Axiom Home Page Forums General Discussion The Water Cooler OT: Katrina and World Support?

Peter, you made a declarative IN your link (and often do), which took us to the "proof".

And don't you think actually getting the truth from a reliable source such as actually listening to the whole interview with Mrs. Bush and former President Clinton (and others) would be a more reasonable approach ?

I could link about 200 right wing whack job sites to counter your 200 left wing whack job sites. However, even though I am a conservative, I think the right wing whack jobs are just that ... NUTS. They are driven by the same hatred as are the left wing sites to which you refer. They just hate different people.

Ok ... Time for some levity mixed with Irony. Picture this: Peter comes back with a link which describes why posting a link is an acceptable debate style ...

biased conclusion jumping

craigsub is personally responsible for all the damage in New Orleans, but you don't have to take my word for it. This website lays it all out for you.

OK, that makes more sense. I was starting to lose the picture for a while.

If you follow pmbuko's link to "kittenwars" things start to get confusing again.

I hear they have good chili and beer in Houston.

Has anyone's personal beliefs been changed by all of this? If not, how about we stop all the hate and discontent and get back to talking about geeky things like speakers and electronics. Huh?

Ash ...

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However, even though I am a conservative, I think the right wing whack jobs are just that ... NUTS. They are driven by the same hatred as are the left wing sites to which you refer. They just hate different people.

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Because noone REALLY thought this tragedy was going to occur. It is easy to look back with "we should have done .....

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Finally, if we are to be intellecually honest, There is not anyone who would have been better prepared than those people at the state, local, and federal levels than what we have today. We have never seen anything like this. ever.

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This is all I have been trying to convince people about. We had an unprecendented disaster. 90,000 square miles affected. And everyone involved in trying to help the problem is human.

Who do we blame ?

1. The mayor of New Orleans for not following his own evac plan ?

2. The mayor for leaving over 500 school buses empty ?

3. The governor for not having her National Guard in place ?

4. Private Citizens for deciding this was a party ?

5. New Orleans Police, for releasing inmates ?

6. Michael Chertoff, for being too slow ?

7. George W. Bush, for whatever reason ?

8. Bill Clinton, because he could have fixed this 8 years ago, but he was consorting with an intern ? (that was dry humor)...

Or do we realize that NOONE is to blame. It was a disaster. We need to help those who need it. We need to learn from this.

Sadly - what will happen is finger pointing, political grandstanding, and "told ya so's".

I agree completely that no one group is to blame. Having said that, the general level of "studiousness" of our governments these days is NOT at the same level it was a generation ago (and I'm not even old enough be be remembering the good old days yet).

Some of this can probably be blamed on a more ignorant, shallow electorate not choosing the candidates with demonstrated ability and willingness to tackle the hard problems, but I also think as a continent we have all become more short-sighted and replaced acceptance of hard reality with wishful thinking.

I see the same thing at a corporate level so I am not just blaming our governments here, but to say "we could not have done better" is IMO unacceptable. We do seem to have the foresight to steer just clear of the worst disasters (catastrophic failure of a nuclear plant, accidental release of man-made plagues) but we still have the capability to cause permanent damage to our environment and cause worse disasters than the levee failures in NO.

As our population grows, the population density in our cities rises and we push urban growth into more corners of the world we need smarter and tougher government to deal with the issues and avoid bigger and "badder" disasters.

We are going to have to get back to the point where government is filled with hard working geeks again rather than just lawyers and drones. Put a bunch of us in the LA and NO governments in the right places and I think the NO disaster would have been much less severe... but how many of us would consider working in government these days ?

THAT, folks, is the real problem we have to deal with.

Bridgman - You inspired me. I am waiting for a report to be sent to my office, so I took some time to research...



Hurricane Camille hits August 17, 1969. Here are some excerpts from the news of the time. :

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The morning after the storm, thousands crawled from beneath the wreckage in southern Mississippi, wandering zombie-like through the blasted landscape. *** In the first few days after the storm, normal society ceased to function. Immediately 15,000 people were homeless, there was no water, food, or fuel.*** The storm had wiped out all means of communication, and roads, bridges, airports, and even railways were impassable or destroyed. The Gulfport Hospital closed - and evacuated all 800 patients to hospitals in the center of the State. Adding to the devastated landscape, was a serious and growing vermin control problem.

Using federal troops and state police, all roads leading into the area where the eye had crossed the coast were sealed off. Military and local police imposed a curfew. The first problem to overcome was the thousands of dead farm animals, pets, and wildlife. Camille's incredible storm surge had drowned thousands of animals. Heavy equipment was brought in to bury thousands of dead cows, horses and pets. Next, insects and rodents had quickly overrun the stricken area - feeding on dead animal carcasses and rotting food. Rattlesnakes, fire ants, and rats bit dozens of victims as they sifted through the rubble. In an attempt to control fire ants, low flying spray planes roared up and down the Mississippi coast, dropping 100,000 pounds of mirex.

The state and federal government supplied thousands of bulldozers and dump trucks to cart away the twisted wreckage. Some of the debris was simply burned. What was not burned - was buried. Convoys of dump trucks continued removing debris, day after day for the rest of 1969.

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Note the words inside the *** ________*** ... Basically, the federal response back then started arriving five days after the storm had passed.

And it is amazing how humor ands up with some truth - I have actually found websites which DO blame Bill Clinton for this. I wonder if there is one which will blame either Janet Reno or Newt Gingrich ...