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Rev. David E. Farmer, PC Parent
Randall Amster, RDP Faculty, and Paul Katan, Prescott community member
Joan Clingan, MAP Faculty, and Frank Cardamone, ADGP Administration
ZNet/ZMag
From Real Climate
From The Chronicle of Higher Education
From Louisiana Environmental Action Network
From Grover Furr
New Orleanians Call for Action
New York Times, Frank Rich, Sept 18 and Maureen Dowd, September 14
United for Peace and Justice
Left Turn Magazine
Malik Rahim
Think Progress
Paramedics Larry Bradshaw and Lorrie Beth Slonsky
Just an Email
Women's eNews
Campaign for America's Future
Minnie Bruce Pratt
Rev. David E. Farmer
Here is a note I just received from my father who is in my home town of Shreveport, LA. working hard with the evacuees from Katrina. I have also attached another letter I received from Rev. Jeff Murphy, Chaplain at University of Mississippi
Medical Center in Jackson, Mississippi
---John [Farmer, MAP student, Prescott College Instructor]
It is beyond my powers to adequately describe what we are seeing and hearing in Shreveport, some 325 miles from New Orleans and having been spared Katrina's destructive winds and rains. Although there are no such thing as reliable estimates, there must be 10-15,000 refugees now in Shreveport-Bossier City, which is a community of only 350,000 or so. There are numerous shelters in town now, with people living, eating and sleeping in gymnasium-like facilities. As time goes on, these conditions are going to fray people's nerves as clothes get dirty, kids becomes restless and annoying, and the desperation of no job, no money, no home & no plan for the future sets it. Our hearts go out to them, and the community has outpoured itself with volunteers, clothing, food, supplies, entertainment, etc. Their situation is replicated all through this area of the country -- Louisiana, Arkansas, East Texas cities (like Tyler and Lufkin), Dallas, San Antonio, Houston, Mississippi, Alabama, Florida and who knows where else. The estimate of 1.2 million refugees gives you some concept of just how many people there really are. In many cases, they have no communication with family and friends. They don't know whether their home is inhabitable or not. Just in Caddo Parish, where Shreveport is located, we have enrolled an extra 2,000 children in schools and there are many, many more to come next week.
There has been some trouble locally with some people going into local hospitals and other buildings stealing, panhandling and threatening people. They mostly seem to be drug-addicted young people who are increasingly unstable. However, compared to the greater New Orleans area, our problems are miniscule, and our crime problem is okay for now, recognizing that it may swell over time. Many keep asking how to help. Right now, money is the best way. If you were here in Shreveport, I would also recommend volunteering at any of the local shelters. Just a presence, an encouraging word of hope can make a difference. But, money will be necessary too. To support our local efforts to help these refugees, I would recommend the Community Foundation of Shreveport-Bossier. It is a local foundation which runs a very tight ship, and they will ensure that the money will be used appropriately. I know several of the Board members and I respect their work. Donations for Katrina relief can be made through their web site: http://www.comfoundsb.org/. If anyone wants to make a faith-based donation, I am partial to our denomination's Week of Compassion fund. Donations to them will go to relief efforts throughout the Gulf Coast areas. Their overhead is almost non-existent (absorbed by the denomination), and they are a good and compassionate organization. They can be reached at http://www.weekofcompassion.org/. And, I would remind everyone that above all else, pray for these victims and pray for the thousands and thousands of dedicated relief workers, medical volunteers, national guardsmen, government workers, etc. They all are finding it difficult at time to find God in the midst of this catastrophe. But the truth is that God can be found in us.
Love Dad
David E. Farmer
Minister of Congregational Care
Kings Highway Christian Church
Shreveport, LA.
This is from Rev. Jeff Murphy, Chaplain at University of Mississippi
Medical Center in Jackson MS.
Jackson now has 50% power restored. We do not have power, but trucks were in our area today. Bell South is estimating that phone service will not be fully restored until Oct. 31. Gasoline is available
in Jackson, but it requires a 4 hr. wait. Crime is climbing - looting,
siphoning gas, electric workers being threatened at gun point.
Because of the gas shortage, UMC is running with only "essential" staff.
That usually do not include chaplains, but because of the situation we are
now deemed "essential." Off time for me this weekend has been canceled,
as has the Labor Day holiday. I do not know when I will have a day off
again. I am looking forwarded to not being seen as "essential."
