Do you live in New Orleans?
Posted By: you are clueless!! sm on 2009-02-06
In Reply to: No - they weren't facts....... - sm
My aunt and uncle have lived there for over 60 years... they have always paid close attention to the money given the state, always hoping the mayor of new orleans would use it to repair and strengthen that very levy they too live near......
They told us about the 60 billion dollars when it came into the hands of the mayor and there was a major uproar amoung the citizens who actually paid attention as to where that money was......why it hadn't been put on the levy!!!!
Now, of course, I don't expect the moochers to care where that money went, as long as they got their monthly check and, of course, the mayor knew they couldn't care less.
But, like I said, I do know what I'm talking about as well as those who actually care about their state. Now, unless you were at the meetings with the mayor, which they were, or know those that were, which you obviously don't, you don't know what you're talking about.
AND, he could have even used those billions to upgrade the charity hospital, which I know for a fact he was asked to do by the administration who desperately needed to upgrade the hospital, but he didn't want to do that either, even though all his federal funding comes from all the projects and their inhabitants in his jurisdiction......ya know, their hospital, the one they go to for all their medical needs?
Why are you so quick to say no, that's not true? I think I know the answer..... why bother with you.
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Any of you live in the midwest? Just in case you live down the road from me...
I live in Wisconsin and am often also in Minnesota.
No, I'm not a stalker or a weirdo (my opinion, anyway).
Yeah, tell me again how liberals want to live and let live....what a joke!!!! nm
why not just tell the truth? That only extends to liberals.*I have had it with Republicans...* a whole group of people tossed out like garbage. *I will not respond to your posts nor read them.*
As to Ann Coulter...the left has their share..Michael Moore, AL Franken...do you ever look at your own party?
That is the most INtolerant post I have seen here in a LONG time.
Liberals true colors always come out...regardless of how much they say they are the MOST tolerant, and want EVERYone to live and let live...everyone if you happen to be liberal.
We are all Americans...and America is about debate. Tell me, liberal Democrat, again how you care about ALL Americans. Talk about ringing hollow.
New Orleans
It heartbreaking what is happening to New Orleans..I visited twice and have always been fascinated with the city..It always had an eerie slant to it..Interview With The Vampire and Anne Rice fit that town so well..**sigh**..I keep flashing back to where I visited..So sad..
Is anyone else following what is going on in New Orleans?
This is just getting downright shameful. Whatever happened to the relief effort and helping people get back on their feet? Where the heck did our money go? The money grubbing venture capitalists are now succeeding in wiping out the few original residents who stayed and refused to go by demolishing their housing. These same people who stayed in their homes and made the best out of their situation for over two years are now being booted out. Smacks of ugly. I hope they choke on it.
New Orleans Snubbed
see gretawire.com
Anarchy and violence in New Orleans
Lots of news that there just isn't enough help and the whole city is breaking down. Bush has turned down planes and able-bodied assistance from Canada and Russia as well as offers from many other countries. Says we can handle it ourselves. Folks in New Orleans say FEMA is there but totally unorganized and not providing enough help. I'm thinking this is in the U.S. and it's a MESS. What kind of message are we sending to the world?
I'm getting pretty darn uptight about this whole situation.
Heck, Dubya won't even help out New Orleans
.
Yeah, its always Louisiana/New Orleans
get the attention. Oh, thats right. They are white and expected to rebuild at least part by themselves, which they have done. Not to be harsh, but when people live off the Govt in the first place, like MANY in New Orleans, they expect to live that way forever. I am afraid the entire country is headed in this direction. Obama is only making it worse. --socialism is real.
Well a hand up will not provide the people of New Orleans with sm
what they need in this time of crisis.
What are you smokin'? Do you think these people don't need emergency money now, they have lost everything.
Good grief. There are mannnny Americans who still live paycheck to paycheck and if the little they have is wiped out, they have nowhere to go. But some people don't see it that way. I call them the I got mine generation.
Rita waters flood New Orleans..sm
NEW ORLEANS (Reuters) - Fast-rising water brought by the outer edge of Hurricane Rita spilled over a freshly patched levee in New Orleans on Friday and flooded a deserted neighborhood of the already devastated city.
Water from the industrial canal, where the levee breached during Hurricane Katrina more than three weeks ago, was submerging houses in the particularly hard-hit Ninth Ward section on the city's east side.
Water also poured out from under the canal's western barrier, which faces the historic French Quarter roughly three miles away.
An official with the New Orleans Fire Department said flooding reached a mile inland west of the canal. It also reached as far north as Interstate 10, which divides the city.
The area had been nearly dried out in recent days.
Residents have not been permitted to return since Katrina hit the ward, where nearly all the small, one-story houses appeared damaged beyond repair.
Searches by rescue teams, who have been going door to door seeking storm victims, were suspended.
Water had begun to seep under the weakened levee late on Thursday, but officials said they did not expect flooding on such a scale so soon.
It's frustrating, but there ain't nothing you can do about Mother Nature, said Henry Rodriguez, president of nearby St. Bernard Parish, also heavily hit by Katrina on August 29.
