The OFFICIAL Unofficial Achewood Message Board
Trivial Pursuits => History => Topic started by: pmcd9 on August 31, 2005, 02:15:40 am
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The levee in New Orleans didn't hold.
"History shows again and again how nature points out the folly of man."
~Paul
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Man, are you trying to be a dick?
Have some fuck*ng dignity. People are dying.
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V, this is one time I might have to disagree with your stance.
Paul's chosen Godzilla as a topic title here, I believe, because that song by Blue Oyster Cult is the source of the quote which rings so true in the midst of this disaster. The New Orleans levee wasn't shored up last year, when the Army Corps of Engineers found it needed to be, due to a decision made by men (and maybe ladies, but absolutely humankind) who currently happen to serve as members and the head of our federal government's administration.
As a result, hundreds of people are dying and perhaps hundreds of thousands have lost their homes. If this isn't nature pointing out the folly of man, I don't know what is.
We know Paul. He's definitely and easily a man who knows when dignity is and is not called for. He's not, I believe, making light of the situation. This is the History forum, after all, and it's where current events discussions go.
Paul, if I'm not dead-on in this assessment, you've got a hell of a lot of explaining to do.
Donate at http://www.redcross.org/ or 1-800-HELP-NOW (435-7669).
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Fair enough. I'm sorry -- this is a fairly sensitive topic for me. Right now I'm staying with my parents, in central Louisiana, and while we weren't hit by the hurricane or its aftermath, we're overwhelmed with evacuees with no place to go. My father teaches students from around Louisiana, and some of them have lost their homes and may have lost family. If that's what Paul meant, I'm sorry, but... yeah, tensions are high.
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And if that's not what Paul meant, I'm sorry too.
Regardless, I hope you and yours are well-stocked and stay safe.
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i, i think the news people (note i only get ABC and UPN so the coverage i have access to is severely limited and what i am commenting on may not be accurate for others),
i think the news people are trying to minimize what they are showing, because as my puny brain tries to piece together this scene here from LA and that one there from MS and etc, it really scares the shit out of me.
this might be the first time i appreciate the news people not acutally telling/showing the fuck*ng truth, because if someone started flying from FLA and headed west with a camera pointed on the coast and then they just rolled that footage i don't think i'd ever get out from under the bed ever again.
my brain is holding to seperate and opposite thoughts concurrently: of course New Orleans is under water, it's below sea level. and: oh my god the entire city is fuck*ng GONE.
wiki says the metro new orleans population is 1,337,726.
they say 80% of new orleans is under water.
WHAT THE FUCK CAN WE DO FOR ONE MILLION PEOPLE?
i mean, holy shit. and that's just new orleans.
i was watching ted koppel last night, and he talked about 80% of the city being under water, but he didn't ONCE talk about how many people that represents not having a dwelling wherein they live and keep themselves safe and eat and all that.
and that's just new orleans.
how long has new orleans been below sea level?
i've always sort of thought godzilla was hokey, but fuck if it doesn't make a whole hell of a lot of sense, because what the fuck other than a giant radioactive dinosaur can walk the coast of the gulf and fuck everything and everyone in it's path?
it's a fuck*ng monster and it just walked on everyone and everything in it's path.
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On an only vaguely related note, with the news being what it is, I found myself wondering if the band Katrina and the Waves are still together. And also, one of my bestfriends, once dated a girl named Catrina, and shortly after came of of the closet as perfering boys.
In regard to making light of the situation, the local news had what was clearly meant to be a funny clip montage yesterday of several Canadian affiliate reporters trying to report while standing out in the insane weather. It was wacky! (I'm being sarcastic here - actually - it was disturbing) It seemed in such poor taste to show this goofy montage in the same news cast as the sound bite that every station is showing of the guy weeping because his house split in half and he can't find his wife's body... Gah!
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An aquiantence who is with the Federal disaster folks flew out to Houston to stage for relief efforts yesterday.
Her goodbye quote: "See you in 6 months".
Right around DC are two of those elite urban search and rescue teams who always get activated for hurricanes and the tsunami and such. I can't even image doing that for a living just because of all the time spent away from home, let alone the things you would see.
