I never realized how bad this hurricane was until I read the headline this morning saying, "THOUSANDS FEARED DEAD". I thought it was just another one of those hurricanes that you hear about, but never really gets too intense...but seriously, I was just in shock. I looked through all the pictures and like the whole city of New Orleans was flooded. This is probably one of the worst natural disasters ever to hit the US, and let me just say, my heart goes out to any of you here who were affected or have family that was affected by the hurricane.
Yeah... my brother goes to Tulane, which is in New Orleans. School for him is officially cancelled for 6 weeks, and they dont think they'll even have a semester. I mean... I obviously know that is not as bad as injury or death, but he doesn't have any clothes, or anything he brought with him to his apartment. He doesn't have an apartment. And he's just going into his second year of College... it really sucks.
It's good to hear your bro got out of there, JonB. I echo nk. I thought it was just another hurricane, too, but it's becoming clearer and clearer that there is just a whole heck of a lot of people who have been displaced and/or are suffering as a result of this. Ack. Don't know what to do except hope for the best for them.
I know this may sound odd to most of you, but I find it ironic that the U.S goes around telling everyone that they're super-efficient and the only "superpower" left in the world today,yet the goverment can't organise any sort of relif for the people. The areas around there are like that of a third world country. I get the feeling the goverment isn't giving a damn because the ones affected are poor, black citizens....
Thinking about this today - 9/11 - the contrast between the emergency response to the terrorist attacks this day 2001 and the emergency response to Katrina is dramatic. It does make me wonder whether the fact that 9/11 affected predominently middle class white Americans whereas Katrina affected predominently lower class black Americans may have anything to do with it. PS - sorry if "black Americans" is not PC; no offence is intended.
I'm going to have to stand up for America on this one. First of all... blame this on Bush... he appointed that inexperienced tool as head of FEMA, which was in charge of the recovery mission. But the one good thing Bush did was fire him! Either way, I can't imagine that it's so easy dealing with an entire city underwater as opposed to a few square blocks reduced to rubble. Something can be said, however, about the fact that New Orleans wasn't prepared for a hurricane of that magnitude. I say blame it on incompetence, not racism.
Yes indeed it is different, and no they weren't prepared for a hurricane of that magnitude, but still the rescue effort could have been much better. Maybe it really was the head of the FEMA guy, but I mean seriously, how long did it take the people stranded in the convention center to get help? 3 days? 4 days? That is WAAY too long if you ask me. They should have gotten help at the latest day 2.