He said he had driven through the area and saw floodwaters reaching 10 blocks from the levee.
We were hoping this wouldn't happen, but with Rita knocking at our door, we're stuck with this, said Mark Heimann, a spokesman for the Federal Emergency Management Agency.
He said he was not aware of any levee breaches elsewhere in the city, emptied of most of its 450,000 residents by Katrina.
© Reuters 2005. All Rights Reserved.
Check your own timeline. He was not flying over New Orleans...
when the levee breached. He was on the ground in Arizona. The corps of engineers had been telling New Orleans and the state of LA that the levees would not hold in a bad storm, but they chose to spend the money elsewhere.
Let's be real here. The whole city is below sea level. As engineers have said even since Katrina, in a huge storm like Katrina and gustav, they might not hold. Nothing Bush can do about that.
That is a ridiculous, mean statement. I repeat...if Obama had been present, he would have been going about his usual day as President also, expecting people to do their jobs. And if he suggests otherwise, I would be the first to call him a liar.
The hurricane is what killed people. George Bush did not kill people.
If he had been a Democratic president, would you be saying this? Of course you wouldn't, you would be defending him right down the line.
That is the difference between you a hard line party follower, and me, an independent not beholden to ANY party. I would be defending that President no matter WHAT party he was in. THe people he trusted to do the job failed him. The state and local authorities failed their constituents.
And bottom line...it was the hurricane that killed people and destroyed property. Not George Bush. Just like it will be the hurricane this time, but EVERYONE learned from the last one, including state and local authorities, and the Republican governor of Louisianna has done an outstanding job in moving that along. Former Dem Governor Blanco is no longer in politics. Wonder why that is.
That being said...it was no one person's fault. All can share some of the blame.
But don't see you attacking anyone but George Bush.
Wonder why THAT is?
Bush is not responsible for New Orleans' plight
Their wonderful mayor is and he loves it and still loves it. Bush didn't cause Katrina; sorry but you obviusly needed to hear that. Bush didn't cause all those folks to be standing around screaming for the government to help them. Now, on the other hand, their previous mayor WAS DIRECTLY RESPONSIBLE for much of the disaster that took place afterwards and before. Why didn't he fix the levy with the 60 million dollars he was given years ago? Why isn't the citizens of New Orleans having a pissfit over that? I'll tell you why........because he's a black mayor. Bush had nothing to do with their situation, just like Obama would have had nothing to do wiht their situation. Mayor Ray Negan had LOTS to do with it. The only reason he wants everyone to come back and live there is because the more moochers living there, the more federal money, i.e., MY MONEY and YOURS, he will receive to once again squander away just like he has done for years.
They needed a new charity hospital; he could have built several with all the billions he has received but he didn't. Didn't hear any of those poor folks yelling about that did ya? No! They go for the white guy in power, which was Bush. Now, if that had been Obama, you would not have heard all the screaming and preaching about the big bad President.
On the other hand, the ones really hit hard by Katrina, the gulf coast of Mississippi, where was all their help? Why weren't they standing in the streets blaming the president for their plight? Because they were folks who worked for a living and never thought for a minute a human being cause a hurricane! They got up and got to work clearing and doing what they could until help came, which by the way should have been them first but it was those screaming in the streets down in New Orleans. Katrina hit the Mississippi gulf coast the hardest, a direct blow!
Water Rising in New Orleans....Get your tissues. OMG Katrina.
Rescuers Race to Save Katrina Victims |
Tuesday, August 30, 2005 
NEW ORLEANS — Rescuers along the hurricane-ravaged Gulf Coast pushed aside the dead to reach the living Tuesday in a race against time and rising waters, while New Orleans sank deeper into crisis and Louisiana's governor ordered storm refugees out of this drowning city.
As looters stripped stores of items, sometimes in front of police, violence broke out in the Big Easy. At around 11 p.m. EDT, two gunmen with AK-47s fired shots into a police station. No one was hurt, and the men fled into the city's French quarter section.
Meanwhile, two levees broke and sent water coursing into the streets of New Orleans a full day after the city appeared to have escaped widespread destruction from Hurricane Katrina. An estimated 80 percent of the below-sea-level city was under water, up to 20 feet deep in places, with miles and miles of homes swamped.
The situation is untenable, Gov. Kathleen Blanco said. It's just heartbreaking.
One Mississippi county alone said its death toll was at least 100, and officials are very, very worried that this is going to go a lot higher, said Joe Spraggins, civil defense director for Harrison County, home to Biloxi and Gulfport.
Several victims in the county were from a beachfront apartment building that collapsed under a 25-foot wall of water as Katrina slammed the Gulf Coast with 145-mph winds. And Louisiana officials said many were feared dead there, too, making Katrina one of the most punishing storms to hit the United States in decades.
After touring the destruction by air, Mississippi Gov. Haley Barbour said it is not of case of homes being severely damaged, they're simply not there. ... I can only imagine that this is what Hiroshima looked like 60 years ago.