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To me, strangely, the predominant thought is "Am I going to have to cross New Orleans off my Eventually Someday Road Trip?" The thought that New Orleans may just not be there anymore in its classic form boggles me. Like what Arkabee said about monsters, in my mindset "New Orleans is gone" is the kind of thing you hear in the wake of a supervillain attack. It's the kind of thing a bad writer would do for shock value, and then for several months you see background news reports about the New Orleans Reclamation Project and if the Justice League writer needs a member not to show up, he's in New Orleans helping with the rebuilding.
Except, of course, that in this case there are obviously no space mongols involved and it can't really be resolved off-panel. But that's the mindset in which I can readily wrap my mind around that kind of destruction to a significant American city. 80% underwater? Criminy.
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I feel for the people in Louisiana, because they're not SUPPOSED to get hurricanes like this, but I must admit to shouting "you fuck*ng idiot!" at the TV whenever I see someone crying about how their home was destroyed by a hurricane... for the FIFTH TIME in as many years. Gee, you think you should move further inland, maybe, you fuck*ng idiot?
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Paul - good post.
I have in the past had issues with people FROM NO (I went to Grad school there) who would face every hurricane more or less cavalierly because "they always turn". This one did too, for the most part...imagine what a direct hit will do when it comes.
Leave it to the French to build a city 12 feet below sea level in the swamp between a huge lake and a huge river. You would have to want to live someplace where the sewage has to be pumped up and out. A city of over a million, a flood of biblical proportions, and all that sewage and garbage, and now bodies...
It will be a miracle if they don't have a cholera epidemic.
Those levees probably would have failed to some degree even with the repairs....I was there once during a routine thunderstorm and they were sandbagging all the entrances of the buildings on Canal Street. The waters got nowhere to go, the ground is swampy already.
the energy behind Katrina was incredible. I don't know what they will do next but if I were any big insurance company I would never insure anything in that area. I think serious consideration to moving the bulk of the population and economically important businesses should be taken - leave it as a college town and theme park for excessive behavior but it's no place for a big city.
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Last year at this time, I lived in Orlando and had experienced three hurricanes passing through the area in (I think) 7 weeks. We didn't get the worst of any of them, but life still sucked.
After the first (most damaging) one, power was out nearly EVERYWHERE. I had thought I had plenty of food, but I'd forgotten to consider how I would cook any of it. There weren't any working traffic signals. The gas stations that had power didn't have gas, and people were lined up in their cars waiting just in case they got more gas delivered. I was lucky in that my apartment building had an intact and relatively non-leaky roof.
Standing water was everywhere, and it was full of tree branches and bits of buildings. There was a water quality alert, so you couldn't drink water without boiling it first. It was over ninety degrees most of the day, every day. I took unheated showers to try to cool off, and my clothes would be soaked with sweat within minutes of putting them on. All of the major highways leading out of town were gridlocked for days, and people kept running out of gas and having no way to get more.
My grandmother lives on the Sound east of Pensacola, right about where Ivan hit hardest. When we visited last Christmas, it was still impossible to get plywood or roofing materials. Her house survived, because my grandfather had purchased the highest property along that stretch of coast. The house 100 yards down the road was washed off of its foundation and was still just sitting there. The road was littered with detritus from the houses in the area: dolls, videos, clothes, stuff like that (Again, this was in December).
It's about ten times worse than that in New Orleans and eastwards. I can't really imagine it. The real horror is that life there won't be approaching normal for weeks at best, and some areas won't ever recover.
There's a reason I don't live in Florida any more. I know I'm more mobile than most people can afford to be (rented property, no spouse or children), but after last summer I decided I was never going to be in a position to go through that again. It didn't sound too bad until I experienced it. I'm guessing that's why people chose to remain in New Orleans -- you seriously can not comprehend the magnitude of a hurricane's power if you haven't been in one.
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I feel for the people in Louisiana, because they're not SUPPOSED to get hurricanes like this, but I must admit to shouting "you fuck*ng idiot!" at the TV whenever I see someone crying about how their home was destroyed by a hurricane... for the FIFTH TIME in as many years. Gee, you think you should move further inland, maybe, you fuck*ng idiot?
