Will Katrina Incite Swing to Socialism?

by **proldic** » Sat Sep 03, 2005 1:50 pm

US Newswire September 3, 2005 Rep. Melancon's Democratic Radio Address "Good morning. This is Congressman Charlie Melancon of Louisiana. The Americans I represent in Louisiana, like so many others in the Gulf Coast, have been devastated by Hurricane Katrina... There is death and immense suffering in the aftermath of this catastrophic storm. There is no way to express to you the grief felt by families searching for loved ones or the faces of those huddled in makeshift shelters still waiting to be evacuated. There are many tears. We are seeking guidance and comfort through prayer. "But let me also tell you that I have witnessed the finest of the American spirit...We are down, but we are strong; and our hope survives... ...We are engaged in a massive effort under difficult circumstances to save lives and stabilize this crisis so that we may begin to restore our communities. This is job one. "We must also be about the job of asking tough questions, my fellow Americans; questions about the health of our infrastructure and emergency response capabilities. We must now realize that long-sought-after coastal restoration projects matter not just for commerce, but safety. Hurricane protection projects and levee support and restoration projects carry with them life-saving and preserving consequences. We have always known these things along the Gulf Coast. Resources for these crucial projects are not just something nice to do, they are essential. "Time is of the essence in responding to millions of Americans throughout our country who have been devastated by this disaster. "Americans, individually and through non-profit organizations, are doing all they can. But there are things only our elected representatives can accomplish through the directives, roles and resources of our American government...

by **proldic** » Sat Sep 03, 2005 2:12 pm

Editor & Publisher September 02, 2005 Editorials, Including Those at Conservative Papers, Rip Bush's Hurricane Response By E&P Staff Editorials from around the country on Friday -- including at the Bush-friendly Dallas Morning News and The Washington Times -- have, by and large, offered harsh criticism of the official and military response to the disaster in the Gulf Coast. Here's a sampling. Dallas Morning News As a federal official in a neatly pressed suit talked to reporters in Washington about "little bumps along the road" in emergency efforts, New Orleans Mayor Ray Nagin issued an urgent SOS. The situation near the convention center was chaotic; not enough buses were available to evacuate thousands of survivors, and the streets were littered with the dead. Moments later, President Bush took center stage and talked at length about the intricacies of energy policy and plans to keep prices stable. Meanwhile, doctors at hospitals called the Associated Press asking to get their urgent message out: We need to be evacuated, we're taking sniper fire, and nobody is in charge. Who is in charge? Losing New Orleans to a natural disaster is one thing, but losing her to hopeless gunmen and a shameful lack of response is unfathomable. How is it that the U.S. military can conquer a foreign country in a matter of days, but can't stop terrorists controlling the streets of America or even drop a case of water to desperate and dying Americans? President Bush, please see what's happening. The American people want to believe the government is doing everything it can do -- not to rebuild or to stabilize gas prices -- just to restore the most basic order. So far, they are hearing about Herculean efforts, but they aren't seeing them. *** The Washington Times Troops are finally moving into New Orleans in realistic numbers, and it's past time. What took the government so long? The thin veneer separating civilization and chaos, which we earlier worried might collapse in the absence of swift action, has collapsed. We expected to see, many hours ago, the president we saw standing atop the ruin of the World Trade Center, rallying a dazed country to action. We're pleased he finally caught a ride home from his vacation, but he risks losing the one trait his critics have never dented: His ability to lead, and be seen leading. He returns to the scene of the horror today, and that's all to the good. His presence will rally broken spirits. But he must crack heads, if bureaucratic heads need cracking, to get the food, water and medicine to the people crying for help in New Orleans and on the Mississippi coast. The list of things he has promised is a good list, but there is no time to dally, whether by land, sea or air. We should have delivered them yesterday. Americans are dying. *** Philadelphia Inquirer (and other Knight Ridder papers) "I hope people don't point -- play politics during this period." That was President Bush's response yesterday to criticism of the U.S. government's inexplicably inadequate relief efforts following Hurricane Katrina. Sorry, Mr. President, legitimate questions are being asked about the lack of rescue personnel, equipment, food, supplies, transportation, you name it, four days after the storm. It's not "playing politics" to ask why. It's not "playing politics" to ask questions about what Americans watched in horror on TV yesterday: elderly people literally dying on the street outside the New Orleans convention center because they were sick and no one came to their aid. The rest of America can't fathom why a country with our resources can't be at least as effective in this emergency as it was when past disasters struck Third World nations. Someone needs to explain why well-known emergency aid lessons aren't being applied here. This hurricane is no one's fault; the devastation would be hard to handle no matter who was in charge. But human deeds can mitigate a disaster, or make it worse. For example: Did federal priorities in an era of huge tax cuts shortchange New Orleans' storm protection and leave it more vulnerable? This flooding is no surprise to experts. They've been warning for more than 20 years that the levees keeping Lake Pontchartrain from emptying into the under-sea-level city would likely break under the strain of a Category 3 hurricane. Katrina was a Category 4. So the Crescent City sits under water, much of its population in a state of desperate, dangerous transience, not knowing when they will return home. They're the lucky ones, though. Worse off are those left among the dying in a dying town. The questions aren't about politics. They are about justice. *** Minneapolis Star Tribune But whatever the final toll, the wrenching misery and trauma confronting the people of New Orleans is much greater than it should be -- as it is, in fact, for tens of thousands of people along the strip of Mississippi that was most brutally assaulted by the storm. The immediate goal must be to ease that suffering. The second goal must be to understand how we came to this sorry situation. How do you justify cutting $250 million in scheduled spending for crucial pump and levee work in the Southeast Louisiana Urban Flood Control Project (SELA), authorized by Congress in 1995? How do you explain the almost total lack of coordination among federal, state and local officials both in Louisiana and Mississippi? No one appeared in charge. *** Des Moines Register The devastation wrought by Hurricane Katrina was the first practical test of the new homeland-security arrangements and the second test of President Bush in the face of a national crisis. The performance of both has been less than stellar so far. Katrina was a disaster that came with at least two days of warning, and it has been more than four days since the storm struck. Yet on Thursday, refugees still huddled unrescued in the unspeakable misery of the New Orleans Superdome. Patients in hospitals without power and water clung to life in third-world conditions. Untold tragedies lie yet to be discovered in the rural lowlands of Louisiana, Mississippi and Alabama. <a href="http://www.editorandpublisher.com/eandp/search/article_display.jsp?schema=&vnu_content_id=1001054151&WebLogicSession=QxnX6OeH1gbn1QelL68Ly95IysGG1narKF2lM2arq6jc2mwZOQ2S|6812391274220187331/177738802/6/7005/7005/7002/7002/7005/-1">www.editorandpublisher.co...02/7005/-1</a>

