Professor's experience in New Orleans

[GTAVercetti 0]

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>I think Gretna did the right thing to protect themselves and their
>city once the situation broke down.

I think threatening to fire on people who are trying to save themselves is disgusting. I guess we will differ on that.

Firstly, there's two stories on that - some refugees say they were threatened, the city officials say they weren't. Without corroboration of one side or the other, I stand mute on that point.

Secondly, what was Gretna supposed to do? Set up a checkpoint and ask if they were looters, before letting them into a city with no assistance to give them? Please note that all of the stories listed state that there were no supplies, shelter or transportation to give the refugees.

"Sure, c'mon in... just take what you want." That attitude among some of the refugees is what caused the problem in the first place.

Hmm, city officials not wanting to admit their cops acted out of turn or threatened someone? NEVER!

To block the way for people fleeing from an area that is flooded is criminal. At the very least, they could have let them pass through.

Simply put, they were blocking a way out of the city.

Why yes, my license number is a palindrome. Thank you for noticing.

[SkyDekker 1,465]

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I think threatening to fire on people who are trying to save themselves is disgusting. I guess we will differ on that.

See, I think this situation would ahve been much better if citizens had been armed. At least then they could have just shot the sherrif and his deputies so they could save themselves.

This was a life endangering situation created by a government entity, exactly what your founding fathers had in mind for the citizens to be able to protect themselves from.

All that was needed here was some firepower.

[mnealtx 0]

As the stories say, they DID let some pass through... and got stores looted/burned and citizens robbed for their troubles...

Mike
I love you, Shannon and Jim.
POPS 9708 , SCR 14706

[billvon 2,991]

>and got stores looted/burned and citizens robbed for their troubles...

Well, of course. All the cops were on the bridge.

[slug 1]

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As the stories say, they DID let some pass through... and got stores looted/burned and citizens robbed for their troubles...

Hi neal

Assuming what your saying is true
Sounds like the sherriff let the wrong people thru and they were all bad people!

This is SC and we're discussing little pieces of a big cluster fuck. "Some of the first people let thru were bad so the gretna cops shut the bridge down."

Be intersting to see the after action reports and watch SC discuss the what happened after all the info and misinfo is available.

R.I.P.

[Michele 1]

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I listened to a guy who was there tell his story. So for me it's a question of listening to an eyewitness who was there vs. reading an internet report from an eyewitness who was there.

I see your point, but I also have two considerations.

1. Emotions tend to run rampant in this sort of situation. I've read accounts of the '94 eq, which was a devastating event in my neighborhood. Some people swore that they "knew they were going to die." Obviously, they didn't. Hyperbole is used - often very effectively - by people to make a point...but what is the point? Often it's something less than what they're saying. You've done this yourself - exaggerate to emphasis a point - and that doesn't make it wrong; it just makes it an exaggeration based in truth but recounted larger than life. It's a normal, usual tactic in reporting, i.e "plummet to his death." To not acknowledge that there is some amount of exaggeration and hyperbole (i.e. 800 people under a bridge, $25,000 in cash from where?).

2. Eye witness accounts are not as accurate as we would like them to be. Many, many experiments demonstrate this. I'm wondering, in this particular story, why others are not speaking out as dramatically as the EMT is?

There is no doubt that something happened. What, exactly, is still unclear, and likely will never be clear.

What is clear is that the professor who allegedly authored the story did not, in fact, experience Katrina. He also made mention of the fact that he could not verify the story as being real or true. He would/could not confirm any details of the story as accurate or inaccurate. This I know from first hand communication with him.

Ciels-
Michele

~Do Angels keep the dreams we seek
While our hearts lie bleeding?~

[rehmwa 2]

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He would/could not confirm any details of the story as accurate or inaccurate. This I know from first hand communication with him.

Are you sure you're not exagerating just to get your point across?

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Driving is a one dimensional activity - a monkey can do it - being proud of your driving abilities is like being proud of being able to put on pants

[GTAVercetti 0]

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He would/could not confirm any details of the story as accurate or inaccurate. This I know from first hand communication with him.

Are you sure you're not exagerating just to get your point across?

Nice one.

Why yes, my license number is a palindrome. Thank you for noticing.

[GeorgiaDon 362]

At some point you have to decide if your priority is property or people.

I think many posters have made it all too clear what side of that choice they would come down on.

I heard on NPR an interview with the Gretna sheriff, some city council members, and a few local citizens. The sheriff freely admitted that his men had fired over the heads of people on the bridge. Their actions were totally supported by the city council, and by all but one of the Gretna citizens being interviewed. One had a comment along the lines of "it's not Gretna's problem to take out New Orleans' trash".

What is this country all about anyway? Is it a society (in the sense of a group of people living in an interdependent way), or is it just a bunch of people who only feel responsible for themselves (fuck everybody else, I'll get mine Jack), who just happen to be living in a particular geographical space?

