New Orleans Is F-cked
Cripes, when you look at New Orleans how much can anyone complain about CD14?I've been to New Orleans a few times. Its a cool place to experience with a ton of history. But when you talk about it as a city, talk about a fucked up place.
It makes me more grateful I live in L.A. Those people got serious problems down there, they are just not handling this disaster well at all.
Even though Los Angeles has its problems, we are tops in dealing with disasters. Why do you think they have asked for our local public safety people to come and help? Because they are quite simply the best, no matter how much some of you may bitch about them.
Nothing but a bunch of brain dead morons running New Orleans.
I have had my beefs about 90% of our elected officials here in Los Angeles, but thank God over the years they have had the foresight to put in place and maintain the best disaster preparedness system in the world.
If you'd like to help the Red Cross with a contribution, we have a link to the right.
Kevin Roderick has posted several very helpful links about the crisis on LA Observed, for more information, please click here.
Posted by Mayor Sam @ 9/01/2005 11:15:00 AM
70 Comments:
Here Here!
Glad to see other people be gleeful about how they don't live in a place where people are suffering and dying. I expect the same reaction from the rest of the country when California gets hit by the Big One.
I guess you had the same attitude after September 11, 2001. "Gee, why did those NY politicians allow skyscrapers to be unprotected, and why wasn't there adequate response to a terrorist threat in a known target city? I'm sure glad I don't live there!" Yeah dude, me either.
Also cool to see a new-found love and appreciation for local politicians which I'm sure will persist. They are SO not taken for granted.
Gotta love this site's take on a hurricane tragedy.
p.s. I think the disaster was staged so that N.O. could get federal aid. Whaddaya think? Huh? Huh?
p.s.s And "boooooo" to those Louisiana politicians to have for years been calling for the federal government to assist with coastline restoration. What kind of liberal crock is that? Sh!t happens. It's the local politician's responsibility to clean up after mess - not the fed.
p.s.s.s. AND those dummy N.O. politicians should have provided and paid for transportation for all the poor, sick, elderly, homeless, car-less, etc. people who could not evacuate when told to do so. Boy am I glad I live in LA!!! Those N.O. politicians have blood on their pathetic hands!!!!
I believe at this time of crisis, your insight on how f-d up this city is doesn't add any value. You should do us a favor and donate your hard earned cash like I did and help the folks over there
Amazingly stupid, short-sighted, sensationalistic and basically dumb-assed post. Great time to make ourselves look good while thousands are suffering. You suck!
Perhaps we should think about relocating EVERYONE from the city and NOT repairing the levees? I mean, since the hurricanes are only going to get worse (conventional wisdom that the insurance industry is preparing for), maybe we should look at repopulating some of the dying towns across the country with the refugees.
Some of you morons don't understand. The point was to be GRATEFUL that our city could handle such a disaster far better than what is currently being done.
By what you say, obviously you are not grateful for the local public safety people and their efforts in LA.
Hope you feel differently when there is a quake.
Oh and I am raising money for the relief efforts you moron. Not just here on the site you potential ass clown.
Cheers!
Mayor Sam
you really think we should be happy that our city is able to handle natural disasters? your post is useless and you should do some soul searching re: your captious remarks.
If you want to really raise money, use this blog to provide sites where people can start donating.
Mayor Sam, for once, YOU'RE really f-cked up. If 80% of LA were basically destroyed, with NO FOOD, NO WATER, NO ELECTRICITY AND NO MEDICINE, we'd be in the same f-cked up predicament regardless of who was Mayor, Police Chief or what have you. NO CITY is prepared for the kind of devastation they're facing.
If anything, the FEDERAL government needs to be tremendously faulted for not being prepared for such a major calamity.
This is way beyond a City's ability to respond. And taking this opportunity to slam a City is nothing less than the worst kind of opportunistic approach.
Listen moron - there is nothing wrong with celebrating our city's resources and capabilities. We're not making fun of the victims, if anything we are taking shots at the tinhorn dumbass politicians who run those shitty states.
And we have a link on our page to donate.
Its not the Fed's responsibility. Public safety is a local function.
Did Nick do it?
Just heard on CNN that Congress won't convene until maybe Friday to look into this catastrophe. Yet, congress was able to convene on Sunday night, with one day's notice, regarding the Schiavo case. What wrong with this picture? I know what's wrong, way too many black folk on those news cameras in New Orleans. The U.S., were a brain dead white woman has more pull than hundreds of thousands of desperate black folk.
Our local public safety has been top notch from all of the previous Mayoral administrations support and development of the departments. Our current mayor just shows up for photo ops and backstabs safety departments.
Has it dawned on anybody that it is nearly impossible to access most areas of N.O.? An armada of national guard troops are on their way as they speak to restore law and order. Hopefully, then supplies will reach these people who are suffering. If you have a problem with what's going on then please don't just give money, book a ticket to Louisiana or Mississippi and volunteer your time to assist in the relief effort.
Mayor Sam was pointing out that we are as prepared as we can be for a natural disaster. New Orleans and the other cities were not as ready nor could they for the type of destruction. Don't take it out on him.
We should be grateful that our local officials are serious about safety and security in the event of a disaster, natural or terrorist.
Mayor Sam you are stupid. How could you use this havoc in New Orleans to paint a pretty picture of our own little city. You are incredibly stupid.
