Flippy - I Rant, You Read
Wednesday, August 31, 2005
Idiot of the Day - Las Vegas Review Journal Editors
This is a quote from this morning’s Review Journal editorial column. “And yet, many people around the world said the United States didn’t offer enough support in response to the tsunami. A U.N. bureaucrat went as far as calling Americans and other Westerners “stingy.” It was an insult of the highest order to the world’s most generous nation. So where is the rest of the world in our time of need? There’s nary a peep from the “global community.”
I cannot BEGIN to tell you how sick of this crap I am. For one, we’re the richest country in the world, based on spending power. We’re amongst the top several countries based on income. But we’re 12th amongst the 21 richest nations overall in helping the world’s poor. No, people, we are NOT #1. Denmark is number one. We’re number one in arrogance, always thinking we’re number one in regards to everything else. Yes, sure, we have a nice country, but that doesn’t make us the be all and end all of the world.
Secondly, and most importantly, in regards to the ignorant statements of the Review Journal; I’m going to quote a news story that was published today regarding other world leaders expressing condolences, after the RJ editorial was printed. However, while listening to CNN yesterday afternoon, I heard with my own two ears and saw with my own two eyes, Louisiana Gov. Kathleen Babineaux Blanco, expressly say that we’d received calls from other countries offering help. In addition, there was this article from Associated Press that states, “From papal prayers to telegrams from China, the world reacted with an outpouring of compassion Wednesday for the victims of Hurricane Katrina in messages tinged by shock that a disaster of this scale could occur in the United States” and this “Whether aid is sent, most nations did offer sympathy. French President Jacques Chirac and German Chancellor Gerhard Schroeder sent messages of sympathy to President Bush. China’s President Hu Jintao and Britain’s Queen Elizabeth II also sent messages of condolence.” Plus, there was this from The Toronto Star -” Canadian officials have started getting ready to send whatever type of aid the United States requires to help with the aftermath of hurricane Katrina, Deputy Prime Minister Anne McLellan said today.”
So, RJ editors, quit your whining and spend your time doing research instead. A person with a modicum of common sense would just hazard a guess that other countries would offer help and aid money. So, with that common sense, the average person would do a little research and note that, yes, aid had been offered. Las Vegas is a big city now, we should have a big city newspaper. Instead, the paper is full of half-truths and hyperbole.
Right now, I’m having trouble understanding why the American Red Cross needs the support of the average American. Do we not have enough government money to help the poor victims of this disaster? We’re spending billions in Iraq, so we surely should have enough money to help Americans get back on their feet after such a tragedy, no? We’ve donated money to charities that are going into the affected areas to help rescue animals. I’m assuming the US government has enough money to help people in the area. Our donations went to Best Friends Hurricane Relief Fund and Noah’s Wish. I expect the government to take care of its people, but I know they won’t take care of their beloved pets.
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I find it interesting that Denmark spent “one cent per person per day” while the United States spent “six cents per person per day.”
Perhaps taxes have something to do with it? Anyhow, as one of the “average americans”, I am glad the Red Cross is asking for help. People may criticize other countries for not caring, criticize our government, blame everything on Bush, etc., but we still have so many wonderful, giving, caring people in this country and I’m so thankful for that. I’m also thankful for the opportunity to give and want to do more…to make some real sacrifices in my own little life to help others (both human and animal). I’m sorry, but criticisms on either end of the “political spectrum” are making me sick right now. (I don’t mean personal offense to you, we’re all allowed to be angry, and, for heaven’s sake, this is your blog. But that’s my rant in kind.)Nance on 09/01 at 06:43 AM -
Criticisms of a political nature are warranted. Some of this devastation could’ve been prevented. Yes, we’re stuck dealing with it the best we can now, but it didn’t have to be this bad. And if we don’t criticize, how will it ever get better?
From http://www.realcities.com/mld/krwashington/12528233.htm
Budget cuts haven’t made disaster preparedness any easier.
Last year, FEMA spent $250,000 to conduct an eight-day hurricane drill for a mock killer storm hitting New Orleans. Some 250 emergency officials attended. Many of the scenarios now playing out, including a helicopter evacuation of the Superdome, were discussed in that drill for a fictional storm named Pam.
This year, the group was to design a plan to fix such unresolved problems as evacuating sick and injured people from the Superdome and housing tens of thousands of stranded citizens.
Funding for that planning was cut, said Tolbert, the former FEMA disaster response director.