New Orleans Mayor Ray Nagin said hundreds, if not thousands, of people may still be stuck on roofs and in attics, and so rescue boats were bypassing the dead.
We're not even dealing with dead bodies, Nagin said. They're just pushing them on the side.
The flooding in New Orleans grew worse by the minute, prompting the evacuation of hotels and hospitals and an audacious plan to drop huge sandbags from helicopters to close up one of the breached levees. At the same time, looting broke out in some neighborhoods, the sweltering city of 480,000 had no drinkable water, and the electricity could be out for weeks.
With water rising perilously inside the Superdome, Blanco said the tens of thousands of refugees now huddled there and other shelters in New Orleans would have to be evacuated.
She asked residents to spend Wednesday in prayer.
That would be the best thing to calm our spirits and thank our Lord that we are survivors, she said. Slowly, gradually, we will recover; we will survive; we will rebuild.
A helicopter view of the devastation over the New Orleans area revealed people standing on black rooftops baking in the sunshine while waiting for rescue boats. A row of desperately needed ambulances were lined up on the interstate, water blocking their path. Roller coasters jutted out from the water at a Six Flags amusement park. Hundreds of inmates were seen standing on a highway because the prison had been flooded.
Sen. Mary Landrieu (news, bio, voting record) quietly traced the sign of the cross across her head and chest as she looked out at St. Bernard Parish, where only roofs peaked out from the water.
The whole parish is gone, Landrieu said.
All day long, rescuers in boats and helicopters pulled out shellshocked and bedraggled flood refugees from rooftops and attics. Lt. Gov. Mitch Landrieu said that 3,000 people have been rescued by boat and air, some placed shivering and wet into helicopter baskets. They were brought by the truckload into shelters, some in wheelchairs and some carrying babies, with stories of survival and of those who didn't make it.
Oh my God, it was hell, said Kioka Williams, who had to hack through the ceiling of the beauty shop where she worked as floodwaters rose in New Orleans' low-lying Ninth Ward. We were screaming, hollering, flashing lights. It was complete chaos.
Frank Mills was in a boarding house in the same neighborhood when water started swirling up toward the ceiling and he fled to the roof. Two elderly residents never made it out, and a third was washed away trying to climb onto the roof.
He was kind of on the edge of the roof, catching his breath, Mills said. Next thing I knew, he came floating past me.
Across Louisiana, Mississippi and Alabama, more than 1 million residents remained without electricity, some without clean drinking water. An untold number who heeded evacuation orders were displaced and 40,000 were in Red Cross shelters, with officials saying it could be weeks, if not months, before most will be able to return.
Emergency medical teams from across the country were sent into the region and President Bush cut short his Texas vacation Tuesday to return to Washington to focus on the storm damage.
Federal Emergency Management Agency director Mike Brown warned that structural damage to homes, diseases from animal carcasses and chemicals in floodwaters made it unsafe for residents to come home anytime soon. And a mass return also was discouraged to keep from interfering with rescue and recovery efforts.
That was made tough enough by the vast expanse of floodwaters in coastal areas that took an eight-hour pounding from Katrina's howling winds and up to 15 inches of rainfall. From the air, neighborhood after neighborhood looked like nothing but islands of rooftops surrounded by swirling, tea-colored water.
In New Orleans, the flooding actually got worse Tuesday. Failed pumps and levees apparently spilled water from Lake Pontchartrain into streets. The rising water forced hotels to evacuate, led a hospital to boatlift patients to emergency shelters, and drove the staff of New Orleans' Times-Picayune newspaper out of its offices.
Officials planned to use helicopters to drop 3,000-pound sandbags and dozens of giant concrete barriers into the breach, and expressed confidence the problem could be solved. But if the water rose a couple feet higher, it could wipe out water system for whole city, said New Orleans' homeland security chief Terry Ebbert.
A clearer picture of the destruction in Alabama became to emerge Tuesday: cement slabs where homes once stood, a 100-foot shrimp boat smoldering on its side, people searching for swept-away keepsakes. The damage in some areas appears to be worse than last year's Hurricane Ivan.
In devastated Biloxi, Miss., areas that were not underwater were littered with tree trunks, downed power lines and chunks of broken concrete. Some buildings were flattened.
The string of floating barge casinos crucial to the coastal economy were a shambles. At least three of them were picked up by the storm surge and carried inland, their barnacle-covered hulls sitting up to 200 yards inland.
One of the deadliest spots appeared to be Biloxi's Quiet Water Beach apartments, where authorities estimated 30 people were washed away, although the exact toll was unknown. All that was left of the red-brick building was a concrete slab.
We grabbed a lady and pulled her out the window and then we swam with the current, 55-year-old Joy Schovest said through tears. It was terrifying. You should have seen the cars floating around us. We had to push them away when we were trying to swim.
Said Biloxi Mayor A. J. Holloway: This is our tsunami.
Looting became a problem in both Biloxi and in New Orleans, in some cases in full view of police and National Guardsmen. One police officer was shot in the head by a looter in New Orleans, but was expected to recover, Sgt. Paul Accardo, a police spokesman.