1:27 The disaster in New Orleans was an unforseen natural disaster. The heroin deaths in California are different. Heroin addiction is not a natural disaster, the addict chose this path. They have to kick the habit, meaning they control it, not the gov. or God.
The heat exhaustion at the fields, also can be controlled. There are ways to find a solution to a problem that one creates, do not compare these petty instances to the New Orleans disaster!
Local officials are responsible for disaster preparedness. The federal government is responsible for responding to those disaster and making sure, in the case of New Orleans, that the leeves could withstand the impact of Katrina or any breach into the barrier.
You damn liberals like 1:42 start blaming the gov. What the hell are you smoking? The peace pipe at a hippy village. You are so ignorant it serves no purpose to set your acid brain infested 60's mentality to norm.
If I were President Bush's secret service detail i'd make sure he is safe and secure since there are a lot of angry people in New Orleans. Hell these people were shooting at helicopters and at hospitals.
I don't know the exact racial breakdown of New Orleans, but its amazing how many of the pictures of suffering and death we see on television is in the African-American community.
I hope all people join in the effort to help these people, especially our black leaders. They should join law enforcement and other local officials in asking for calm and working to help get these people out of danger and fed.
Mayor Sam could you post some links on the site for people to find out how to help? I imagine most know how by now, but it may help. Kevin R over at LAObserved has some good info up for a little while already.
OK 2:07 so what does this tell you...we have criminals loose on the streets that want NO HELP! The liberals love this crap, they love chaos, rebel groups, anticapitalism, and this was actually FIdel Castro's fault if we are going to point fingers. All of his people are in New Orleans causing shit. Los Comunistas y Democratas.
Oh great now this becomes political...it only took what 15 minutes or so?
Last anon, you are a late bloomer on this crap. The democratic party has made this politicial as soon as the hurrican touched ground. It was 5-4-3-2-1 and they cried, "It was Bush's fault, yea, he could have pushed this mother out of the..."
All over the news, Mr/Mrs late bloomer is what the Democratic party is whining to American...Whaaa, Whaaa, instead of helping, donating, or giving encouraging news...pathetic liberals!
Liberal vs. Conservative? You guys are jokes. You disgust me. I am putting my money and time where my mouth is.
New Orleans Mayor Issues 'Desperate SOS'
By ADAM NOSSITER, Associated Press Writer 26 minutes ago
Fights and fires broke out, corpses lay out in the open, and rescue helicopters and law enforcement officers were shot at as flooded-out New Orleans descended into anarchy Thursday. "This is a desperate SOS," the mayor said.
Anger mounted across the ruined city, with thousands of storm victims increasingly hungry, desperate and tired of waiting for buses to take them out.
"We are out here like pure animals. We don't have help," the Rev. Issac Clark, 68, said outside the New Orleans Convention Center, where corpses lay in the open and he and other evacuees complained that they were dropped off and given nothing — no food, no water, no medicine.
The plea from Mayor Ray Nagin came even as National Guardsmen poured in to help restore order and put a stop to the looting, carjackings and gunfire that have gripped New Orleans in the days since Hurricane Katrina plunged much of the city under water.
About 15,000 to 20,000 people who had taken shelter at the convention center to await buses were growing angry and restless in what appeared to be a potentially explosive situation. In hopes of defusing it, the mayor gave them permission to march across a bridge to the city's unflooded west bank for whatever relief they can find.
In a statement to CNN, he said: "This is a desperate SOS. Right now we are out of resources at the convention center and don't anticipate enough buses. We need buses. Currently the convention center is unsanitary and unsafe and we're running out of supplies."
In Washington, Homeland Security Secretary Michael Chertoff said the government is sending in 1,400 National Guardsmen a day to help stop looting and other lawlessness in New Orleans. Already, 2,800 National Guardsmen are in the city, he said.
But across the flooded-out city, the rescuers themselves came under attack from storm victims.
"Hospitals are trying to evacuate," said Coast Guard Lt. Cmdr. Cheri Ben-Iesan, spokesman at the city emergency operations center. "At every one of them, there are reports that as the helicopters come in people are shooting at them. There are people just taking potshots at police and at helicopters, telling them, `You better come get my family.'"
Some Federal Emergency Management rescue operations were suspended in areas where gunfire has broken out, Homeland Security spokesman Russ Knocke said in Washington. "In areas where our employees have been determined to potentially be in danger, we have pulled back," he said.
A National Guard military policeman was shot in the leg as the two scuffled for the MP's rifle, police Capt. Ernie Demmo said. The man was arrested.
"These are good people. These are just scared people," Demmo said.
Outside the Convention Center, the sidewalks were packed with people without food, water or medical care, and with no sign of law enforcement. Thousands of storm refugees had been assembling outside for days, waiting for buses that did not come.
At least seven bodies were scattered outside, and hungry people broke through the steel doors to a food service entrance and began pushing out pallets of water and juice and whatever else they could find.
An old man in a chaise lounge lay dead in a grassy median as hungry babies wailed around him. Around the corner, an elderly woman lay dead in her wheelchair, covered with a blanket, and another body lay beside her wrapped in a sheet.
"I don't treat my dog like that," 47-year-old Daniel Edwards said as he pointed at the woman in the wheelchair. "I buried my dog." He added: "You can do everything for other countries but you can't do nothing for your own people. You can go overseas with the military but you can't get them down here."
