Quote:
"step up"
Obviously you haven't seen the ghettos of the south, especially New Orleans. Most people aren't staying overnight in the Astrodome anyways, or in Reunion Arena in Dallas or in the San Antonio Convention Center.
Obviously you haven't seen the ghettos of the south, especially New Orleans. Most people aren't staying overnight in the Astrodome anyways, or in Reunion Arena in Dallas or in the San Antonio Convention Center.
Regardless of how they look, saying that, essentially, sleeping in a crowded football field was preferable over having a home that you've lived in for years, and then chuckle about "luck", is hardly a compassionate statement.
Shame on Mrs. Bush for being so callous about the situation.
I'm not so sure that the refugees in the Astrodome saw it that way. All the interviews I've seen show people who are overwhelmed by the hospitality and want to move to Houston.
Nevertheless, Barbara's words, no matter her intent, shouldn't have been spoken.
All the interviews I've seen show people who are overwhelmed by the hospitality and want to move to Houston.
I've read interviews where refugees tell stories of rape, assault and murder in the Astrodome. What have you been watching? Fox "Everything Is A-Okay In America" News?
Quote:
Regardless of how they look, saying that, essentially, sleeping in a crowded football field was preferable over having a home that you've lived in for years, and then chuckle about "luck", is hardly a compassionate statement.
I was refering to the homeless who evacuated to the Astrodome. Sleeping in a covered football field with free meals is preferable to sleeping in the street.
Quote:
I've read interviews where refugees tell stories of rape, assault and murder in the Astrodome. What have you been watching? Fox "Everything Is A-Okay In America" News?
Are you talking about the Astrodome or the Superdome?
Astrodome, though as I said in MSN, it could have been an editorial error.
I would classify that as an editorial error. It was only at the Superdome and Convention Center that had those kind of stories (mostly the Superdome).
I was refering to the homeless who evacuated to the Astrodome. Sleeping in a covered football field with free meals is preferable to sleeping in the street.
That is what you mean. But from what I have read, that is not what the President Mother meant. She meant everyone.
I recieved this forewarded message in my e-mail, it has a new more interesting perspective on the disaster, at least, in my opinion it is, and I can quite say that I agree with this perspective, and I think it's pretty self explanatory as to why:
This article is quite good and hits the nail on the head with a fresh perspective. For those of us who have watched the news coverage of the disaster in New Orleans, it was like watching something that was happening in a third world country. This article exposes the dirty underbelly of the true cost of a nanny state where excessive liberalism has sucked dry individual initiative and the ability of citizens to take personal responsibility. It is long, but is an important read to help understand what is happening on the ground in New Orleans and the political blame game that is sure to follow.
TIA Daily -- September 2, 2005
By Robert Tracinski
It has taken four long days for state and federal officials to figure out how to deal with the disaster in New Orleans. I can't blame them, because it has also taken me four long days to figure out what is going on there. The reason is that the events there make no sense if you think that we are confronting a natural disaster.
If this is just a natural disaster, the response for public officials is obvious: you bring in food, water, and doctors; you send transportation to evacuate refugees to temporary shelters; you send engineers to stop the flooding and rebuild the city's infrastructure. For journalists, natural disasters also have a familiar pattern: the heroism of ordinary people pulling together to survive; the hard work and dedication of doctors, nurses, and rescue workers; the steps being taken to clean up and rebuild.
Public officials did not expect that the first thing they would have to do is to send thousands of armed troops in armored vehicle, as if they are suppressing an enemy insurgency. And journalists--myself included--did not expect that the story would not be about rain, wind, and flooding, but about rape, murder, and looting.
But this is not a natural disaster. It is a man-made disaster.
The man-made disaster is not an inadequate or incompetent response by federal relief agencies, and it was not directly caused by Hurricane Katrina. This is where just about every newspaper and television channel has gotten the story wrong.
The man-made disaster we are now witnessing in New Orleans did not happen over the past four days. It happened over the past four decades. Hurricane Katrina merely exposed it to public view.