The reports from south Mississippi hospitals are hellish, even those 90
miles inland. Patients are dying simply because medicine, medical
supplies, and treatments requiring electricity are unavailable. The rumor
is that Forrest General Hospital in Hattiesburg will be evacuated today if
power is not restored.
Some of you have asked what you can do to help. Here are some
suggestions:
- First - PRAY!
- Make a donation to the Red Cross or Week of Compassion. Find our what they most need - Money, care kits. etc.
- Those of you who are able, donate blood.
A special prayer concern - I have not heard from cousin, Cam Holzer,
Director of Pastoral Services at the Tuero Infirmary in New Orleans.
Those of you who know her, please let me know if you hear from her. Her
husband is very ill and will require immediate medical attention.
I am hot, sweaty, and tired, but well. And I deeply appreciate your
prayers.
Peace,
Jeff
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ZNet/ZMag
Check out ZMag—a community of people committed to social change—for many excellent essays on the situation in the US Gulf. http://www.zmag.org/weluser.htm
I recommend that you start with this September 03, 2005 article “How the Free Market Killed New Orleans” By Michael Parenti. “[…] It was not until Day Three that the relatively affluent telecasters began to realize that tens of thousands of people had failed to flee because they had nowhere to go and no means of getting there. With hardly any cash at hand or no motor vehicle to call their own, they had to sit tight and hope for the best. In the end, the free market did not work so well for them. […]” http://www.zmag.org/sustainers/content/2005-09/03parenti.cfm
From Real Climate
"Hurricanes and Global Warming - Is There a Connection?"
http://www.realclimate.org/index.php?p=181
"[...] On Monday August 29, Hurricane Katrina ravaged New Orleans, Louisiana and Missisippi, leaving a trail of destruction in her wake. It will be some time until the full toll of this hurricane can be assessed, but the devastating human and environmental impacts are already obvious. [...]"
From The Chronicle of Higher Education
The Chronicle of Higher Education is running an online blog/forum about the hurricane for people in higher-education:
http://chronicle.com/jobs/forums/list.php?f=19
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From Louisiana Environmental Action Network
The Red Cross is Great, But Here is a Grassroots Alternative
Dear Friends,
On Friday, I talked on the phone with my friend Marylee Orr, who lives in Baton Rouge, Louisiana. Marylee is the director of the Louisiana Environmental Action Network--a coalition of over 100 grassroots citizens groups throughout the now devastated state of Louisiana. I got to know her on the Department of Environmental Studies' field studies trip to Louisiana.
Marylee hasn't been up late every night out for the last week out of aimless worry about the many victims and the environmental tragedy left in the wake of the hurricane and official mismanagement of both the disaster prevention and response efforts. She's been up late because she is working hard to do something about the situation. As she told me on the phone on Friday afternoon, the federal government is not really on the ground doing much yet and, in some of the hard hit parishes in the state, even the Red Cross is not much of a presence yet. In the time honored tradition of grassroots citizenship for the common good, this gutsy woman is using the local contacts with grassroots activists, local officials, and Louisiana faith communities she has built up over 20 years to help close the dramatic gap between the intense need of the people of the Louisiana and the official response so far.
Just this Thurday, LEAN members provided an airdrop of food, water, and medical supplies to the trapped residents of St. Bernard and Plaquemine Parishes, two of the most inundated areas in the state. Saturday, LEAN dropped more supplies for stranded people in Washington Parish. LEAN is also working hard now to raise more funds to allow local people, working with local government leaders to provide direct, immediate assistance with all the efficiency that comes from not being a bureaucrat or an outsider. I've already made a contribution to the Red Cross to offer some assistance to the hurricane victims in Louisiana, but I've decided to write a check for ten times that amount to the Louisiana Environmental Action Network in order to support people that I know have both the big hearts and the local knowledge needed to help meet the crying humanitarian needs in Louisiana. I also know that LEAN won't just leave the area when the immediate crisis is over. LEAN will also work to address the toxic cesspool and chemical contamination that will be left behind when the water finally recedes. I’m asking everyone I know to join me in contributing money directly to LEAN for their local efforts in disaster relief. Every penny will be used well. I would trust Marylee with my life and I know her effort will save lives. Please dig deep and give as much as you can to: LEAN, 162 Craydon Avenue, Baton Rouge, LA 70806.
