BigAL

Way to turn a simple request into a political rant. Real helpful. Smokinandjokin - check out USAtoday.com. They have a photo slide show on the front page. Specifically check out photo 58 on the recovery tab. I didn't see the trash, but it's got the light coming through the holes in the dome.

Well, as I pointed out in my initial response, there are no facts to support that statement, only conjecture, anecdotes, and unconfirmed reports. But hey, feel free to jump to all the conclusions you want to believe in if it makes you feel better.

All true, but that's got nothing to do with the main premise of the article which is summed up in the last paragraph... "The welfare state—and the brutish, uncivilized mentality it sustains and encourages—is the man-made disaster that explains the moral ugliness that has swamped New Orleans. And that is the story that no one is reporting."

I think most reasonable people agree that the Federal gov't was at least 24 hours late in responding to Katrina. That's not an anecdotal story. There are plenty of facts that can be used to determine "blame". It's a fact that Mike Brown, the head of FEMA said that the Federal Gov't was unaware of the situation at the Convention Centre/Superdome 2 days after it had been on tv. How can you possibly explain or justify that? I can't explain that anymore than I can explain why Mayor Nagin did not use the city and school buses to evacuate people from New Orleans, instead of taking them to the Superdome. If you want to buy into the "Intellectual Activist's" theory, you have to know at a personal level the status of the people commiting the crimes, and how that relates to welfare. Otherwise, it's just speculation.

The article is all about assumptions. Assumptions about the people looting & committing crimes, assumptions about whether these same peolple are the ones on welfare, assumptions about the number of trouble makers. For all we know there could be 100 thugs, gang members, criminals or whatever, that have committed the bulk of the crimes and incidents referenced in the article. Until there is more than anecdotal sotries, with specific people involved, their backgrounds, and status, all you have is conjecture. Maybe this intellectual activist will follow up with some research to back up his theory.

The prisoners were not set free. Here's a link to an abcnews report with Senator Landrieu about what happened to the prisoners.

Eryn - You asked me what my thoughts were, figured you'd at least respond.

So while folks are complaining about CNN and MSNBC, you point to a CNN article for some positive news. Brilliant

I agree with you almost 100%. It starts with the NO local gov't, but someone from FEMA who worked with them during their hurricane Pam simulation should have realized that what the local gov't had was up to wasn't going to cut it. By the way, best of luck to you down there. I'm sure you will do some good.

When the mayor of NO bails, the FEMA chief has no clue as to what was going on in the Superdome, and GWB is doing photo ops for 2 days before finally doing a flyby, I'd say there was a lack of leadership.

What bias and spinning have Smith and Cooper displayed? Although I haven't watched Cooper too much, I heard they have both gotten emotional, but I don't see them spinning things to the left or to the right. Bib, you certainly come from a point of view where you believe in what the administration is trying to do, and how they've gone about doing it. So I have no idea if that will influence your perception on how the Katrina relief is going. There was a definite lack of leadership from the Mayor of NO, to the Governor, to FEMA, and ultimately to President Bush. I don't know if you are biased or unbiased enough to admit that. Hence my initial question.

I admit that I am tempted to, but the bottom line is no. I think the Local, State and Federal gov't all have failed these people regardless of what color they are. One part where I think you can question race's role is around the perception of looting. I don't know if it's true (haven't bothered to prove it one way or the other), but I do wonder if there's some truth to the media reporting black people as looters, and whites as looking for food. Is there anything really different about someone breaking into walmart, taking shoes, clothing, and food to help their family, and a doctor breaking into the pharmacy to take medicine? Both can be considered looting, but the doctor will get praised for helping people where as the other person is condemend even if all they are doing is helping their family survive. I have no sympathy for the guys taking tv's though. That is looting. I also think this is much more about class than race. If you look at the people who did stay, you have to wonder if they had any means of getting out when they called for a mandatory evacuation. To me, it's pretty sad that we have people living in that kind of poverty at all. I'm not a socialist by any means, but we are the richest nation in the world, and we have billions of dollars to help other countries, yet we still have pathetic living conditions in this country.

Apparently not. Sorry

Did I mention Geraldo? As far as Shepard goes, it is actually interesting to see Fox depart from the normal position of the Administration can do no wrong. I think it's good to see him get pissed off over what was going on down there. Geraldo on the other hand is pathetic.

Did I mention Geraldo?

What makes you think Bib's firsthand observations would be any more or less biased than Shepard Smith's or Anderson Cooper's. No offense Bib.

So it's not FEMA's job to say "hey we did this study that shows a category 3 will devastate your area, that the plans you have in place are inadequate, and you should be doing this instead?" My only point is if they new a category 3 was going to be so terrible, then surely they understood how severe things were going to get. Yes I can say that the NO Mayor and LA Governor did not do particularly good jobs either, but FEMA new what they were doing and had planned. You would think that they would be more prepared to handle things themselves considering what they knew was in place.

I'm specifically referring to FEMA's activity to get the wrod out about the dire consequences of staying based on the hypthetical scenario they ran with Hurricane PAM. If FEmA knew had bad it was going to be. They should have been telling people "if you stay, there's a good chace you'll die or be stranded for days before we can get to you" They new how poor some sections of NO are. Both FEMA and the Local autorities should have done more to bus those people out of there.

Funny, I don't see anything of that nature in FEMA's press release archives prior to the storm. FEMA Press Releases

Why in the days leading up to Katrina hitting New Orleans didn't we here from FEMA and the people that made this study warning those affected of their predictions? If they new it was going to be that bad, they had an obligation to be shouting from the rooftops before hand.

Like the people who need hope are watching Geraldo on TV.

It must be nice to live in a world where everything you say is fact, and everyone else has opinions. Enjoy it.

I put you in with "you guys" because you always seem to imply that if you disagree with the Iraq war then it's because you're either ignorant, stupid, or uninformed. How's that for an easy set up for ya?

I get the feeling you guys would be saying the same thing if we'd invaded Indonesia instead of Iraq.

See above reply.