by **proldic** » Sat Sep 03, 2005 2:17 pm

Editor & Publisher August 31, 2005 Editorials Raise Questions About President's Response to Katrina--and Lack of Preparations By E&P Staff As the truth sinks in--this is the worst natural disaster in the nation's history--editorials in a wide range of newspapers have now raised critical issues about the lack of preparation, the effects of so many National Guard sent to Iraq, and the response of President Bush to the tragedy this week. One of the most stalwart conservative newspapers in the nation, the Union Leader of New Hampshire, today blasted Bush's response to the great Gulf Coast hurricane... On Thursday, after the president returned to Washington, The New York Times mocked his speech... The Washington Post, meanwhile, called for a close look at what should have been done differently, saying "it will be extremely important to better understand the causes of this long-predicted disaster and to determine what, if anything, could have prevented it. This administration has consistently played down the possibility of environmental disaster, in Louisiana and everywhere else. The president's most recent budgets have actually proposed reducing funding for flood prevention in the New Orleans area, and the administration has long ignored Louisiana politicians' requests for more help in protecting their fragile coast, the destruction of which meant there was little to slow down the hurricane before it hit the city...given how frequently the impact of this one was predicted, and given the scale of the economic and human catastrophe that has resulted, it is certainly fair to ask questions about disaster preparations. Congress, when it returns, should rise above the blame game and instead probe the state of the nation's preparation for handling major natural catastrophes, particularly those that threaten crucial regions of the country." The Albuquerque (N.M.) Tribune asked: "Like the National Guard, is FEMA itself being stretched too thin by the number and increasing intensity of natural disasters such as hurricanes and wildfires? That's not to mention the potential for earthquakes, including the so-called 'Big One' in California." <a href="http://www.editorandpublisher.com/eandp/search/article_display.jsp?schema=&vnu_content_id=1001052874&WebLogicSession=QxnX6OeH1gbn1QelL68Ly95IysGG1narKF2lM2arq6jc2mwZOQ2S|6812391274220187331/177738802/6/7005/7005/7002/7002/7005/-1">www.editorandpublisher.co...02/7005/-1</a>

by **proldic** » Sat Sep 03, 2005 3:12 pm

"The Late Victorian Holocausts -- El Nino Famines & The Making of the Third World" "Dead Cities" "Ecology of Fear" all good books, the first one essential reading