At the very end of our phone call on Friday, Marylee thanked me for pledging money and for my offer to encourage other folks to contribute to LEAN's disaster relief efforts, but she also asked for one more thing. It means so much to know that people around the country care." For people who want to send good wishes as well as their checks, please write to Marylee's group at lean@leanweb.org. She likely won't have time to write back, but it will mean a lot to this hard working, non-sleeping group of local heros to know that our hearts and prayers are with them.
September 2, 2005
Dear Friends of Louisiana,
Due to the catastrophic event of Hurricane Katrina there is an enormous need for life-saving and life-sustaining supplies. At this time, the most needed items are tetanus shots, insulin, IV fluids, as well as financial resources to purchase and transport medical and food assistance directly to victims.
Louisiana Environmental Action Network (LEAN) is working closely with the Office of Representative Brasso of St. Bernard Parish. Our contributions are being immediately given to the residents of St. Bernard and Plaquemines Parishes, two of the most inundated areas. LEAN feels that by working directly with the parish representatives we are best able to assist in meeting the critical needs of these victims and addressing the crisis in our communities.
The situation in Louisiana is heartbreaking and we hope that by working together we can help save lives and improve the lives of those who have survived this disaster. We would appreciate donations of medical supplies, food and water, or funds to purchase these supplies. For example, yesterday, September 1, 2005, we purchased medical supplies such as aspirin, neosporin, syringes, hand sanitizer, gloves, tylenol, bandages, and so forth. These supplies were directly air dropped down today on September 2, 2005, to people stuck in St. Bernard and Plaquemines Parish.
We can not thank you enough for caring about what is going on in our region. Your prayers and support are greatly appreciated. Words can not describe the suffering and courage of the people here. Please help us help our neighbors in our home state. May God bless you for all your support, concern and prayers during this tragic time.
With warmest regards,
Marylee Orr
Executive Director
Louisiana Environmental Action Network
162 Croydon Ave
From Grover Furr
Dear Colleagues:
Today's Star-Ledger (Newark, NJ -- the state's largest paper, "Resolve's Still Standing") carries this paragraph: "New Orleans' vulnerability to a storm like this has been known for a long time. A series of articles three years ago in the New Orleans Times-Picayune detailed the potential crisis with eerie foreshadowing -- right down to how water could flow over the tops of levees and turn the city into a giant bowl of hazardous soup. The articles also predicted there would be no escape for thousands of car-less residents."
I've located this series, from June 2002, in Lexis-Nexis, and put it on line here:
http://chss.montclair.edu/english/furr/essays/tpnoseries02.html
EVERYTHING that has happened was predicted then. You have to read the series to see how outrageous the government on all levels has been.
Sincerely,
Grover Furr
Montclair SU
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NEW ORLEANIANS CALL FOR ACTION - PLEASE FORWARD WIDELY
Displaced New Orleans Community Demands Action, Accountability and Initiates A People's Hurricane Fund
Not until the fifth day of the federal government's inept and inadequate emergency response to the New Orleans' disaster did George Bush even acknowledge it was 'unacceptable.' 'Unacceptable' doesn't begin to describe the depth of the neglect, racism and classism shown to the people of New Orleans. The government's actions and inactions were criminal. New Orleans, a city whose population is almost 70% percent black, 40% illiterate, and many are poor, was left day after day to drown, to starve and to die of disease and thirst.
The people of New Orleans will not go quietly into the night, scattering across this country to become homeless in countless other cities while federal relief funds are funneled into rebuilding casinos, hotels, chemical plants and the wealthy white districts of New Orleans like the French Quarter and the Garden District. We will not stand idly by while this disaster is used as an opportunity to replace our homes with newly built mansions and condos in a gentrified New Orleans.
Community Labor United (CLU), a coalition of the progressive organizations throughout New Orleans, has brought community members together for eight years to discuss socio-economic issues. We have been communicating with people from The Quality Education as a Civil Right Campaign, the Algebra Project, the Young People's Project and the Louisiana Research Institute for Community Empowerment. We are preparing a press release and framing document that will be out as a draft later today for comments.
Here is what we are calling for:
- We are calling for all New Orleanians remaining in the city to be evacuated immediately.
- We are calling for information about where every evacuee was taken. We are calling for black and progressive leadership to come together to meet in Baton Rouge to initiate the formation of a Community Oversight Committee of evacuees from all the sites. This committee will demand to oversee FEMA, the Red Cross and other organizations collecting resources on behalf of our people.
- We are calling for volunteers to enter the shelters where our people are and to assist parents with housing, food, water, health care and access to aid.