“A lot of good was done, but it just wasn’t finished,” said Tolbert, who was the disaster chief for the state of North Carolina. “I don’t know if it would have saved more lives. It would have made the response faster. You might say it would have saved lives.”
FEMA wasn’t alone in cutting hurricane spending in New Orleans and the surrounding area.
Federal flood control spending for southeastern Louisiana has been chopped from $69 million in 2001 to $36.5 million in 2005, according to budget documents. Federal hurricane protection for the Lake Pontchartrain vicinity in the Army Corps of Engineers’ budget dropped from $14.25 million in 2002 to $5.7 million this year. Louisiana Democratic Sen. Mary Landrieu requested $27 million this year.
Both the New Orleans Times-Picayune newspaper and a local business magazine reported that the effects of the budget cuts at the Army Corps of Engineers were severe.
In 2004, the Corps essentially stopped major work on the now-breached levee system that had protected New Orleans from flooding. It was the first such stoppage in 37 years, the Times-Picayune reported.
“It appears that the money has been moved in the president’s budget to handle homeland security and the war in Iraq, and I suppose that’s the price we pay,” Jefferson Parish emergency management chief Walter Maestri told the newspaper. “Nobody locally is happy that the levees can’t be finished, and we are doing everything we can to make the case that this is a security issue for us.”
The Army Corps’ New Orleans office, facing a $71 million cut, also eliminated funds to pay for a study on how to protect the Crescent City from a Category 5 storm, New Orleans City Business reported in June.
Being prepared for a disaster is basic emergency management, disaster experts say.
For example, in the 1990s, in planning for a New Orleans nightmare scenario, the federal government figured it would pre-deploy nearby ships with pumps to remove water from the below-sea-level city and have hospital ships nearby, said James Lee Witt, who was FEMA director under President Clinton.
Federal officials said a hospital ship would leave from Baltimore on Friday.
“These things need to be planned and prepared for; it just doesn’t look like it was,” said Witt, a former Arkansas disaster chief who won bipartisan praise on Capitol Hill during his tenure.
Flippy on 09/01 at 12:34 PM -
Actually, this is a better article - http://www.salon.com/opinion/blumenthal/2005/08/31/disaster_preparation/index_np.html
Flippy on 09/01 at 12:46 PM -
The following rant is not directed towards you Flippy.
I have seen extremist posts from both sides of the political spectrum and none of them hit close to the truth. I have read posts saying absurd things such as Americans “deserved” this, written by Americans to “where is the rest of the world now”. The hyperbole on both sides is ridiculous. Put the politics aside and deal with the tragedy. There are people dying on the roadside.
That said, I agree with you 100% on your skewering of the Las Vegas Review Journal article, Flippy. The media is a plague upon this nation. It is slanted on both sides and in the end, provides little more than a disservice to the American people. To prove just how out of touch that RJ article is, even Faux News is reporting that other nations are sending condolences and support. In fact, they just reported that the EU is offering to send gasoline to the US.
As for the Red Cross, I am not sure that I trust them to handle my money. We have decided that our dollars would be better spent donating to the charities that Leigh-Ann posted on her blog yesterday. While aid organizations will certainly deal with the human victims of this disaster, who will look after the animals?
Expat on 09/01 at 02:21 PM -
Yes, I agree that it’s ridiculous to say that anyone deserved this. I do still think the politics can be discussed while people are being helped. I think if the politics aren’t discussed, we’re going to end up with people forgetting about this once it’s no longer headline news. The gulf cities needed to be protected and money was diverted. The people who live there have a right to be pissed off. Okay, no, shooting at rescue helicopters isn’t going to help - that’s idiotic.
I’m tired of the looting & criminal aspect of this disaster (a woman and child were raped at the Superdome - how sick is that???), but here’s a fabulous story about a 13 year old boy who saved his family. If I had lots of money, I’d set up a scholarship fund for him.
http://www.miami.com/mld/miamiherald/12529675.htmFlippy on 09/01 at 02:43 PM -
Blah… that site wanted me to sign up and I was too lazy. LMAO I whole heartedly agree that a 13 year old who saved his family should be honoured in some way!
No kidding about the criminal aspect. I don’t know if that goes to show the desperation of the sitution, or the innate evil of some people? I am thinking that latter. When I heard about the rapes, robberies, and murders that occurred last night, I was sickened. As bad as things were, they got worse. What the hell is wrong with some people?