Don

_____________________________________
Tolerance is the cost we must pay for our adventure in liberty. (Dworkin, 1996)
“Education is not filling a bucket, but lighting a fire.” (Yeats)

[rehmwa 2]

I guess I can't answer that without being in the shoes of the Gretna populace and observed the attitudes of the 'refugees'.

I do know that if there's a long line of 100 people at my door - and I invite them to take a shortcut through my house to get through and move on, even offer them a drink of water or whatever as hospitality calls for - and the first 6 trash my home, then I'd likely shut the door on the remaining 94 - even though I know that there are likely some people there that are decent. When acts of kindness are abused is when you find the worst types of responses.

So I suspect some overamped wrongdoings by the first wave of refugees triggered an overreaction by the people of Gretna against the following waves (which may or may not have acted similarly to the original troublemakes.)

So it's not property vs people. It's about how much tolerance would you have to help people that don't respect you. Walk in their shoes before judging.

But - Even Rambo got a drive through to the other side of town. It's too bad the people of Gretna couldn't have found a way to at least do that.

alternative - the people of Gretna are assholes. But I like to think most people mean well and only act poorly when treated poorly

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Driving is a one dimensional activity - a monkey can do it - being proud of your driving abilities is like being proud of being able to put on pants

[Michele 1]

Just because I was curious, I did some searching on the origination of the story, and it's authors, Larry Bradshaw and Lorrie Beth Slonsky.

I've found that they are either contributing editors or editors/reporters for Socialist Worker, which can be located here...http://www.socialistworker.org/. the story this entire thread is based on was first published in the Socialist Worker.

Another comment made by the authors of the article...

"Whatever you think about what happened to us in New Orleans, we only hope that we can all work together to expose injustice, challenge racism, hold the Bush administration accountable for its actions and inactions, and, most importantly, collaborate to build a better world for all of us."

While I agree in principle with that comment, I'm not sure what it says about the way the incident was reported...or the tenor in which it was written.

And yes, I am sure I'm not using hyperbole and exaggeration...my example holds.

Ciels-
Michele

~Do Angels keep the dreams we seek
While our hearts lie bleeding?~

[billvon 2,991]

>I do know that if there's a long line of 100 people at my door - and
>I invite them to take a shortcut through my house to get through
> and move on, even offer them a drink of water or whatever as
> hospitality calls for - and the first 6 trash my home, then I'd likely
> shut the door on the remaining 94 . . .

Once again, most people I've met in person are far nicer in person than they are on the net. And if 100 people showed up at your doorstep, and their only way out of a disaster was through your house, you'd let them through, because our common friends think you're a decent guy - and I tend to believe them. And if they trashed your house you'd bitch about it (rightly) - but next time it happened you'd still do the right thing.

[rehmwa 2]

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Once again, most people I've met in person are far nicer in person than they are on the net. And if 100 people showed up at your doorstep, and their only way out of a disaster was through your house, you'd let them through, because our common friends think you're a decent guy - and I tend to believe them. And if they trashed your house you'd bitch about it (rightly) - but next time it happened you'd still do the right thing.

I don't know, Bill. I didn't consider it a harsh or 'tough guy' position, just practical. Maybe you're right, maybe I let the line sit while I personally walk each person through and out before letting in the next. But I can understand both positions and won't fault someone if they choose the harsher path.

Like I said - Even Rambo got a ride through town. These people may have been jaded, and a ferrying service would have been chastised too as cold and unfeeling, but at least it would have gotten the 'refugees' through.

Edit: and at what point does shutting the door become the "right thing" to do? I believe there exists such a point, just that it's a long way out there. The risk is falsely accuse the next guy in line of being guilty of the first guys' crime. That's the hard part - when does an individual's behavior become predictive of the next individual's potential actions? When it becomes culturally ingrained.... And you still can't use statistics to predict individual actions normally, especially when concerning psychology.

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Driving is a one dimensional activity - a monkey can do it - being proud of your driving abilities is like being proud of being able to put on pants

[juanesky 0]

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This was a life endangering situation created by a government entity HURRICANE KATRINA, exactly what your founding fathers DID NOT hadVE in mind for the citizens to be able to protect themselves from.

I'm glad you think the situation is amusing to you.

Well, mntealx, I think people will prefer to believe a debunked internet falsely authored story rather than someone without an agenda, who was a witness....

No room for debate here...and I like Ice cream hmmmm

"According to some of the conservatives here, it sounds like it's fine to beat your wide - as long as she had it coming." -Billvon

[juanesky 0]

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As the stories say, they DID let some pass through... and got stores looted/burned and citizens robbed for their troubles...

Hi neal

Assuming what your saying is true
Sounds like the sherriff let the wrong people thru and they were all bad people!

