At last, a happy story

From the DomeBlog in Houston, a volunteer describes how the New Orleans evacuees are being treated:

Evacuees are brought into the hall in a registration area, where they are given fresh clothes, allowed to take showers and given a plastic badge to show they'd been through the sign-in process. The clothes they are wearing are tagged and taken over to the Hilton across the street, where they are laundered. The evacuees find a place to sleep in a giant room filled with air mattresses. From a distance, it looks like a sea. The room is softly lit; it's soothing. They are then brought into the distribution area. There were enough volunteers that many people had a 'personal shopper' who helped them find what they needed, and sometimes carried bags.
As they enter the distribution area, they walk a gauntlet of volunteers who hold baby strollers. Parents who don't have a stroller are offered one, and everyone applauds as the evacuees pass. They are treated like heroes. My daughter stood in this line with a box of toys, making sure each child was handed one as he or she came in. 'I made sure each one of them laughed,' she said.

They have endured so much, and will have to rebuild their lives economically and socially and psychologically. But finally, for at least a few minutes, they are being treated like the heroes they are.

Great line of the day

From Internik at Daily Kos 'I Am More Angry Than I Have Ever Been In My Life and It Is A Righteous and Purposeful Indignation'

Even by conservative thinking, the most basic job of the government is to protect the lives of its citizens and Bush just proved how much of a rat's ass conservatives actually give about the security of the America people . . . Lake New Orleans is the end product of the every-man-for-himself selfishness of the American conservative movement which has not solved any of our nations problems. So I have these words for all you Anti-American, Anti-Government, Conservative Assholes: You want to cut my taxes? Fuck you. My taxes protect American lives. You want to downsize the government? Fuck you. My government defends the American people. You want the government off your back? Fuck you. My government watches my back. Conservatism is dead, washed away by the waters of Hurricane Katrina. And when anyone tries to spread its un-human contemptuous philosophy, or support its vile proponents, I will remember New Orleans and they will be struck down by my righteous retribution. I Will Remember New Orleans.

42,000 plus are STILL NOT EVACUATED!

Goddamn it!
From Sunday's Washington Post: Many Evacuated, but Thousands Still Waiting: "About 42,000 people had been evacuated from the city by Saturday afternoon, with roughly the same number remaining, city officials said."
Emphasis mine. And then it says "Search-and-rescue efforts continued in flooded areas of the city, where an unknown number of people wait in their homes, on rooftops or in makeshift shelters."
So, it has taken them three full days (Thursday, Friday and Saturday) to evacuate 42,000 people. And now they're saying they STILL have 42,000 people to move, PLUS all of the people still existing on the roofs.
I hope the media keeps the pressure on -- keep crying Geraldo, keep screaming Anderson Cooper -- because at this rate, they won't finish this screwed-up evalucation for another week.
Also posted at Kos.

No matter how cynical I get, I just can't keep up

Daily Kos has a number of diaries up talking about this: Intentional withholding of aid? : the evidence [updated with lots of links].
The level of incompetence displayed by governments around Hurricane Katrina is so staggering that people are actually thinking there was some deliberate action here to prevent rescues -- seizing on the opportunity for gentrification by clearing away all those poor people.
I don't know -- even thinking this way seems totally tin-foil. But as Lily Tomlin once said "no matter how cynical I get, I just can't keep up". Yesterday, even CNN news people were talking about what a great photo op it was for Bush that the army convoy was heading to the convention centre as he was touring the area -- and I thought, oh come on. Now we hear that the Louisana governor questioned whether all the equipment brought in to repair one of the levee breaks was just backdrop, because the equipment is gone today.
Then again, maybe the repair crew just didn't have their paperwork done yet -- as Hunter notes, the missing requisition excuse seems to be moving to the fore as the reason why no one could get anything done.
After the tsumani, Senate majority leader Frist was touring the area and was heard to say to his photographer "get some devastation in the back".
Is Bush just saying "get some rescue in the back"?

