Sometimes people surprise you....

[boybill]

I work in an organization that does business all over America. Most of our representatives are teacher volunteers who work for free, and a few who manage the volunteer force and work for very small stipends. One such person that I’ve had the frustration of working with is a good ol’ boy from Houston, TX. Talk about your agitating cats; this guy has been my “Newmanâ€￾ for the past 3 years. What a shock today when he called me to ask… "How are all of our teacher volunteers in Louisiana?" He heard many of the residents of New Orleans were being evacuated to Houston, and he wanted to offer up his home to any and every one of our volunteers who may have been displaced. So far, we have accounted for most of our Louisiana/Mississippi teachers. We have a few who we haven’t been able to locate. Needless to say he made me misty eyed. I love it when I get to see the best in people.

[bio]

This is a time when people need to be at their best.

The whole area is devistated. Water is continuing to rise in New Orleans and they're now evacuating the evacuation areas.

It's bad.

[baldy]

being from the UK i havent ever seen anything like the destruction that occured this week, my heart really goes out to those ppl who have lost their homes, their families et al. Insurance goes some way to replacing the house, but it never can put the memories back and all the irreplaceables, the photos etc..... Something else i noticed is that this country is not so disimilar to the UK. You guys have a stiff upper lip too and i'm pretty confident that you'll pick up, get on, and build better afterwards.

[miftah]

I promise to not talk shit on Texas for a whole year.

[bio]

It looks like it may be a while before they get those people out of there.

Of course, had they actually evacuated the area like they were told to (it was a maditory evacuation), things would have been better (they estimate thousands dead).

[miftah]

Yeah, I'm especially disappointed in the city leaders. The possibility of this happening came up not that long ago, and the same concerns were raised. Since then, they seem to have done nothing about it, and now a city has been wiped from the map, Biblical-style. Between leaders who do nothing and people who refuse to do what they're told when its for their own safety... Well, its tragic. I wish life lessons didn't have to come so hard, but it sure seems like we don't get them sometimes unless they are.

[boybill]

Sometimes people do not have the means for an evacuation.... take for instance a family who has no car (they rely on public transportation). That also means they probably (but not necessarily) have no disposable income to purchase bus/plane/train tickets with raised prices because of sudden demand. Now this family probably wants to get out, but how... and to where? They have no money to stay in a hotel, and at first emergency shelters only open in the towns affected (not to smart on the part of leaders, but you already covered that). I get what you’re saying about the idiots who have the means and choose out of stupidity and stubbornness to stay. But in a place like New Orleans, having spent a little time there, there is a large population of people with little or no means, even with the several days notice they had, there were likely tens of thousands of people who had no where to go, and no way to get there. If my parents lived in New Orleans, I am certain they would be stuck in the Dome.

[bio]

Here is a compliation of interesting editiorials about the situation.

In early 2001, experts with the Federal Emergency Management Agency set out to rank the likeliest, most catastrophic disasters facing America. According to the Houston Chronicle, they were a terrorist attack in New York, a major earthquake in San Francisco and a major hurricane in New Orleans.

In this case, two out of three is bad.

[bio]

They have some interesting satatlie photos (before and after) of the affected areas over at Digital Globe.

I also saw some video today of the stadium before the busses arrived and started driving people to texas. It looked like something you'd see in another country. No food, water, or protection for the past few days for those who followed the order to get to the stadium.

The very old and the very young started dying... it's a bad thing.

[miftah]

Boybill, I'm very aware that poor people exist. I'm a grad student in art. I know poverty, though certainly not the level that many endure in the deep south. I wasn't criticising people for not leaving if they couldn't. In fact, I can't think of a reason why anyone would. I was being critical of the civic officials who were warned but did nothing because... well if I knew why, I'd be well on my way to saving the world.

[miftah]

DOUBLEPOST! woot.

Look for the series that starts with the woman and the shopping cart. About halfway down. If you look at the pictures closely, you'll see a story get told. And its a nice one. A good thing to hear about in difference to the horror stories coming out hourly. It would be a shame if the rest of the country started losing perspective about what kind of people live in New Orleans.

I found this via this which I found via Encap. Compelling and unfiltered.

[miftah]

Answers about who was negligent of the levee situation. And some anger regarding snailfucking response time.

[ZIPPER]

No quad post for you miftah!

Do you know what would surprize me? Seeing the Oil companies make a substantial contribution to the relief efforts. It would only be fitting since this area of the country helped them make some of their $800 billion profits from last year.

All I ask of them is to turn over the profits they make from this, that should only be a couple $100 billion.

I hope talking bad about the oil companies dosen't fall under anything illegal in the Patriot Act II or we will all be going down.