This is SC and we're discussing little pieces of a big cluster fuck. "Some of the first people let thru were bad so the gretna cops shut the bridge down."

Be intersting to see the after action reports and watch SC discuss the what happened after all the info and misinfo is available.

R.I.P.

Nope, no one mentions about the sniper fire from the bridge. Why stick to the facts?

"According to some of the conservatives here, it sounds like it's fine to beat your wide - as long as she had it coming." -Billvon

[billvon 2,991]

>This was a life endangering situation created by a government entity
>HURRICANE KATRINA, exactly what your founding fathers DID NOT
>hadVE in mind for the citizens to be able to protect themselves from.

Exactly. Come on, Skydekker! The founding fathers certainly could not have understood hurricanes when they wrote the Constitution and the Bill of Rights. They're new.

[jenfly00 0]

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Well, mntealx, I think people will prefer to believe a debunked internet falsely authored story rather than someone without an agenda, who was a witness....

Just to clarify, are you referring to your ultra-right, pro-war, civil right eroding, fuck those lazy black bastards self as ...unbiased????

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"O brave new world that has such people in it".

[mnealtx 0]

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Well, mntealx, I think people will prefer to believe a debunked internet falsely authored story rather than someone without an agenda, who was a witness....

Just to clarify, are you referring to your ultra-right, pro-war, civil right eroding, fuck those lazy black bastards self as ...unbiased????

Nice debating technique... way to address the issue!!

Mike
I love you, Shannon and Jim.
POPS 9708 , SCR 14706

[rehmwa 2]

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Just to clarify, are you referring to your ultra-right, pro-war, civil right eroding, fuck those lazy black bastards self as ...unbiased????

Agree with him or not, that's about the most glorious and blatant personal attack I've seen today. A work of art.

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Driving is a one dimensional activity - a monkey can do it - being proud of your driving abilities is like being proud of being able to put on pants

[kallend 2,027]

WASHINGTON (Reuters) - U.S. President George W. Bush has named his homeland security adviser, Fran Townsend, to lead an internal inquiry into the much-criticized federal response to Hurricane Katrina, the White House said on Tuesday.

Well, that will be wonderfully impartial

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The only sure way to survive a canopy collision is not to have one.

[SkyDekker 1,465]

four months from now Fran Townsend will report that after intense investigation, all criticism was unfounded. The little bit that was true was already addressed when Brownie got sacked...now please move along, nothing to see here....

Unfortunately, she won't say in her report:

Unfortunately, our President was not bright enough to realize an Arabian horse judge was not the best person to run FEMA.

[mnealtx 0]

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WASHINGTON (Reuters) - U.S. President George W. Bush has named his homeland security adviser, Fran Townsend, to lead an internal inquiry into the much-criticized federal response to Hurricane Katrina, the White House said on Tuesday.

Well, that will be wonderfully impartial

Shades of Gorelick being on the 9/11 committee, eh?

Mike
I love you, Shannon and Jim.
POPS 9708 , SCR 14706

[juanesky 0]

Oh Bill, definitely you fail to maintain your mantra of self addressed impartiality.

Why not quote the actual strike out letter, and at least make a comment in regards to the veracity of my statements. Still you prefer to believe some unknown, debunk story as truth, instead of debating the facts I have posted about.

Yep, complete silence about that. Figures. Same goes as to when people that you like attack the ones you dislike. I personally don't have a problem, I'm a man, and can fend on my own.

Keep disregarding facts foes....back to distorting as usual...

"According to some of the conservatives here, it sounds like it's fine to beat your wide - as long as she had it coming." -Billvon

[jenfly00 0]

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Just to clarify, are you referring to your ultra-right, pro-war, civil right eroding, fuck those lazy black bastards self as ...unbiased????

Agree with him or not, that's about the most glorious and blatant personal attack I've seen today. A work of art.

I don't believe I've strayed outside the rules. I mean, come one. Agree with him or not ..unbiased? My point is would be like me stating an 'unbiased' opinion of women's rights. Any reviews of Juanesky's posts will show him solidly promoting conservative (ultra?), issues favoring war, the 're-defining American civil rights and scorn for hurricane victims that wouldn't (couldn't?) evacuate. You accept that as unbiased?

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"O brave new world that has such people in it".

[juanesky 0]

and any of your point of views are clearly based out of facts, relity, and just promoting a liberal view based in imaginary circumstances, so it seems. At least I was there and did something personally against it, without any prejudicer to the people we encounter. If you are the one that make the conection with me saying "criminal elements" and "those lazy black bastards" it was you. YOu are the ones that see in colors, I see by the actions of people, even those deranged ones like yourself for example.

"According to some of the conservatives here, it sounds like it's fine to beat your wide - as long as she had it coming." -Billvon