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Does America care about black and poor people? That's the question I pose on the 5th anniversary of Hurricane Katrina. The mainstream media narrative proclaims New Orleans is rising from the waters of despair and making a comeback, bigger and better than before. The New Orleans Saints won the Superbowl, all is right in The Big Easy. Nothing to see here, move along.
Well, that's the wrong narrative. Five years later, New Orleans is still drowning for the black and poor folks who cannot return to New Orleans. Malik Rahms the director of Common Ground says;
"They don't want no poor n*****s back in - that's the bottom line."
Poor blacks can't come back because they have no homes to come back too.
People have not returned because the projects they were living in were knocked down. People didn't return because there are no jobs. People didn't return because [their] rents have quadrupled. Other people have not returned because they've found a higher standard of living in Houston, San Antonio, and Atlanta. We have people laying it out in the film more eloquently than I can. They have better-paying jobs in their new cities; the education systems are better. Those are the main reasons why people have not returned.
There is an old saying: A white man’s heaven is a Black man’s hell. Arne Duncan, the U.S. secretary of education and President Obama’s basketball buddy, is one of those white men – a disaster capitalist who sees a silver lining in the Katrina catastrophe that swept away much of Black New Orleans, four and a half years ago. Duncan’s ghoulish statement, that “the best thing that happened to the education system in New Orleans was Hurricane Katrina,” is identical to the sentiments expressed by racist Louisiana whites and the Bush Administration, when they gushed unashamedly over the opportunities Katrina created to build a new order in the city, even as bloated Black bodies still floated in the streets.
Poor black people haven't returned because it's not safe;
In the chaos of Hurricane Katrina, thousands were left with little protection. And as the flood waters rose, many were left to grab on to each other to survive. Watch The Untold Race War during Hurricane Katrina.
In that desperate time, according to court documents, Roland Bourgeois grabbed a shotgun.
The 47-year-old man pleaded not guilty in a Louisiana federal courtroom Thursday afternoon to charges that he shot at three black men and issued an ominous warning that "anything coming up this street darker than a brown paper bag is getting shot."
We are one country and all of our citizens are important, rich and poor, black and white. When a government gives an every man for himself attitude towards disease and natural disasters, it reflects badly on our country. It is the duty of our country to, not only protect its citizens against terrorist attacks, but against natural disasters and diseases as well. If America is serious about being the world’s police man, they should also think about being the world’s fireman too. The money that was supposed to be used to fix the levees in New Orleans was used to drop bombs in Iraq and Afghanistan. Imagine if our tax payer money was used for disaster relief rather than to create more disasters. The lessons of Hurricane Katrina is that a military cannot save its people from disasters if they are only trained to kill. America has not been invaded in 300 years yet we invest more money into our military than we do anything else. Rather than being a destroyer, American needs to be a savior, of both its own people and its fellow citizens of the world.
This is what I wrote on the fourth anniversary of Katrina;
It's not about a Hurricane, it's about America. Three years after Katrina, much of the lower ninth ward is still in ruins. Three years after Katrina 40% of the displaced citizens still can't return home. Trouble the Water is a film that is about to be released about Katrina and the failure of our government to help it's citizens. It's not about flooded school buses. It's not about people not evacuating. It's not about Ray Nagin and "Chocolate City", it's about America.
Here is what I wrote August 31, 2008 about the aftermath of Katrina;
Here is a sample of what New Orleans looks like three years later.
36. Percent fewer tons of cargo that move through Port of New Orleans since Katrina.
38. Percent fewer hospital beds in New Orleans since Katrina.
40. Percentage fewer special education students attending publicly funded, privately run charter schools than traditional public schools.
41. Number of publicly funded, privately run public charter schools in New Orleans out of total of 79 public schools in the city.
43. Percentage of child care available in New Orleans compared to before Katrina.
46. Percentage increase in rents in New Orleans since Katrina.
56. Percentage fewer inpatient psychiatric beds compared to before Katrina.
Fast forward five years later the lower ninth ward is still being asked to pull itself up by it's bootstrap and thousands of poor black Americas want to return home but can't.
The American media was all in a tizzy when former Mayor Ray Nagin said New Orleans would be Chocolate City again and when Kanye West said "George Bush doesn't care about black people". They twisted it as examples of so called black racism (Shirley Sherrod) to distract from the FACT the aftermath of Hurricane Katrina displaced (for lack of a better word) poor black people out of New Orleans and made the political landscape whiter. People got wrapped up in who was telling the truth and ignored the truth.