On New Orleans' Canal Street, which actually resembled a canal, dozens of looters ripped open the steel gates on clothing and jewelry stores, some packing plastic garbage cans with loot to float down the street. One man, who had about 10 pairs of jeans draped over his left arm, was asked if he was salvaging things from his store.
No, the man shouted, that's EVERYBODY'S store!
Looters at a Wal-Mart brazenly loaded up shopping carts with items including micorwaves, coolers and knife sets. Others walked out of a sporting goods store on Canal Street with armfuls of shoes and football jerseys.
Outside the broken shells of Biloxi's casinos, people picked through slot machines to see if they still contained coins and ransacked other businesses.
People are just casually walking in and filling up garbage bags and walking off like they're Santa Claus, said Marty Desei, owner of a Super 8 motel.
Insurance experts estimated the storm will result in up to $25 billion in insured losses. That means Katrina could prove more costly than record-setting Hurricane Andrew in 1992, which caused an inflation-adjusted $21 billion in losses.
Oil prices jumped by more than $3 a barrel on Tuesday, climbing above $70 a barrel, amid uncertainty about the extent of the damage to the Gulf region's refineries and drilling platforms.
By midday Tuesday, Katrina was downgraded to a tropical depression, with winds around 35 mph. It was moving northeast through Tennessee at around 21 mph, with the potential to dump 8 inches of rain and spin off deadly tornadoes.
Katrina left 11 people dead in its soggy jog across South Florida last week, as a much weaker storm. |
I bet that New Orleans, Biloxi and everyplace else could sure use some National Guard help right now
Bush is not busy with this hurricaine. He is biking in Idaho or Montona or somewhere after giving a speech to the VFW about how we have to stay in Iraq to honor those killed in Iraq. But wouldn't it be really really helpful if the National Guard was in Mississippi, Louisiana and Alabama instead of Iraq being killed to honor those already killed. Another thing, if he talked to Sheehan or this soldier, he would have to talk to ALL of them, God forbid.
Dennis Hastert Questions Rebuilding New Orleans
Wouldn't it be nice if precautions could be taken to build this city correctly to prevent another tragedy? Nah.... Bush won't go for that. Killing people in Iraq is more important.
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2005/09/01/AR2005090101482_pf.html
Hastert Questions Rebuilding New Orleans
The Associated Press
Thursday, September 1, 2005; 5:04 PM
WASHINGTON -- It makes no sense to spend billions of dollars to rebuild a city that's seven feet under sea level, House Speaker Dennis Hastert said of federal assistance for hurricane-devastated New Orleans.
It looks like a lot of that place could be bulldozed, the Illinois Republican said in an interview Wednesday with The Daily Herald of Arlington, Ill.
Hastert, in a transcript supplied by the newspaper, said there was no question that the people of New Orleans would rebuild their city, but noted that federal insurance and other federal aid was involved. We ought to take a second look at it. But you know we build Los Angeles and San Francisco on top of earthquake fissures and they rebuild too. Stubbornness.
Hastert's press secretary, Ron Bonjean, said Hastert was not suggesting New Orleans should be abandoned or relocated. The speaker believes that we should have a discussion about how best to rebuild New Orleans so as to protect its citizens, he said. What he is saying is that rebuilding the city in the same way is not sensible.
There are some real tough questions to ask, Hastert said in the interview. How do you go about rebuilding this city? What precautions do you take?
Hastert announced Thursday that the House, currently at the end of its summer break, would return for an emergency session Friday to approve some $10 billion in federal aid for hurricane victims.
In the wake of this disaster, the people of Louisiana, Mississippi, Alabama and Florida should know that the United States Congress stands ready to help them in their time of need, he said in a joint statement with Senate Majority Leader Bill Frist, R-Tenn.
New Orleans collects dead as officials dodge blame
By Mark Egan
NEW ORLEANS (Reuters) - New Orleans began the gruesome task of collecting its thousands of dead on Sunday as the Bush administration tried to save face after its botched rescue plans left the city at the mercy of Hurricane Katrina.
Except for rescue workers and scattered groups of people, streets in the once-vibrant capital of jazz and good times were all but abandoned after a mass exodus of hundreds of thousands of refugees into neighboring Texas and other states.
Battered and sickened survivors made no attempt to disguise their anger: We have been abandoned by our own country, Aaron Broussard, president of Jefferson Parish, just south of New Orleans, told NBC's Meet the Press.
It's not just Katrina that caused all these deaths in New Orleans, Broussard said. Bureaucracy has committed murder here in the greater New Orleans area, and bureaucracy has to stand trial before Congress now.
After a nightmare confluence of natural disaster and political ineptitude that al Qaeda-linked Web sites called evidence of the wrath of God striking America, National Guard troops and U.S. marshals patrolled the city, stricken in the days after the hurricane by anarchic violence and looting.
Local and federal officials said they expected to find thousands of corpses still floating in flood waters or locked inside homes and buildings destroyed by the devastating storm that struck the U.S. Gulf coast last Monday.
