[Gort]

As you all know, New Orleans, Bioloxi and lots of other communities in the areas hit hard by Hurricane Katrina need as much help as they can get, so I'd like to post some relief links for anyone that might be interested in helping out anyway possible. It's bad down there - really bad.

American Red Cross

The Salvation Army

Episcopal Relief and Development

Catholic Charities (big Roman community down in the Big Easy)

My sister and her family live a few minutes east of Biloxi; she left with her daughter for shelter inland before the storm hit, while her husband and son stayed behind to stick it out. We've not heard from anyone yet but are optimistic. Say a prayer to your God or Gods, burn some incense, think happy thoghts, and hug those close to you. Be thankful!
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- Tom Carter

"You can't stop the waves but you can learn to surf" - Jack Kornfield

[Ragnarok]

There's a blog from a guy that works in New Orleans, in a data center. He's a on a 10th floor. There are photos of the city there.

http://mgno.com/
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"Ever forward, my darling wind." -Master Yuppa
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[Gort]

The devastation is unbelievable! The local government in New Orleans has known for years that this was a problem and could possibly happen, but there appears to be no plans in place. Then again, looking at the devastation, it would appear that they're very, very overwhelmed.

Thanks for the link.
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- Tom Carter

"You can't stop the waves but you can learn to surf" - Jack Kornfield

[lysander]

it sounds pretty crazy out there after reading that.
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Earth under attack by paper mache aliens; world leaders plead - 'Save us! Doctor Who!'

[digitaldecoy]

Watching the suffering in New Orleans is horrifying. And the situation seems to get worse by the hour, at least from what you see on CNN. Hell, who is going to help these people? All these poor humans survived the storm and now they seem to be stuck in a death trap, that�s insane!
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�Que la fuerza te acompa�e!

[balistic]

Ragnarok: That's the datacenter that hosted Something Awful, which has been down since last night. Guess they ran out of diesel for the generators.

The most troubling thing for me in watching all of this, is that it demonstrates that society is basically only ever three days from anarchy. A big distruption in daily life + 3 days = mad max. I mean, this is something that I had basically assumed all along, but to see it play out in the 21st century . . . troubling.
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brian.prince|light.comp.paint

[Ragnarok]

About the generator:

Well, people, I'm not sure how much longer we're going to have internet. Our last OC3 which is located down the street is going to run out of fuel sometime tomorrow according to the providers. They had a fuel drop scheduled for today and they didn't make it in. Now it's scheduled for tomorrow morning. Our fuel drop was a no-show also. We have fuel for several days, but if the provider goes down it's game over man. There's no reason to be here any longer at that point. Our primary mission will be over and this blog will not be able to be updated.

I agree with you about the human nature. What amazes me is that the looters and shootings started the next day...
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"Ever forward, my darling wind." -Master Yuppa
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[gLitterbug]

I think this catastrophe throws a real bad light on America. It�s such a great nation and can�t even help itself. Sure it�s a disaster, I don�t say it isn�t horrible. But it seems that even though the area was known to be victim of something like this some day, they didn�t even have ANY plan it seems.

Also I think the problem of looting isn�t that easy to divide into black and white. I mean people having nothing to eat or drink, having lost everything, I doubt those are mentally stable and they just grab everything they can to survive. Sure some try to make a profit off it by stealing electronics and whatnot, but honestly it doesn�t even have much use for them.

Another thing that I�m wondering is, if the whole shootings and whatnot will make americans wonder how much sense it makes to give everyone who wants a gun.

I don�t want to sound like the America hater. There are so many innocent people that died for nothing, exactly that is what makes me partially angry. Whenever I watch news on TV, all I see is poor black people drowning there and having shit. They lost what little they have. To me it sometimes seems like nobody really cares anyways because nobody wants to help those people. Everybody who could afford it fled already anyways, so the useless scum can just drown there.

Sorry if it all sounds a bit aggressive, but everytime I hear anything about it on the news it seems to not get better at all. No help coming, people not even having water to drink. That in a country that is the greatest nation ever, that sends out thousands of soldiers into the rest of the world to keep up peace and order...

Most ironic to me is that the first thing you always hear is "Let your prayers be with us blabla". For a nation that filled with christian ideals and all, there is pretty little social care around imo.

[oDD]

[Gort]

[balistic]

[Gort]

Well I'll give 'im that, but the Mayor does have the authority to mandate things - like getting people to a centralized location, but I think he could've done more - prepared for the worst, you know?

The gist of my concern is that there's more to the situation than what the news is making it out to be.

By the way, young man, it's Saturday night, you're single and at home?
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- Tom Carter

"You can't stop the waves but you can learn to surf" - Jack Kornfield

[gLitterbug]

Well Gort, I don�t take stuff I see on TV as the real and only full truth. But no matter how it is in real life, what people over here and everywhere see is the news. Sure I get info from people like you that have family there too, but I don�t really know you much either and the facts you present me might just be as influenced by your opinion as things we see on TV.

My point is that, no matter who made them, mistakes have been made. I dont�really care if its the mayors fault or anyone elses. I doubt it is of importance to any of the already dead victims who is to blame. I�m just pretty sure that this could have been handled way better. It pretty much always can be handled better.

I don�t know how much you know about happenings in Europe, but even we in Austria had floodings very recently. Everything is smaller here sure, less country, less people, less military to help, etc. I just would�ve thought that America would be able to handle such thing in a much more efficient and controlled manner. Just think of it for once from the perspective of a non american. Much we hear from your nation is how proud you are about yourself, your military and in pretty much any speech we see from over there we hear words like "let our prayers be with us".

Then in a big shocking difference to that we see images on the news about destroyed areas, people trapped and without food, water or anything. People looting while toting guns, cops trying to keep that all at a minimum. As I said most people I see on the news are black. You hear numbers of people that have been evacuated or fled themselves and then you hear that most of those who were left behind, had no chance to get out at all.

