New Orleans, if it happened here

[andymackem]

well quite. it was just the thought of 500,000 bird's eye roast beef dinners.. i'm sorry, but it made me laugh.

depends on how much of a reserve of stores like that the military hold, i guess.

In the case of the US military, that shouldn't matter either. I'm sure there are supermarkets in the US. Homeland security merely goes and recquisitions the local WalMart. And hopes that Buttfuck, Idaho doesn't starve as a result.

But my point about carbon emissions to get aid across the Atlantic raises a certain irony.

If this storm is a by-product of global warming, and that warming is a consequence of fossil fuel use (see earlier thread about weather), does flying in aid actually generate a longer-term problem?

Has Bush's helicopter ride ultimately ensured a further devastating hurricane elsewhere on the SE seaboard? Would the tactical sacrifice of New Orleans (think Moscow 1812, albeit in very different circumstances) on an altar on restricted transportation and fuel use serve the greater long-term good of humanity than attempting to rescue an already disastrous situation?

One for the moralists out there to ponder of an evening

[Zuma]

Sound more typical of the News Of The World, indeed just because it is in print means nothing..."claims" indeed is the key word.

[Obviousman]

I have said it before, and I'll just repeat it:

It's a plain disgrace for a country that considers itself the centre of the civilised world to go through something like this

[Zuma]

well quite. it was just the thought of 500,000 bird's eye roast beef dinners.. i'm sorry, but it made me laugh.

depends on how much of a reserve of stores like that the military hold, i guess.

In the case of the US military, that shouldn't matter either. I'm sure there are supermarkets in the US. Homeland security merely goes and recquisitions the local WalMart. And hopes that Buttfuck, Idaho doesn't starve as a result.

But my point about carbon emissions to get aid across the Atlantic raises a certain irony.

If this storm is a by-product of global warming, and that warming is a consequence of fossil fuel use (see earlier thread about weather), does flying in aid actually generate a longer-term problem?

Has Bush's helicopter ride ultimately ensured a further devastating hurricane elsewhere on the SE seaboard? Would the tactical sacrifice of New Orleans (think Moscow 1812, albeit in very different circumstances) on an altar on restricted transportation and fuel use serve the greater long-term good of humanity than attempting to rescue an already disastrous situation?

One for the moralists out there to ponder of an evening

Aye Andy, and just wait till Wubya arrives in an F15 to declare the problem over........

[eastmidswhizzkid]

basically wot lazcorp and andy mackem said.

population of 1.2m -i keep trying to imagine Leicester x4 in that situation...and that's just new orleans;billox keeps being referred to as a coastal resortbut i doubt very much if it's exactly skeggie or mablethorpe

[boudicca]

But my point about carbon emissions to get aid across the Atlantic raises a certain irony.

If this storm is a by-product of global warming, and that warming is a consequence of fossil fuel use (see earlier thread about weather), does flying in aid actually generate a longer-term problem?

Has Bush's helicopter ride ultimately ensured a further devastating hurricane elsewhere on the SE seaboard?

Nah, we all know that it's cows that are responsible for global warming really...

Re that comment about the Sri Lankan guy saying they reacted to the tsunami in a more civilised way... I suppose it's virtually impossible (for me anyway) to verify a comment like that, but if it is the case, I think it says less about American society alone and more about the societies of the developed world compared with the developing world.

In Europe, as well as America, we are simply not used to situations in which our very survival is in danger. People in the tsunami hit countries were/are more familiar with hardship (this is a sweeping generalisation, I know). Perhaps it is simply a case of a society which is unaccustomed to having so little (since it's all been blown or washed away) reacting slightly more violently than a society which is built around people who have much less to begin with, and are used to living in a "civilised" manner in this kind of disaster.

Mibbe.

[emilystrange]

i was pretty disgusted that the refugees are being made to wait for hours on the streets at centres after being evacuated, then searched for weapons and drugs at the door.

to give them their due, local officials were also reported as being disgusted, but the tv report didn't say what they were doing about it.

this was in baco raton i think. iirc, this is a kind of bournemouth for the very rich.

jese jackson described this centre as looking like 'the hull of a slave ship'.. 6000 people on camp beds

[smiscandlon]

I think that saying animalistic behavior is expected in the poor and uneducated is proof that education doesn't protect against ignorance, namely prejudice. Just because a person isn't privileged enough to be able to afford the astronomical prices of even state university education in the U.S. doesn't mean that they'll immediately turn murderer and rapist the minute they get a chance. Likewise, an Ivy League degree doesn't guarantee "civilized" behavior in an extreme crisis circumstance. And education doesn't necessarily guarantee against poverty.