When we remove the water from New Orleans, we're going to uncover people who died hiding in houses, who got caught by the flood. People whose remains will be found in the street, U.S. Homeland Security Secretary Michael Chertoff told Fox News.
AS UGLY AS YOU CAN IMAGINE
There'll be pollution. It is going to be about as ugly a scene as you can imagine.
Later, Chertoff flew into New Orleans and said the search for storm victims would be arduous. Let me be clear: we're going to have to go house to house in this city, he said. This is not going to happen overnight.
President George W. Bush, who in a rare admission of error, conceded on Friday that the results of his administration's relief efforts were unacceptable, said on Saturday he would send 7,200 more active-duty troops over three days. Continued ...
© Reuters 2005. All Rights Reserved.
See link for entire article.
NOTES FROM NEW ORLEANS: A Hard Head Makes A Soft Behind...sm
NOTES FROM NEW ORLEANS: A Hard Head Makes A Soft Behind
By Deborah Cotton
By now, you’ve heard the election results – Mayor Nagin against Lieutenant Governor Mitch Landrieu in the run-off, the mayor coming away with the a large number of the Black vote, including those of my Black friends who swore they were done with him. As one brother later told me, “At the end of the day, I had to go with my own.”
Forcing the issue of having a Black mayor for New Orleans, even when all his actions demonstrate an inability or unwillingness to make issues important to the Black community a priority, in the hopes that it will help us reclaim our ‘Chocolate City’, strikes me as, well…hard-headed.
I went to the Sheraton Election Night to cover Nagin’s speech. The room was filled with nothing but Black faces, so shocking considering just two months ago, you couldn’t hardly find a Black person with a New Orleans driver’s license who had anything nice to say about our Mayor’s on-the-job performance. I looked into those faces, faces of friends and people I’d met out at rallies and neighborhood planning meetings, all of whom openly discussed their dissatisfaction with the current leadership. But this mayor’s race was no longer about the future of New Orleans. This race has become about race.
At Nagin’s Election Night party, there was a distinct feeling of Black people welcoming the prodigal son back home, of redemption of the husband who strayed. Once it was clear his White majority supporters were backing anyone but him, he started out on the ‘Back To Africa’ tour so many of our prodigal sons and daughters have performed in – OJ Simpson, Mariah, Vanessa…and was successful in securing a large number of Black votes. There were literally tears in the eyes of many of the women there, cracked voices calling out “We love you!” “Speak your truth!” They loved that he said “Chocolate City” and pissed White people off.
The room was electric and his speech had some profound moments. But then… the classic Nagin kicked in and he said something that fell like a bad note in his otherwise melodic song.
“This economic pie is getting ready to explode. And it will be shared equally. I want the community to get more comfortable with the Ray Nagin type. The Joe Canizaro type...”
Smiles and tears froze.
Joe Canizaro is a local land developer and one of President Bush’s biggest campaign contributors. When Nagin tapped his choices for the ‘Bring Back New Orleans’ advisory panel that would create a rebuilding plan for New Orleans, he followed Canizaro’s advice and stepped over local talent and intelligentsia and hired consultants from Los Angeles called the ‘Urban Planning Institute’, of which Canizaro was a long time board member. Many New Orleanians were upset they had so little representation on the BNOB panel. And the ones that were included on the panel, like City Council President Oliver Thomas, voiced frustration at being dis-included from many a luncheon and social gathering were decisions and deals were made about the rebuilding plan. When the plan was finally unveiled, it was clear to those watching why the planning lunches were secret.
When the BNOB committee presented it plan to the public at the Marriot Hotel last November, we saw a map of New Orleans on the overhead screen that had large green swatches over areas that the ULI recommended for permanent closure -the Ninth Ward, New Orleans East, and Gentilly. These areas are predominately Black communities. Even more telling about the agenda of the planners was the fact that the plan made no mention of where else in New Orleans the residents of these closed Black neighborhoods could move to.
A plan for a new New Orleans. “Oh, we don’t know where ‘those’ people went…” Residents were absolutely livid. So much so that the ULI returned to the community months later with a revised plan that said the neighborhoods proposed for phasing out would be given four months to prove they could repopulate and be viable or the city would begin a forced buy-out program. There still seemed to be a lack of understanding on the part of the from-out-of-town panel that people have not been able to repopulate their neighborhoods because their houses are destroyed, the insurance companies are denying claims across the board, landlords are price gouging the rental market, and FEMA’s STILL not provided even half the trailers requested.
Just as the BNOB panel began to take public comments after their presentation of the revised plan, a huge Black man bellowed out like a sonic boom from the back of the room:
“You’re not taking my land!! If you come trying to take my property, you’re gonna have a baby Iraq on your hands! Nobody worked the jobs I’ve worked, taking crap from employers I didn’t wanna take, to make my note every month to sit here and have you tell me I can’t rebuild MY own home!! That’s my house and if you thinking ‘bout coming to take my land, you betta come heavy. And Joe Canizaro – I HATE YOU!”
