prayers to those in path of Hurricane Katrina

[Guest Nogbad]

What seems so sad to me is the way all the rich folks and most of the white folks have run away leaving the poor to die of disease/ starve / die fighting over what's left.

 

Shameful.

 

It seems the veneer of civilisation is pretty thin.

[John in Leeds]

Help where we can.

 

Watch carefully and LEARN

 

There but for the grace of god go any of us.

[Baldini]

What seems so sad to me is the way all the rich folks and most of the white folks have run away leaving the poor to die of disease/ starve / die fighting over what's left....Shameful.....

 

Exactly. I just can't believe what I'm seeing on the TV news. It's like those folks in NO have just been written off...Sure, I don't know the logistics of it but surely something should have been done to get them out by now...far as it seems on UK news there's little or no help coming in for any of the Gulf Coast. It's hard to credit that this is the USA. The poor sods trying to run local rescue seem to be totally overwhelmed, God help them, cos no other fucker seems to lifting a finger.

 

As to aid? Is money any good? Red cross? Who? It's the USA for @#!#$#'s sake - surely money isn't the issue.

 

KB

[Guzzirider]

I have been listening to the news on the radio and it seems that the money sidelined for bolstering the flood defences to New Orleans was spent elsewhere, and many of the National Guard sent abroad.

 

Best wishes to all who may be affected in the USA.

 

Guy

[jrt]

Money is and is not the issue. Part of the problem is simply *getting* to people. You can't drive in- there are few existing roads. Those that still exist are under water. Some fools were taking shots at helicopters who were flying rescue- so the helicopters pulled back (I don't blame them).

I'm saddened to see the reaction of people in the wake of a disaster when their best response is looting and shooting. Unfortunately, it seems to be the norm.

 

Money was spent on bolstering the defenses of NO over the years, but recall that the city is SEVERAL FEET below sea level. The dams and levees that failed should have been fixed and built up in the 1960's/70's/80's. At that time, such spenditures were considered 'pork barrel' and so only half-assed construction was funded. The Corps of Engineers (the Army group that oversees these projects) and the City went through a practice hurricane excercise last year...unfortunately, they only practiced with a cat 3 hurricane. oops.

[jrt]

Impressive pictures of the damage

[dlaing]

Money was spent on bolstering the defenses of NO over the years,

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And cut severely in recent years.

And Bush is repeating himself:

I don't remember the exact quotes, but they were something like:

Nobody would have thought terrorists would use planes as weapons.

Nobody thought the levees would not hold.

 

Here is an interesting article(I am sure there will be more...Ane the TV media said Bush and Clinton, both pulled funding. We shall see who was more responsible):

 

Did New Orleans Catastrophe Have to Happen?

By Will Bunch

Editor & Publisher

 

Wednesday 31 August 2005

 

'Times-Picayune' had repeatedly raised federal spending issues.

 

Philadelphia - Even though Hurricane Katrina has moved well north of the city, the waters may still keep rising in New Orleans. That's because Lake Pontchartrain continues to pour through a two-block-long break in the main levee, near the city's 17th Street Canal. With much of the Crescent City some 10 feet below sea level, the rising tide may not stop until it's level with the massive lake.

 

New Orleans had long known it was highly vulnerable to flooding and a direct hit from a hurricane. In fact, the federal government has been working with state and local officials in the region since the late 1960s on major hurricane and flood relief efforts. When flooding from a massive rainstorm in May 1995 killed six people, Congress authorized the Southeast Louisiana Urban Flood Control Project, or SELA.

 

Over the next 10 years, the Army Corps of Engineers, tasked with carrying out SELA, spent $430 million on shoring up levees and building pumping stations, with $50 million in local aid. But at least $250 million in crucial projects remained, even as hurricane activity in the Atlantic Basin increased dramatically and the levees surrounding New Orleans continued to subside.

 

Yet after 2003, the flow of federal dollars toward SELA dropped to a trickle. The Corps never tried to hide the fact that the spending pressures of the war in Iraq, as well as homeland security -- coming at the same time as federal tax cuts -- was the reason for the strain. At least nine articles in the Times-Picayune from 2004 and 2005 specifically cite the cost of Iraq as a reason for the lack of hurricane- and flood-control dollars.