- We are calling for teachers and educators to carve out some time to come to evacuation sites and teach our children.
- We are calling for city schools and universities near evacuation sites to open their doors for our children to go to school.
- We are calling for health care workers and mental health workers to come to evacuation sites to volunteer.
- We are calling for lawyers to investigate the wrongful death of those who died, to protect the land of the displaced, to investigate whether the levies broke due to natural and other related matters.
- We are calling for evacuees from our community to actively participate in the rebuilding of New Orleans.
- We are calling for the addresses of all the relevant list serves and press contacts to send our information.
We are in the process of setting up a central command post in Jackson, MS, where we will have phone lines, fax, email and a web page to centralize information. We will need volunteers to staff this office.
We have set up a People's Hurricane Fund that will be directed and administered by New Orleanian evacuees. The Young People's Project, a 501(c)3 organization formed by graduates of the Algebra Project, has agreed to accept donations on behalf of this fund.
Donations can be mailed to:
The People's Hurricane Fund
c/o The Young People’s Project
99 Bishop Allen Drive
Cambridge, MA 02139
If you have comments of how to proceed or need more information, please email them to Curtis Muhammad (muhammadcurtis@bellsouth.net) and Becky Belcore (bbelcore@hotmail.com).
Thank you.
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New York Times
Many of the articles and columns in the New York Times are asking difficult questions and exploring the broad issues.
Consider Maureen Dowd's column, especially this from September 14:
http://www.nytimes.com/2005/09/14/opinion/14dowd.html?incamp=article_popular
"[...] Given that the Bush team has dealt with both gulf crises, Iraq and Katrina, with the same deadly mixture of arrogance and incompetence, and a refusal to face reality, it's frightening to think how it will handle the most demanding act of government domestic investment since the New Deal. [...]"
And this September 2 article "From Margins of Society to Center of the Tragedy" (which now requires a fee online).
http://www.nytimes.com/2005/09/02/national/nationalspecial/02discrim.html
"[...] In New Orleans, the disaster's impact underscores the intersection of race and class in a city where fully two-thirds of its residents are black and more than a quarter of the city lives in poverty. In the Lower Ninth Ward neighborhood, which was inundated by the floodwaters, more than 98 percent of the residents are black and more than a third live in poverty. [...]"
And this from Frank Rich. http://www.nytimes.com/2005/09/18/opinion/18rich.html
"[...]
The worst storm in our history proved perfect for exposing this president because in one big blast it illuminated all his failings: the rampant cronyism, the empty sloganeering of "compassionate conservatism," the lack of concern for the "underprivileged" his mother condescended to at the Astrodome, the reckless lack of planning for all government operations except tax cuts, the use of spin and photo-ops to camouflage failure and to substitute for action. [...]"
United for Peace and Justice
"Much can be said about how long-term policies -- from denying the existence of global warming to permitting greedy developers to destroy protective offshore islands and wetlands -- may have contributed to the severity of Katrina."
Check out UFPJ 's web page for analysis of the connection between the war in Iraq and the situation in the US Gulf.
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Left Turn Magazine
"Notes From Inside New Orleans" by Jordan Flaherty, union organizer and editor of Left Turn Magazine.
"I just left New Orleans a couple hours ago. I traveled from the apartment I was staying in by boat to a helicopter to a refugee camp. If anyone wants to examine the attitude of federal and state officials towards the victims of hurricane Katrina, I advise you to visit one of the refugee camps. [...]"
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Malik Rahim
Eyewitness New Orleans: ‘This is criminal’
Following are excerpts from an article being circulated on the Internet by Malik Rahim, a veteran of the Black Panther Party in New Orleans, an organizer of public housing tenants both there and in San Francisco, and a recent Green Party candidate for New Orleans City Council. He was a guest speaker at a 1998 Communist Manifesto conference in New York hosted by Workers World Party. Rahim lives in the Algiers neighborhood, the only part of New Orleans that is not flooded. What he describes is nothing less than deliberate genocide against Black and poor people.
Sept. 1—It's criminal. From what you're hearing, the people trapped in New Orleans are nothing but looters. We're told we should be more "neighborly." But nobody talked about being neighborly until after the people who could afford to leave, left.
If you ain't got no money in America, you're on your own. People were told to go to the Superdome, but they have no food, no water there. And before they could get in, people had to stand in line for 4-5 hours in the rain because everybody was being searched one by one at the entrance.