Mr. Harvey’s explosion was a pivotal moment in this early phase of our reconstruction. His face made the front page of the paper and he’s since been interviewed by dozens of media outlets. His roaring outburst exposed the stifled anger, disgust, rage, pain, and grief so many homeowners felt at the slap in the face by these Los Angeles-based, Nagin-Canizaro sponsored planners.
Blacks here have an over-arching mistrust of Canizaro. And the moment Nagin uttered his name on Election Night as someone we need to be checking for, we witnessed the first signs of the prodigal son returning to his old ways.
I looked at the Black faces around me, their responses to his Canizaro remark, and saw frozen smiles – and determination. Determination to go forward, against all the signs and track record of what they knew they didn’t want, for fear of losing our Black foothold in local government.
“Don’t we even get to keep that?”, we ask ourselves here in the New Orleans. ‘We lost our homes, every last stick of furniture, every appliance, photo albums and grandmother’s jewelry and all our files and the dog too and family, friends, neighbors we grew up with – everything that give context and meaning for even being here in this life…’ The only thing many Black people got out of here with before the levees broke, besides our memories, was their Black skin. And a feeling is alive here that if we lose our Black leadership, the only thing that survived in New Orleans, we won’t have a future here.
When I first moved to New Orleans, I was saturated in blackness and I loved it. Black people were everywhere and it really felt like another country, other than the United States. One of my favorite jaunts then, and still today, is to go to City Hall and revel in the family vibe where ‘my folks’ are running things. No other public office have I ever felt so comfortable, so…relevant. And so included.
I, too, am still constantly wrestling with strong emotions about being a Black public figure, a Black woman, tearing away from the fold, away from ‘the Black man’. I’d love nothing more than to be wrong about Mayor Nagin’s ability to lead us out of darkness. But…you know - especially you ladies - how you know something deep inside that you don’t want to be true, so you say to yourself, ‘Maybe I’m wrong…’ But later on, when the sh-t hits the fan, you realize how foolish it was to doubt what your wisdom and intuition told you.
New Orleans can’t afford false pride based on race. Our empire has been completely demolished. Sometimes, there’s so much to do, so much wrong here that needs addressing, and you get so overwhelmed trying to hold it together, you just sit back down and start crying. Crying for the old days.
And that’s when faith comes in. Faith that if we walk on what we know is His truth, that He’ll provide the best outcome. And if we force things to be our way, moving from a limited, human mentality of fear, we’ll just end up with more of this hard knocks life.
My grandmother used to tell me whenever I was cutting up, “A hard head makes a soft behind!” Her words came rushing to me when Mayor Nagin finished his speech and the DJ fired up the room with a song from the Gap Band:
‘Oops! Upside Your Head’
Sounds like foreshadowing to me…
Deborah Cotton is a freelance journalist and public speaker based in New Orleans, covering on-the-ground stories of the city’s recovery and chronicling the rebuilding efforts of the historic Ninth Ward. She can be reached at Deborah.cotton@gmail.com.
* From now until May 7th, check out her election/Jazz Fest coverage in her daily blog ‘The Second Line’ on http://blackvoices.aol.com
First Iraq and now Bush leaves New Orleans rebuilding to future President.
Bush: New Orleans may need a decade
NEW ORLEANS, Aug. 28 (UPI) -- As he headed for the Gulf Coast on Monday, U.S. President George Bush told an interviewer he expects the rebuilding of New Orleans to take a decade.
Bush planned to spend the anniversary of the U.S. Gulf Coast landfall of Hurricane Katrina in New Orleans after a visit to Biloxi, Miss. It was his 13th visit to the devastated area.
We can rebuild buildings, the question is can we rebuild its soul, he told April Ryan of American Urban Radio Networks. We can. I believe, 10 years from now April, you and I will be thinking about our time here, and trying to remember what it was like 10 years ago
Bush came under fire last year for apparently ignoring Katrina immediately after New Orleans flooded and then flying over the city in Air Force One.
Later White House spokeswoman Dana Perrino said she wasn't aware of a specific time period but that the president has said all along that it would take more than a year to rebuild New Orleans.
In terms of like, 10 years, I don't know about exact time frame, but it's certainly going to take several years, Perrino said.
live and let live
I read your post. It is based on accusations, which is all anyone can really go on as Hitler is not here to pick his brain. It also states Hitler felt they were capitalists, which was a reason why he wanted to destroy them. I also know what my many NYC jewish friends talk about when we talk about WWII and concentration camps which we have talked a lot about over the years. As an aside, from someone who calls me hateful all the time, you do need to look within. To call Chomsky despicable filth for no reason other than you disagree with him and his ideology is really quite scarey and sad. This is America, where we can believe and worship anything we want and if a person does not like it, they can put it out of their mind and live their life and let Chomsky and every one else, who does not think like you, live theirs. Long live Chomsky and every other Communist, Socialist and Capitalist in America. Viva America!!
we DO want to live and let live
We just get a might testy when a board specifically set up for our group is invaded by people who just want to name call, endlessly recycle false propanganda, and obsess over foibles. Separate but equal, I say. You can go to the conservatve board and just rehash and regurgitate all 10 Fox talking points and you won't be bothered by me, rest assured.