Its a city, not a bunch of condominium lofts

So now they are talking about the rebuilding of New Orleans as though it was some kind of "warehouse condominium" project.
They think it will be like what happens when developers buy an old warehouse and renovate it into trendy loft condominiums. They think they can empty the city completely so it can be drained and cleaned up and rebuilt and then -- and only then-- will everybody be able to move back in.
This is about as realistic as the 3000 lb sandbag idea -- sounds a neat and simple solution in theory; totally unrealistic in practice.
So typical of the way rich people think -- people who would never dream of staying in their house during a major renovation, but instead would move to a hotel and only come back when everything is finished and cleaned up. In its breathtaking impracticality, of course, this idea is not dissimilar to many of the other ideas which have come out of the Bush administration -- these guys are famous for this faith-based thinking, that they can just wish for something and voila, it is done!
Give your heads a shake. Ain't gonna happen.
The reason is a plot point in all those great "end of the world" novels -- Lucifer's Hammer, and Warday, and Out of the Deeps, and No Blade of Grass. It happened in London during the Blitz. It happened in Paris in 1945, and in New York after 911.
People will not leave. People love their cities.
People in particular love New Orleans.
In checking that new blog I found yesterday, The Interdictor, this guy wants to stay:

Outpost Crystal is still secured and still kicking. We've got people begging us to leave, but that's not going to happen. We might lose Charlie Squad depending on internect connectivity, but Alpha Squad and Bravo Squad are going nowhere until New Orleans' infrastructure is rebuilt or declared permanently and irrevocably destroyed. As far as I'm concerned, this building is my post, and it will not be abandoned until I'm properly relieved.

And judging by the photos he has posted on his blog, the area of the city he lives in looks pretty normal -- needs a good cleanup, but it looks like any city would after a windstorm. Its messy but its not a disaster area, the streets are dry, the buildings look intact, windows not blown out. The photos show people bicycling by, the occasional car, and a fire truck coming past. The thousands of people who used to live in this area are going to want to come back as soon as they can -- they left all their stuff behind, and they will need it. So the good guys in New Orleans, many of them at least, won't want to leave.
The bad guys won't be leaving either. Where do they have to go? I cannot, offhand, think of any community anywhere which would welcome the armed bands of gangsters who now infest New Orleans.
In spite of the flooding and all the chaos, a few hundred or even a few thousand armed teenagers could survive in New Orleans indefinitely -- looting food from and staying in the thousands of intact houses and apartments like those of Interdictor's neighbourhood. When the police and everyone else is gone, they can loot the remaining drugstores and hospital pharmacies for any drugs they might want. And once the power and water are back on -- which they have to be, before rebuilding can occur -- why, then these guys are in clover. And they can, like the insurgents in Iraq, maintain their slacker's paradise by taking occasional potshots at any re-construction workers foolish enough to try to begin the reconstruction.
The National Guard and the army can waste a lot of manpower trying to clean out these people, likely with about the same degree of success as they have had cleaning insurgents out of Fallujah, driving them out of one area only to have them pop up somewhere else.
Its not a pleasant picture. Maybe if enough of the good guys stay, then the bad guys won't get such an upper hand.

"Lawsy me, Miz Scarlett, we jest gots to get those darkies to move their lazy butts!"

SteveRose at Daily Kos writes the most shocking story I have seen yet: Red Cross NEVER allowed into New Orleans.. He wondered why he hadn't seen any Red Cross workers in all the TV coverage of New Orleans. So he phoned:

So I called the Red Cross and asked them if its true. And, to my surprise, the nice lady answering the phone said it was true and they told/asked/ordered not to enter . . . Homeland Security told the Red Cross DO NOT enter New Orleans and says this still now. And why, you may ask? Not Security. Not worker safety. Not lack of access. It was because people would be drawn to the Red Cross food and they wouldn't want to go to be evacuated. So I asked: 'The people starving and dying at the convention center yesterday couldn't get Red Cross food and water because they would be drawn to the food at the convention center, where they were, and not want to be evacuated from the convention center where no evacuations were going on or planned and all the while they are dying'. . . . she said yes, that was true. She seem relieved to admit it.