Oh, I agree that there should be a political discussion surrounding some of the decisions that lead to this point (like the article you printed, for example). I am talking more about the nutbag extremists like the jackass who said that Katrina was punishment for all of the abortion clinics in New Orleans and that the radar image of the hurricane looked just like a fetus. Sometimes you have to wonder if the idiots should have a right to free speech. (Hey, maybe I should search for that article so that you can award him Idiot of the Day as well!)
Expat on 09/01 at 03:05 PM -
Ah, I found the article at Google News and didn’t realize that direct links to it required registration. Shhhh, don’t tell, I swiped it. Under the circumstances, I hope I don’t get sued.
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Posted on Thu, Sep. 01, 2005BILOXI
‘That boy is a hero’: Rescue of family is silver lining for city
A 13-year-old boy in Biloxi, Miss., rescued his entire family—12 people, including his twin sister—during Katrina’s rage.
BY AUDRA D.S. BURCH
.(JavaScript must be enabled to view this email address)
BILOXI, Miss. - In the long, harrowing moments before Katrina crashed into the east side of this coastal city, a dozen family members, friends and neighbors piled into the only bedroom of a wooden house.Then they waited, and some drifted asleep. Suddenly, the water rushed in. It came fast, penetrating every wall and window. They retreated to a living room that yielded no protection from the five-foot tide inside the house.
The babies began screaming, the adults panicked and, in that moment, 13-year-old Phillip Bullard began saving lives. Four adults and nine children, including himself.
Phillip swam and cradled the youngest, a 1-year-old boy. He floated the oldest—all through the house, out a broken front window and into a boat floating down what was once Holley Street. He coaxed his twin sister to turn loose the side of the house, which she clung to in terror. And he took the hands of his mother and grandmother and guided them through the house, on a path made from sodden furniture.
They were willing to die, unable to swim and too frightened to leave their home.
‘‘I just didn’t want to see my family drown,’’ said Phillip, a seventh-grader who spent Wednesday in a shelter at Biloxi Junior High, which he normally attends. ``I was scared if I didn’t keep helping, somebody would die.’‘
WORD SPREADS
Phillip’s story hopscotched across town. Folks quickly learned about the boy who rescued his family, a bright spot in an otherwise dreary day in the aftermath of Hurricane Katrina.
‘‘That little boy is a hero,’’ said Kenneth Brinson, who helped set up an outdoor community center near Main Street Baptist Church in the neighborhood where Phillip lives. Most of the day, Brinson cooked red beans and rice and smoked sausage for the hungry.
Phillip, a typical teenager who runs and jumps and dances and dreams, lives with his mother and grandmother on the east side of town, a collection of older A-frame homes in a mostly poor, mostly withered neighborhood. Almost from the very beginning, they knew the little house would fall to a storm with this kind of roar.
‘‘I saw all the water and it was coming from everywhere. I swear it came through the floor,’’ said Vanessa Posey, 44, Phillip’s mother. ``I started screaming and trying to get everybody up. I broke the window and tried to put the babies on top of the bar. My son did most everything else.’‘
CLEARED THE WAY
Phillip, a soft-spoken boy who said he knew he wanted to be a police officer or doctor before the storm, says he went under water to clear a path to the window and then got his 25-year-old sister, Yoshico Posey, out. He picked her first because she was the only other person who could swim and help guide the rest out of the house. They formed a rescue team. He carried or floated each person out the window; she passed them to a neighbor who was helping, or put them in a boat they found drifting by.
Later, they used broomsticks to paddle down the street and sought haven in the upstairs loft of a neighbor’s home.
‘‘It felt like Phillip was in there getting people for hours,’’ said Vanessa Posey, sitting outside the shelter. ``I just kept thanking the Lord for every person he got out.’‘
By the time Phillip finally swam out of the house, he found his twin sister clinging to the exterior wall of the house.
‘‘She was scared. It took me awhile to convince her to let go and take my hand,’’ he said softly. ``But I had to keep trying because she would not have made it.’‘
After everyone was rescued, Phillip took the boat to Division Street, a main thoroughfare, to find help. It never came.
And so the story that began at noon Monday in the earliest moments of Katrina’s brief stay ended with Phillip in a shelter, nursing a foot cut by tin that his mother fears will become infected. This time, help is on the way.
‘‘I just thank God for Phillip,’’ the mother said. ``We would not be here but for the grace of God and the courage of my son.’’
Flippy on 09/01 at 03:09 PM -
Wow! That boy is such a hero. He certainly deserves to be honoured in some way. Like you, I wish that I had the money to provide him with a scholarship so that he could achieve his dream of becoming a doctor. That kid clearly has a big heart!
