I've been alternating between relief, rage, and guilt as of late. We survived Katrina v 1.0 while on vacation in Southern Florida. For a while it looked like we were in the direct path of the storm then it jogged a bit to the south. While it was relief for me and my family (not to mention my in-laws who's condo last the roof LAST YEAR in Frances and it's finally being fixed NOW) short of the storm turning around and heading out to sea, it meant suffering for some. I couldn't rejoice in my own good fortune while others didn't fare as well.

It was compounded more after she came asher in Louisiana, Mississippi, and Alabama. The horrors there are perhaps the worst things I've ever seen in my life. I was worried for quite some time about my friend's family - he grew up in that area and has a huge family. He alone has 11 siblings and his family has cousins, uncles, aunts, etc. all over the place. When I emailed him right after Katrina, he was glued to the television watching for anything that looked familiar.

And then... nothing. For days, it seemed like nothing. Someone dropped the ball, and whatever happened to "the buck stops here". President Excuse is busy rehashing the great times he had drinking along the Gulf Coast and promising to bring it back to something better than it was before. Sounds a lot like Nero fiddling while Rome burned. People are suffocating in their attics because they have no way out and he laments the loss of a great place to kick back with his buddies? Is this man remotely living in the real world?

And of course his die-hard supporters went to work right away, blaming the whole thing on the black people who were looting. I would challenge any of them to go without water for three or four days - watch their children or parents dying in front of them - watch their skin erupt in open sores from the toxicity of the water - and hear nothing from our government. What would they do? Sit around singing Kum Ba Ya?

There is never an excuse for murder or rape, but the looting... But heck, if I was there with my kids I would be doing whatever it took to survive. I've heard people calling them animals. Would they do that if the color of their skin was different? Probably not. The die-hard Bush supporters are in full-swing, demonizing people who are probably in a panic mode just to survive. One chastizes the Mayor of New Orleans for not calling for calm - see, it's all his fault. It's not that Bush was on vacation and couldn't be bothered... it's not that the federal government dropped the ball. It's that the mayor of the city didn't go on TELEVISION or RADIO and call for calm.

Want to take a survey of how many of these people have televisions or radios? If you could find ten working in all of the flooded areas I'd be amazed. There's also the problem of ELECTRICITY to POWER THEM!!!

The goverment saw a panicked country almost four years ago now on 9/11. What plans were put in place? I listened over and over again to how Bush was making us safer. From what? What will happen now in any metropolitan area following a disaster of this sort? Man-made or natural, it's quite obvious there are no plans in place for anything - not for getting relief supplies to the inner cities or people cut off from getting to outside resources on their own. There are no decent plans for evacuation of our cities in the event of a disaster - what about dirty bombs in the middle of downtown? How will they evacuate the surrounding areas?

Oh, and the re-building contract for New Orleans just went to Halliburton. Halliburton who's "misplaced" over $9 billion in Iraq but our taxpayer dollars just keep getting channeled in their direction.

Then there's the long term outlook economically in this country.

Where's the call from our illustrious President to his buddies over at Exxon, Shell, BP, etc. that in the wake of the disaster they have to dip into the record profits they've made since he's been in office and help the country out? I know some tourist towns who will be hurting real quick if gas prices don't come down by fall foliage season. There goes more jobs....

What happens as the price increase hits the trucking industry? As food and other basic necessities of life become too expensive for families? As people who are working part-time find that it now costs them twice as much to fill up their car?

Is anyone in our government going to do anything?



(For the record, the person who chastized the Mayor of New Orleans - her idea of relief supplies is organizing a Bible drive - even as a Christian myself I roll my eyes to that.)