Emphasis is mine. And so is my outrage. I don't think I have ever heard anything more patronizing and racist. So some "overseer" decided that all those lazy, greedy black people had to be starved out -- for their own good, of course. Disgusting.
Now, of course I know there are Canadians even today who would have the same kind of attitudes toward Aboriginal people.
But who put ignorant racists in charge of the Homeland Security department? And why did the Red Cross just shut up and follow orders? At some point, doesn't somebody have to SAY something?

Today's New Orleans photos

Which photo will be the memory of New Orleans -- this one?


Or this one?

Let me see if I have got this straight

Some other bloggers have noted this too, but that has never stopped me from chiming in on this point:
The federal disaster people think that saying they didn't know any better -- "we never thought the levees would break" -- is sufficient excuse for their inept and inadequate preparation for disaster.
But a single mother with no money who didn't know enough about hurricanes and storm surges to get herself and her kids out of town last Saturday is now to be held responsible for all the horror that has happened to her and her family ever since.
Yeah, I get it!

New Orleans bloggers

Interdictor is liveblogging from a highrise outpost, and gathering reports from around town. See also the blog reports at Looka, Metroblogging New Orleans, and NOLA view
Crossposted at Daily Kos.

Great line of the day

From Paul Krugman, in his New York Times column: "The reason the military wasn't rushed in to help along the Gulf Coast is, I believe, the same reason nothing was done to stop looting after the fall of Baghdad. Flood control was neglected for the same reason our troops in Iraq didn't get adequate armor. At a fundamental level, I'd argue, our current leaders just aren't serious about some of the essential functions of government. They like waging war, but they don't like providing security, rescuing those in need or spending on preventive measures. And they never, ever ask for shared sacrifice . . . America, once famous for its can-do attitude, now has a can't-do government that makes excuses instead of doing its job. And while it makes those excuses, Americans are dying. "

The people of New Orleans today

The Roof People


The Superdrome People


The Convention Centre People


The Freeway People


And The Stranded Tourist People

They're all in this together, and they're on their own for now.
Wes Clark said "It all comes back to leadership":

. . . Where is the leadership? Then just this morning, the President claimed that no one could have anticipated the levee breaches we've seen in New Orleans after Katrina hit. That's not leadership, that's an excuse. In fact, people have predicted this kind of disaster for many years, including President Bush's own FEMA in 2001, when they ranked hurricane flood damage to New Orleans among the three likeliest, most catastrophic disasters facing America. Instead, funding
was significantly cut back, leaving key engineering projects on hold. Instead, this Administration focused on the war in Iraq, tax cuts, and private sector economic growth without asking the American people to make needed sacrifices for the good of the country. Again I ask you, where is the leadership? You've got to keep asking that question.

Ooh, I'm politicizing it AGAIN. Slap my wrist, somebody.

Great line of the day

In Blog in the time of cholera, Driftglass writes:

The path from the Christmas Tsunami to Hurricane Katrina to 9/11 is simply this: When your theology allows God to become the author of mass murder for His own inscrutable purposes, it is only a matter of time before the hatefully righteous that claim to be on His Buddy List start their own bloody race to the bottom in His Name. And whether they are perverting the Bible or the Koran, their aims are always the same; to destroy your capacity to reason by assassinating Science, to spread the hate and fear that give them purpose and power to every corner of the Earth. And to make you kneel.

Make time to read the whole thing.

Katrina relief

You can donate here for Canadian Red Cross Katrina relief projects.

Locator service: Salvation Army Team Emergency Radio Network SATERN

To volunteer or to donate to a worthy organization which puts dedicated people on the ground ASAP for disaster relief, click here for the Mennonite Disaster Service. They are already gearing up to send in their teams.

