Hurricane Katrina aftermath - worst natural disaster in US history

[Kal-el]

Like I said, majority of those people deserve help and I do hope it will work out for them BUT surviving is not sitting on your *** at the superdome crying "where's FEMA?" Surviving is that guy that took his kids into a car and drove north because he thought "I'm not gonna take ANY chances when it comes to my family".

Absolutely, Jake......

[WorkShed]

I'll try to do this in order,

I love a good discussion, even if I'm proven wrong in the end.

1) Evacuation plan: for $20 any of the Ford F150 drivers will give you a ride in the back

Unsubstantiated.

2) Skyscraper Info, I work on the 28th of a skyscraper which is designed to withstand sustained winds of 140 mph. In the South building codes require a building to withstand winds of only 110 mph at most. In addition structures built before 1987 don't feature much hurricane technology that is in place today. The trade center was built to take 160 mph, an absolutely absurd number for the 1970s. That means that Katrina would've seriously rocked that building. Anything tall that is left there now is there by sheer luck or extremely good structural engineering. Skyscrapers are anchored in bedrock, NO is soft soil.

The sustained winds were around 90mph, with gusts well over 100mph.

3) A leading scientific therory states that animals feel meteorological warning signs. They can sense vibrations and pressure changes, so can we. Ask someone who has Arthritis, they'll often tell you when there will be a T-storm.

Trust me, I know about the arthritis thing. Besides, the animal-thing is only one scientific theory, but a well-founded one. The thing is, I didn't hear any reports of animals going haywire before the storm.

4) Stealing, explain to me the reasoning or something I can't understand about people stealing HDTVs? Will they use them as floating devices or follow the weather channel? I can understand food because that is a necessity but besides a few other items what can you justify as "not stealing" We had a blackout in NYC, what if I was breaking into Best Buy to get a flashlight?

I don't know why you have such a problem with the looting. Insurance won't pay unless everything is destroyed. Some owners will come back JUST to destroy their businesses.

5) I don't know what to say to someone who doesn't have ANY money to evacuate his family. How is that possible?

With unemployment as high as it is, it's pretty damn possible.

How were they living in teh day before the hurricane?

For arguments to hold any water, proper English is preferrable. I don't even know what you are trying to say here.

6) It's a shame India is offering technology that we have. If they shipped it FedEx overnight that'd be nice. We have more money more people more everything and closer to the disaster site than anyone. Help is nice but unnecessary. But with helicopters being shot at and hospital evacuees facing sniper fire I wouldn't want to go down there.

More money, more people, more everything, but thousands are dying. We need help. Having that argument that we don't need help is exactly what got so many Russians killed during Chernobyl and one of their submarine accidents.

7) Most are leaving, it took X feet of water to convince them. It will take the Cholera to convince the rest, right?

Some are stupid, yes. But A LOT are gone. You have to take those numbers into account. A thousand people out of hundreds of thousands doesn't mean much.

8) Why is there rape and murder there? 15000 wild cavemen at the superdome who can't organize some sort of order? I know why, it's because anyone with half a brain wasn't in a coastal marsh when a Category 5 hit.

Everybody is panicing. That's what I told you before. When you have no food and no water, you get desperate.

9) Why I felt ashamed? Because we hold our heads high in this country and get to work.

After five goddamn days, we get to work. Bush didn't even notice a problem until around day four.

What will we do now? <---It's not in our spirit. You don't give up and wait for help, you get the hell up and take care of yourself.

That "everyone for themselves" mentality creates choas and death.

Thousands of people had 7 buildings drop on their heads in NY. They got up and started digging.

When it was over, it was over. For the most part, they had clear weather. New Orleans is dealing with one of the greatest floods in a concentrated area that the United States has EVER seen. It's not that easy. I'm not making light of 9/11, I'm merely stating that those are two completely different events.

The death toll for the hurricane is much higher.

I know when you're 300 lbs and there'e no Hershey bar in sight times are tough but what can I say?