Er, far be it from me to get in the way of a good Jough rant, but you do realize that many of the people caught in Katrina are those sufficiently poor that they can't just get sick of hurricanes, pack up, and leave, right? Not everyone has the liberty of easy mobility. For that matter, we're often talking about homes that have withstood previous hurricanes; I believe they mentioned that a lot of the places in Alabama and Mississippi that got destroyed were buildings that had previously stood up to George and Camille. I get the frustration, but most of the inability to evacuate this time was gridlock and lack of transportation, not hubris.
(Honest to God, I'm contradicting Jough. This really must have gotten me pissy, huh?)
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Right around DC are two of those elite urban search and rescue teams who always get activated for hurricanes and the tsunami and such. I can't even image doing that for a living just because of all the time spent away from home, let alone the things you would see.
I actually know a couple of people who do this. I asked one of them once, how do you deal with going to Oklahoma City and the WTC and all these places where awful shit is happening? And she said, better to go there and HELP than sit at home doing nothing.
Hey, how about all that money diverted away from levee buildup and stuff like that in favor of going to blow shit up in Iraq? (http://www.thismodernworld.com/weblog/mtarchives/week_2005_08_28.html#002409) Brilliant!
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Actually, I was talking about people in Florida who keep rebuilding and staying where they are rather than moving once a hurricane decimates their homes EVERY YEAR OR TWO.
The people of LA may not have had a hurricane of this magnitude ever, or at least not in the course of their lifetimes, and thus are spared being thought of as fuck*ng idiots.
Now, if any of those SAME people have this happen to them AGAIN next year, they deserve our ire, scorn, and pointless cursing at the tele.
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To me, strangely, the predominant thought is "Am I going to have to cross New Orleans off my Eventually Someday Road Trip?" The thought that New Orleans may just not be there anymore in its classic form boggles me.
Yeah, as the hurricane approached I thought, damn, I really should have tried harder to get there before it got wiped off the map... But I once visited a historic district in a city in Poland that was completely levelled in WWII and was rebuilt identically. It's amazing what people can do. And it's not us tourists who are going to want it back the worst, you know?
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No. it's the people who want our Yankee Tourist Dollars who will want it back the most.
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The people of LA may not have had a hurricane of this magnitude ever, or at least not in the course of their lifetimes, and thus are spared being thought of as fuck*ng idiots.
1 million + people
12 feet below sea level
Between a huge lake and a huge river
The first ones there who thought it was a good place for a city WERE fuck*ng idiots.
At this point, everyone should be well understanding that living there is basically a year-to-year dice roll on losing everything. The dice have rolled well for a long time, so the next 10-15 years could be pretty rough.
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First off, to all the people concerned they missed their chance to see New Orleans. Forget that, NO is gonna be just fine. This storm has beat the hell out of them, but give 'em a little time and they'll be back on their feet. NO isn't buildings it's people.
V, I read your message at 5 am this morning just before leaving for work and it hurt my feelings. I've been posting on this board for nearly two years and you should know by now that i'm nothing if not compasionate. I feel for the people of Louisiana and Mississippi and everywhere that Katrina has torn hell out of. Shreveport (the town of my birth) isn't the only town dealing with refugees. We got a whole mess of cajuns crowding our hotels, rest stops and anywhere they can find. We've got 25 thousand being brought in to the Astrodome right now. Answering a call for volunteers I went there straight from work, but in typical Houston style, they already had more helping hands than they could use so they turned me away. When I finally got home my inbox was flooded (pun intended) with e-mails from a family friend trying desperatly to find shelter for cousins in Louisiana who have lost everything, a home, and business, it's terrible. I have offered to put them up in my house. They will be here tomorrow. So no, i'm not taking this lightly.
My original post was a comment on the unmitigated audacity of thinking you can hold back the ocean. I first heard about the levees in NO a couple of years ago in a nature program about natural disasters. After seeing what they were doing, I just shook my head and said that ain't gonna work. I guess I was right sad to say. As for the people dying, well I gotta tell you I don't have a whole lot of sympathy for them. It's like the Darwin Awards Olympics. I heard someone on the radio saying "it's our tsunami." No, it's not. The tsunami was unexpected and sudden. Hurrican Katrina was forcast for weeks. Hey, there's a hurricane coming. GET THE FUCK OUT!!! I realize that some people have mobility issues, but you don't have to stay in your 2 bedroom wood frame house. GO TO THE SHELTER!!! I imagine some of those dead folks were listening to that silly c&w song about having hurricane parties everytime it blows right up until their house (with them in it) was being busted into toothpicks.