The man-made disaster is the welfare state.
For the past few days, I have found the news from New Orleans to be confusing. People were not behaving as you would expect them to behave in an emergency--indeed; they were not behaving as they have behaved in other emergencies. That is what has shocked so many people: they have been saying that this is not what we expect from America. In fact, it is not even what we expect from a Third World country.
When confronted with a disaster, people usually rise to the occasion. They work together to rescue people in danger, and they spontaneously organize to keep order and solve problems. This is especially true in America. We are an enterprising people, used to relying on our own initiative rather than waiting around for the government to take care of us. I have seen this a hundred times, in small examples (a small town whose main traffic light had gone out, causing ordinary citizens to get out of their cars and serve as impromptu traffic cops, directing cars through the intersection) and large ones (the spontaneous response of New Yorkers to September 11).
So what explains the chaos in New Orleans?
To give you an idea of the magnitude of what is going on, here is a description from a Washington Times story:
"Storm victims are raped and beaten; fights erupt with flying fists, knives and guns; fires are breaking out; corpses litter the streets; and police and rescue helicopters are repeatedly fired on.
"The plea from Mayor C. Ray Nagin came even as National Guardsmen poured in to restore order and stop the looting, carjackings and gunfire....
Last night, Gov. Kathleen Babineaux Blanco said 300 Iraq-hardened Arkansas National Guard members were inside New Orleans with shoot-to-kill orders.
"These troops are under my orders to restore order in the streets, she said. "They have M-16s, and they are locked and loaded. These troops know how to shoot and kill and they are more than willing to do so if necessary and I expect they will."
The reference to Iraq is eerie. The photo that accompanies this article shows National Guard troops, with rifles and armored vests, riding on an armored vehicle through trash-strewn streets lined by a rabble of squalid, listless people, one of whom appears to be yelling at them. It looks exactly like a scene from Sadr City in Baghdad.
What explains bands of thugs using a natural disaster as an excuse for an orgy of looting, armed robbery, and rape? What causes unruly mobs to storm the very buses that have arrived to evacuate them, causing the drivers to drive away, frightened for their lives? What causes people to attack the doctors trying to treat patients at the Super Dome?
Why are people responding to natural destruction by causing further destruction? Why are they attacking the people who are trying to help them?
My wife, Sherri, figured it out first, and she figured it out on a sense-of-life level. While watching the coverage last night on Fox News Channel, she told me that she was getting a familiar feeling. She studied architecture at the Illinois Institute of Chicago, which is located in the South Side of Chicago just blocks away from the Robert Taylor Homes, one of the largest high-rise public housing projects in America. "The projects," as they were known, were infamous for uncontrollable crime and irremediable squalor. (They have since, mercifully, been demolished.)
What Sherri was getting from last night's television coverage was a whiff of the sense of life of "the projects." Then the "crawl"--the informational phrases flashed at the bottom of the screen on most news channels--gave some vital statistics to confirm this sense: 75% of the residents of New Orleans had already evacuated before the hurricane, and of the 300,000 or so who remained, a large number were from the city's public housing projects. Jack Wakeland then gave me an additional, crucial fact: early reports from CNN and Fox indicated that the city had no plan for evacuating all of the prisoners in the city's jails--so they just let many of them loose. There is no doubt a significant overlap between these two populations--that is, a large number of people in the jails used to live in the housing projects, and vice versa.
There were many decent, innocent people trapped in New Orleans when the deluge hit--but they were trapped alongside large numbers of people from two groups: criminals--and wards of the welfare state, people selected, over decades, for their lack of initiative and self-induced helplessness. The welfare wards were a mass of sheep--on whom the incompetent administration of New Orleans unleashed a pack of wolves.
All of this is related, incidentally, to the apparent incompetence of the city government, which failed to plan for a total evacuation of the city, despite the knowledge that this might be necessary. But in a city corrupted by the welfare state, the job of city officials is to ensure the flow of handouts to welfare recipients and patronage to political supporters--not to ensure a lawful, orderly evacuation in case of emergency.
