerk cleaning up a mess. The cynicism of it is breathtaking. They want a pat on the back for doing the bare minimum, but only after the worst has already happened.

The press release says they are expanding capacity. This sounds very technical and efficient. It sounds like they are fixing a computer server, not dealing with human lives. But what does "expanding capacity" really mean? usually, it means cramming more people into loud, unsafe rooms for a night or two. It is a band-aid on a broken leg. It solves nothing permanently. As soon as the temperature rises a few degrees, those extra beds will likely vanish, and the people will be back on the street, waiting for the next freeze.

There is a deep coldness here, and I am not talking about the wind chill. I am talking about the coldness of a society that accepts this. In a functional world, housing would be a basic thing, like water or air. But in the grand theater of the American economy, housing is a game. If you win, you get heat. If you lose, you get a sidewalk. And if you lose badly enough, you become a statistic in a news report about the weather.

We must also laugh—bitterly—at the way this is reported. It is treated as a natural disaster. “The cold killed them.” No, the cold did not kill them. The lack of a warm room killed them. The failure of policy killed them. Nature is just doing what nature does. The wind does not have a moral duty to be warm. The city government, however, supposedly has a duty to its citizens. But perhaps that is an old-fashioned idea from Europe that does not apply here.

So, eighteen people are dead. The city adds some beds. The politicians will give speeches about how tragic it is. They will wear serious faces and nice coats. Then, spring will come. The ice will melt. Everyone will forget. The tourists will return to take photos of the skyscrapers, never looking down at the pavement where people froze. And next winter, we will do this entire absurd dance all over again. It would be funny if it wasn't so terribly, predictably sad.