Give to the red cross, I did.
~Paul
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We finally heard from a doctor deal with at work. Being a doctor he couldn't evactuate early. He and his family are fine but all they have left are the clothes they were wearing and their cell phones. We now have to call a bunch of hospitals to let them know that he had some breast ultrasound and mammography films of theirs that are, needless to say, lost. Luckily everybody seems to be pretty understanding.
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The images from the news have left me in disbelief and sadness. As this is the closest connection I have to the events, I wish anyone affected the best.
Incidentally, does anyone know if a hurricane is just a cyclone by another name? Is there any metereological difference between the two?
cheers,
-OZ
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Incidentally, does anyone know if a hurricane is just a cyclone by another name? Is there any metereological difference between the two?
I believe cyclone is more a synonym for tornado.
...
and Merriam-Webster confirms this.
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Man, but tornados are the extremely local weather event right? Like a big spout of air maybe on the order of 10m across? What we call a cyclone here, at least, seems to be exactly what is termed a hurricane elsewhere. Regional meterological linguistic variation?
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Well, at least according to this faqs.org FAQ (http://www.faqs.org/faqs/meteorology/storms-faq/part1/), the proper scientific name for a hurricane is a "tropical cyclone."
So not only are they indeed the same meterological events, your name for them is actually more correct than ours.
e d u c a t i o n ;
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Wow, who knew? I think I've just been educated.
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I thought that in the southern hemisphere a hurricane is called a typhoon...is a typhoon something else?
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I thought that in the southern hemisphere a hurricane is called a typhoon...is a typhoon something else?
I think so:
Main Entry: ty·phoon
Pronunciation: tI-'fün
Function: noun
Etymology: alteration (influenced by Chinese -- Guangdong -- daaih-fùng, from daaih big + fùng wind) of earlier touffon, from Arabic tufAn hurricane, from Greek typhOn violent storm
1 : a tropical cyclone occurring in the region of the Philippines or the China sea
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Fats Domino lives! Woo-hoo!
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I'm afraid that New Orleans is in danger of slipping into anarchy. Unless basic services are restored soon or EVERYONE is relocated, it's just going to get worse.
The people that are stuck in New Orleans right now have no hope for normalcy -- and people without hope can turn violent quite easily. I entertained very real thoughts of harming people and stealing from them when I was stuck in Orlando without power, gas, or food... and that was only after three days. I was hungry, hot, thirsty, and had nothing to fill my time with but waiting and envy. I was rapidly losing sight of the big picture.
I wasn't really bad off at all, yet I felt angry. I ended up finding a hotel room and taking a cab there until power came back. It was really nothing, but until I was fed, clean, and cool I was filled with this inexplicable rage at everyone who had those things.
And again, my situation was ten times better than many people in that area, and a hundred times better than most in New Orleans. I had my (intact) home, my possessions, and the means to remove myself from the area. My part of town wasn't hit that hard; services began to be available again after 36 hours or so. My power was back in under a week, and I luckily spied a gas station as its fuel delivery truck pulled in and was able to fill up.
If my home was destroyed with all of my possessions including my only means of transportation...
If there simply was no shelter to go to and no food available...
If I didn't know whether my friends, family, and neighbors were even alive...
If I didn't have the cash to get out of the area...
If I didn't know whether I would have a way to make a living any more...
I don't know. I just don't know.
Sometimes I feel like the best answer is to move everyone out of the area, because that many people who've been through that much tragedy and are under that much hardship... things could get very bad.
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Many have tried to lay blame for the problems in NO at the feet of the President. And I think... they are correct to do so.
~Paul
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Well, I think very little of George W. Bush. However, I don't think he controls the weather.
I do wonder why it has taken THREE DAYS to get the National Guard/Military involved and on site.
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Well, I think very little of George W. Bush. However, I don't think he controls the weather.
I don't know, he seems to think he's JC's right hand man.
~Paul
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We are all JCs right hand men and women if we live as Christians.
I spent the night last night helping a complete stranger move since she got evicted with her 7 year old son with 24 hours notice. No one blamed the President. My friend's wife went off the deep end a couple of months ago and now he's devastated that they are getting divorced. He's a very liberal guy and he's going through hell but he has yet to blame the president.