The street outside the center, above the floodwaters, smelled of urine and feces, and was choked with dirty diapers, old bottles and garbage.
"They've been teasing us with buses for four days," Edwards said.
People chanted, "Help, help!" as reporters and photographers walked through. The crowd got angry when journalists tried to photograph one of the bodies, and covered it over with a blanket. A woman, screaming, went on the front steps of the convention center and led the crowd in reciting the 23rd Psalm.
John Murray, 52, said: "It's like they're punishing us."
The Superdome, where some 25,000 people were being evacuated by bus to the Houston Astrodome, descended into chaos as well.
Huge crowds, hoping to finally escape the stifling confines of the stadium, jammed the main concourse outside the dome, spilling out over the ramp to the Hyatt hotel next door — a seething sea of tense, unhappy, people packed shoulder-to-shoulder up to the barricades where heavily armed National Guardsmen stood.
Fights broke out. A fire erupted in a trash chute inside the dome, but a National Guard commander said it did not affect the evacuation. After a traffic jam kept buses from arriving at the Superdome for nearly four hours, a near-riot broke out in the scramble to get on the buses that finally did show up.
The first of hundreds of busloads of people evacuated from the Superdome arrived early Thursday at their new temporary home — another sports arena, the Houston Astrodome, 350 miles away.
But the ambulance service in charge of taking the sick and injured from the Superdome suspended flights after a shot was reported fired at a military helicopter. Richard Zuschlag, chief of Acadian Ambulance, said it was too dangerous for his pilots.
The military, which was overseeing the removal of the able-bodied by buses, continued the ground evacuation without interruption, said National Guard Lt. Col. Pete Schneider. The government had no immediate confirmation of whether a military helicopter was fired on.
Terry Ebbert, head of the city's emergency operations, warned that the slow evacuation at the Superdome had become an "incredibly explosive situation," and he bitterly complained that FEMA was not offering enough help.
"This is a national emergency. This is a national disgrace," he said. "FEMA has been here three days, yet there is no command and control. We can send massive amounts of aid to tsunami victims, but we can't bail out the city of New Orleans."
In Texas, the governor's office said Texas has agreed to take in an additional 25,000 refugees from Katrina and plans to house them in San Antonio, though exactly where has not been determined.
In Washington, the White House said President Bush will tour the devastated Gulf Coast region on Friday and has asked his father, former President George H.W. Bush, and former President Clinton to lead a private fund-raising campaign for victims.
The president urged a crackdown on the lawlessness.
"I think there ought to be zero tolerance of people breaking the law during an emergency such as this — whether it be looting, or price gouging at the gasoline pump, or taking advantage of charitable giving or insurance fraud," Bush said. "And I've made that clear to our attorney general. The citizens ought to be working together."
On Wednesday, Mayor Ray Nagin offered the most startling estimate yet of the magnitude of the disaster: Asked how many people died in New Orleans, he said: "Minimum, hundreds. Most likely, thousands." The death toll has already reached at least 126 in Mississippi.
If the estimate proves correct, it would make Katrina the worst natural disaster in the United States since at least the 1906 San Francisco earthquake and fire, which was blamed for anywhere from about 500 to 6,000 deaths. Katrina would also be the nation's deadliest hurricane since 1900, when a storm in Galveston, Texas, killed between 6,000 and 12,000 people.
Nagin called for a total evacuation of New Orleans, saying the city had become uninhabitable for the 50,000 to 100,000 who remained behind after the city of nearly a half-million people was ordered cleared out over the weekend, before Katrina blasted the Gulf Coast with 145-mph winds.
The mayor said that it will be two or three months before the city is functioning again and that people would not be allowed back into their homes for at least a month or two.
"We need an effort of 9-11 proportions," former New Orleans Mayor Marc Morial, now president of the Urban League, said on NBC's "Today" show. "So many of the people who did not evacuate, could not evacuate for whatever reason. They are people who are African-American mostly but not completely, and people who were of little or limited economic means. They are the folks, we've got to get them out of there."
"A great American city is fighting for its life," he added. "We must rebuild New Orleans, the city that gave us jazz, and music, and multiculturalism."
Lt. Gov. Mitch Landrieu toured the stricken areas said rescued people begged him to pass information to their families. His pocket was full of scraps of paper on which he had scribbled down their phone numbers.
When he got a working phone in the early morning hours Thursday, he contacted a woman whose father had been rescued and told her: "Your daddy's alive, and he said to tell you he loves you."
"She just started crying. She said, `I thought he was dead,'" he said.
2:23 You disgust me too for judging the conservative and liberal, what are you Marxist!
"These are good people. These are just scared people," Demmo said.
__________________________________
The above statement from the article posted earlier is evident on how this culture has been intimidated and reinforced to be dependant. The democratic party teaches dependency on others and does not promote independence, where we survive the best we can on our own without any assistance, unless critical. These people are scared, they have never been on their own without help. They are used to the monthly check, provisions and the gov to take care of them, now they are alone, how could they survive. The democratic party has tarnished their lives.