I can understand the chaos that happened after the tsunami, because they had no warning, but here there was plenty of warning. In the three days before the hurricane hit, we knew it was coming and everyone could have been evacuated.
We have Amtrak here that could have carried everybody out of town. There were enough school buses that could have evacuated 20,000 people easily, but they just let them be flooded. My son watched 40 buses go underwater—they just wouldn't move them, afraid they'd be stolen.
People who could afford to leave were so afraid someone would steal what they own that they just let it all be flooded. They could have let a family without a vehicle borrow their extra car, but instead they left it behind to be destroyed.
There are gangs of white vigilantes near here riding around in pickup trucks, all of them armed, and any young Black they see who they figure doesn't belong in their community, they shoot him. I tell them, "Stop! You're going to start a riot."
When you see all the poor people with no place to go, feeling alone and helpless and angry, I say this is a consequence of HOPE VI [a federal grant program used to eliminate public housing—WW]. New Orleans took all the HUD money it could get to tear down public housing, and families and neighbors who'd relied on each other for generations were uprooted and torn apart.
Most of the people who are going through this now had already lost touch with the only community they'd ever known. Their community was torn down and they were scattered. They'd already lost their real homes, the only place where they knew everybody, and now the places they've been staying are destroyed.
But nobody cares. They're just lawless looters ... dangerous.
The hurricane hit at the end of the month, the time when poor people are most vulnerable. Food stamps don't buy enough but for about three weeks of the month, and by the end of the month everyone runs out. Now they have no way to get their food stamps or any money, so they just have to take what they can to survive.
Many people are getting sick and very weak. From the toxic water that people are walking through, little scratches and sores are turning into major wounds.
People whose homes and families were not destroyed went into the city right away with boats to bring the survivors out, but law enforcement told them they weren't needed. They are willing and able to rescue thousands, but they're not allowed to.
Every day countless volunteers are trying to help, but they're turned back. Almost all the rescue that's been done has been done by volunteers anyway.
My son and his family—his wife and kids, ages 1, 5 and 8—were flooded out of their home when the levee broke. They had to swim out until they found an abandoned building with two rooms above water level.
There were 21 people in those two rooms for a day and a half. A guy in a boat who just said "I'm going to help regardless" rescued them and took them to Highway I-10 and dropped them there.
They sat on the freeway for about three hours, because someone said they'd be rescued and taken to the Superdome. Finally they just started walking, had to walk six and a half miles.
When they got to the Superdome, my son wasn't allowed in—I don't know why—so his wife and kids wouldn't go in. They kept walking, and they happened to run across a guy with a tow truck that they knew, and he gave them his own personal truck.
When they got here, they had no gas, so I had to punch a hole in my gas tank to give them some gas, and now I'm trapped. I'm getting around by bicycle.
People from Placquemine Parish were rescued on a ferry and dropped off on a dock near here. All day they were sitting on the dock in the hot sun with no food, no water. Many were in a daze; they've lost everything.
They were all sitting there surrounded by armed guards. We asked the guards could we bring them water and food. My mother and all the other church ladies were cooking for them, and we have plenty of good water.
But the guards said, "No. If you don't have enough water and food for everybody, you can't give anything." Finally the people were hauled off on school buses from other parishes.
You know Robert King Wilkerson (the only one of the Angola 3 political prisoners who's been released). He's been back in New Orleans working hard, organizing, helping people. Now nobody knows where he is. His house was destroyed. Knowing him, I think he's out trying to save lives, but I'm worried.
The people who could help are being shipped out. People who want to stay, who have the skills to save lives and rebuild are being forced to go to Houston.
It's not like New Orleans was caught off guard. This could have been prevented.
There's military right here in New Orleans, but for three days they weren't even mobilized. You'd think this was a Third World country.
I'm in the Algiers neighborhood of New Orleans, the only part that isn't flooded. The water is good. Our parks and schools could easily hold 40,000 people, and they're not using any of it.
This is criminal. These people are dying for no other reason than the lack of organization.
Everything is needed, but we're still too disorganized. I'm asking people to go ahead and gather donations and relief supplies but to hold on to them for a few days until we have a way to put them to good use.
I'm challenging my party, the Green Party, to come down here and help us just as soon as things are a little more organized. The Republicans and Democrats didn't do anything to prevent this or plan for it and don't seem to care if everyone dies.
This article is copyright under a Creative Commons License.