 

Newhouse News Service, in an article posted late Tuesday night at The Times-Picayune Web site, reported: "No one can say they didn't see it coming. ... Now in the wake of one of the worst storms ever, serious questions are being asked about the lack of preparation."

 

In early 2004, as the cost of the conflict in Iraq soared, President Bush proposed spending less than 20 percent of what the Corps said was needed for Lake Pontchartrain, according to a Feb. 16, 2004, article, in New Orleans CityBusiness.

 

On June 8, 2004, Walter Maestri, emergency management chief for Jefferson Parish, Louisiana; told the Times-Picayune: "It appears that the money has been moved in the president's budget to handle homeland security and the war in Iraq, and I suppose that's the price we pay. Nobody locally is happy that the levees can't be finished, and we are doing everything we can to make the case that this is a security issue for us."

 

Also that June, with the 2004 hurricane season starting, the Corps' project manager Al Naomi went before a local agency, the East Jefferson Levee Authority, and essentially begged for $2 million for urgent work that Washington was now unable to pay for. From the June 18, 2004 Times-Picayune:

 

"The system is in great shape, but the levees are sinking. Everything is sinking, and if we don't get the money fast enough to raise them, then we can't stay ahead of the settlement," he said. "The problem that we have isn't that the levee is low, but that the federal funds have dried up so that we can't raise them."

 

The panel authorized that money, and on July 1, 2004, it had to pony up another $250,000 when it learned that stretches of the levee in Metairie had sunk by four feet. The agency had to pay for the work with higher property taxes. The levee board noted in October 2004 that the feds were also now not paying for a hoped-for $15 million project to better shore up the banks of Lake Pontchartrain.

 

The 2004 hurricane season was the worst in decades. In spite of that, the federal government came back this spring with the steepest reduction in hurricane and flood-control funding for New Orleans in history. Because of the proposed cuts, the Corps office there imposed a hiring freeze. Officials said that money targeted for the SELA project -- $10.4 million, down from $36.5 million -- was not enough to start any new jobs.

 

There was, at the same time, a growing recognition that more research was needed to see what New Orleans must do to protect itself from a Category 4 or 5 hurricane. But once again, the money was not there. As the Times-Picayune reported last Sept. 22:

 

"That second study would take about four years to complete and would cost about $4 million, said Army Corps of Engineers project manager Al Naomi. About $300,000 in federal money was proposed for the 2005 fiscal-year budget, and the state had agreed to match that amount. But the cost of the Iraq war forced the Bush administration to order the New Orleans district office not to begin any new studies, and the 2005 budget no longer includes the needed money, he said."

 

The Senate was seeking to restore some of the SELA funding cuts for 2006. But now it's too late.

 

One project that a contractor had been racing to finish this summer: a bridge and levee job right at the 17th Street Canal, site of the main breach on Monday.

 

The Newhouse News Service article published Tuesday night observed, "The Louisiana congressional delegation urged Congress earlier this year to dedicate a stream of federal money to Louisiana's coast, only to be opposed by the White House. ... In its budget, the Bush administration proposed a significant reduction in funding for southeast Louisiana's chief hurricane protection project. Bush proposed $10.4 million, a sixth of what local officials say they need."

 

Local officials are now saying, the article reported, that had Washington heeded their warnings about the dire need for hurricane protection, including building up levees and repairing barrier islands, "the damage might not have been nearly as bad as it turned out to be."

 

--------

 

Will Bunch is senior writer at the Philadelphia Daily News. He won a Pulitzer Prize in 1992 when he reported for Newsday. Much of this article also appears on his blog, Attytood, at the Daily News.

[Guest Dave Pott]

We should ALL hold off on making knee-jerk judgements till we get the ACCURATE facts. I don't think you fellas in England or elsewhere have any better grasp on this situation than I do(here in California).

 

About all I can do at this time is send $ to trustworthy organizations, help organize food donation(I work for Sunkist Orange Growers) and hope for the best.

 

There will be plenty of time for people to point fingers later.

