One year after Katrina

[dmcowen674]

Originally posted by: conehead433

Originally posted by: DealMonkey

Originally posted by: blackangst1
I learned that people should not rely on the government for so much. Im not so sure it is the government's responsibility to protect EVERYONE from their own laziness. Or from Mother Nature. ****** happens. With all the buses that never got used, and the time given to evacuate, they had it coming. Sorry to sound so crude, but thats the way it is.

And then there's Ray Nagin Mr-Chocolate-City man. Crying with his hand out to Uncle Sam meanwhile resources he has control over go unused.

That's quite a rant you got going there. Interestingly, Mayor Nagin won his re-election. I guess the people of NO disagree with you.

Nagin is an idiot, and obviously the people who re-elected him are as well. A marriage made in ........

Nagin is an idiot, and obviously the people who re-elected him are as well. A marriage made in ........chocolate

Finished for you. It's the words he used.

 

[Starbuck1975]

Nagin is an idiot, and obviously the people who re-elected him are as well. A marriage made in ........chocolate

Willy Nagin's Choclate City Bars...now with more nuts!!!

 

[DealMonkey]

Originally posted by: conehead433

Originally posted by: DealMonkey

Originally posted by: blackangst1
I learned that people should not rely on the government for so much. Im not so sure it is the government's responsibility to protect EVERYONE from their own laziness. Or from Mother Nature. ****** happens. With all the buses that never got used, and the time given to evacuate, they had it coming. Sorry to sound so crude, but thats the way it is.

And then there's Ray Nagin Mr-Chocolate-City man. Crying with his hand out to Uncle Sam meanwhile resources he has control over go unused.

That's quite a rant you got going there. Interestingly, Mayor Nagin won his re-election. I guess the people of NO disagree with you.

Nagin is an idiot, and obviously the people who re-elected him are as well. A marriage made in ........

If you insist, however I'd venture to say the people that lived thru Katrina are more well-versed in what was going on at the local level than some random person on the Internets.

 

[Fern]

Originally posted by: DealMonkey

Originally posted by: conehead433

Originally posted by: DealMonkey

Originally posted by: blackangst1
I learned that people should not rely on the government for so much. Im not so sure it is the government's responsibility to protect EVERYONE from their own laziness. Or from Mother Nature. ****** happens. With all the buses that never got used, and the time given to evacuate, they had it coming. Sorry to sound so crude, but thats the way it is.

And then there's Ray Nagin Mr-Chocolate-City man. Crying with his hand out to Uncle Sam meanwhile resources he has control over go unused.

That's quite a rant you got going there. Interestingly, Mayor Nagin won his re-election. I guess the people of NO disagree with you.

Nagin is an idiot, and obviously the people who re-elected him are as well. A marriage made in ........

If you insist, however I'd venture to say the people that lived thru Katrina are more well-versed in what was going on at the local level than some random person on the Internets.

Yeah, hanging around in a flooded house with no electricity is a great way way to pick up lots of info. Same for swimming through murky water with that big LCD you just scored for free.

Whats that quote about people deserve the government they elect?

Of course, NO is famous for ineffective & graft-plaqued government. Its always possible Nagin was the "least-worse" candidate.

Somewhere, somebody should prolly point out LA & NO use a different system of government than the rest of us - they use the "French system" (Napoleanic code).

 

[thegimp03]

Before blaming the response to Katrina, maybe next time those idiots should think twice before they build a city right next to the largest river system in North America, 10 feet below sea level.

 

[Orignal Earl]

Originally posted by: thegimp03
Before blaming the response to Katrina, maybe next time those idiots should think twice before they build a city right next to the largest river system in North America, 10 feet below sea level.

lol
Time for another cartoon by the worlds greatest political cartoonist Ted Rall

E Pluribus Nihil

 

[wiin]

Did Gumbell talk about the NAACP? Last I heard, the NAACP refused to distribute the money collected by the organization for the victims of Katrina. Also what happened to the money donated by foreign govenments? The federal government is getting a lot of criticism for not doing the work of the local government but no one is investigating how the money collected is being spent. I guess it is a lot easier to criticize the federal government.

Originally posted by: steppinthrax
I was watching Brian Gumbell and saw how he talked about katrina one year later. He addressed a lot of nagging questions and how they were answered. Particually race and how it was use in this incident. How long it took for response. And he even compared the incident to "this didn't feel like the U.S." I was just curious on other people's opinion on what went wrong exaclty.