I know that it�s not only like that, I�d be dumb if I did. But I think that it�s not all just a heap of manipulating media either. I�m sure there are great, helpful people over there too, like one guy in the news, who said he bought all the stuff he could afford, packed it in his van and rides down there to help people.

If you can, tell me that the truth is that everything bad I heard and saw on the news is totally wrong. That your country did and does everything possible to help those people, that it is not mostly the poor people that got left behind and that there are no crazy guys who loot and shoot. I�d be more than happy to hear that, but I�m affraid you can�t tell me that either without lying to me.

Just as you I don�t mean to take a stab at you. I know enough american people online that I like(and I�m very worried about a dear friend of mine who lives in the area and I have no contact with currently), who are not the image of an american we get through media. But America sure doesn�t do a great job of representing itself well in the rest of the world lately.

Again, I don�t write this just to piss anyone off. Unlike you might think I am very much interested in getting information not only from TV and this seems like a pretty good place to do so. Discussions are always of benefit if you don�t have a closed mind.

Oh and for the record, I don�t drink mint juleps.

[Gort]

[Jimmyjimjim]

[quote="Gort"]

[gLitterbug]

Well I don�t drink bier either, especially not bier actually. Not a big fan of alcohol altogether.

That aside, I�m sure in no position to tell anyone what he did wrong. Even if you don�t believe me, I�m not someone who thinks his opinion (which he got only out of the TV he doesn�t even have but only watches at his parents place for news now and then) is the only one. But if everybody who is not directly involved would not give a shit, that�d be worse imho. Even if it�s just opinions and talking and often times not really the most useful ones, we might all learn something from it to improve things in the future. After all communication is probably the most important thing for humanity.

I know there are always people that could leave and do not. It�s the same here where the floodings are. There were floodings not too long before these in the same areas. Some things have been learned from those, but the government as well as the people here made plenty of mistakes and thought that the floodings "won�t come again that fast".

I don�t take TV over firsthand accounts. The whole reason why I posted my highly offensive posts here is to maybe correct that biased view I got from the media. I personally think it�s better to post my opinion here and get some reactions, no matter how extreme they might be, than to take the view I got out of the media as the truth and just not post anything. But I think you still have to admit it�d be just as dumb to cast everything aside I heard so far and just adapt what you tell me as my new opinion.

Also I do take your replies personally, after all you are adressing them to me. Don�t worry though as I did not take offense. Some austrian fuck who posts his brainfarts about things he sees on the news might be the last thing you need when you got family in the distaster area. I�m sorry if my stuff adds to your frustration, but unlike the impression I might have given, this helps me to broaden my view and I do not want to miss this opportunity.

Anyways, I should probably care more about my own situation. I too am single, it also was Saturday here and even though I was spending the night out, I�m still sitting here in front of my PC at nearly 7am. Lonely, having nothing better to do than discussing something that happened half the world away with somebody I barely know. Thats my own, not too small personal disaster.

[Drunken Monkey]

for some reason i thought of all the anarchy goths from my high school with their dumbass circled A t-shirts... how long would those "rebels" survive in real anarchy like this?
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"A fear of weapons is a sign of retarded sexual and emotional maturity" - Sigmund Freud

[Gort]

gLitterbug:

Let me rephrase; I meant no offense by my comments, although it's easy to see how they're taken personally, and I apologize for that.

I appreciate you being up front and honest about your feelings yet with diplomacy.

Not beer? Then what . . . ?

Tom
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- Tom Carter

"You can't stop the waves but you can learn to surf" - Jack Kornfield

[eyewoo]

It seems to me the disaster after the initial catastrophe should be described as another clear example of the inhumanity of bureaucracy. After all the interagency problems that emerged from the 911 catastrophe, our current brilliant administration had the brilliant idea to solve the problem by building the largest top-down bureaucracy ever put together - the Department of Homeland Security which lumped together 22 agencies and over 180,000 employees. In its first big test, it turns out some of the agencies that should have jumped in with sleeves rolled up, were instead waiting around for someone up the ladder to tell them what to do... gad!

Clearly I've oversimplified it... and I'm sure that simplification will get totally absorbed and lost in the bureaucracy.
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[watmough]

ya,eyewoo,bureaucracy is bad for quick action......but its great at spreading out blame!

[Impaler]

You know those surreal moments when everything in your life aligns perfectly? Like, you'll call a friend who was just dialing your number, or you write down a word and seconds later someone says that exact same word?

I'm taking a geology course this semester. The third day of class (before any real warnings about the hurricane), our professor was telling us about natural disaster areas. Of course New Orleans came up, and how the city could very easily flood to ruins because it sits in a sub-sea level basin. Two days later, New Orleans is destroyed by Hurricane Katrina. My prof's name is Kathy.

Eerie, no?
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QED, sort of.

[gLitterbug]

I think you should kill Kathy before she does any more damage.

[Ragnarok]

I've been reading Interdictor blog since I posted its url here and not following the media much, and my opinions about how the government handled this aren't pretty.
I mean, they had helicopters to patrol, to show the president the place, but when they got them to distribute food and water, they dropped the crates instead of landing so half of the contents where destroyed by the fall. How can they explain that?
If you tell me it is because some dumbasses where shooting at helicopters, well, the US has the greatest army, couldn't they have added a couple of Apaches to the convoy?
Many people didn't get food nor water in 3+ days. That's something I don't understand, I hope they have some great explanation.
Also, why have they waited for so long to accept humanitarian aid? They had offers since day 1, and with a country that big I just find hard to believe they couldn't handle it from day 1.
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"Ever forward, my darling wind." -Master Yuppa
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