No one has really reported this story, as far as I can tell. In fact, some are already actively distorting it, blaming President Bush, for example, for failing to personally ensure that the Mayor of New Orleans had drafted an adequate evacuation plan. The worst example is an execrable piece from the Toronto Globe and Mail, by a supercilious Canadian who blames the chaos on American "individualism." But the truth is precisely the opposite: the chaos was caused by a system that was the exact opposite of individualism.
What Hurricane Katrina exposed was the psychological consequences of the welfare state. What we consider "normal" behavior in an emergency is behavior that is normal for people who have values and take the responsibility to pursue and protect them. People with values respond to a disaster by fighting against it and doing whatever it takes to overcome the difficulties they face. They don't sit around and complain that the government hasn't taken care of them. They don't use the chaos of a disaster as an opportunity to prey on their fellow men.
But what about criminals and welfare parasites? Do they worry about saving their houses and property? They don't, because they don't own anything. Do they worry about what is going to happen to their businesses or how they are going to make a living? They never worried about those things before. Do they worry about crime and looting? But living off of stolen wealth is a way of life for them.
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've seen that article. Good one.
FYI, the Saints will play their home games at LSU and San Antonio's Alamodome.
**is trying to decifer what is the difference between Mau's post and Ultra's earlier one and can't find any**
**makes note to eventually puncture the idiotic notion that the U.S. is (or contains) a "welfare state"**
Red,
There are no social programs in the US? No welfare, WIC, subsidized housing, free/subsidized healthcare, foodstamps?
If it looks like a welfare state, and smells like a welfare state, and sounds like a welfare state...
Definately not as bad as East Germany was, a "Workers Paradise" where you couldn't be fired, it bred terrible work habits and that area of Germany is still paying the price of socialism. But to claim that elements of US population don't sponge off the govt. for basic necessities is simply false.
Jimro
Having social programs doesn't create a "welfare state," any more than the mere existence of "elections" make countries "republics" or "democracies" when they clearly aren't.
That's something I'll address when I get around to making a topic on the issue, which I have noted to do. However, I have school work, paid work, and 5 different websites to run to which I must attend. So don't expect the topic very soon, but I'll get around to it.
This article exposes the dirty underbelly of the true cost of a nanny state where excessive liberalism has sucked dry individual initiative and the ability of citizens to take personal responsibility.
The City of Vancouver, British Columbia is home to some of the largest social housing projects, and the only government-subsidized safe-injection drug use site in North America. Your classic "welfare society". And yet, Vancouver Urban Search And Rescue was on the ground in New Orleans before any US government help arrived. I think I just heard a toilet flushing.
There's also another component to add: the fact that New Orleans is one of the most corrupt cities in America. I believe it was called America's 'murder capitol', if I'm not mistaken.
Corruption and criminals mixed with the innocents who can't defend themselves = trouble.
And National Guard soldiers don't count? Read up on NIMS again.
www.city.vancouver.bc.ca/usar/
I think you need to flush again, or light a match or something.
Jimro
As of 2004 the "murder capital" of the US is still Chicago.
I think you need to flush again, or light a match or something.
No no, don't light a match. I had chilli for dinner; let's not take any chances here, ok?
*edges away from Cycle and Jimro*
Speaking of which, here's a new, very sad development:
Ah.
Well, New Orleans was pretty close. On the verge of rising past Chicago, actually.
And National Guard soldiers don't count? Read up on NIMS again.
Sorry, I meant to say VUSAR was in certain parts of NO long before the National Guard -- which is pretty good considering it's such a small team.
FYI, FEMA had activated 18 US&R (Urban Search & Rescue) teams in preparation for Katrina. 7 of them were in the region by Saturday...August 27th.
I can't help but get annoyed that some people are bringing the race card into the equation. Natural disaster, oh noez!! Let's whip out the race card! We're being opressed by all these white people!
Maybe they are. You never know with governments.