I just got a laugh out of that one 2:27. Pathetic people who can't contribute anything to this blog. Have you been watching TV? People are dying
I seem to remember that reporters are the ones complaining about the relief efforts or the lack thereof. I don't remember hearing Nancy Pelosi yelling for the republicans heads because some think that the relief effort is going way too slow. Is Rush Limbaugh saying something different than the regular mainstream media that has reporters in the middle of the death and destruction?
Let me answer your ????'s, no, do not watch TV like you may do...Liberals live for Television and reality shows. I have donated 90% if my savings this morning to the Red cross and will continue as much as possible. I do help, but my neighbor a liberal would rather spend his money on a BBQ and Budweiser instead of writing a simple check out to a relief organization.
The other neighbor on my right, is a tight ass, he wants gov. welfare, county food stamps, and works under the table, unreported, I asked if he wanted to donate to the "Red Cross" he replied, "For what? What am I getting, nothing, so no." Do you see the pic anon?
These are all Democrats in this community. We could unite and help, but when you have dependency of money, drugs, and other social assistance with a 1st grade education, what more can you expect from these democrats?
Wow you should spin for the Republican party! I hear they pay better than the Democrats.
The second or third worst natural disaster in our nation's history and we talk about who's blaming who when bodies are floating through the streets, bodies are being covered and left in corners of relief areas, and small children can't eat. Yeah all you guys are a real class act. Makes me so proud to be an American
Little known fact: There are (well, were) a total of nine (9) NEIGHBORHOOD WATCH ORGANIZATIONS operating within the city limits of metropolitan New Orleans (population 500K), a city well-known for its heightened political and civic activism and pride.
Thought you might want to know!
2:39 Anyone in particular that can use my services? Anything for the party.
2:47 PM Like I said before, I donated almost all of my savings, which was 5 years worth of savings, enough for a down payment on a CALIFORNIA home. I am and did do something! What have you done? Anything? Did you donate, ask neighbors to donate, walk your community with American Red Cross brochures and information to help these victims of Katrina? I bet not.
Gasoline sellers have been fast to raise prices, to more than $3 a gallon and in some places far higher, because of a sudden drop in supplies, prompting accusations they are artificially setting high prices to profit from the disaster.
Asked in an interview on ABC's "Good Morning America" if U.S. oil companies should forfeit profits during the crisis, Bush said instead American corporations should contribute cash to hurricane relief funds.
Howard Dean, chairman of the Democratic National Committee, seized on that comment. He said that while Bush was "asking ordinary Americans to do more, he ought to show some real leadership, and call on his friends in Big Oil to join in the sacrifice and stop gouging American families at the gas pump."
I highly doubt prices will deflate as quickly if at all below $3 after weeks and months of relief efforts. Score: $Billions for the Oil Industry, $Billions Lost by Americans
Good job GWB and your Republican friends in the South!
Big Mutt has to weigh in here. I've been reading my other fave blogger, billmon. His Nawlins piece rocks. Petreochemical sludge meets fetid water and dead animals and people in a soup of heat and humidity peppered with angst, fear and incredible fatigue. People are desperate and feel abandoned in their hardest hour.
Reality is we don't know the half of it and when we do I betcha we'll be revising our list of whoze been naughty and whoze been nice. The feds have been very, very slow to act.
Nawlins if fuctup bad. Maybe the city will never recover from this. The bedlam and mayhem factor is growing as I tap keys and the mayor is in the SuperDome describing a hellish place. People there are asking where's the water and the rescue and food and raingear. It's raining now.
I was wondering if we got the big one in LA, we would have no warning the way that Nawlins got warned. I think gun crazed Angelenos might prove to be just as bad or no better than our sister city on the bayou.
Here's a dog suggestion: stock up water and canned goods, get a camping sove, pack a box or three and keep blankets and raingear "por si las moscas" which means just in case. oh yeah, make sure you got a bicycle. might be the only way out of ELAY in rubble.
I must reply to big mutt regarding "slow moving feds": It may interest you to know that FEMA was actively engaged in activating all DAE's (Disaster Assistance Employees) across the country on the previous Saturday BEFORE Katrina struck! The problem has been one of arranging for transportation, living quarters, DAC (Disaster Assistance Center) leases and locations, office supplies for said DACs, etc.
As New Orleans has no viable infrastructure (power, water, sewage disposal, telephone lines, etc.), and is currently underwater by 30 feet or more, let's not be so quick to judge the Federal Government "slowness", unless you have credible sources.
I believe the two previous paragraphs of this post should give a more balanced idea of what the problems are facing the Federal Government in dealing with this disaster.
In a sense, I agree with Mayor Frank on this one, but we really could be more prepared for a New-Orleans-magnitude disaster.
(First-Time blogger)
Mayor I'm with you and totally agree. The point is we have the best police department in the nation and I can't see this ever happening in LA. We would be much more organized and LAPD would be out to make sure the city didn't turn into a lawless place. New Orleans politicans should be ashamed of themselves. They knew this was coming since last Friday and weren't prepared. Sad that 4 days later thousands are still stranded with no food or water.
Yet, where the hell is the support for our officers at a time they need it most getting slammed in the media? Why isn't the Nation of Islam leaders doing anything about helping out their people instead of threatening to burn down our city?
re 7:44 PM
Who is this person freakishly obsessed with NOI yet knows nothing about them? They DO have relief efforts.