And for updates on disaster relief, see Disaster News Network

"Facing the unforeseeable"

There is no plan.
A National Guard MP in the Superdome described it: "This is mass chaos. To tell you the truth, I'd rather be in Iraq. You got your constant danger, but I had something to protect myself. [And] three meals a day. Communications. A plan. Here, they had no plan."
No, likely not.
Not for something like this.
And I can't fault them, not really.
Its just too horrible, too massive. The mind just refuses to grasp it.
Imagine if, say, a year ago. someone says to the city council of New Orleans "hey, guys, what if there is a hurricane and the levees fail and there are people drowned all over and there are no phones and the power goes out and the highways are broken and the streets are flooded and we have thousands of refugees in the Superdome and . . . "
Nope, not gonna imagine it, too horrible, makes me feel sick, sorreee -- let's just stick our thumbs in our ears and waggle our fingers and say NA-NA-NA-NA-NA until that annoying voice just goes away.
It reminds me about the Quebec ice storm of 1998.
They didn't have a plan either -- except for one little town south of Montreal who apparently had one of those nitpicking finnikin city managers who had a plan for EVERYTHING, so he had a bunch of volunteers out knocking ice off the town's transmission towers even before it stopped raining. They survived the ice storm quite nicely, thank you, and I hope that guy got a big raise.
Anyway, the report done about the ice storm concluded that there needed to be a "culture of emergency preparedness" established in Quebec, so that people would learn how to "face the unforeseeable" and figure out, in advance, what their most important problems would be if disaster struck.
It's just not something that people do very easily.
Seems to me that New Orlean's number one engineering priority now is closing those dykes.
And their number one human priority is doing something about communications -- even sending out city workers with bullhorns on boats to make announcements would be an improvement on what they are doing now, which is nothing.
And when I was looking for the ice storm descriptions, I came across this site with all sorts of survival kits -- for a hundred bucks you can buy a wind-up radio and flashlight kit, for example. Worth thinking about -- and a heck of a lot better than just sticking our thumbs in our ears and chanting NA-NA-NA-NA.

New Orleans refugees

Bit by bit, I think the news media is getting it. I'm not sure if government officials have got it yet.
This is a disaster.
There was a bit of a "blame the victim" thing starting up yesterday in places in the media and the blogosphere, to the effect that people in New Orleans should have known better than to stay behind so anything that happened to them was their own fault.
But the magnitude of this disaster has overwhelmed that excuse. Aaron Brown was going on tonight about how uncomfortable he was calling his fellow Americans "refugees" -- but finally concluding he had to use that term because that is exactly what they are. Joe Scarborough and David Schuster on MSNBC were talking about how many people in Biloxi died because they didn't have $20 for a tank of gas and so couldn't leave town. The New York Times editorial ripped Bush a new one:

George W. Bush gave one of the worst speeches of his life yesterday, especially given the level of national distress and the need for words of consolation and wisdom. In what seems to be a ritual in this administration, the president appeared a day later than he was needed. He then read an address of a quality more appropriate for an Arbor Day celebration: a long laundry list of pounds of ice, generators and blankets delivered to the stricken Gulf Coast. He advised the public that anybody who wanted to help should send cash, grinned, and promised that everything would work out in the end. We will, of course, endure, and the city of New Orleans must come back. But looking at the pictures on television yesterday of a place abandoned to the forces of flood, fire and looting, it was hard not to wonder exactly how that is going to come to pass.

I think the media are beginning to ask, and in increasing strident tones, "What the hell are you doing to help?"
Personally, I am tired of hearing FEMA people talk endlessly during TV interviews about how nice they are to have come so far -- I want to ask them "Yes, but what are you getting done? Are you making these people's lives easier or are you harassing them with BS red tape?"
In Houston, apparently, the Astrodome will be open to refugees -- but only the refugees who came from the New Orleans dome, not any refugees who got to Houston on their own but now have no place to stay. And there seems to be a lot of fuzziness about how that evacuation is being done and how long it will actually last.
And I hear the FEMA director talk about how people don't have any money, and then he calmly announces that they really should get some from somewhere, like maybe from the Red Cross -- so I guess it was OK for the American government to hand out cash in Baghdad, but not in New Orleans.
Joe Scarborough had a very sensible idea tonight (the polarity of the earth is reversing, I know, but he DID!). He said people close enough to the disaster area should just load up their trucks with supplies and drive down and drop them off, then turn around and go get some more. I guess this is what people were doing during another recent disaster that Joe covered in Pensacola, Florida, and these acts of kindness made all the difference to the desperate people there.