Another one from Rising Hegemon.

I think I gotta move this blog up into my regulars. All their entry below this line. Hate to do that, but it's pretty significant.

I read this last night, but suffered an outage on the internets. But bigger bloggers, including the Big Blue Convention Host, Talk Left, and perhaps first by Adventus, have noticed now and it is a story that needs to be repeated because its implications are so perverse and terrible.

The Red Cross (link active)itself says:

Hurricane Katrina: Why is the Red Cross not in New Orleans?

* Access to New Orleans is controlled by the National Guard and local authorities and while we are in constant contact with them, we simply cannot enter New Orleans against their orders.

* The state Homeland Security Department had requested--and continues to request--that the American Red Cross not come back into New Orleans following the hurricane. Our presence would keep people from evacuating and encourage others to come into the city.

Who the hell, be it local, State or Federal Homeland Security made such an order? And why the hell wasn't it rescinded by Wednesday? To take the suffering of tens of thousands of fellow citizens so cavalierly. It sounds like a decision Stalin would have made toward Leningrad in the Summer of 1941.

Somebody is culpable for the deaths of likely hundreds of people by those orders. The first 72 hours are the most critical...the majority of those stranded received no assistance until Friday...far more than 72 hours after the levees broke...120 hours after the Hurricane.