I live on the GC.
I don't hate anyone! They ignored the warnings and blamed the government because they did not listen.
Again look at Andrew and Ivan people prepared and then WORKED to rebuild their lives and they did not blame FEMA.
I am not from PA, but I live in PA....
and the people I know were offended. And so they should be. Lots of folks in flyover America are offended. He made a blanket statement and it offended a lot of rural folks whose jobs are on their farms. There are a lot of people in PA whose jobs have not been outsourced. That is the trouble with blanket statements. There are a lot of small towns in PA and not all of us are bitter. We do not cling, we embrace our second amendment rights and our religous beliefs...through good times and bad. If we did not, then we might indeed BE bitter.
Obama does not know me. And I suspect he does not know a lot of rural America. Our vote counts too. Maybe he should not have painted such a broad stroke.
Maybe where you live......not here
I have known plumbing business owners my entire life and they ain't rich by a long shot. They do okay. They employ lots of people, which should be the main concern here.....employment. They perform a service you sure as shoot would want.
Same with electricians. Both professions are tough jobs and I have no problem with them doing well if they can. My brother worked for a plumbing company when he was younger and was called out in the freezing cold to crawl under homes to replace pipes, homes that might at any minute collapse they were so old. He found himself in so many dangerous situations replacing pipes. H@ll fire....they couldn't pay him enough for what he did.
Electricians crawling around in spaces I wouldn't want to go. In the middle of summer here in the south, one had to crawl around in a very small space above our home to run wires and you couldn't pay me enough to do that job. I thought they were going to pass out from the heat. I was more worried about them.
And the A/C - heating guys. Aren't you glad they're there when you need them. Do I want to see them taxed out of business? Who would?
I'm sure good 'ole Obama would want one of them showing up in the middle of the night if his heat went out and he wants warmth. Of course, he has the money to pay for that middle of the night housecall. We don't but that's not the company owners fault. We're slapping down the very people who keep this country rolling.
Obama is a joke! Snide hypocrit.
I and others do not want to live like the
people from the Holocaust had to. This is coming from other countries too.
Obama's own words - I will change the world. That will not be his job if he is elected. People from Germany see hitler in him. People in Brittain say he's a bad choice. People from all over say the Obama camp was how Hitler rose to power in Germany. Not my words theirs.
So go ahead and praise lord Obama. Others have enough sense to see him for what he is.
Most of us do not live
in your parallel universe on the fringes, including a good number of life-long REAL conservative economists found in my citations. It does not take more than a minute or 2 to come up with references and resources, that is if you do anything else with your time other than spend it reading the info on walls of the right-rag outhouses. It comes as no surprise you cannot find any info from the real world there.
But suit yourself. You don't have time to educate yourself or do any research before you open your potty mouth? Fine with me, but don't expect anybody with a triple-digit IQ to take you seriously.
Ain't bipartisan support a b*itch?
Don't know where you live, but in LA,
they cannot arrest someone who is a known illegal criminal who has already been deported, unless a new crime is committed, so police can spot dangerous gange members whom they have already arrested and deported in the past, but there is nothing they can do until another crime is committed. It is ridiculous.
Where do you live?
If you voted for Obama, you are one of the two types of voters. Now, you either live in an area where there is enough working people that you never really see the downside of where all your taxes really go, or you know plenty who mooch already and feel you must stick up for them for some reason, why is that? Afraid you won't be "loyal" or do you feel you're entitled?
I believe in working for a living.... unfortunately, our government has long since forgot what a sovereign country is all about and managed to create an entire welfare country in just a few short decades!
Do you live in CA?
x
I don't know where you live....
but people do not jack off in libraries in my neighborhood. Evidently, since you are implying this is LAW or a proposed bill that is imminent (which it is not), you have failed to notice that people are NOT flaunting their wedding tackle in your local library.
Because MOST of them live off YOU and ME!!
--
I don't know where you live....(sm)
but you should really try getting out of your little box. The issue with marriage isn't whether or not a man and woman can marry, but rather whether a gay or lesbian couple can marry. Remember Prop 8? That would be the law that just recently passed saying it was illegal for gays and lesbians to be married. They previously had this right -- It has now been taken away with Prop 8, funded by the religious community.