Who Dis? - says Brett Favre and the Vikings as they score first in what should be an epic Sunday evening.
Who you like?
If the Saints win they play in their first Super Bowl ever. Great season culminating in a big achievement for the city that needs this more than any other.
If the Vikes win then Brett Favre silences all the critics. Well most of them.
The NFL wins either way and got what they wanted in Peyton Manning leading the Colts to the big game.
Ever since the Haiti earthquake happened, it has invited quite a few comparisons to the disaster brought about in New Orleans by the federal flood. There are even those in the mainstream media who have asked if this quake is going to turn out to be Obama's "Katrina."
This is not surprising because there are some similarities in the situations--for example, the slowness in rescuing and getting aid to the survivors--which reminds casual observers of the way New Orleanians had to wait a week for food, water and rescue after her levees failed. Also, these catastrophes are manmade--Haiti's because of shoddily-constructed buildings, New Orleans' because of poorly-built and maintained levees--both of which had been disasters waiting to happen.
We are down to six teams in the NFL playoffs. And tomorrow night we shall say then there were four.
Both New Orleans and Indianapolis looked good IMO today. Caution to the wind though as Arizona looked vulnerable last week and got Colt McCoyed when Warner got drilled today. Oh and Baltimore just looked sloppy sloppy on offense and defense tonight.
I do expect these two teams to win again next week against TBD opponents either the Cowboys or the Vikings for the Saints and the Colts will tackle either the Chargers or the J- E - T- S.
I think we will see Indy vs. New Orleans with an epic battle as the Colts win their second championship with Peyton Manning at the helm.
by Greg Palast is a documentary that must be seen if one is to understand what's going on in New Orleans after Katrina and the Federal Flood. Palast's tough, gutsy journalism reminds me of what "60 Minutes" was, back in the day when that program had cojones. Palast, investigating what really happened in New Orleans on 8/29/2005, interviews then-LSU professor Ivor Van Heerden. Van Heerden says speaking to Palast could endanger his job due to the political connections of higher-ups--and we all know what happened to Van Heerden.
Palast also interviews flood victims discouraged in one way or another from returning home and the nefarious machinations behind attempts to discourage their return.
(Always enjoy Louisiana1976 diaries. I think this is something that separates us from other "Progressive" sites. A wide array of important diaries on issues. - promoted by admin)
Nearly four and a half years ago this nation experienced the two worst disasters of this past decade: Hurricane Katrina and New Orleans' federal flood. Today many consider them old news, if not history, but they still are present in the lives of those who survived them.
I love this time of year. Holidays. Family and Friends. The spirit of giving. Bowl Games. College Basketball and Saturday Night Football - which is being called Thursday Night Special Edition on the NFL Network.
(Superb diary on Obama's New Orleans pit stop - promoted by admin)
Today Obama will be making an extremely short stop in New Orleans. Or what my favorite NOLA blogger calls a "tinkle-stop tour." In New Orleans, he'll be visiting a charter school and participating in a town hall meeting in the Lower 9th Ward.
In contrast, his next stop will be San Francisco, where he'll be spending four times as much time--16 hours. This has caused Harry Shearer to say,
Total elapsed time in SF: sixteen hours. They must have experienced a hell of a federal disaster there. Four times worse, you figure?
(Awesome diary. Thanks for providing us more information with this issue. Most of us do make the mistake of calling both events Katrina. - promoted by admin)
Often when people including those in government and the mainstream media who should know better refer to the events of 8/29, it is merely as "Katrina" or "Hurricane Katrina".
There were actually two catastrophes that happened that day: the storm, which passed to the east of New Orleans, devastating the Mississippi and eastern Louisiana Gulf Coasts, which was a NATURAL disaster, and the falling apart of New Orleans' federally-built and maintained levees, which was a MANMADE disaster due to poor engineering.
While the use of Katrina as shorthand to cover the two events is easy (I've even done that at times) it's misleading because of the implication that the flooding of New Orleans was a natural disaster. And this matters--more below the fold.
(I invited Louisiana1976 to post this after reading it at Daily Kos this evening. Steve King is perhaps the biggest hate monger in Congress not named Bachmann. Also we want to try and focus more on continuing issues as related to Katrina relief. Please join me in welcoming Louisiana1976, I hope she will stop by frequently and give us her thoughts. - promoted by admin)
Here's why: Rep. King was recently interviewed by "The Hill."