 

[Stunt]

Originally posted by: Orignal Earl

Originally posted by: thegimp03
Before blaming the response to Katrina, maybe next time those idiots should think twice before they build a city right next to the largest river system in North America, 10 feet below sea level.

lol
Time for another cartoon by the worlds greatest political cartoonist Ted Rall

E Pluribus Nihil

:laugh:

I want more!!

 

[Cattlegod]

basically someone kicked down the stall door when our pants were at our ankles. that someone was a mean b1tch named katrina.

 

[savvy]

People have different views on this. Very different.

 

[BoberFett]

Originally posted by: DealMonkey

Originally posted by: blackangst1
I learned that people should not rely on the government for so much. Im not so sure it is the government's responsibility to protect EVERYONE from their own laziness. Or from Mother Nature. ****** happens. With all the buses that never got used, and the time given to evacuate, they had it coming. Sorry to sound so crude, but thats the way it is.

And then there's Ray Nagin Mr-Chocolate-City man. Crying with his hand out to Uncle Sam meanwhile resources he has control over go unused.

That's quite a rant you got going there. Interestingly, Mayor Nagin won his re-election. I guess the people of NO disagree with you.

Obviously brain dead is not limited to Republicans.

 

[piasabird]

Maybe you should compare the way Louisiana was prepared for disaster and look at how Florida is prepared for disasters. Florida gets hit all the time with hurricanes and they manag to do pretty well with these kinds of disasters. Florida is run by a Republican Governor and they do just fine. Louisiana is run by a Democrat and they did horribly. The facts speak for themselves.

 

[Moonbeam]

Originally posted by: piasabird
Maybe you should compare the way Louisiana was prepared for disaster and look at how Florida is prepared for disasters. Florida gets hit all the time with hurricanes and they manag to do pretty well with these kinds of disasters. Florida is run by a Republican Governor and they do just fine. Louisiana is run by a Democrat and they did horribly. The facts speak for themselves.

I guess they must since no facts were spoken by you.

 

[funkbass81]

Originally posted by: Used Rugs
Hate. Lies. Greed. The Republican way.

so, do tell, what democrats are rectifying the situation?

 

[dmcowen674]

Yeah sure.

I didn't even get the $2,000 emergency money FEMA handed out like candy in places like Houston.

11-26-2006 Bush renews vow to aid Katrina victims

WASHINGTON - President Bush on Saturday renewed the nation's commitment to help victims of last year's Gulf Coast hurricanes and thanked U.S. troops fighting abroad.

In his Saturday radio address, Bush said Americans are grateful to those who rallied after hurricanes Katrina and Rita to bring food, water and hope to people who lost everything.

"We renew our commitment to help those who are still suffering and to rebuild our nation's Gulf Coast," Bush said.

 

[CaptnKirk]

I am in the process of relocating to the New Orleans area, transfering from one job to another.
I have made 2 trips into the area in the last month, first for a series of interviews near the end of October,
then a house-hunting trip with my wife to find a place to live while I begin working in the area.
You can't describe what it's like there to people - you have to stand and look at it to comprehend what occured.

And it's been 15 months - a year and a quarter AFTER the storm hit.

We tried to give it a shot at living in the New Orleans proper area, but after plotting out the flood area, and confining
the search to the area outside the footpring ot the flood zone, we gave up . . after a single morning and an afternoon,
and shifted our search to the 'North Shore' area accross the Twin Span Bridges on I-10 into the South Eastern corner of Slidell.
Even at that, the area just West of where we did find an aparment was hideously damaged by the storm.

Slidell Damage

The area from the Industrial Canal, where you leave the Downtown area and head East on I-10 toward Slidell took the most of the local wind damage.
On both sides of the Freeway it looks like it was bombed out - could be any Third World Country where warfare has occurred . .
and it stays like that for 7 miles, all the way out to where 6 Flags Amusment Park sits abandoned.
On both sides of the highway there are empty, gutted homes - a mix of houses, apartments, shopping centers, and malls
that sit abandoned -
roofs torn off, walls blown down, windows and doors caved in where the winds and debris blew right through
the house or apartment - came in through the South side entrance and blew right through and out the Notrhside as an exit.
there are easily 40,000 residences destroyed in that area alone.
Here the flooding wasn't the result of any break of a leavee or a canal, it was the 24 inches of rain that fell during the storm that drown the pumps out
or where electrical lines toppled leaving the pumping stations usless to evacuate the water from the area as the rain continued.

In the downtown CBD areas of New Orleans there was minimal wind damage as the highest winds occured to the East -
from Slidell, accross Mississippi, and into Alabama. Waveland, MS Pass Christian, MS and on toward Biloxi took more storm surge damage.