Good for you...Where you live that is...nm
I live near MacDill and know
some people there, including my stepdaughter. They have been talking draft for some time now. My friends are against it; they feel working side by side with someone who does not want to be there is demoralizing. The administration, however, is rabidly obsessive about this and we all know what happens when they get their sights set on something. Also there has been much talk of foreign persons serving in our military, sort of like the French Foreign Legion; romantic...yes, practical, hardly. On the one hand we have the ** fears and queers** tactics spun to perfection by this administration. If anyone other than they are in office, we will be attacked. Cheney even got on TV and said Ohio, Florida and Pennsylvania would be prime targets if Kerry was elected president, what a coincidence these were swing states with a lot of clout. And if the terrorists didn't get us, the homosexuals would. The fear tactic has worked wonders for them. What does not get much press (imagine - and us with a liberal press and all) is the government's willingness to allow complete open and free access to our country in certain instances....Dubai company running shipping ports, some ports of entry not being scrutinized at all, like say Tampa Bay, about 1 mile from MacDill, better known as CentCom. And now, they think foreigners in our military is a good idea. If that is not a shot direct to the heart of operations, if that is not aiding and abetting and enabling and empowering enemies I don't know what is. We can't know all sorts of things because it will **empower the terrorists** and we have to sacrifice our privacy and our rights because *the terrorists gonna get us..** but we are not only going to allow, but invite foreigners to join our military ranks, at the same time as building a 700-mile wall to keep foreigners out. Nuff said.
I live in upstate NY
I believe in G-d, most of my liberals friend do as well, but not all of them. I have a few conservative friends who are athiest.
If you live on the GC, you were paying about
nm
You must live in another country! Sorry, but the
I was better off, made more money, paid lower taxes, and had more job security during the Clinton Administration than now. Same with all my MT friends & co-workers.
Sure, there are people who don't live within
their means. But are totally discounting the fact that there thousands of people out there who are just trying to get by and do live within their means. I know a lot of people who have no credit cards, do not drive fancy cars and buy their clothes at Wal-Mart only when they need them. These people are making the same amount that they made years ago but are paying more because of the rising costs of fuel, heating fuel, groceries, electricity, etc. These are people who have always lived within their means, and now can barely afford the necessities. Are you really too biased to see that?
only 80 people live there?
maybe. could be. Some say. It was reported that.
Do you live in Ohio?
x
And if you did live in Ohio - sm
You might be able to vote three or four times. :)
When did I say I wanted to live in
a Socialist society. I don't. Neither do I want an unstable person with a fiery temper with his hand on the nuke button.
As I live and breathe!
I have followed your posts for a while. A month or so back, I replied to you saying that even though I am an enthusiastic Obama supporter, I think your solution to your relative ambivalence toward both candidates is a really good one. You have identified a person who most closely represents your beliefs and have decided to do a write-in. I think Mr. Dobbs will receive more than a few of those. Even though I cannot buy into his immigration crusade and he is a bit on the conservative side for me, I do admire him in terms of his style and the fairly polite manner in which he expresses his views and delivers the news and I can understand his appeal to independents.
It is very refreshing to see somebody who takes their vote seroiusly and seeks to use it in support of somebody, instead of casting a vote "against" somebody else...an undesirable position in which I have often found myself in the past.
I really think that Karma will be doing its thing and that campaigns founded in hate speech, mispresentations and slaughter of truth will go the way they need to go....to the trash heap. I hope you will be able to maintain your principles and cast your vote in support of your best choice and I look forward to reading more of your sensible and insighful middle-of-the-road viewpoints in the future.
you live in dumbsville.....
http://www.obamacrimes.com/attachments/028_Obama,%20Motion%20for%20Leave%20and%20First%20Amended%20Complaint.pdf
TRUTH JUST EATS AT YOUR GUT DOESN'T IT?
You want to know about |AIG first hand? I live in...sm
Stowe Vermont. The Stowe ski resort was built as a pet project many years ago by AIG. It was very low key for many, many years for many reasons, zoning etc. So lovely and pristine, no high rise condos, a quaint small town Vermont experience. A few years ago, after years of wrangling, permits were obtained for a huge VERY luxury hotel, ski base lodge, million plus dollar condos, high end shopping in a ski village etc. Fast forward a few years, the hotel is completed and the base lodge almost done, condos halfway complete, no village yet. I guess that technically we Americans now own 80% of this resort. Maybe I can get a subsidized ski pass? I haven't heard of any slow down with the development, but I could be wrong. I wonder if we will be sold off but I doubt it. Very interesting. No one has any idea of the excesses of corporate America over the last 50 years.
So you must live in one of the good
I managed to live through the 60s and 70s.
I know exactly what to expect and remember it as a time when American behaved like America and I was able to feel strongly patriotic about my country. For all those prophets of doom, I can assure you, it won't be fatal.
Oh please....what world do you live in?
Remember the Rodney King incident? Any excuse. Wonder why OJ wasn't convicted? Sure as heck wasn't because he was innocent! Pleeeze! You live under a rock?
You think if a black president were to be injured or worse by some thug there wouldn't be rioting? If whites were screaming and yelling all up and down the street, they would be called racist but if blacks are rioting, burning, killing because a black person suffered injustice, then they think they are in the right.
I'm not sticking my head in the sand and pretend the facts aren't there.
Depending on where you live
@
You can blame those that tried to live beyond their
//
I know where I live they do have to study and take a ..
test to become an american citizen, then they can legally work in America and pay taxes. I don't know what it is like where you live though.
The one with the nightstick DID NOT live in the
building, he was asked/escorted to leave by the police. The other one does live in the building and can stand/wear what he wants.
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