Again, you aren't there. These types of arguments have no point.

10) We didn't have wellfare in 1805, we also didn't have free-loaders who collected my tax money to buy themselves stuff that I can't afford. The Govt isn't there to bail people out all the time. It's Social Darwinism. This isn't the USSR.

Um, we did have taxation before those times. It's what caused the Revolutionary War.

So now you can't afford things? What about DVDs, HDTVs, automobiles, gasoline? These things are so easy to come by for you. Guess what? A lot of poor people pay taxes as well. To place them all simply into a neat little pile and stamp "freeloaders" on their heads is to dull the argument. Things are more complex than that.

Like I said, majority of those people deserve help

Sure doesn't sound like it from your standpoint. You're backtracking.

and I do hope it will work out for them BUT surviving is not sitting on your *** at the superdome crying "where's FEMA?"

We'll see what you do when people are dying all around you and the government says that help is on the way. How would you have felt if terrorists kept attacking NYC and the government never came to help?

Surviving is that guy that took his kids into a car and drove north because he thought "I'm not gonna take ANY chances when it comes to my family"

Surviving is a lot of things.

Trust someone who has been here for a great tragedy and let me tell you, sometimes you have a small chance to do something and save your life. If you don't you might have to face 10 million square feet of space collapsing on your head.

You want a medal?

[j7wild]

All this back and forth arguing between yall not going to solve anything, get anyone anywhere nor help those poor folks in New Orleans, Louisiana, Mississippi, Alabame.

So here's the link again:

http://www.networkforgood.org/topics...on/hurricanes/

Go there and make a donation; especially you Jake since you think it's easy to survive on $5/hour, why don't you donate at least $5? or even $20.

Thanks!!

p.s. there are many people in this country for whom, $5 makes the difference between not having a place to stay or food on the table or gas in a car. BTW - I already donated (last week), so don't bite my head off!!

[ZUBi]

& here comes the new one: Ofelija...

[j7wild]

20 Mind-Numbingly Stupid Quotes About Hurricane Katrina And Its Aftermath

1) "I don't think anybody anticipated the breach of the levees." –President Bush, on "Good Morning America," Sept. 1, 2005, six days after repeated warnings from experts about the scope of damage expected from Hurricane Katrina

2) "What I'm hearing which is sort of scary is that they all want to stay in Texas. Everybody is so overwhelmed by the hospitality. And so many of the people in the arena here, you know, were underprivileged anyway so this (chuckle) – this is working very well for them." –Former First Lady Barbara Bush, on the Hurricane flood evacuees in the Houston Astrodome, Sept. 5, 2005

3) "It makes no sense to spend billions of dollars to rebuild a city that's seven feet under sea level....It looks like a lot of that place could be bulldozed." –House Speaker Dennis Hastert (R-Ill.), Aug. 31, 2005

4) "We've got a lot of rebuilding to do ... The good news is — and it's hard for some to see it now — that out of this chaos is going to come a fantastic Gulf Coast, like it was before. Out of the rubbles of Trent Lott's house — he's lost his entire house — there's going to be a fantastic house. And I'm looking forward to sitting on the porch." (Laughter) —President Bush, touring hurricane damage, Mobile, Ala., Sept. 2, 2005

5) "Considering the dire circumstances that we have in New Orleans, virtually a city that has been destroyed, things are going relatively well." —FEMA Director Michael Brown, Sept. 1, 2005

6) "Brownie, you're doing a heck of a job." –President Bush, to FEMA director Michael Brown, while touring Hurricane-ravaged Mississippi, Sept. 2, 2005

7) "I have not heard a report of thousands of people in the convention center who don't have food and water." –Homeland Security Secretary Michael Chertoff, on NPR's "All Things Considered," Sept. 1, 2005