I got such a wedgie today and I never once considered that the President might be to blame.
The National Guard is under the direct command and control of the Governor of the State. If it's taking too long to mobilize them (these are citizen soldiers who need time to get their family and work lives together before they can act on orders)(and there needs to be a plan for their deployment prior to sending them) you need to look at the STATE government. Only 15% of Louisianas guardsmen have been mobilized overseas, the rest are in Louisiana and presumably waiting for orders from their governor.
The President can Federalize and mobilize guard troops but that takes time, requires them to be Federally empowered and paid, and takes power away from the states, which no Republican would ordinarily do. It would be pointless to Federalize them and then leave them to work in the state they started out in. The President did sign orders for FEMA to start moving into the region on FRIDAY - before the storm hit - based on predictions of disaster which unfortunately were all too true.
Disaster has struck and the wheels are in motion. Those that want to stand around blaming or making political hay from human tragedy should do so quietly; others have work to do. As for the anarchy that's a horrible situation that displays the worst of human nature - it requires a strong hand and a strong stomach to quell it at this point. We should be grieving for humanity - but if you weren't already because of what's happening in the Sudan, what has happened un Uganda, Zimbabwe, and other places....well, maybe it seems worse because it's happening right here, but you know what...it's one world we live in. And we need to work in the world, not in our ideal little minds.
I suggest contribution, prayer, and helping your fellow man every chance you get no matter how trivial the need.
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Well, I think very little of George W. Bush. However, I don't think he controls the weather.
I don't know, he seems to think he's JC's right hand man.
~Paul
Regardless of what we all think of the president, as well as the various state and local officals down in Louisiana, I'm not entirely sure a political argument is what we should be getting into right now. Discuss whether Cathy would give a BJ to Marmaduke, donate to a charity of choice, even post a link to a Scandanavian Music video, just as long as we avoid a flame war. Tempers seem to be short.
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Thanks, Mantonio. I've been staying away from this thread because my temper regarding this sort of thing is getting very short; at this point I don't really have a lot more to say, and I'm tired. If we have to be angry at each other politically, can it go to Private Message, please? Thank you.
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Ok, I get the message, i'm sorry. I'm frustrated is all, forgive me.
~Paul
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Ok, I get the message, i'm sorry. I'm frustrated is all, forgive me.
~Paul
No offense taken. I think we're all on edge here.
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Fats Domino lives! Woo-hoo!
I didn't know he was still alive before this. But hey, at least there's some good news.
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The people of LA may not have had a hurricane of this magnitude ever, or at least not in the course of their lifetimes, and thus are spared being thought of as fuck*ng idiots.
Sorry, but it's a fairly common view point that the people of LA are fuck*ng idiots too. Earthquakes, mudslides, and smog don't really jive with the concept of suitable living conditions in a common sense world.
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Smells, I think you're thinking of L.A., or the city of Los Angeles, whereas I was talking about LA, or the state of Louisiana, which is where the hurricane which we're discussing hit.
Man, Canadians are so Canada-centric. There's a whole world outside of CA, you know!
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I have NO problem blaming the President. Not for the hurricane itself, obviously, but for making a bad situation worse. Politics is, by its very definition, the process of deciding how to allocate our resources. And this administration chose to divert resources away from levee projects in Louisiana in favor of the war in Iraq. And now the people in New Orleans are suffering for it.
http://www.thismodernworld.com/weblog/mtarchives/week_2005_08_28.html#002409
Can I definitively say that everything in NO would be peachy if the money had been spent properly? Of course not. But if I could go back in time and undo it, would I? You bet. Yadda yadda yadda, Saddam Hussein was a very bad man, but fuck Iraq. Seriously, fuck 'em. Not like they were dying en masse. Take care of our own people.
Anyway. Over lunch I heard on the radio a reporter who was riding with a convoy of National Guard vehicles headed downtown with food and water and stuff, so hopefully that'll be there soon.
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I'm totally against politicizing human tragedy; especially a natural disaster that was inevitable. Due to it's location and elevation, NO was pretty vulnerable regardless of what preparations could have been made.
I guess my biggest issue is the breakdown of society - I am not happy that the shoot to kill order is out on looters, but I'm also not happy that people are stealing things that they don't need to survive.
I hope someone taking diapers or water isn't shot, though.