What took down New Orleans was flooding that occured AFTER the storm had passed, errosion to the leavee structures
and not to the Mississippi River Channel,
but of the Waterway Canals that connect Southward from Lake Pontchartrain. Decades of substandard workmanship
and use of materials that were the cheapest that anyone could buy to maximize profits for the contracting companies that did the jobs.

While we were there on the 15th of November, there was a 'Milestone' reached in the reconstruction of the City of New Orleans . . .
Volunteer Workers had 'gutted' the 1,000th house in the process of getting houses ready for demolition.
The houses that had flooded have to have the contents removed from all the rooms and stacked on the streets for trash disposal.
We drove through neighborhoods where evey house had a mountain of trash piled outside - the furniture,
and personal belongings of those who had been displaced, along with the appliances and rotting contents of refrigerators.
On the walls of homes and buildings for block after block was the ''Mud-Line', a 2 inch wide stain that was left
as a high-water mark by the water that sat there for weeks - and is present in each and every area that flooded.
Some ares it was only from calf to knee deep, other areas were neck to shoulder high, while in other places it came to the roof.

Now about the 1,000th milestone - there are another 1,600 homes on the 'Waiting for Action' list,
another 4,600 waiting for 'Approval' to be placed on the list for 'gutting', and who knows how many more
are still trying to apply for assistance - and that's just for the cycle that goes with clearing out the contents
and tearing down the interior walls so the main structure can be evaluated for repair, reconstruction, or demolition.

Then there's the 'Money Cycle' - those residents who have applied for funds to repair or replace the homes that they lost.
There are 77,600+ applications in the system for the funds that are earmarked for dispersal to the strom victims.
Of that amount, less than 2,600 have been approved and moved to the next level of Beuracratic Bullshit
and of that number group only 274 have been signed off for payment, and when you get to funds received,
payments made are 26 recipients, at a maximun of $ 60,000 in an area where the repair or replacement cost is estimated to be $ 120,000+
On top of that the Insurance Companies are using every trick in the book to excuse themselves from having to pay out claims.

New Orleans isn't really helping itself either with the 'supply and demand' cycle for available housing,
with at least 150,000 dwellings damaged or destroyed, those that did escape major damage and have been repaired (Beware - Black Mold)
are being offered for twice what they were going for before the storm hit. There isn't much available under $ 1,000 per month
and even at $ 1250 per month the housing and apartments are pretty bad or questionable in functionality and location.
Craigs List - New Orleans Rentals beware - some areas are less than 'wonderful'.


New Orleans has a long and painful road to recovery - it's been over a year, and little progress has been made.


Oh, by the way - 80%+ of the people DID EVACUATE, the storm wasn't what caused them problems,
it was the FAILURE OF INFFASTRUCTURE after the storms that caused the problem.
The Flooding began AFTER THE STORM HAD PASSED.
Encroaching flood waters left people stranded ater the fact, and those are the people who had survived the hurricane.

Mississippi got hit a lot harded, and Republicans Haley Barbour and Trent Lott haven't really been much of a factor it getting them help.
They too are floundering in the FEMA Red-Tape, and they have hands on the situation to help pull strings - ain't working.

FEMA- Another 4-letter 'F-Word'

Piasabird - What 'Governor' of Florida just so happens to have a brother as the President, and gives instant asistance to make the Family look good?

Some Pictures from New Orleans

Mall #1
Mall #2
Mall #3
Mall #4

East NOLA Store
East NOLA Apartment

Slidell Hwy 11 #1
Slidell Hwy 11 #2
Slidell Hwy 11 #3

Mud-Line, Canal ST @ Basin St

New View from Apartment
Yes, that's lake Pontchartrain, scary, huh?

 

[SarcasticDwarf]

The CF that was Katrina occured for a variety of reasons, all of them dealing with the utter incompetance of people.


1) Individuals: Individuals expect(ed) the government to take care of everything. What it comes down to is that in an emergency, YOU have to take care of yourself.

2) Local (city, county, and state): The local governments were completely unprepared. No real disaster planning had been done. IMO this is where the biggest fault lies. An example of this would be the response to hurricanes in Florida vs Louisiana.

3) FEMA: FEMA was not prepared to respond to a disaster on this scale. This was partially due to the fact that the organization was not designed to respond on this scale, but also due to failures in implementation of protocols.

 

[CaptnKirk]

Originally posted by: SarcasticDwarf
The CF that was Katrina occured for a variety of reasons, all of them dealing with the utter incompetance of people.


1) Individuals: Individuals expect(ed) the government to take care of everything. What it comes down to is that in an emergency, YOU have to take care of yourself.