Think Progress
Think Progress, a web site by the American Progress Action Fund (a nonpartisan organization) includes a timeline of the events leading up to and since the hurricane that provides important context.
http://thinkprogress.org/katrina-timeline/
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From Paramedics Larry Bradshaw and Lorrie Beth Slonsky
A first hand account by paramedics Larry Bradshaw and Lorrie Beth Slonsky is being sent around via email. The report can be found in full on Counterpunch.
"[...] Two days after Hurricane Katrina struck New Orleans, the Walgreen's store at the corner of Royal and Iberville streets remained locked. The dairy display case was clearly visible through the widows. It was now 48 hours without electricity, running water, plumbing. The milk, yogurt, and cheeses were beginning to spoil in the 90-degree heat. The owners and managers had locked up the food, water, pampers, and prescriptions and fled the City. Outside Walgreen's windows, residents and tourists grew increasingly thirsty and hungry. [...]"
LARRY BRADSHAW and LORRIE BETH SLONSKY are emergency medical services (EMS) workers from San Francisco and contributors to Socialist Worker. They were attending an EMS conference in New Orleans when Hurricane Katrina struck. They spent most of the next week trapped by the flooding--and the martial law cordon around the city.
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An Anonymous Email
This email was actually sent to one of my current students who lost a home in Mississippi. It's from a friend. It's not from someone famous. It's not making its way around the web. It's just very simple. And very profound. Joan
Hello everyone, I thought everybody should read this. Its a letter from my friend ****, who had just started working at **** University in New Orleans and had been living there for three years. She's an English professor. The letter sums up perfectly how everyone I know at home is feeling right now. Pretty hurt and angry and glad to be alive. Frankly, losing everything is making out easy right now. There are people in worse shape than many many many many of us.
Hey,
I'm sorry about your parents' house and your stuff.
They won't let us back in to N.O., even to check on
our stuff, for at least 3 weeks, but probably 3
months. THANKSGIVING, man. Four of my friends
completely, totally, 100% lost their houses. Lots of
folks lost cats, jobs, etc. My house is insured. It's
either there or it's not. I'd like to have some family
photos, since I'm the sole living archivist, but I'm
not worried about that, either. We white folk will be
okay.
It's those tens of thousands of dead and hundreds
of thousands of destitute and homeless that bother me.
I have a healthy case of survivor's guilt. I don't
feel guilty for actually living--it's just that
somehow I survived unscathed. I mean, insurance will
take care of anything I lost. I have a job to go back
to. Hell, they're still PAYING me. My little life is
more or less waiting for me. No amount of donating
money or volunteering will make up for the fact that I
could not do one **** thing while genocide was going
down in my city. I love N.O. so much it's hard to
explain. I can't wait to go back, dysentary be damned. It's the only place I've ever felt at home.
This is not something that happened to me or you
or our middle-class friends. This is something we
watched on TV. After the past few years, the long and miserable deaths of my ma & pa, etc., I thought I'd gotten tough, but this has got me reaching for the xanax.
I swear, i want to be a cop or a fireman when I
grow up. A first responder. I wanna be able to help
next time. I wanna be Sean Penn helping people into
boats.
Congratulations on your degree. Maybe you should
move to N.O. for your Ph.D. After all, there are a few
hundred thousand folks that need counseling, and the
city needs people who love it . The polls say that
most Americans say not to rebuild. Oh, how many ways
can I say **** YOU? Every time I leave N.O., I realize
that I'm no longer American or Southern, I'm New
Orleanian. I knew this when I started to plan the
party we'll have when all this is over.
Just keep counting the ways you're lucky, and
pretty soon survivor's guilt will take over, and
you'll never have to worry about taking anything for
granted again. Look on the sunny side! Ha!
Keep in touch,
****
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Women's eNews
FEATURE: Health & Environment
Health Workers Fly to Aid Female Katrina Survivors
By Rebecca Vesely - WeNews correspondent
As a Louisiana network scrambles to replace battered women's shelters
devastated by Hurricane Katrina, ob-gyn nurses are flying to the Gulf Coast,
Planned Parenthood is supplying contraception and the Ms. Foundation is
raising relief funds.
