Bureaucracy Kills
New Orleans Mayor Ray Nagin has announced that city officials are running out of supplies for “rescued” people stuck in the convention center. In the midst of 90+ degree heat and 90+% humidity, the mayor has announced that these people will begin marching a number of miles to where relief will supposedly be.
This directly contradicts what Homeland Security Director Michael Chertoff said just moments before, when he announced that FEMA had all the resources they needed and were working furiously to rescue and relieve people.
If so, why haven’t there at least been air drops of water and food to the ceonvention center? Why are there still people stuck in rescue centers in New Orleans? Why is it, when I see images of the convention center, there are never any authorities in sight? The federal response has been pathetic.
From an AP article:
Outside the Convention Center, the sidewalks were packed with people without food, water or medical care, and with no sign of law enforcement. Thousands of storm refugees had been assembling outside for days, waiting for buses that did not come.
At least seven bodies were scattered outside, and hungry people broke through the steel doors to a food service entrance and began pushing out pallets of water and juice and whatever else they could find.
An old man in a chaise lounge lay dead in a grassy median as hungry babies wailed around him. Around the corner, an elderly woman lay dead in her wheelchair, covered with a blanket, and another body lay beside her wrapped in a sheet.
“I don’t treat my dog like that,” 47-year-old Daniel Edwards said as he pointed at the woman in the wheelchair. “I buried my dog.” He added: “You can do everything for other countries but you can’t do nothing for your own people. You can go overseas with the military but you can’t get them down here.”
[…]
Terry Ebbert, head of the city’s emergency operations, warned that the slow evacuation at the Superdome had become an “incredibly explosive situation,” and he bitterly complained that FEMA was not offering enough help.
“This is a national emergency. This is a national disgrace,” he said. “FEMA has been here three days, yet there is no command and control. We can send massive amounts of aid to tsunami victims, but we can’t bail out the city of New Orleans.”
Beyond the incompetence and lack of leadership in FEMA’s efforts, the citizens of New Orleans are under attack from armed thugs roaming the city. Arsonists started a number of fires near the Superdome, and people were shooting at a National Guard helicopter. Meanwhile, the scum who’ve been looting include police officers and other authorities. Disgusting. But it’s been the violence that’s hurt relief efforts the most, as Reuters reports:
Two hospitals were under siege by robbers who used axes, guns and metal pipes to steal pain killers and medicine, according to a pilot flying relief operations into New Orleans.
Power and water were off and supplies were exhausted. Critically ill patients were dying one by one without oxygen, insulin and intravenous fluids, the pilot said.
I’m lucky. My immediate family is now safe and sound in Houston. It’s too early for them to even begin thinking about where they will live now that their homes are either destroyed or under 8+ inches of water. But they are safe and sound, which is more than what can be said for so many of the people in the greater New Orleans area. They need help, and they need it now. They need more boats, more food, more water, and more semi-permanent shelter space immediately.
Also, thanks to Tim and Dan for keeping up with the Katrina blogging while I’ve been traveling.
To get some idea of the sheer anarchy that is prevalent in New Orleans right now, read this Editor and Publisher piece.
But the 18-year-old who ensured their safety could find himself in a world of trouble for stealing the school bus.
Because how dare he get 100 people to safety from the post-apocalyptic hell hole that NO has become.
I also read about a group of doctors who were staying at the Ritz-Carlton for a conference on HIV, who looted a Walgreens and set-up a makeshift medical center in the hotel. They actually managed to call Walgreen’s corporate HQ for permission and had an armed escort from police, as far as I know.
That 18-year-old kid is a hero. When the government can’t protect you from things you can’t protect yourself from, which is the one essential thing that government should do, then you have to take matters into your own hands.
I lambasted looters in a comment yesterday. My criticism still stands; I don’t see how those carrying dozens of watches, televisions, and other luxury goods can be reasonably defended. But the fact is that much of the looting has been appropriate and in a number of cases, particularly this one, downright heroic.
Transcript of the radio interview with Mayor Nagin is here:
http://www.cnn.com/2005/US/09/02/nagin.transcript/index.html
The political implications are huge, but I hope and believe that most people will put the blame on the government nanny state. How many hundreds of thousands in N.O. thought that the gov would always be there and there was never a need to worry, let alone plan for a natural disaster. On the nola.com weblog there are people STILL posting they need rescue and charity hospital hasn’t been evacuated yet, and they are out of electricity, food, and water.