2) Local (city, county, and state): The local governments were completely unprepared. No real disaster planning had been done. IMO this is where the biggest fault lies. An example of this would be the response to hurricanes in Florida vs Louisiana.

3) FEMA: FEMA was not prepared to respond to a disaster on this scale. This was partially due to the fact that the organization was not designed to respond on this scale, but also due to failures in implementation of protocols.

You are completely ignoring the fact that over 80% of the people there DID EVACUATE - they DID TAKE CARE OF THEMSELVES.
But, again, AFTER THE STORM WAS OVER and the leavees failed, they were kept out, not allowed to return
until after the floods subsided - like a couple of weeks, and when they got back their homes were ruined.
Their jobs and workplaces were gone as well, that was some 250,000+ citizens that were stranded without residence or work.
They weren't helped either - the sensationalism of the media focused on about 50,000 who didn't leave and were stranded -
either by their own poor decisions, or circumstances where they were left to fend for themselves while waiting for the 'promised aid' to arrive.

No matter how much you want to blame the victims, it doesn't change the fact that all levels of help failed when it was needed the most.
It doesn't change the fact that today 15 months - more than a year later, IT IS STILL FAILING.

Schools Left to Decay

Tear Down This House . .

 

[piasabird]

It does not matter how well the Federal Government is prepared, if the State is not prepared to work with the Federal Government, then it will not matter. Why didnt the State of Louisiana even call out the National Guard until after it was too late? FEMA has never been able to immediately respond to any disaster, so it was an unrealistic expectation. Go back in time and research this if you dont believe me.

Try contrasting how Florida is prepared for Hurricanes and you will see that better preparation on the part of the state is what it takes. As a region, that part of Louisiana, is not very accessible when it goes under water during a storm. If you live below Sea Level, you had better think about what it is going to take to get the hell out of there during a storm. Otherwise you are an idiot. There were plenty of people stranded in the Suburbs that were too stupid to leave also. However, they just did not get as much coverage, because most of those people were not Black! I dont have any magic solutions.

I live near St Louis, MO and there were lots of people in Missouri and Illinois that were flooded out of their homes during the Flood of 93. They just had to find some other way to survive and leave before they were overrun by the flood water. There is only so much that could be done during that time, and there was no stopping the flood.

Mother Nature does not care if you are White or Black. Mother Nature is an equal opportunity force of destruction.

Last year, I was without power at my house for over 7 days. The Federal Government did not bring me ice everyday and give man any special handouts. No Air Conditioning and no Water in the middle of the Summer, But I still went to work. I have no compassion for stupid rednecks in Louisiana!

 

[daniel49]

it appears to have been a mistake to put fema into homeland security...it should be seperate again

 

[rudder]

Originally posted by: blackangst1
I learned that people should not rely on the government for so much. Im not so sure it is the government's responsibility to protect EVERYONE from their own laziness. Or from Mother Nature. ****** happens. With all the buses that never got used, and the time given to evacuate, they had it coming. Sorry to sound so crude, but thats the way it is.

And then there's Ray Nagin Mr-Chocolate-City man. Crying with his hand out to Uncle Sam meanwhile resources he has control over go unused.

Lets not forget the decades leading up to Katrina. Lots of money was spent to go to the upkeep of the levee system. It was misspent/stolen/misdirected or whatever.

Lesson learned: The government is filled with people who go their job because they know someone or they fluffed them enough to get recommended for a job. Very few people with responsible positions get there because they actually have the qualifications. So don't expect them to come pull your ass out the fire when it is time to do so.

 

[jimkyser]

Originally posted by: piasabird
It does not matter how well the Federal Government is prepared, if the State is not prepared to work with the Federal Government, then it will not matter. Why didnt the State of Louisiana even call out the National Guard until after it was too late? FEMA has never been able to immediately respond to any disaster, so it was an unrealistic expectation. Go back in time and research this if you dont believe me.

The Governor DID call out the guard. She declared a state of emergency and had an agreement with Gov. Bill Richardson of New Mexico BEFORE the hurricane made landfall to get guard troops in to help because Katrina was at level 5 and bearing down on her state. But the federal government didn't get the paperwork processed in time.

And while you concentrate on NO, what of the southern shore of Mississippi? They were actually hit with the brunt of the hurricane and they have gotten little if any assistance as well. I have been down there twice, to Biloxi/Gulfport and Pearlington, on work trips with my church and it's an unbelievable mess. The insurance companies are doing everything they can to pay as little on claims as possible and there is way more work than there are able bodies to do.