What annoys me is that Bush is pulling out the politics card, "Wow for me! I handle a disaster great!"
Yeah, we all saw how you handled 9/11. And the war in Iraq. And now we're seeing how you're handling Hurricaine Katrina, with your self-endorsing photoshoots and frequent holidays.
Quote:
As of 2004 the "murder capital" of the US is still Chicago.
Actually it is Detroit, and yeah it came up in Current Events my firt year of High School and I recall the teacher backing his point fully.
And I seriousily doubt Chicago is more murder-ridden then Detroit.
I can't help but get annoyed that some people are bringing the race card into the equation.
The fact that almost all of the people who were stuffed into a stadium full of feces and dead bodies were black gives people fairly good reason to think about possible racial prejudices.
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What annoys me is that Bush is pulling out the politics card, "Wow for me! I handle a disaster great!"
Technically, the local government did that first. Also, Bush has also decided to take the fall and claim all responsibility for any failure on the federal government's part to respond to Katrina.
Quote:
The fact that almost all of the people who were stuffed into a stadium full of feces and dead bodies were black gives people fairly good reason to think about possible racial prejudices.
When over 70% of New Orleans is black (and that most of those who are poor in NO ARE black), it's hard to yell racism when it turns out there are mostly blacks, don't you think?
Also, it seems that a lot of people think the federal government was 'slow' in responding to Katrina.
The first post of the thread shows a timeline of the Katrina events, complete with sources.
Also, in case everyone's complaining about FEMA's 'slow' reaction (even though they were preparing well before Katrina hit), take a look. How does three weeks sound to you?
EDIT: For once, I have good news!
New Orleans Airport and Ports Open?
The headline speaks of the death toll, but scroll down a bit and you'll see some positive news.
Also, I just saved a bunch of money on my car insurance by switching to Geico! (shot)
I think elements of class and poverty had alot more to do with the slow response than race. While race and gender often intersect to determine a person's economic status, like Ultra said, over 70% of New Orleans is black so it makes sense that alot of the refugees on TV are black. Most of the white inhabitants of the city were in suburbs and generally held higher economic status, so they had the money to evacuate. The city should have better prepared to handle it's large number of inhabitants living below the poverty line. It's inexcusable that they did not use their public transportation to evacuate the projects.
Quote:
What annoys me is that Bush is pulling out the politics card, "Wow for me! I handle a disaster great!"
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------Technically, the local government did that first. Also, Bush has also decided to take the fall and claim all responsibility for any failure on the federal government's part to respond to Katrina.
Yes, although it was delayed I'm glad that Bush admitted his share of the responsibility to the nation.
Quote:
Also, in case everyone's complaining about FEMA's 'slow' reaction (even though they were preparing well before Katrina hit), take a look. How does three weeks sound to you?
The problem to me isn't the fact that there wasn't an adequate plan of action, the problem was that the FEMA director was a lawyer. In an emergency situation decisions have to be made. There is not time to consider every possible legal consequence of action. He meandered way too much after the initial devestation with trying to determine who was to blame for the lack of action, instead of taking action himself with FEMA. Now that his qualifications are being criticized, I can see why he might not have had the right training to handle federal disasters. The newly instated FEMA director has a 30 year history as a firefigher, which I think will be beneficial in future emergency situations.
The problem to me isn't the fact that there wasn't an adequate plan of action, the problem was that the FEMA director was a lawyer. In an emergency situation decisions have to be made. There is not time to consider every possible legal consequence of action. He meandered way too much after the initial devestation with trying to determine who was to blame for the lack of action, instead of taking action himself with FEMA. Now that his qualifications are being criticized, I can see why he might not have had the right training to handle federal disasters. The newly instated FEMA director has a 30 year history as a firefigher, which I think will be beneficial in future emergency situations.
Read up on NIMS, read up on Posse Commitatus, heck read this. NO had a FEMA approved evac plan that used city transit busses and school busses to evac those who couldn't evac themselves. Why did the plan fail?
www.chronwatch.com/conten...?aid=16626
Was President Bush Forced to Use the Insurrection Act?