This is a wakeup call that the government is inept at all levels, even if it’s a live or death situation.
Anybody hear Mayor Moron (Nagin)’s speech on WWL the other night?
If someone can find a transcript, it’s worth posting.
Bush could have cut his vacation short, at least.
Andy,
I’d forgotten to check that link since yesterday, thanks for reminding me. The “bigfoot” entry is just astonishing. The ineptitude of FEMA and the local authorities seems nearly criminal in severity.
There’s lots of talk in the blogosphere about the level of blame that should be attributed on President Bush. I don’t know how much he should be blamed, but my gut feeling is that there’s very little he could have done. Who knows? But the political implications of this are going to be very serious for both him and the Republican party as a whole. For example, Dennis Hastert is doing his part to destroy the Republican majority in the Congress. Idiot.
We’re only 24 hours from complete anarchy..
It is atrocious the response from emergency officials, and it seems like there are too many generals. The mayor obviously couldn’t handel the situation, and he should have resigned his authority to the military.
Shoot the looters onsite.
But it’s not the ability to reason, it’s the ability to survive that is lost. Check out this blogger, he’s staying in his ISP riding it out.
interdictor blog
and here is a link to the national guard channel i’ve been listenin to all day.
http://mirror1.ev1helps.net:8080/
Sho – In some cases, that is the situation. I have no beef with people who are stealing camping equipment and food. I’d also be stealing those sorts of things if I were stuck in New Orleans with little to no food or water. If you have a family to feed and no water or food to give them, it’s completely understandable that you would steal to take care of them.
Additionally, if I were still stuck in New Orleans I’d be yelling at the incompetent police and FEMA officials quite a damn bit. That’s not an inability to reason, that’s desperation. I’m sure all of you would feel the same way if stuck there.
But many of the looters that’ve been on TV have been stealing dozens of pairs of shoes, televisions, and other luxury goods. The video I linked to shows NOPD loading up shopping carts with goods from Wal*Mart. There are roaming bands of armed thugs going door to door stealing from and shooting poor victims stuck in their houses and in rescue centers. These sorts of criminals deserve no compassion… they are just trying to further themselves at the expense of true victims. It’s disgusting.
You presume it ever started.
There was an angry guy on the news yelling about how the police wouldn’t stop their cars to talk to him. Frankly, if I were being yelled at and/or shot at by an angry crowd, I wouldn’t stop either.
All ability to reason has ceased in the South.
I predicted this four days ago. I can tell you all about FEMA’s incompetance, having live through the 1998 ice storm in upstate NY, Vermont, NH and southern Ontario.
FEMA got there and did nothing more than shut down the freeways. It’s wasn’t FEMA giving out food, it was us soldiers from Ft. Drum. It wasn’t FEMA enforcing the law, it was the local police… and us soldiers from Ft. Drum. It wasn’t FEMA cutting downed trees from homes and yards, it was us soldiers.
I don’t know what FEMA was doing. Supposedly they were there. Oh… they stopped people from hawking generators and other things. That’s right. They were more concerned about regulating prices than feeding people and getting them safe.
“FEMA” is an alternate spelling of “incompetent”.
They should airdrop some Lifestraws at least.
I’ve read those reports of police officers and other authority figures looting, but I think it’s possible that they’re taking food and water to redistribute to survivors, and not stealing luxury items. At least, I hope that’s the situation.
The E&P piece is astonishing, and I read the source from NOLA.com earlier today.
I just heard Bush Sr. say on CNN that no one could have expected the levees to break.
This is probably not the best time to lie to the American people.
Updated with more links.
Cafferty on CNN just pointed out that Congress had a quicker response to the Terry Schiavo situation then it’s had to the disaster in New Orleans. It’s pretty obvious where their priorities are.
Regarding “the incompetence and lack of leadership in FEMA’s efforts,” I think this article is worth a read:
Destroying FEMA
Some quotage:This is an immense human tragedy, one that will work hardship on millions of people. It is beyond the capabilities of state and local government to deal with. It requires a national response.Which makes it all the more difficult to understand why, at this moment, the country’s premier agency for dealing with such events — FEMA — is being, in effect, systematically downgraded and all but dismantled by the Department of Homeland Security.