All fair points. My own comments, though, were based on observation of the community I live in, not ignorance or prejudice. This is a neighbourhood where antisocial behaviour and vandalism are (without exaggeration) daily occurences, assault and violent crime are regular events, to the point where I've even been questioned by the police once over a murder, purely because of the apartment block I live in.

Regardless of whether someone is rich or poor, educated or not, everyone basically has the choice of whether or not to treat their fellow human beings with respect, regardless of the circumstances. I've no doubt that most folk in New Orleans are just trying to survive, but there is obviously still that element who feel that this presents an opportunity for assault and rape, looting and even murder, firing at rescue helicopters (WTF?) etc. I hate to say it, but it reminds me very much of the lawlessness in Iraq following the fall of Saddam's government.

[andymackem]

Something that occured to me as I was driving into work:

Sometime in June, not long before I went to Russia, a GNER train to London broke down and the electrics failed. It was stranded somewhere near Peterborough IIRC.

You can't open the windows on these trains and with no electrics the air-con stopped. It was a very hot day and after a few hours it was getting very unpleasant.

I'm sure there were reports of fist-fights breaking out over bottles of water on that train. Probably between people from New Orleans who were visiting the UK.

[canon docre]

Something that occured to me as I was driving into work:

Sometime in June, not long before I went to Russia, a GNER train to London broke down and the electrics failed. It was stranded somewhere near Peterborough IIRC.

You can't open the windows on these trains and with no electrics the air-con stopped. It was a very hot day and after a few hours it was getting very unpleasant.

I'm sure there were reports of fist-fights breaking out over bottles of water on that train. Probably between people from New Orleans who were visiting the UK.

...and some ferocious Peterborough inhabitant/s committed "cannibalistic - acts" on the poor travellers.

[emilystrange]

Johnny?

[canon docre]

Johnny?

No wonder, that he could afford to quit the job, after filling up his stock for the winter.

[emilystrange]

*snigger*

[markfiend]

Michael Morre's open letter to George W Bush.

===

Also, take a look at this.

[nick the stripper]

Also, take a look at this.

Typical emotive press jibe

[emilystrange]

good letter.

and the other is just plain disgusting.

[Quiff Boy]

Britain is sending half a million READY MEALS???

which i'm sure is more than the US did for the tsunami appeal...

[FiveLeavesLeft]

I wasn't paying that much attention to the hurricane news first cos I thought that since it was happening in a developed country like the USA, they'd be able to control the situation. So it's of course tragical that there are thousands of victims in the area. Anyway, I'm thinking that if the same happened in Finland, the rescue operation would be more organised, social inequality is not yet as serious a problem here.

[emilystrange]

but.. can we do it better if it happened here? i'd say yes.

[Quiff Boy]

its at times like this a country's foreign policies and inward-looking nature (when it comes to looking after ones self at the expense of other nations) comes back and "bites you on the ass"...

[emilystrange]

what's the latest offerings received, then?

[boudicca]

They're talking about tens of thousands of dead now...

Surely not. That's just... dreadful.

[Jaimie1980]

Judging by the way some people behave as a matter of course where I live I'm sorry to say similair things would happen, I think, though not on the same scale.
There was alot of deprivation in that place and when that happened the consequences were pretty much inevitable. Harrowing.

[Quiff Boy]

the tsunami appeal - "Between 170,000–250,000 people are thought to have died as a result of the tsunami"

Funds pledged
4. United States $350,000,000
...
9. United Kingdom $93,550,000

however:

Funds pledged (per capita)
22. United Kingdom $1.54 per person
...
24. United States $1.18 per person

Funds pledged (per $ GDP)
25. United Kingdom $52497.19 per $1 billion
...
29. United States $29787.23 per $1 billion

[Batfish]

Saw this, uncredited, but it makes sense:

A person writing on the internet wrote:
Lots of things about the US become easier to understand if you consider it as a very rich third world country... Not just now, but generally. Like enormously high and rising inequity (including reducing real-terms median income over the last 30 years!), lack of adequate healthcare, housing, education for the poor, and a belief that richer states have no responsibility to improve the living conditions of poorer ones, diversion of national wealth into warfare rather than welfare. That sort of thing.

Lots of examples at the moment; eg general notion that Texas helping out refugees from Louisiana is a 'stunningly generous offer' rather than you know, standard operating practice, or the proportion of US military strength being used to sort out Katrina cleanup (and you know, they could have been shipping in troops to safe nearby areas over the weekend), or just a general 'oh well, of course it's individuals' responsibility to look after themselves and their property', or the Red Cross explaining that it's their largest aid effort ever (because, you know, American Red Cross is the world).

Not to mention police and other rescue personnel actively looting (apparently this happened after 9/11 as well), something which I think we can safely say Would Not Happen Here.