Written by Barbara J. Stock
Tuesday, September 06, 2005
Hurricanes do not sneak up on people. Unlike tornadoes, hurricanes dont just reach down out of the dark storm clouds to wreak havoc on humanity. Hurricanes are tracked, named, have warning flags dedicated to them, and all coastal cities have long-standing plans for dealing with them. Nearly everyone in the world knew Katrina was going to hit Louisiana, Mississippi, and Alabama, and yet so many have died in New Orleans. Why?
Hurricane Katrina struck the tip of southern Florida as a category 1 hurricane and made a beeline for the warm waters of the Gulf of Mexico. For three days Katrina churned her way across the Gulf, growing in size and strength until it was a monster storm. With sustained winds of over 175 mph, Katrina bore down on the city of New Orleans. Literally, at the last possible moment, Katrina was pushed, ever-so-slightly, by dry air from the Midwest, off to the East and dropped from a category 5 to a high category 4 with sustained winds of 150 mph. Katrina was still a killer storm by anyones description. For three long days, the governor of Louisiana and the mayor of New Orleans watched Katrina bear down on their state and city respectively but took very little action to protect their citizens other than to state the obvious: Leave town. No assistance was offered to the poor or elderly.
Aerial views of New Orleans have shown pictures of hundreds of buses, left parked and unused. Why didnt the mayor of New Orleans activate those buses to move the people out of the city those who wanted to leave but had no way out? Why was this golden opportunity to save lives left parked, only to be lost to the floodwaters? This from the Louisiana disaster plan, pg. 13, paragraph 5, dated 01/00: The primary means of hurricane evacuation will be personal vehicles. School and municipal buses, government-owned vehicles and vehicles provided by volunteer agencies may be used to provide transportation for individuals who lack transportation and require assistance in evacuating'... Why was the citys own disaster plan for using those buses to evacuate people not implemented? Governor Blanco and Mayor Nagin had three days to evacuate the poor and elderly from New Orleans but they did not. Why?
While the governors of both Mississippi and Alabama put in a formal request for federal assistance before Katrina even made landfall, the governor of Louisiana refused to relinquish any of her power for the good of the people. Now she and her party point the finger of blame at the White House.
Liberal blogs and websites are pointing to the Department of Homeland Securitys website which states that it can take control in any disaster, natural or otherwise, but this is not true. The Department of Homeland Security can only work with the state and local officials in organizing relief efforts such as food, water, and shelter. There is no military arm of the Department of Homeland Security or the Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA), and the military is what was needed and everyone knew that.
Instead of asking why the Democratic leaders of Louisiana failed the people, these sites post disgusting pictures of floating bodies with the message: George Bush did nothing. The truth is, the Democratic governor wouldnt allow Bush to do anything. That floating body belongs to Governor Blanco. She is the one who did nothing.
Roving bands of violent criminals quickly took control of the streets. While Mayor Nagin did declare martial law, it was a toothless declaration. The New Orleans police department was instantly overwhelmed. Many policemen just threw up their hands and walked off the job. Some joined the looters and were videotaped by MSNBC shopping in the local Walmart. The handful that was left on the job did their best but the best they could do was try to stay alive in a now lawless and dying city.
Because there was no one in charge, the initial rescue operations were feeble at best and there was chaos. The scope and magnitude of the disaster, which covers an area the size of Great Britain, still had not been realized by Governor Blanco who steadfastly refused to declare martial law and officially request that the federal government send in the troops.
It has come to light that all during the night on Friday, September 2, the president of the United States was forced to negotiate with Governor Blanco for the lives of the suffering and dying people of New Orleans. She feared that allowing the federal government to take control would make her administration appear as though it had failed. How she would be judged was more important to her than the lives of those people who were dying in the squalor. How many died as Blanco maneuvered to protect her reputation?