And to all to Mayor Sam/Frank defenders: how do you know how well the local response will be in a catastrophe of such magnitude? You have crystal balls? How "prepared" was LA for the 1992 riots? I bet you all were a bunch of Darryl Gates lappers too. Oh yea - he did a great job!
what about that NOI clown who said the hurricane was god's revenge on white people for slavery? 90% of the victims in New Orleans are black
Jack Ass (Mayor Sam), 7:44 PM:
In cases like this it IS the Federal government's responsibilty. That's why we have FEMA.
Remember the riots in '92? Where were was the LAPD then? There was looting for days and all the cops did was watch. And this was WITHOUT a natural disaster. I witnessed them watch looters tear apart stores . . . and they drove on. So don't talk sh-t about how awesome our City is when we've NEVER faced anything comparable to what they're facing in New Orleans.
1:42.
Didn't the gov, media, and local police tell these people to leave the area way before the hurricane hit? so why did they stay? why this mentality?
i'm going back to billmon. If you watched the very excellent NBC coverage yesterday and (oh noooo) listen to NPR you would see/hear that my opinion on federal response is based on facts. I'm not looking for blame. I am concerned with emergency response to natural hazards.
re: ELAY doing right what Nawlins got wrong. Great act of "mirror, mirror on the wall" but I still don't buy it. Long talks with firemen have convinced me that a big one would be very, very hard to handle. Every house has a potential toxic bomb under every kitchen sink and in every garage. The large plastic jug of amonia you keep in the laundry room and the gas for the weedwhacker are enough to make rescue of people in your house hard to do. Once you get bodies and injured out into the endless sprawl of ELAY, where do you take them? To one of the 13 closed hospitals in the San Fernando Valley?
Reality is that we have seen years of cutbacks and hospital closures that make us very vulnerable to a serious quake. Have you ever tried to get out of ELAY on Labr Day Weekend? multiply by 100!
Even Bush (not this dog's fave prez) is saying federal response is "unacceptable". 7:44pm 9-1 is downright high on crack. it's even worse than da mayor of dis blog. so much "mirror mirror on the wall".. and the mirror says it aint you in both cases.
woof.
The fairest of them all is New York!!!! (that should get em going)
9:08 PM
Who said that? Give us a name and a quote.
7:29 am
Are you really asking why the elderly, the hospitalized, the homebound, the poor people without cars, the large families without money for gas/plane tickets/bus fare/hotel, the people with no family outside of NO, the children who can't make decisions for their parents, etc. did not evacuate? You actually think it's possible to achieve 100% evacuation of a city in 2 days without assistance for those who aren't able? Oh these right-field fantasies.
I guess missing two legs and a brain to function, right?
8:59 This may help you. Villaraigosa's friend for 5 years+ is a RACIST.
" South L.A. Pastor Says Hurricane Katrina is Revenge for Southern White Supremacy: "Reverend Lewis E. Logan II, senior pastor of the Bethel African Methodist Episcopal Church, addressed the crowd at an anti-LAPD rally he hosted in response to Nation of Islam Minister Tony Muhammad’s alleged beating at the hands of police. The reverend began what appeared to be a prayer for the victims of the disaster – but then veered wildly, suggesting that Katrina is a Black woman seeking retribution on the South for its history of racism. … it is no a coincidence that it is exactly 50 years from the time of (inaudible) lynching and murder. That it is not a coincidence that the storm’s name is a sister. Katrina. For she represents the collective cries of mothers who have lost their sons (applause) to the brutality (louder applause) and the murderous grip of this racist white supremacist American culture (frenzied applause)."
Who said that? do you mean this dog's love for New York and Chicago, the only real civilized cities in America? or do you mean the Bush quote that fed response is "unacceptable."? The former is plain truth, the latter I just heard from the horse's mouth, so to speak.
Bush is going to the "area" today. Wonder if they can get an all-white Republican crowd to gather round the prez with thank yous and praises for a "mission accomplished".? Karl's workin on it.
"Morning Edition" (NPR-KPPC-FM) is very, very good this AM. At least they are dicussing the race aspect of this disaster without the fulminations going on here. When the water recedes, we will all be able to re-examine the big pic.
arf
Logan is not NOI, he's AME. There is a difference. Is he racist against black people, white people, or both?
Tony is NOI.
Next time someone you know tries to explain why they don't
bother voting, show them the below column by Molly Ivins.
The misery and bizarreness going on in New Orleans right now
DIDN'T HAVE TO HAPPEN. It wasn't Katrina that stopped
maintaining the levies, that was Bush Administration policy.
It wasn't Katrina that slashed FEMA's budget and appointed a
FEMA director who had NO PREVIOUS DISASTER EXPERIENCE. That
was Bush.
It wasn't Katrina who ordered an evacuation but made no
attempt to provide the 28% of the city who lived below the
poverty line with a means to leave town -- the blame for that
one is shared by the mayor, governor and Bush.
It wasn't Katrina that chose to ignore legions of scientific
experts who published study after study proving that New
Orleans was in dire threat of flood -- that was George Bush.
It wasn't Katrina who rolled back the wetlands protections
instituted under Clinton, allowing unrestricted development
instead (wetlands absorb storm surges and hurricane impacts;
Louisiana has lost an average of 25 square miles of coastal
wetlands every year under Bush).