[jrt]

We should ALL hold off on making knee-jerk judgements till we get the ACCURATE facts. 

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That's altogether too rational....

 

 

seriously- you are absolutely correct on all your points.

[Guest Nogbad]

It's a bit off to blame people for what is in reality a natural catastrophe. It's debateable whether you could really protect NO 100% from such a thing.

 

No, what really bothers me is the way law and order has collapsed, and it is quite obvious only the poor were left behind to suffer. I can't believe how so many people were left there, and it is a really sad indictment of American society that it has degenerated into looting and gang war with people dying all around.

 

It's WORSE than the 3rd world.

 

Don't ever lecture me about freedom and democracy folks. All I see in the US is "Every man for himself, and let the devil take the hindmost"

 

Sorry.

[velofish]

It's a bit off to blame people for what is in reality a natural catastrophe. It's debateable whether you could really protect NO 100% from such a thing.

 

No, what really bothers me is the way law and order has collapsed, and it is quite obvious only the poor were left behind to suffer. I can't believe how so many people were left there, and it is a really sad indictment of American society that it has degenerated into looting and gang war with people dying all around.

 

It's WORSE than the 3rd world.

 

Don't ever lecture me about freedom and democracy folks. All I see in the US is "Every man for himself, and let the devil take the hindmost"

 

Sorry.

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Enjoying yourself?

 

John

[grossohc]

I have to agree with nogbad here, the masters of the universe are missing some thing. . American response is pathetic.

[velofish]

I have to agree with nogbad here, the masters of  the universe are missing some thing. . American response is pathetic.

59302[/snapback]

 

 

None of us is there. None of us understands what is happening on the ground. Using zero REAL knowledge you attack the US?

Examine your language. "Masters of the Universe" indicates a predisposed negative attitude.

The logistics of an enormous relief effort in an area devoid of local infrastructure is way beyond your comprehension, And mine.

None of us will truly uderstand what is happening there for YEARS, if ever. Enjoy your petty attacks in the meantime.

FWIW I despise Bush.

 

John

[Guest MotoMessiah]

We're a fast food and self gratifying nation. All for yourself. I suppose being founded with a gun and bible in hand can do as much. As opposed to planning for the future as our grandparents did we're in for it now. Sad. I suppose that can be said of much of the world. Regardless the response is pathetic.

[dlaing]

I won't stop bitching till I see it raining supplies to stranded people.

But what we get is just what the cheap tax payers asked for.

Bush bought American votes with petty tax breaks, and the swamp people pay the price.

Granted that if the Hurricane had hit before Bush cut funding, the result would have been the same.

But Bush deserves blame, and since Clinton cut funding, he too deserves equally proportional blame to how much was cut.

Although I have a partisan bias, I would bet that Clinton, Gore or Kerry, would probably be just as inept, and the other side of the house would be bitching and blaming....so get over it, and join my bitching out YOUR President.

When 911 hit, Giulliani aced the pop quiz while Bush sat through Kindergarten.

This is Deja Vu all over again.

Isn't it ironic, Gulf War and Gulf Disaster.

Just like Giulliani on 911, the mayor of New Orleans is kicking ass, and after two days got Bush to stop looking like an ass, and promise to rebuild NO.

That being said, it is all superficial, and the only reallity that matters is people getting saved.

On 911 Bush saved as many lives as Giulliani, and the same is happening here.

I don't think anyone expects the commander in chief to have the balls to force the major airlines to cancel their flights to fly sorties in and out of the Gulf Coast.

But that is exactly what we should expect.

And yesterday is the time to expect it.

I blame Bush for what happened yesterday, today, and tomorrow.

I don't give a damn if he does or does not make feel good speeches.

We need action.

If we don't blame him, he can't be held accountable and he can continue on his merry way of making oil companies richer at the expense of peace and taxes.

And on a positive side, I think it is great that Houston opened up the AstroDome to the refugees, and all the people across the country who are opening their doors to strangers are freeeekin' awesome.

Way more awesome than me sitting on my duff bitching.

Here is another good article(for those who wish to read about blame):

http://www.salon.com/opinion/blumenthal/20...n/index_np.html