The Posse Comitatus Act prevents, by federal law, the president of the United States from sending federal troops into any state without the direct request of the elected governor of that state. A frustrated President Bush could only stand by and watch as the horror unfolded until he received the request for help. Despite the finger-pointing at President Bush, there was little that he could do until he was formally asked for assistance. No matter how loudly the liberals scream, they know full well that the president was helpless to do much of anything.
As the death toll rose and the animalistic behavior of some of those who chose to remain within the city became public knowledge, it was obvious that authorities needed to regain control. As the scenes from New Orleans, now a national disgrace, were being beamed around the world, a shameless Governor Blanco only cared about her own political image.
There is reason to believe that President Bush, running out of patience with Blanco by Saturday morning, used the only option that remained to him. It is being reported that Bush went around Blanco and utilized the Insurrection Act to federalize the National Guard and send in active military troops to take over the rescue and put down the lawlessness that had taken over New Orleans. The forces that Bush had poised to move into the city, swung into action. It was no accident that the major, organized rescues began when the sun came up on Saturday morning. At 6:30 AM, when the sky over New Orleans was suddenly filled with military helicopters and military convoys poured into the streets, they were there because of President Bush, not Governor Blanco.
The largest military evacuation the world has ever seen moved with the precision and efficiency that is only seen within the military. With men like Lt. General Russel Honore, 1st Army Commander and Army Brigadier General Mark Graham in charge, law and order was quickly restored, and an endless line of helicopters and boats began removing the stranded people and taking them out of the hell-hole called New Orleans. Those forces were ready to act because the President of the United States had positioned them to be ready.
Everyone demands answers and everyone wants to put the blame for this catastrophe on someone. The most convenient person to blame is President Bush. In truth, he is the least responsible on the local level. While the liberals feel this is the perfect time to make political hay because so many African-Americans are involved, the first line of defense for those people, the mayor of New Orleans, and governor of Louisiana, both Democrats, are the leaders that failed them. The people of New Orleans were abandoned by an arrogant governor and a hapless mayor as both struggled to save their own political careers. But, because they are both Democrats, the leftists want these ineffective leaders seen as helpless victims of a thoughtless and racist Bush who ignored their repeated pleas for help.
Mayor Nagin has been reduced to babbling about how the CIA is out to kill him because he spoke his mind, and Governor Blanco has become the invisible woman hoping that no one will notice that her gross incompetence and arrogance cost lives. But the left marches on, blaming President Bush because it knows it can. Most Americans are not aware of the laws preventing the federal government from taking over a city or a state.
The Democrats have closed ranks around their incompetent members and blame the president who was forced to deal with an inept governor. Governor Blancos thanks is to point the finger of blame back at the president when she knows the fault is her own.
The Democratic Party could not possibly sink much lower than it has this past week. The mayor, the governor, and all those liberal websites, blogs, and shrieking leftist politicians should jump into the sewer water that now flows in the streets of New Orleans. Thats where they belong, with the rest of the floating waste. The Democratic or Progressive Party should be buried with the dead. Cause of death: Gross incompetence, asphyxiation from lies, and the failure to accept responsibility for the deaths of thousands of American citizens because power meant more to them than lives.
######
Jimro
Do I have to lock this topic and FORCE you all into Marble Garden?
BTW this statement...
Quote:
While the governors of both Mississippi and Alabama put in a formal request for federal assistance before Katrina even made landfall, the governor of Louisiana refused to relinquish any of her power for the good of the people.
...is really misleading. Blanco put in a formal request for federal assistance days before Katrina hit. So that admission is glaring. The only relinquishing issue came long after Katrina had hit and was when Nagin among other leaders of neighboring parishes that were also underwater (which for some reason is not being covered much at all) were all complaining to Bush on the Friday he came to visit.
While there are plenty of issues in all the editorials people keep erroneously posting in this topic (go to Marble Garden and create another topic as I hinted at earlier if you want to discuss societal issues, who caused what, etc.), when people don't editorialize from the same set of obviously verifiable general information, it is annoying.