It wasn't Katrina who refuses to provide real support for
using alternative energy, and who continues to keep the USA
dependent on Oil, so don't even blame Katrina for long lines
at the pumps or higher prices. Yep, that's Bush, too.
Yes, Katrina packed a wicked punch. But no, New Orleans
didn't have to suffer like it is suffering today. Molly
Ivins is right -- it's hurricanes PLUS government policies
that kill people.
=============================
Published on Thursday, September 1, 2005 by the Chicago
Tribune
Why New Orleans is in Deep Water
by Molly Ivins
Like many of you who love New Orleans, I find myself taking
short mental walks there today, turning a familiar corner,
glimpsing a favorite scene, square or vista. And worrying
about the beloved friends and the city, and how they are now.
To use a fine Southern word, it's tacky to start playing the
blame game before the dead are even counted. It is not too
soon, however, to make a point that needs to be hammered home
again and again, and that is that government policies have
real consequences in people's lives.
This is not "just politics" or blaming for political
advantage. This is about the real consequences of what
governments do and do not do about their responsibilities.
And about who winds up paying the price for those policies.
This is a column for everyone in the path of Hurricane
Katrina who ever said, "I'm sorry, I'm just not interested in
politics," or, "There's nothing I can do about it," or, "Eh,
they're all crooks anyway."
Nothing to do with me, nothing to do with my life, nothing I
can do about any of it. Look around you this morning. I
suppose the National Rifle Association would
argue, "Government policies don't kill people, hurricanes
kill people."
Actually, hurricanes plus government policies kill people.
One of the main reasons New Orleans is so vulnerable to
hurricanes is the gradual disappearance of the wetlands on
the Gulf Coast that once stood as a natural buffer between
the city and storms coming in from the water.
The disappearance of those wetlands does not have the name of
a political party or a particular administration attached to
it. No one wants to play, "The Democrats did it," or, "It's
all Reagan's fault." Many environmentalists will tell you
more than a century's interference with the natural flow of
the Mississippi is the root cause of the problem, cutting off
the movement of alluvial soil to the river's delta.
But in addition to long-range consequences of long-term
policies like letting the Corps of Engineers try to build a
better river than God, there are real short-term
consequences, as well. It is a fact that the Clinton
administration set some tough policies on wetlands, and it is
a fact that the Bush administration repealed those policies--
ordering federal agencies to stop protecting as many as 20
million acres of wetlands.
Last year, four environmental groups cooperated on a joint
report showing the Bush administration's policies had allowed
developers to drain thousands of acres of wetlands.
Does this mean we should blame President Bush for the fact
that New Orleans is underwater? No, but it means we can blame
Bush when a Category 3 or Category 2 hurricane puts New
Orleans under. At this point, it is a matter of making a bad
situation worse, of failing to observe the First Rule of
Holes (when you're in one, stop digging).
Had a storm the size of Katrina just had the grace to hold
off for a while, it's quite likely no one would even remember
what the Bush administration did two months ago. The national
press corps has the attention span of a gnat, and trying to
get anyone in Washington to remember longer than a year ago
is like asking them what happened in Iznik, Turkey, in A.D.
325.
Just plain political bad luck that, in June, Bush took his
little ax and chopped $71.2 million from the budget of the
New Orleans Corps of Engineers, a 44 percent reduction. As
was reported in New Orleans CityBusiness at the time, that
meant "major hurricane and flood projects will not be awarded
to local engineering firms. Also, a study to determine ways
to protect the region from a Category 5 hurricane has been
shelved for now."
The commander of the corps' New Orleans district also
immediately instituted a hiring freeze and canceled the
annual corps picnic.
Our friends at the Center for American Progress note the
Office of Technology Assessment used to produce forward-
thinking plans such as "Floods: A National Policy Concern"
and "A Framework for Flood Hazards Management."
Unfortunately, the office was targeted by Newt Gingrich and
the Republican right, and gutted years ago.
In fact, there is now a governmentwide movement away from
basing policy on science, expertise and professionalism, and
in favor of choices based on ideology. If you're wondering
what the ideological position on flood management might be,
look at the pictures of New Orleans--it seems to consist of
gutting the programs that do anything.
Unfortunately, the war in Iraq is directly related to the
devastation left by the hurricane. About 35 percent of
Louisiana's National Guard is now serving in Iraq, where four
out of every 10 soldiers are guardsmen. Recruiting for the
Guard is also down significantly because people are afraid of
being sent to Iraq if they join, leaving the Guard even more
short-handed.
The Louisiana National Guard also notes that dozens of its
high-water vehicles, Humvees, refuelers and generators have
also been sent abroad. (I hate to be picky, but why do they
need high-water vehicles in Iraq?)
This, in turn, goes back to the original policy decision to
go into Iraq without enough soldiers and the subsequent
failure to admit that mistake and to rectify it by
instituting a draft.
The levees of New Orleans, two of which are now broken and
flooding the city, were also victims of Iraq war spending.
Walter Maestri, emergency management chief for Jefferson
Parish, said on June 8, 2004, "It appears that the money has
been moved in the president's budget to handle homeland
security and the war in Iraq."
This, friends, is why we need to pay attention to government
policies, not political personalities, and to know whereon we
vote. It is about our lives.
Molly Ivins is a syndicated columnist based in Washington.