8) "Well, I think if you look at what actually happened, I remember on Tuesday morning picking up newspapers and I saw headlines, 'New Orleans Dodged the Bullet.' Because if you recall, the storm moved to the east and then continued on and appeared to pass with considerable damage but nothing worse." –Homeland Security Secretary Michael Chertoff, blaming media coverage for his failings, "Meet the Press," Sept. 4, 2005

9) "I mean, you have people who don't heed those warnings and then put people at risk as a result of not heeding those warnings. There may be a need to look at tougher penalties on those who decide to ride it out and understand that there are consequences to not leaving.” –Sen. Rick Santorum (R-PA), Sept. 6, 2005

10) "You simply get chills every time you see these poor individuals...many of these people, almost all of them that we see are so poor and they are so black, and this is going to raise lots of questions for people who are watching this story unfold." —CNN's Wolf Blitzer, on New Orleans' hurricane evacuees, Sept. 1, 2005

11) "Louisiana is a city that is largely under water." —Homeland Security Secretary Michael Chertoff, news conference, Sept. 3, 2005

12) "It's totally wiped out. ... It's devastating, it's got to be doubly devastating on the ground." –President George W. Bush, turning to his aides while surveying Hurricane Katrina flood damage from Air Force One, Aug. 31, 2005


13) "I believe the town where I used to come – from Houston, Texas, to enjoy myself, occasionally too much – will be that very same town, that it will be a better place to come to." –President George W. Bush, on the tarmac at the New Orleans airport, Sept. 2, 2005

14) "Last night, we showed you the full force of a superpower government going to the rescue." –MSNBC's Chris Matthews, Sept. 1, 2005

15) "You know I talked to Haley Barbour, the governor of Mississippi yesterday because some people were saying, 'Well, if you hadn't sent your National Guard to Iraq, we here in Mississippi would be better off.' He told me 'I've been out in the field every single day, hour, for four days and no one, not one single mention of the word Iraq.' Now where does that come from? Where does that story come from if the governor is not picking up one word about it? I don't know. I can use my imagination.” –Former President George Bush, who can give his imagination a rest, interview with CNN’s Larry King, Sept. 5, 2005

16) "...those who are stranded, who chose not to evacuate, who chose not to leave the city..." –FEMA Director Michael Brown, on New Orleans residents who could not evacuate because they were too poor and lacked the means to leave, CNN interview, Sept. 1, 2005

17) "We just learned of the convention center – we being the federal government – today." –FEMA Director Michael Brown, to ABC's Ted Koppel, Sept. 1, 2005, to which Koppel responded " Don't you guys watch television? Don't you guys listen to the radio? Our reporters have been reporting on it for more than just today."

18) "I actually think the security is pretty darn good. There's some really bad people out there that are causing some problems, and it seems to me that every time a bad person wants to scream or cause a problem, there's somebody there with a camera to stick it in their face." –FEMA Director Michael Brown, CNN interview, Sept. 2, 2005

19) "I don't make judgments about why people chose not to leave but, you know, there was a mandatory evacuation of New Orleans." –FEMA Director Michael Brown, arguing that the victims bear some responsibility, CNN interview, Sept. 1, 2005

20) "Thank President Clinton and former President Bush for their strong statements of support and comfort today. I thank all the leaders that are coming to Louisiana, and Mississippi and Alabama to our help and rescue. We are grateful for the military assets that are being brought to bear. I want to thank Senator Frist and Senator Reid for their extraordinary efforts. Anderson, tonight, I don't know if you've heard – maybe you all have announced it -- but Congress is going to an unprecedented session to pass a $10 billion supplemental bill tonight to keep FEMA and the Red Cross up and operating." –Sen. Mary Landrieu (D-LA), to CNN's Anderson Cooper, Aug. 31, 2005, to which Cooper responded:

"I haven't heard that, because, for the last four days, I've been seeing dead bodies in the streets here in Mississippi. And to listen to politicians thanking each other and complimenting each other, you know, I got to tell you, there are a lot of people here who are very upset, and very angry, and very frustrated. And when they hear politicians slap – you know, thanking one another, it just, you know, it kind of cuts them the wrong way right now, because literally there was a body on the streets of this town yesterday being eaten by rats because this woman had been laying in the street for 48 hours. And there's not enough facilities to take her up. Do you get the anger that is out here?"