Expat on 09/01 at 03:42 PM -
*sniffle*
Thank you for posting something heartwarming. I think I’ll completely fall apart if I read one more thing about raping, shooting, spouses dying in front of each other, etc.
I do so want to believe that people are good.
moonandsun03 on 09/02 at 01:56 PM -
That’s a great story. Like moonandsun I’ve been watching the news and wondering where the good of this world is… Thank goodness for that boy’s bravery.
Lassa on 09/02 at 04:06 PM -
The spiritual strength of so many of the people down there is amazing. Time after time they thank God or praise the Lord for their lives. I am humbled by their faith.
Nance on 09/03 at 12:22 PM -
I assume God spared the people who lived because, well, the people who died were sucky anyway
Leigh-Ann on 09/03 at 03:47 PM -
I wish the “Lord” had thought this whole thing out. Rapists surviving? Babies dying of dehydration? People shooting at med-evac helicopters? I’m not impressed with this “Lord” person.
Flippy on 09/03 at 11:50 PM -
The horror that is New Orleans could certainly have been delt with in many more proactive ways. The animals truly have been completely overlooked and donations of goods or services to organizations willing to rescue and help is one of the only ways that I feel like I’m contributing to the solution.
Flourish on 09/04 at 05:36 AM -
It would be interesting to hear how the hurricane survivors, the ones who thanked God for their lives on television, would respond to your questions. I wonder what they would say.
Nance on 09/04 at 09:16 AM -
The Michigan Humane society is sending an adoption unit and supplies to help rescue pets. How heartbreaking that these people, who have lost everything, also have to relinquish their pets in order to go to the shelters. I can’t even begin to imagine that.
We have one adopted dog already, maybe I can manage another one. Oh how sad!Nance on 09/04 at 09:20 AM -
Oh, Flippy, I want to quickly clarify something. I’ve been posting here for a little while now, and really like you and your writing, and I’m not some extreme right-winger coming aboard trying to rouse anyone or say something stupid. I know you are an atheist, and I respect that fact. I struggle with anger and many of the statements/questions you, in reply, commented on, and I do believe in God. My husband in an avowed atheist. We love and respect each other even with our spiritual differences. Many of my friends are atheists or agnostics as well as Christians, conservative Jews, Muslim. And I find it amazing, that inspite of everything some of these people have gone through, they still are saying they feel blessed, etc. And find it incredibly interesting, in the context of all of the discussions on this tragedy, that they say what they do.
Nance on 09/04 at 10:10 AM -
Some may feel blessed, but others, not so much. Then there was Charlene Brown-Williams, 41, lying on the floor of the city’s airport with around 10,000 others awaiting emergency flights out. She does not know what happened to any of her friends or relatives and is being sent several states away to start a new life in a shelter. “I went to sleep on the night of the storm and I prayed. I’m still praying for those angels to come and take me. There’s somebody out there with wings on their back but so far they’re not coming through for me.”
I’m sorry if Leigh-Ann & I were harsh towards you. We didn’t mean it to be taken personally, but being avowed atheists, we struggle to fathom how anyone could possibly thank God for anything. Professional athletes pray to win. Rappers thank God when they’ve won a Grammy. How is God deciding who is going to win, lose, live, die, etc? Is it like God lottery?
Leigh-Ann and I feel so strongly about the God & political issues that I don’t think either of us could be married to someone who believes differently, because our beliefs are such a core part of us. Although, my sister-in-law was pretty religious before she married my super atheist (to the point of mocking - I’m at least polite in her presence…sorry if I haven’t been that way with you) brother. I guess it’s probably a lot easier for the atheist spouse than the believer spouse in “mixed” marriages. We do have friends that are religious and <gasp!> Republicans. We avoid political discussions when we’re with them. Luckily, they’re not the anti-gay Republicans. They’re more the “our parents were Republicans, so we’re Republicans, but we’re not interested in any politics” Republicans.
Flippy on 09/04 at 01:51 PM -
I’d like to add that I wasn’t necessarily trying to mock “Nance”, but was taking a pot-shot at hurricane survivors who were thanking God for sparing them. I have to assume that a person who thanks God for sparing *them* also believes, by default, that God chose not to spare other people. It just seems so arrogant to feel that God is the reason you’re alive—as if your life has more value than someone else’s. It’s fine to have faith, and to be thankful, but if you don’t also believe in some element of luck then it seems to me you’re being pretty self-centered.
Leigh-Ann on 09/04 at 02:04 PM