© 2005 Chicago Tribune
Molly Ivins,
Katrina was your fault for not doing proper journalistic reporting and doing something about it before it hit. Your words mean nothing, absolutely nothing when people are suffering. Get off your ass and help the victims.
Your full of B.S. emotion, and lack the sane mentality needed to help these people that are suffering. Go sell some things and donate it to the victims.
Oh Shit! Next, she will blame Bush for her weight problem.
2:27 and 2:28 are as clueless as the Bush Administration, not to mention just as limited in their vocabulary.
Yes, limited, I was taught my Ivins.
this dog is a big fan of Molly. And she is actually (technically) right on coastal zone protection, wetlands, flood protection and the toxic waste dump that has become Louisiana. But a class 5 hurricane is very hard to "plan for" when the cost is in the billions and the event so relatively rare. Without Katrina, who would have supported a massive system for Nawlins? Not the repubs, not the demos. Just us crazy mad dog Keynsians. (oh god not a commie Marshall Planner! yes!)
But people like yourselves have come to oppose government spending on infrastructure. Especially big projects like a new Bay Bridge (build the cheaper more vulnerable one) Boston's "big dig" and our need for new passnger rail. Nobody wants to pay for that kind of thing anymore. We just want new weapons.
As for Molly Ivans? She is still one of the only Texans this dog likes to walk with. I just heard yr boy Bushie at the airport in Nawlins. ugh. that little punk can't even finish a short little throw-away line. And he says the time to act is now... ahem. Katrina was 5 days ago, but what would he know, he was on vacation.
What were you doing Mutt, sucking up to Molly for 5 days instead of working to help these people.
nah, I gave $600 from my last paycheck and joining a relief drive this weekend while you're out burning gas on this grrrrreat weekend. Mutt is not into big girls that way anyway. I can do better than Molly.
Have not bought or burned gas since bush said, "don't buy gas."
I work and help a great organization that is in the middle of the Katrina havoc.
Katrina = $ for Halliburton (how surprising)
from the Houston Chronicle
Business Section
http://www.chron.com/cs/CDA/printstory.mpl/business/3335685
Sept. 1, 2005, 8:30PM
AROUND THE REGION
CONSTRUCTION
Halliburton hired for storm cleanup
The Navy has hired Houston-based Halliburton Co. to restore electric power, repair roofs and remove debris at three naval facilities in Mississippi damaged by Hurricane Katrina.
Halliburton subsidiary KBR will also perform damage assessments at other naval installations in New Orleans as soon as it is safe to do so.
KBR was assigned the work under a "construction capabilities" contract awarded in 2004 after a competitive bidding process. The company is not involved in the Army Corps of Engineers' effort to repair New Orleans' levees.
...Hmmmm. Another "no bid" contract?
Gingrich on the aftermath of Hurricane Katrina:
"...puts into question all of the Homeland Security and Northern Command planning for the last four years, because if we can’t respond faster than this to an event we saw coming across the Gulf for days, then why do we think we’re prepared to respond to a nuclear or biological attack?”
The Bush Administration:
Color-coded Mission Accomplished Shock and Awe hype masking
stupidity, incompetence, and snake oil.
Not only did New Orleans have days to prepare for Katrina, but they actually had a full year since the last rude wake-up call (Ivan) exposed holes in their system. In a stunning display of stupidity, Mayor Nagin and Gov. Kathleen Blanco failed to develope better evacuation strategy for N.O. after Hurricane Ivan provided the below lessons:
Ivan exposes flaws in N.O.'s disaster plans
05:09 PM CDT on Sunday, September 19, 2004
By KEVIN McGILL Associated Press
Those who had the money to flee Hurricane Ivan ran into hours-long traffic jams. Those too poor to leave the city had to find their own shelter - a policy that was eventually reversed, but only a few hours before the deadly storm struck land.
New Orleans dodged the knockout punch many feared from the hurricane, but the storm exposed what some say are significant flaws in the Big Easy's civil disaster plans.
Much of New Orleans is below sea level, kept dry by a system of pumps and levees. As Ivan charged through the Gulf of Mexico, more than a million people were urged to flee. Forecasters warned that a direct hit on the city could send torrents of Mississippi River backwash over the city's levees, creating a 20-foot-deep cesspool of human and industrial waste.
Residents with cars took to the highways. Others wondered what to do.
"They say evacuate, but they don't say how I'm supposed to do that," Latonya Hill, 57, said at the time. "If I can't walk it or get there on the bus, I don't go. I don't got a car. My daughter don't either."
Advocates for the poor were indignant.
"If the government asks people to evacuate, the government has some responsibility to provide an option for those people who can't evacuate and are at the whim of Mother Nature," said Joe Cook of the New Orleans ACLU.
It's always been a problem, but the situation is worse now that the Red Cross has stopped providing shelters in New Orleans for hurricanes rated above Category 2. Stronger hurricanes are too dangerous, and Ivan was a much more powerful Category 4.
In this case, city officials first said they would provide no shelter, then agreed that the state-owned Louisiana Superdome would open to those with special medical needs. Only Wednesday afternoon, with Ivan just hours away, did the city open the 20-story-high domed stadium to the public.
Mayor Ray Nagin's spokeswoman, Tanzie Jones, insisted that there was no reluctance at City Hall to open the Superdome, but said the evacuation was the top priority.