I think most of them are from George!!

[Gaumont]

To WorkShed: I Agree



To Jake: To say that US doesn't need help is just dumb. U may be young and think US is invincible, but U'll grow up and find out the truth sooner or later.

The risc of Cholera is basically no bigger then in non-flooding time, unless u think ppl will run around fishing for, and eating raw shellfish. I would asume that u (like sooo many others) think that lots of dead bodies will start epedemics. Not true. Dead bodies will smell, but not contaminate u.

Skyscarpers: As soon as the windows goes to hell, the structure can withstand lots more wind.

"The Govt isn't there to bail people out all the time. It's Social Darwinism."
Wow, thats nice of u. I would suggest that U think about what that actually means. And how it affects the average ppl below middle class.


In all, I would have to say that I think you (Jake) will grow up to make the Republican party very proud. Just a stab in the dark, but Republican parents? Giving u a nice core of values, that u now just taken a few steps further down the line to the Right, because u just dont get it yet.

[j7wild]

I want to say this to Jake:

No matter how much money you have and how wealthy you are; once the electrical grid shuts down, you have no access to cash (banks are closed, time lock safes are down, atm are not working)

Do you think people walk around with a wad of cash in their pockets nowadays?

I know several people (friends and family) who carry nothing but Credit Cards and Checkbook and Debit Cards.

So what you mentioned $20 will get you a ride in a F-150 pickup truck out of town; that's not going to happen without any cash.

Figure in an average family is 4 people, that's $80 which is a small fortune when you don't have any cash on you.



Oh if you were lucky to find a store or restaurant that is open; how are they going to approve your credit card, debit card, check when there is no electricity to power computers and credit card authorizations terminal?

think before you talk!!



p.s. plus communication lines and switching stations and transmission hubs, towers may be down too

[WorkShed]

Great comments here.

Did anyone watch the Daily Show last night? They had some great points against Bush and points for the media (which is surprising considering the Daily Show often pokes the most fun at the media). It was fantastic.

[SharkmanSIX]

Small point, I love hearing about these people from around the US and Canada are going down just to help out. I read in my news paper that some Mississauga paramedics are heading down to help.

Is there anyone from New Orleans on this board?

[Jake]

I don't want to get into another argument because I don't have time to type everything but a few things in short,

Electricity wasn't out until the storm hit, ppl could've taken money out before there was no power. Having a $20 in my wallet is something called being prepared. Oh and I saw that a bank and a Zales were cleaned out completely so someone sure has the cash lol :big grin: <---I'm trying to be funny so please don't argue with me on it.

All I'm saying is that people should have some common sense. If you hear on TV in the morning that there will be rain and you don't take an umbrella with you and get wet then there is noone to blame but yourself. Can you possibly argue against this? There is always someone to blame, right? It isn't the government's fault that people are stupid and stubborn. If there's a fire in your house and you never thought about an escape route or got an extinguisher then it is YOUR fault that your family dies. If you walk onto a highway and get hit by a car it is YOUR fault that you die. If you live in LA and hang a crystal chandelier above your bed then it is YOUR fault that you die if an earthquake occurs.

I can understand the Tsunami being a tragedy because there was no warning, but come on EVERYBODY knew Katrina would hit. I would sell my watch shoes clothes and anything else I had on me to get my family a ride out of the city.

YOU ARE RESPONSIBLE FOR YOUR OWN LIFE

not me, not the govt, not even your family unless they choose to

Help is important but you should never count on it. What were they expecting? They raised their arms and said "Evacuate me" Right right I wasn't there so I can't say that but neither were any of you so don't act like it.