No one wins here and I there's no point arguing about it.
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I'm totally against politicizing human tragedy; especially a natural disaster that was inevitable. Due to it's location and elevation, NO was pretty vulnerable regardless of what preparations could have been made.
So the fact that decisions made by the Bush administration led DIRECTLY to this situation being far worse than it had to be should just be ignored? Why is pointing this out "politicizing" it? You assume the motive is "Make Bush look bad," not "Babies and old people dying in the streets is wholly unacceptable?" Are we EVER allowed to be pissed at the administration for anything? If not now, when?
War in Iraq + irresponsible tax cuts --> cuts to USACE levee projects --> New Orleans is a big fuck*ng bowl of water.
War in Iraq --> half the National Guard and all their equipment over there --> the Superdome is fuck*ng Lord of the Flies territory.
Appointing a goofball campaign donor who couldn't run the International Arabian hoss Assocition (http://www.dailykos.com/story/2005/9/2/34622/68348) and had no emergency management experience to run FEMA --> FEMA can't get its shit together --> no fuck*ng water, food, or medicine for four days after the storm.
It's a straight line, A STRAIGHT LINE, from the actions of this administration to all this bungling. They got re-elected on the platform of "Only we can protect the country," and then when the chips are down and all that wondrous Homeland Security infrastructure is called upon... nothing.
THEY. FUCKED. UP. And I find it strangely entertaining that while "Are you scared of accountability?" was a club used to bludgeon No Child Left Behind past objecting teachers' unions, when the shoe is on the other foot, no one in this administration wants to be held accountable for anything.
Sorry, Dawg, but I ain't hearin' that. "Please don't politicize this" comes across as "Please don't say anything critical of Republicans, because it might force us to acknowledge their fuck-ups." It's a cop-out.
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I don't really consider myself capable of handing myself in a debate on this board, but I am going to try my hardest to express my feelings about this post. I respect you (and everyone here), carlos, but I couldn't agree less with you.
So the fact that decisions made by the Bush administration led DIRECTLY to this situation being far worse than it had to be should just be ignored
This didn't start with the Bush administration. According to an article I read in today's paper, one of the engineers who works on the levees said that efforts to improve them would have had to begun 20 to 25 years ago to prepare for something like Katrina. He also said funding has been steady during the Iraq war. I am going to find this article just it doesn't look like I'm talking out of my ass here. The point is, the problems with New Orleans go back years and years before the Bush Administration.
On top of that, New Orleans was pretty fucked, levees or no. Just because of geography, elevation, being built on a swamp, it's just a bad place to be hit with a hurricane. It's been covered well in this thread already.
Are we EVER allowed to be pissed at the administration for anything? If not now, when?
Yeah, because I NEVER hear anyone blame the Bush Administration for anything.
There are a lot of very valid things to blame him for, no question about that. But this whole Katrina situation is bigger than everyone. It is an absolute worst-case scenario that no amount of planning and preparation could have braced us for.
All this just makes me angry, because it's petty partisanship in a time when we all need to pull together. Pointing fingers isn't going to fix anything.
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I, for one, do not think Cathy would ever give Marmaduke a BJ. Garfield on the other hand....
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Guys? See earlier note about not turning this into a political thread? If there has to be out-duking, start your own thread or take it to PM. Please.
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What V said. There are myriad other places on the web to discuss this issue. This is a place to talk about cartoon cats and the various attributes of cheeses, books and bodily parts.
I have great respect for all our regulars. I would consider it a tragedy if someone left because of ill-feelings over a timely/topical discussion.
Talk about these issues all you want. I am. I'm just not doing it here. Please. This place is a refuge. It's the underground. It's about drum machines, Alex Trebek and ***** butts. I need the silly that Achewood and this board provide as a relief from the all too real facts that surround me daily. Don't drag me back to the ugly mundane with your fights!
Please. Please. Please. This is my haven. This is where I come to escape politics, religion and daily harmonics to correspond with my fellow slaves who've partaken of the achewater. Don't take that away from me. Resolve your current events debates elsewhere!
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I agree with August and V.
Several of the posts above made me very, very pissed off.
I wrote a long and scathing response full of swears.
I read what I wrote.
I erased it all.