"Our main focus is to get the people out of the city," she said.
Callers to talk radio complained about the late decision to open up the dome, but the mayor said he would do nothing different.
"We did the compassionate thing by opening the shelter," Nagin said. "We wanted to make sure we didn't have a repeat performance of what happened before. We didn't want to see people cooped up in the Superdome for days."
When another dangerous hurricane, Georges, appeared headed for the city in 1998, the Superdome was opened as a shelter and an estimated 14,000 people poured in. But there were problems, including theft and vandalism.
This time far fewer took refuge from the storm - an estimated 1,100 - at the Superdome and there was far greater security: 300 National Guardsmen.
The main safety measure - getting people out of town - raised its own problems.
More than 1 million people tried to leave the city and surrounding suburbs on Tuesday, creating a traffic jam as bad as or worse than the evacuation that followed Georges. In the afternoon, state police took action, reversing inbound lanes on southeastern Louisiana interstates to provide more escape routes. Bottlenecks persisted, however.
Col. Henry Whitehorn, head of state police, said he believes his agency acted appropriately, but also acknowledged he never expected a seven-hour-long crawl for the 60 miles between New Orleans and Baton Rouge.
It was so bad that some broadcasters were telling people to stay home, that they had missed their window of opportunity to leave. They claimed the interstates had turned into parking lots where trapped people could die in a storm surge.
Gov. Kathleen Blanco and Nagin both acknowledged the need to improve traffic flow and said state police should consider reversing highway lanes earlier. They also promised meetings with governments in neighboring localities and state transportation officials to improve evacuation plans.
But Blanco and other state officials stressed that, while irritating, the clogged escape routes got people out of the most vulnerable areas.
"We were able to get people out," state Commissioner of Administration Jerry Luke LeBlanc said. "It was successful. There was frustration, yes. But we got people out of harm's way."
© 2004 The Associated Press.
George W. Bush was once known as the C.E.O. President, a term his handlers eagerly coined in order to convey that the country would from now on be run like a business. That quickly evolved into the less flattering Enron President... then the War President... now it's looking like we can all finally settle on one.
George W. Bush: the Disaster President.
"I don't think anybody anticipated the breach of the levees."
He honestly said that.
If that brings up more than a passing twinge of familiarity,
being a more than remarkable restatement of Condi Rice's now-
famous assertion to the Senate panel -- then I suppose we shouldn't be surprised.
But it does bring up something that we joke about often, but
apparently have never taken quite seriously enough:
Our President is an idiot.
I don't mean an average, run-of-the-mill idiot.
I mean an idiot who apparently, for the entire duration of
his presidency, literally was paying absolutely no attention
to even the most life-threateningly critical tasks of
government.
The administration specifically cut the funds to fix these
specific levees, in order to specifically divert that Corps
money to Iraq, despite urgent warnings and predictions of
catastrophic disaster if the levees were breeched. The
administration specifically cancelled the Clinton-backed
flood control program to preserve and restore the wetlands between New Orleans and the gulf, instead specifically opening parts of that buffer zone for development.
Nobody anticipated this disaster?
It was identified by FEMA as one of the top three likeliest major disasters to strike America.
It has been a major disaster scenario for years. Everybody anticipated it, which makes this single statement by George W. Bush possibly the most dishonest, lying, craptacularly false thing he has ever said in his presidency -- even surpassing his now-infamous State of the Union Address. Truly, this is President Bush's blue-dress moment.
And yet, funneling the money into Iraq was more important. You better bet your crapulent, lying, one-track, drink-addled ass that's a political issue.
He also said today:
"I hope people don't play politics at this time of a natural disaster the likes of which this country has never seen."
Oh, I'm touched. Utterly touched.
After 9/11, the entire Republican Party went en masse to get Twin Towers ass tattoos.
The Republican convention was a wholesale tribute to crass exploitation, the sets themselves designed to evoke the aftermath of the attack. Every domestic and international policy this administration -- no, this entire Republican government -- has produced has been heaved up before the public while waving the spectre of 9/11 as the catch-all vindication of every administration whim.
Every tax cut, every civil rights issue, every budget cut, every budget expansion, no matter how tortured the logic must be, has some Republican senator standing on the Senate floor and proudly raping the corpses of that day as justification for their particular agenda item.
Oh, we've seen politicization of disaster. Every Republican campaign for the last four years has revolved around the politicization of disaster.
But Lord help us, George W. Bush is going to get the vapors if anyone asks him to explain his administration's active cuts of the very programs designed to keep New Orleans safe.
Hi Anon,
Hmmmm to you too. This sounds like what are mayor does here in Los Angeles with Meruelo and co.
7:22 Ok michel moore wanna be...why don't you go live in North Korea, much better conditions for your type of mental problems.
Its just insane.
Did you hear about the teenager (I think his name is Jabbor Gibson), who took an initiative and drove a school bus with 100 strangers, for 7 hours straight from New Orleans to Houston, saving the people, including new born babies.
The bus was initially refused access to the Astrodome! WTF
Now get this - he might be prosecuted for "stealing" the bus!
"YOUNG RESCUER TO BE PROSECUTED FOR DRIVING A STOLEN BUS AND SAVING 100 PEOPLE"
DO THESE PEOPLE HAVE ANY SHAME?
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