A Marble Garden topic has been started.
There.
And one last thing...
Quote:
Blanco put in a formal request for federal assistance days before Katrina hit.
But she didn't specify what kind of assistance she needed. Plus, she told Bush to wait 24 hours so she could determine what assistance she would need.
Just as an aside, remember the 2003 heatwave that hit Europe?
news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world...091244.stm
French death report points finger
Thousands died across Europe
Poor communication and the absence of doctors on August leave were among the factors behind France's heatwave tragedy, an official report has found.
The 35-hour week also contributed, says the inquiry, set up to examine why more than 11,400 people died.
The report describes what happened as a "health catastrophe".
It found that health authorities were not fully aware of the unfolding crisis on the ground.
Many of the dead were elderly people, unable to cope as temperatures soared to 40C (104F).
       
ESTIMATED DEAD
France - 11,400
Netherlands - 1,400
Portugal - 1,300
UK - 900
Spain - 100
The inquiry was set up by Health Minister Jean-Francois Mattei after the government was criticised for its slow response to the crisis.
Information on the scale of the crisis was not pooled because the health ministry, other government departments and workers on the ground were so compartmentalised, the report says.
The August leave system - which also meant the cabinet was absent as the crisis took hold - comes in for strong criticism.
The mass departure of doctors on holiday had a severe impact on the working of the emergency system, it says.
Lorries used as mortuaries
Lorries were used as overflow mortuaries
It suggests better organisation of the healthcare system, liaison between weather services, hospitals and those caring for the elderly, and better provision of beds for elderly patients.
"An adequate alert, watch and information system would have allowed those involved to act more quickly in implementing measures to adapt the health care system, " said the report.
France's surgeon-general resigned last month after ministers publicly blamed his department for failing to alert them to the crisis.
On Monday, officials in the Netherlands said as many as 1,400 Dutch people died in the heatwave between June and August.
The total is up on an earlier Dutch official estimate that between 500 and 1,000 people died.
In August - the peak of the extreme heat - temperatures repeatedly topped 30C, in a country where the average would normally have been 22C (72F).
######
So far the US dead from Katrina sits at 710
www.kplctv.com/Global/sto...v=0nqxeYQ0
Jimro
It's not possible that thousands died. Besides, a whole bunch of people from New Orleans came to the "Astrodome" in Houston. They continued going there. Right now, some homes and other places in New Orleans are built and 44% of people that came from New Orleans to Houston want to go back to New Orleans.
I think more died waiting to be rescued than from the actual storm. Whoever deserves the blame should really get the blame for those poor souls.
I know it's flawed and mine but it's my opinion. Deal with it.
In other news, Hurricane Rita.
Mother Nature is sure having a lollercaust this summer.
You also forgot her Shakespearean (from Othello) sister Ophelia.
It came to visit South Carolina the last few days.
We'll see how Rita moves once it's in the Gulf...hopefully it'll miss Louisiana but after last year when Florida got hit 4 times, I'd stay away from New Orleans.
Katrina was a strong category 4 by landfall.
And Katrina passed by over three weeks ago. >.>
I think he means Rita...
There's another topic for it. >.>
About of a 5th of the population of New Orleans didn't have cars, and certainly not everyone has enough money to drive out someplace and crash in a hotel for who knows how long. They're saying it'll take weeks to get the water out. Plus, evacuation means you must leave your home while it gets destroyed in a natural disaster--not everybody can emotionally comprehend that.
Well, I just felt the effects of this storm last night. I waited all afternoon for the NWS to issue a tornado watch, and the eventually did. There was a touchdown in Faquier county (near a town called "Marshall", hehe), but that was it. I never got issued a warning, though I did expect one from the same cell that went through Faquier.
I live in a suburb just south of Washington, DC. When a hurricane takes the path of where it travels west up the coast, brushes North Carolina and Virginia, the most I have to worry about is flooding and power outtages. One of my taped epsiodes of Sonic X has local hurricane relief information scrolling across the top.