Full Story: http://www.womensenews.org/article.cfm?aid=2443
Campaign for America's Future
An excellent organization that has long been challenging the corporate agenda, addresses the various issues at hand in a letter to congress. You can go here to sign the letter asking congress to look at relief and health needs for evacuees; a commitment to rebuilding the US Gulf including the wetlands and rivers; strengthening the social safety net; bringing our troops and national guard home to provide protection here in the US; and addressing energy independence plans.
http://ourfuture.org/Rebuild_America.cfm
From Minnie Bruce Pratt
Louisiana authorities are saying that 10,000 people may have died in the state as the result of Hurricane Katrina.
Mounting evidence shows the human tragedy and devastation in New Orleans is a direct result of the U.S. war on Iraq.
The local Times Picayune newspaper warned in nine articles between 2004 and 2005 that millions of hurricane and flood-control dollars had been diverted to the war, saying of looming catastrophe, “It’s a matter of when, not if.”
President George W. Bush, faced with soaring war costs in Iraq in early 2004, recommended slashing the budget for engineering at Lake Pontchartrain by more than 80 percent. The breach in the New Orleans levees allowed water from Pontchartrain to flood the city.
In the last decade, the Corps of Engineers has worked to implement the Southeast Louisiana Urban Flood Control Project (SELA), authorized by Congress in 1995.
But when Katrina hit, $250 million worth of projects remained unfinished. One that a contractor was rushing was at the 17th Street Canal, the location of the main breach in the levees. (Editor and Publisher, Aug. 29)
Walter Maestri, emergency management chief for Jefferson Parish, said in 2004: “It appears that the money has been moved in the president’s budget to handle homeland security and the war in Iraq, and I suppose that’s the price we pay. Nobody locally is happy that the levees can’t be finished, and we are doing everything we can to make the case that this is a security issue for us.” (Times Picayune, June 8)
During a 2004 forecast exercise, federal, Louisiana and New Orleans officials saw a fictitious “Hurricane Pam” produce almost every tragedy now occurring.
But officials abandoned plans to prepare for the actual disaster because of budget cuts.
So those familiar with the situation looked on in disbelief when Bush said Sept. 2 on “Good Morning America”: “I don’t think anyone anticipated the breach of the levees.”
Government agencies had been well aware of the potential for failure
and the horrific human cost.
Racism and war on the poor
Brian Wolshon, an engineering professor at Loui siana State U. and consultant for evacuation planning, said at least 100,000 people in New Orleans were iden tified as “low-mobility”—elderly, infirm or impoverished and without cars. In disaster planning sessions “little attention” was given to what would happen to these people in the event of a hurricane or flood. When the question of their needs was raised, he said, “the response was often silence.” (New York Times, Sept. 2)
People of color make up 70 percent of the New Orleans population—and 28 percent live below the poverty line. (Black Com mentator) These were the people abandoned to death and devastation by authorities.
This racism and the criminal disregard of poor people recall the devastating flood of 1927, when levees broke up and down the Mississippi River after a spring of torrential rain. In the segregated South, Black people were “rescued”—and then confined in work camps, forced into work details to repair white owners’ property. Some were shot for refusing to be re-enslaved. (Pete Daniel, “Deep’N As It Come: The 1927 Mississippi River Flood”)
As New Orleans was threatened, local, state and federal authorities agreed the Corps of Engineers should dynamite the levees below the city—where the population was mostly poor and rural. Though promised compensation, very few of the deliberately flooded-out people ever received a cent. (Judd Slivka, “Another Flood that Stunned Amer ica,” U.S. News Online, Sept. 2)
London’s Financial Times reported on this year’s disaster with the headline: “Bush’s Policies Have Crippled Disaster Response.” But these policies, including war on Iraq, are a direct outgrowth of capitalist profit-seeking. Wetlands drained by land-developers and rendered useless as buffers against storm, the growth in global warming and the rise in sea level—all are spin-offs from unchecked, rapacious big business.
With planning and political will, the Gulf Coast lands could have been protect ed. Because of global warming, the Dutch—who are experts in preventing floods—have for some time been investing an additional $10 billion to $25 billion in “sea defense.” They are upgrading all their “dikes, pumping stations and seawalls.” (Christian Science Monitor, Sept. 4, 2001)
But the political will of both the Republicans and Democrats in the U.S. reinforces only a system of capitalist exploitation. A different answer can come from a rising storm against that system—one coming from the people who have lost the most and have the most to gain.
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This page was prepared by Prescott College faculty member, Joan Clingan. Suggestions for additions or corrections are welcomed. Please check back as this page will be updated daily for as long as it is useful to do so.
Last updated September 27, 2005.
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