by **Dreams End** » Sat Sep 03, 2005 4:16 pm

These guys play so many angles. FOX, who, bizarrely, was the harshest and most direct in reporting about the "delays" yesterday, is now using these delays as evidence of the need for a strong leader, particularly a military man. "The civilian agencies tried," says Geraldo, "but really only the military could make this work." So whether this whole thing was allowed to happen or not, they are trying various ways to take advantage. I'm guessing that Brown will be fired and Gen. Honore will be elevated to some kind of national leader...although I find him an interesting guy, I think they are intentionally highlighting him in the face of all this..he arrived exactly at the same time Bush did. I feel they will use this as a way to militarize traditionally civilian responsibilities...perhaps the entire DHS apparatus. Just thinking out loud here, but that seems to be how they are going to take advantage of this chaos. Will it work? I don't know...there is SO much anger and the media (only at times and often more the reporters than the anchors) are actually doing their job more than I've seen in quite a long time. Look for more fires in NO and, if reporters insist on wandering into "unauthorized areas" sniper shots at reporters from those very busy looters. Also note that two people have been shot at the Convention Center by military. One for "attacking someone with scissors" and another for "raping a 13-year old girl." This from Geraldo. That "rape" allegation was made a few days ago as well. <sarcasm>Too bad these army guys don't learn hand to hand combat so they can disarm someone with scissors without shooting him in the head. </sarcasm>

by **Qutb** » Sat Sep 03, 2005 5:15 pm

Yeah, scissors are so scary you just have to shoot somebody wielding such a formidable weapon... I agree about the media, or at least the reporters on the ground. They are human, after all. I think the spell of 9/11 may finally be broken. Anderson Cooper has been great. And the issue of race/class is definitely going to be highlighted. It's an elephant of such a size that it's impossible to ignore. Honore seems like an ok guy to me. But the impression everybody has after this is definitely that the military are the only ones who are competent to take charge after a catastrophe. Bush's actions are, as per usual, inexplicable. You know he loves to be a hero. Why the fuck is he playing guitar while New Orleans is being inundated? It is of course his second term, maybe he just doesn't care. Qutb means "axis," "pole," "the center," which contains the periphery or is present in it. The qutb is a spiritual being, or function, which can reside in a human being or several human beings or a moment. It is the elusive mystery of how the divine gets delegated into the manifest world and obviously cannot be defined.

by **proldic** » Sat Sep 03, 2005 5:55 pm

regarding Mike Davis. He's been the subject of a lot of controversy, some of it quite justified. I used to think he was amazing, but lately I've found myself disagreeing with him on some key points. In fact, I am very worried about the combined effect of him and James "clusterfuck" Kunstler's "Magical" urbanism. The work of those two, plus Richard Heinberg, probably lead the pack in the austerity-planned shrinkage-downsizing meme, at least as far as liberal intellectuals go. I should have just plugged "Late-Victorian Holocausts", which is good.

by **proldic** » Sat Sep 03, 2005 6:01 pm

Gregory Rodriguez, associate editor for the Pacific News Service [says] "I think it's condescending. I tend to tie Mike Davis into a whole Anglo-apocalyptic school. There's a generation of whites who are growing older, and they have a sense that the end is near. The era in which their preeminence was unique is over, and Mike Davis feeds into that. At the same time, this is the moment other groups are going to get a piece of the pie, so Davis is dooming our world at the very moment we are taking our place in it." Well put, imo.

by **robertdreed** » Sat Sep 03, 2005 10:06 pm

The insistence on playing off cultures in competition as a zero-sum game is bogus and illegitimate. What a failure of Left politics. What a lack of imagination. It's all seen in terms of Power, with the idea of hostility being inevitable. Same as the fascist Right. Only man gets to oppress man, instead of the other way around. I'm glad I don't live my life with that paranoia. Driving cab since 1986, and I've never been robbed. ( I feel like I'm tempting fate to say that. But it's worth it. ) If Mike Davis isn't Left enough for you, proldic, who is? Yes, I'm aware that I've been purged from your cadre, joining that ever-lengthening list...presumably, Davis is still merely under suspicion. Edited by: <A HREF=http://p216.ezboard.com/brigorousintuition.showUserPublicProfile?gid=robertdreed>robertdreed</A> at: 9/3/05 8:21 pm

Will Katrina Incite Swing to Socialism?

Will Katrina Incite Swing to Socialism?

Conservative Papers Rip Bush's Hurricane Response

"Wide Range" of Newspapers Critical of Bush

Mike Davis Has Been Writing About This Stuff

Re: Mike Davis Has Been Writing About This Stuff

Re: Mike Davis Has Been Writing About This Stuff

I should qualify myself

Davis et al

factional politics

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