This isn't the place for this, people. Take a step back, realize that the diversity of view points shared on TOUAMB are what make it a good thing, and that no matter what you say to one another, that you will not change the other person's political stance, and will only escalate things to a place you don't want to go to. We have reached an impass. Let it go.
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This (http://www.livejournal.com/~interdictor/) site seems like the place to be if you want to talk about the Hurricane. I'll limit my own comments to my personal experiences dealing with the Katrina aftermath.
~Paul
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They say comedy just equals tragedy plus time. So how much time before Katrina jokes are game? A month maybe? I've got a couple good ones.
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Jough, the comedy is already here.
Now, regardless of how you feel politically about this (I happen to agree, but only somewhat), or how you feel about the man's music (I think it is rad), you have to admit this shit is hilarious:
http://www.hiphopmusic.com/archives/001133.html
If you can, watch the clip. I can't believe this was on television.
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http://yahooracists.ytmnd.com/
That's pretty funny, but also pretty sad.
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http://yahooracists.ytmnd.com/
That's pretty funny, but also pretty sad.
Actually, that's kind of stupid. Yahoo News didn't write either photo caption. They reprinted captions from the new organizations that created them. So, other photos from those organizations may have been consistently captioned (i.e. referred to a white person as looting).
Of course, I question the use of the word "looting" at all when it refers to taking food/water/life necessities during a disaster of these proportions.
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Actually, that's kind of stupid. Yahoo News didn't write either photo caption. They reprinted captions from the new organizations that created them. So, other photos from those organizations may have been consistently captioned (i.e. referred to a white person as looting).
aaahhhh, you're no fun.
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Well, I think the problem wasn't that they used the word "looting" but that they weren't consistent.
Black guy with a loaf of bread: obviously he must've stolen it. "Looting"
White kids with soda and potato chips: obviously they must've just "found" the stuff.
The whole concept of ownership goes out the window in a catastrophe - you gotta get what you need for you and your family to survive.
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Now if they were carrying TVs and Bose radios then that would be looting.
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Well, I think the problem wasn't that they used the word "looting" but that they weren't consistent.
Black guy with a loaf of bread: obviously he must've stolen it. "Looting"
White kids with soda and potato chips: obviously they must've just "found" the stuff.
The whole concept of ownership goes out the window in a catastrophe - you gotta get what you need for you and your family to survive.
But the point is that two different news organizations wrote the captions in question. The AP, as I recall, wrote the "looting" caption and some other newspaper (AEP?) wrote the "found" caption. Yahoo just posted both newstreams. Yahoo was therefore not being inconsistent. This is like being mad at Fark for posting a link to a stupid story. Blame the creator, not the messenger.
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Both stories were from the AP - Yahoo just got the second one from the Canadian feed rather than the U.S. feed.
Here's the original source of that image:
http://www.flickr.com/photos/firewall/38725768/
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Both stories were from the AP - Yahoo just got the second one from the Canadian feed rather than the U.S. feed.
Here's the original source of that image:
http://www.flickr.com/photos/firewall/38725768/
Thanks. I wouldn't have shown it through YTMND if I knew it was somewhere else.
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Alex Chilton is Missing (http://www.pitchforkmedia.com/news/05-09/02.shtml)
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Alex Chilton is Missing (http://www.pitchforkmedia.com/news/05-09/02.shtml)
There was a thread on metafilter saying he was found, but the link they posted as proof is now dead.
I hope he's OK.
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Both stories were from the AP - Yahoo just got the second one from the Canadian feed rather than the U.S. feed.
Here's the original source of that image:
http://www.flickr.com/photos/firewall/38725768/
Is that what AFP is? OK, point taken. But then it's still the AP that's racist and not Yahoo.
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http://www.snopes.com/photos/katrina/looters.asp
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http://www.snopes.com/photos/katrina/looters.asp
For the first time ever, Snopes works in my favor!
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Alex Chilton's OK (http://www.pitchforkmedia.com/news/05-09/06.shtml#katrina).
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Alex Chilton's OK (http://www.pitchforkmedia.com/news/05-09/06.shtml#katrina).
Thank God.
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It said no flaming, If all you have is an ad hominem attack off the thread topic, I think you fall outside the requested "intelligent" posts. Everyone else so far at least understood what I was saying.
Where did I flame or make an ad hominem attack? Quote me.