Gaumont: I agree with you on some things but allow me to clarify on help for the US, If there is a fire at my house why would the firemen from across town show up? Sure they could help but why should they seeing as there are 600 firehouses between them and me. I do think of my country as strong and to me help means taht we can't take of ourselves. You're right, this is because I'm young and have this crazy psychological disease, BUT I'm sure you're a strong guy, how would you feel if an old lady came up to you and asked you if you need help carrying your groceries, wouldn't you feel weak, or hurt? A lot of these countries are just doing it for publicity (hell as America often does) Some of these countries get millions of $ of aid from the US so they can please spare me the humiliation of saying "Here here poor US we can give you a dollar"
Oh and I'm not a pathologist but I'm fairly sure Cholera is a disease you get from ingesting water contaminated by sewage. All the sewage systems in NO have overflowed. Dead bodies decomposing in the water are waste and are disease incubators.


Yeah, I'm a good Republican, which happens to be the ruling party at the moment and yes, I'm an insensitive prick. I know I'm young and stupid but my core belief is that PEOPLE NEED TO TAKE ACTION TO IMPROVE THEIR LIVES, NOT WAIT FOR OTHERS TO DO IT FOR THEM Saying all that I don't want to brag about it but my office of 20 people gave $5000 to the FDNY,NYPD,OEM team that was deployed. My donation was not as much as other peoples but at 10% of my last paycheck it was a bit more than $5. I don't want a medal but I come from a poor family and my parents never whined about being discriminated against and never took any financial aid. You either earn what you have or you simply don't deserve it.

I feel bad for the children whose parents just weren't competent enough to save them.

[Kal-el]

Maybe we should rename this thread to

Hurricane Katrina: Point/Counterpoint

[Jake]

Hehe, we're just having a friendly little chat.

[WorkShed]

Kal-el, I just noticed that you're from Cedar Rapids. That's awesome. I'm only a half hour away from you.

[Kal-el]

Yeah, I've noticed that before too. How's the weather down there? Just kidding. Do you use Yahoo messenger Workshed? My AIM doesn't work...

[Gaumont]

To Jake:

About those who diden't leave. I agree that that was a bad desition. But that doen't mean they dont need and deserve help. We cant just help those who've done everything to prevent danger themself. We have to help those who have smoked themself to lungcancer, and them who suffer from obesity, and those who drove to fast and crashed, and those who drank to much and got alcoholic poisoning, and he who forgot to turn of the stove, and the skateboarder who broke his legs.
We aint perfect, we make mistakes, big and small, and when we do, we should help eachother up again. If there comes a time when we don't its probably time to close earth down and go home.


About financial Aid. Its a system set up by they goverment that we pay for ourself, through taxes. Its basically an insurance. If u cant get by, we'll help you out untill you can. Much like u buy house insurence, U pay so IF your house goes down the drain you get som help. just as u pay taxes so you get help from the goverment when u need it. Now im ALL for that. Im not for ppl taking social aid when they dont relly need it, or when they are to lazy to get a job, like there always are a few. But for the majority that really need it, they should get it, no matter if its cuz u lost your job or a hurricane tore your town to peices.

And about the old lady.
Needing help is not a sign of weekness. We all need help, every now and then. Your analogy about the lady is flawed. In your story I should have been hit by a truck then asked if i wanted help with my groceries. And I probably would like that help.
But thats not the point. The point is that if an old lady asked if she could help me with my groceries I would think that it was a sweet offer, and be thankfull because shes looking out for me. Feeling "weak, or hurt" cuz someone ask if they can help me out is just not how im wired.
Besides its hardly only "aid" coutries thats offering to help. Sweden offered (among other things) to send teams and equipment to help drain New Orleans of water.
Economicaly Sweden is a friend of US, but ask the average Joe (or Svensson as they are called here) what he/she thinks of US, and u wont get an overwhelming positive answer (which you can thank Mr Bush for). But we still want to send help, political differences aside, when someone needs help, you help. I just dont get how that can offend you.