THE HILL: What vote would you like to redo?
KING: I don't really go back and re-live that sort of thing. Some of the big votes that I've thought about, some of the jury's still out. And at this point, maybe I'd answer that question another way, probably the singular vote that stands out that went against the grain, and it turns out to be the best vote that I cast, was my "no" vote to the $51.5 billion to [Hurricane] Katrina. That probably was my best vote. But as far as doing something different again, I don't know.
Today August 29, 2009 marks the 4th anniversary of Hurricane Katrina and one of the greatest tragedies our country has ever known.
Not only has it been a long struggle to rebuild New Orleans, but the entire Gulf Coast region that stretches across Alabama, Mississippi and Louisiana. New Orleans bore the brunt of the damage and should be the focus although we urge our friends to pause and remember others in the region that lost their lives, homes and livelihood.
President Obama had this to say in his weekly radio address about the progress of rebuilding efforts
"No more turf wars. All of us need to move forward together, because there is much work to be done."
And he also remarked
"So on this day, we commemorate a tragedy that befell our people. But we also remember that with every tragedy comes the chance of renewal."
I was a bit disturbed by the media coverage I have seen leading up to the fourth anniversary of Katrina. The focus was on how tourism had recovered and residents had moved back to the city. Very few of the national stories have focused on those that were not able to leave or those that lost everything and were forced to start anew. New Orleans is considered a fabulous tourist destination, but we too often forget those citizens of the city and region who have suffered far too long from the political nightmares that have existed.
I've spent the last four days in Pittsburgh for the Netroots Nation convention for progressive bloggers. Netroots Nation 2009 lacked diversity in any number of ways you could choose to define diversity. As another Daily Kos user this morning points out, the Netroots could have been called the whiteroots convention . From my perspective as a southern blogger I was also disappointed in the shrunken numbers of Southern attendees.
I was thus extremely disappointed when Las Vegas was announced as the choice for the location of the 2010 convention. As someone who started as a trained political field organizer I learned that you have to go directly to the people. The choice of where we go to hold our conventions is important as a symbol and also as a tool to influence change. Las Vegas at the Rio hotel may be a lot of fun and debauchery but does that stretch us far enough as a movement. Btw - Pittsburgh was an excellent choice
A Federal jury convicted Former Louisiana Congressman William Jefferson on 11 counts of taking bribes. Remember Jefferson's freezer was raided by the FBI in which nearly 100k was found. Jefferson had continued to serve in Congress even after the allegations were made and his freezer was raided.
Last year, voters in LA-02 decided to put corruption and old school politics to rest and elected Republican Joseph "Anh" Cao in a Democratic district with a +28 PVI.
I'm absolutely shocked , but somewhat optimistic that Bill Jefferson was defeated tonight. I know nothing about Anh "Joseph" Cao (R) that defeated Bill "Cash in the Freezer" Jefferson tonight. Electing Jefferson would have sent the world a message that we put corruption and party over country. I'm a Democrat and a progressive one at that, but there is nothing progressive about electing a corrupt and vile individual.
I have found very little information on Cao althought I've learned that he will be the first Congressman of Vietnamese descent. Here's Cao's website which gives us some insight into Cao's background
Like many in New Orleans, on August 28, 2005, Joseph and his family fled from their home in Venetian Isles (located in New Orleans East) as Hurricane Katrina was bearing down on New Orleans. Returning in early September, Joseph saw that everything he possessed was destroyed, including his home and his law offices. Joseph would once again have to rebuild his life.
Determined to return and rebuild, in October of 2005 he moved his family to Westwego and began the rebuilding of his Orleans home and law office. His office would take three months to repair, his home a year and a half. Like the people of Orleans and St. Bernard Parishes who were ravaged by Hurricane Katrina, Joseph has endured struggles against insurance companies and the political leadership and has proven to be a leader in rebuilding the Vietnamese community. He assisted the residents in New Orleans East in their successful fight against a landfill that threatened to change the social fabric of their community. He fought energy and telecommunication companies to have basic necessities restored in a timely fashion.
Regardless of Cao's background, I'm fairly certain that Cao is going to be a one-term Congressman. However, I find it promising that we were able to elect Cao in a 75-80 % African American district. Surely Cao will be a moderate in a +28 district and hopefully one that works to help those that are still affected by the rebuilding process in New Orleans.
With all of the results now in from all of the precincts, the Louisiana SOS shows Cao winning by about 1,800 votes.