Yes, my post of yesterday was very angry. That anger was directed at the administration, on account of all those dead babies and old people and stuff. If you think I shouldn't be angry about that, I don't know what to tell you. I did call AD out on the whole "No blame game" talking point business, but I don't think that's a flame or an insult. I think you're arbitrarily declaring a topic off-limits because you can't effectively respond to the criticisms of the administration. It's not an insult to point that out--if you think it is, then you're much more sensitive than I thought possible. I ask you to explain to me why exactly we shouldn't hold those responsible accountable, other than so you aren't offended.
One person, ONE, tried to address my post on its merits. I appreciated RRC's point that there were other contributing factors, sure, but IMO the administration bears the brunt of the blame. Pointing that out is not "petty partisanship," it's wanting to confront reality and making sure this crap doesn't happen again.
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For my own part:
I wanted to keep the politics out because I didn't want this to be a politics-dominated thread. I think this is a big enough topic that this thread should stay general-interest, and political arguments tend to dominate threads. I'm not saying the political ramifications of Katrina can't be discussed at all; just make your own thread, or have a conversation in PM. Furthermore, I don't think political conversation needs to be "sanctioned" on this board; just be respectful of the purpose of the topic, and start a new thread if unsure. How hard can this be?
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Splitting the topic is fine by me.
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One person, ONE, tried to address my post on its merits. I appreciated RRC's point that there were other contributing factors, sure, but IMO the administration bears the brunt of the blame. Pointing that out is not "petty partisanship," it's wanting to confront reality and making sure this crap doesn't happen again.
I appreciate the response, carlos, and I just wanted to let you know that my perspective has changed quite a bit over the past week. I now agree with you, to an extent. So, manly handshakes all around, I guess.
ANYWAYS, I hear Garfield really knows how to work the shaft.
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Of course Garfield knows how to smoke the pole. Why else do you think Jon keeps him around?
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I, for one, do not think Cathy would ever give Marmaduke a BJ. Garfield on the other hand....
Because this deserves reiteration.
Oh, I took this to mean that Cathy would give Garfield a BJ. Because, you know, there are cat people and dog people...
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I, for one, do not think Cathy would ever give Marmaduke a BJ. Garfield on the other hand....
Because this deserves reiteration.
Oh, I took this to mean that Cathy would give Garfield a BJ. Because, you know, there are cat people and dog people...
God dammit now somebody has to make a joke about Cathy liking pussy.
Look what you've done!
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Alternately, it could mean that Garfield thinks that Cathy would give Marmaduke a BJ. It's ambiguous!
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I thought it implied that Garfield would give Marmaduke a blow job.
~Paul
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I am going to have the most messed up dreams tonight because of you people. If we're going to discuss this topic can't we involve Brandy and Jen (http://www.libertymeadows.com/)?
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Of course Garfield knows how to smoke the pole. Why else do you think Jon keeps him around?
Odie's the one with his mouth open and drooling all the time.
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It's ambiguous!
Indeed it is! I originally meant it to mean Cathy might smoke Garfield's pole. After reading this discussion, though, I've changed my mind.
It now means Garfield and Marmaduke would smoke eachother's poles while Odie videotapes the whole thing. Cathy, meanwhile, freaks out and calls the police. Or would animal control be more appropriate?
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I am going to have the most messed up dreams tonight because of you people. If we're going to discuss this topic can't we involve Brandy and Jen (http://www.libertymeadows.com/)?
Noooo! When I worked at the comic shop, the only guys who liked Liberty Meadows were 30 years old and living with their mothers, and owned mint copies of every Bone comic.
Oh wait... the majority of my customers were 30 years old and living with their mothers.
And by the way, I take a sort of malevolent glee in imagining the kids from Family Circle being sold into sexual slavery. "Jeffie, who sold your spleen on the black market?" "Not me!"
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And by the way, I take a sort of malevolent glee in imagining the kids from Family Circle being sold into sexual slavery. "Jeffie, who sold your spleen on the black market?" "Not me!"
Sigh. I miss the DFC.
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To bring the topic full circle, Pedro used to do something similar with Marmaduke. He used to imagine that just after the conclusion of the panel, a family member took Marmaduke out back with a shotgun.
"Honey, Marmaduke tracked mud on the rug again! Get the shotgun and a shovel!"
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beautiful.