Tuesday, April 04, 2006
Things Learned From the Katrina Debacle
I personally endured a great loss during Katrina. I feel that the responsibility for this debacle lies with the combined incompetence of the Mayor, the NOPD, the State of Louisiana, FEMA, and the President.
I also learned several things from this occurrence. First, I learned that we cannot depend on a Mayor who is more interested in the business community than the people he was primarily elected to represent. Second, that New Orleans cannot function with a Police Chief that had to be sent to charm school to learn to speak coherently. Obviously, he should never have been promoted above a patrolman. Third, I learned that we have an ineffective Governor who is not respected, and finally the dumbest President in modern U.S. History.
I hope a few others learned something too. I hope, for example, the people of St. Bernard Parish learned a bit of a lesson. It’s interesting to see them on TV begging for trailers and in FEMA lines for the same handouts they “block voted” to deny to minorities, whom they considered so far below themselves. It calls to mind the old adage “what goes around, always comes around”. It’s really strange how things happen, isn’t it?
My feelings of bitterness stem from my experiences, but I have met many others that suffered the same or a similar fate.
New Orleans is now at a pivotal point in its history. I have just about made up my mind that if the people of New Orleans are stupid enough to reelect Mr. Nagin, I will be one of the first to leave.
My association with the present Mayor goes back a long way. In 1968, I was a graduate student and teaching assistant at Tuskegee Institute in Alabama, where Ray Nagin was an undergraduate. Being from New Orleans, we all knew each other. When he ran for Mayor, I felt an association, despite the fact that I was never his political confidant. In essence, I supported him when he was elected. Now I realize that just because he could run a monopoly cable company, he was not the person New Orleans needed as Mayor.
He dedicated his first three years to tearing down the house that Marc Morial built, but he didn’t build a better one to replace it.
I realize that Ray Nagin, Eddie Compass, Governor Blanco, or President Bush could not have prevented Hurricane Kartina. But they sure could have reacted to it more sensibly. There is no doubt in my mind that, had the evacuation been run more efficiently, my Mother would be alive today.
Yes, I suffered a very great loss. But the greatest loss for many others may lie ahead if we don’t vote to really change things from New Orleans all the way to Washington, D.C.
Contributed by T.R. Aspie
I also learned several things from this occurrence. First, I learned that we cannot depend on a Mayor who is more interested in the business community than the people he was primarily elected to represent. Second, that New Orleans cannot function with a Police Chief that had to be sent to charm school to learn to speak coherently. Obviously, he should never have been promoted above a patrolman. Third, I learned that we have an ineffective Governor who is not respected, and finally the dumbest President in modern U.S. History.
I hope a few others learned something too. I hope, for example, the people of St. Bernard Parish learned a bit of a lesson. It’s interesting to see them on TV begging for trailers and in FEMA lines for the same handouts they “block voted” to deny to minorities, whom they considered so far below themselves. It calls to mind the old adage “what goes around, always comes around”. It’s really strange how things happen, isn’t it?
My feelings of bitterness stem from my experiences, but I have met many others that suffered the same or a similar fate.
New Orleans is now at a pivotal point in its history. I have just about made up my mind that if the people of New Orleans are stupid enough to reelect Mr. Nagin, I will be one of the first to leave.
My association with the present Mayor goes back a long way. In 1968, I was a graduate student and teaching assistant at Tuskegee Institute in Alabama, where Ray Nagin was an undergraduate. Being from New Orleans, we all knew each other. When he ran for Mayor, I felt an association, despite the fact that I was never his political confidant. In essence, I supported him when he was elected. Now I realize that just because he could run a monopoly cable company, he was not the person New Orleans needed as Mayor.
He dedicated his first three years to tearing down the house that Marc Morial built, but he didn’t build a better one to replace it.
I realize that Ray Nagin, Eddie Compass, Governor Blanco, or President Bush could not have prevented Hurricane Kartina. But they sure could have reacted to it more sensibly. There is no doubt in my mind that, had the evacuation been run more efficiently, my Mother would be alive today.
Yes, I suffered a very great loss. But the greatest loss for many others may lie ahead if we don’t vote to really change things from New Orleans all the way to Washington, D.C.
Contributed by T.R. Aspie
Monday, April 03, 2006
A Natural Enema
I have something to say about New Orleans. It cured me of the latent racism
that comes from being raised and spending most of your life in a predominantly white area. It was the first place, along with the attendant 36 hour bus ride to and from, that acquainted me with black people, where I was in contact with them, and where I wasn't part of the 90-95% population that was caucasian, and thus rightfully viewed with a bit of suspicion.
I got a reuben at the Camelia Grill, on St. Charles Street. I spent a week with
a beautiful, intelligent woman who had spent her whole life there. I saw the
banks of the Mississippi, the French Market, and the rampant poverty that made every other city block a row of hovels that people proudly called their own.
And I saw this city get destroyed, by incompetent, bungling government. The
local government fucked up. They didn't have the resources to handle something that size, because New Orleans is a very, very poor city. The federal
government, which knew of the danger, and our President, who thought
"everything would be fine", also fucked up. That I am angry for. I had to spend
a week of my life worrying about a woman I loved, while her city burned and
drowned. And see that smug, self-satisfied prick play guitar, while a
democratic stronghold of the south received a natural enema.
Thanks, Grover Norquist. Thank you, Neoconservatives, thank you nepotism, thank you cronyism and incompetent bureaucracy and inefficient government. You nearly killed an American city, one of the most richly cultural patchwork places in this great country. This is what drowning the government in a bathtub means, you silly fucks. You destroy EVERYTHING that makes this country great, while a helicopter flies you to safety and your butler tells the head chef what your personal waiter will bring you for supper. Go to hell.
Posted by MEGIDO 04/03/2006 @ 12:44am
that comes from being raised and spending most of your life in a predominantly white area. It was the first place, along with the attendant 36 hour bus ride to and from, that acquainted me with black people, where I was in contact with them, and where I wasn't part of the 90-95% population that was caucasian, and thus rightfully viewed with a bit of suspicion.
I got a reuben at the Camelia Grill, on St. Charles Street. I spent a week with
a beautiful, intelligent woman who had spent her whole life there. I saw the
banks of the Mississippi, the French Market, and the rampant poverty that made every other city block a row of hovels that people proudly called their own.
And I saw this city get destroyed, by incompetent, bungling government. The
local government fucked up. They didn't have the resources to handle something that size, because New Orleans is a very, very poor city. The federal
government, which knew of the danger, and our President, who thought
"everything would be fine", also fucked up. That I am angry for. I had to spend
a week of my life worrying about a woman I loved, while her city burned and
drowned. And see that smug, self-satisfied prick play guitar, while a
democratic stronghold of the south received a natural enema.
Thanks, Grover Norquist. Thank you, Neoconservatives, thank you nepotism, thank you cronyism and incompetent bureaucracy and inefficient government. You nearly killed an American city, one of the most richly cultural patchwork places in this great country. This is what drowning the government in a bathtub means, you silly fucks. You destroy EVERYTHING that makes this country great, while a helicopter flies you to safety and your butler tells the head chef what your personal waiter will bring you for supper. Go to hell.
Posted by MEGIDO 04/03/2006 @ 12:44am
