Update: an Email from New Orleans
Got an email from Jon Donley from the Nola.com(Times Picayune linked website) countering my arguments about the Red Cross being held out of New Orleans intentionally by the Dept of Homeland Security.
It's obvious that this guy is exhausted, and it's not like he has a lot of time to write emails to me sitting in air conditioned Houston. So, I'm just going to print the part about the Red Cross in New Orleans, and, out of discretion, leave some of the personal details of his experience out. (Jon, if you feel that I need to print the second paragraph, tell me and it'll be up in a second.)
Please believe me that this guy has been through hell. And that his on the ground experience gives him some real credibility.
Specifically, I was writing about the absence of the Red Cross in the early days of the disaster before the mass evacuations had begun, not at present, but I find it difficult to argue.
The fatalism in this has struck me hard. I can't imagine what it's like there after a week.
Mike
Comments?
It's obvious that this guy is exhausted, and it's not like he has a lot of time to write emails to me sitting in air conditioned Houston. So, I'm just going to print the part about the Red Cross in New Orleans, and, out of discretion, leave some of the personal details of his experience out. (Jon, if you feel that I need to print the second paragraph, tell me and it'll be up in a second.)
Please believe me that this guy has been through hell. And that his on the ground experience gives him some real credibility.
You're right, we're mad. But not about this. I can't imagine anything moreThat's a good rebuttal.
foolish than allowing the Red Cross into New Orleans. I'm afraid that you
don't understand that anyone left in New Orleans is going to die. They can
die hungry, or they can die fed, but they are going to die. I don't have
time to explain this to you, but allowing the Red Cross in would kill
people. Many people are holding out, thinking that if they just get food
and water delivered, they can avoid leaving New Orleans. Anything that
encourages that is going to kill people. The Red Cross should - and is -
focusing on the vast refugee camps and shelters spread from here to San
Antonio. People are dying there, too . . . and the Red Cross is stretched
to the limit feeding them, giving them basic survival services
Specifically, I was writing about the absence of the Red Cross in the early days of the disaster before the mass evacuations had begun, not at present, but I find it difficult to argue.
The fatalism in this has struck me hard. I can't imagine what it's like there after a week.
Mike
Comments?
posted by mikevotes at
2:18 PM
1 Comments:
The truth will probably never be known. We shall await the books and the movie, the debates and the conferences, the poems and the memorial services but the truth will slip away like quicksilver. Looking at it all from the UK as someone who loves the USA -its people, its jigsaw culture, its energy, its beauty - I look at Mr Bush and think that your great country deserves a finer leader than him. The Katrina Tragedy showed us what he is - a hollow man who can hardly string sentences together let alone show genuine compassion or understand the significance of what has gone down. Rest in Peace all ye who have drowned or slipped away like quicksilver.
By
Yorkshire Pudding, at 3:07 PM
Post a Comment
<< Home