Darkstarexodus Escribi�:

Be interesting to see what the final body count is before Bush declares a War on Nature. (not trying to be glib...)

plus, i think mother nature has WMD's.....were deffinately fucked

I read a letter in Metro (free newspaper) this morning that apparently George Bush was forced to intevene after the Mayor of New Orleans stood back and did nothing for the people affected. How much truth is there in this?

mc marsh Escribi�:

I read a letter in Metro (free newspaper) this morning that apparently George Bush was forced to intevene after the Mayor of New Orleans stood back and did nothing for the people affected. How much truth is there in this?

Partisan politics and the blame game at work. It's not that black and white. There was failure on many fronts and many facets to the events that took place. It is hard to even write a brief synopsis of everything that happened because like I said, there is failure on all fronts.



Bottom line is this: the mayor of New Orleans only has so much power to act on a federal level when it comes to an emergency. Could he have done more? Sure, but he could only do so much. It wasn't necessarily the hurricane itself that caused all this damage you're seeing on the news. No, those swampy images were caused by the levees breaking as they were only able to withstand a lower category storm. Funding to fix those levees was denied because all the money's been filtered into Homeland Security fighting would be terrorists from blowing up a bomb somewhere. Come on! New Orleans and the State of Lousiana begged the feds for money to fix those levees but were denied and everyone knew way back when that the levees would break if the storm was bad enough. George Bush was not forced to intervene, being President is a 24/7 job and when your country is faced with a crisis larger than most of us have ever seen in our lifetimes (I sure as hell don't remember anything this bad natural or unnatural in my 33 years) it's your job to take the upper hand - matter of fact George seemed a bit taken aback that his vacation had to be cut short.



And that's only the beginning. I don't have time to go into the inexcusably slow response that New Orleans got that would've prevented some of these deaths... other than it was 4 days until help finally arrived!!!



Absolutely shameful. Just shameful and inexcusable for the US to be that ill prepared in the face of a disaster. The government let those people down. God help us if another storm hits us, or we get the big earthquake and so on and so on. Or even another terrorist attack larger than the one that took out the world trade center. Because if the response in New Orleans is what we have to look foward to in the wake of a national crisis, then we're al pretty fucked.



Anyway. What matters now is that the focus needs to be shifted from blaming and finger pointing to actually dealing with the thousands of my partisan politics get in the way of this, but obviously there's bigger fish to fry...

whirlygirl Escribi�:

...is faced with a crisis larger than most of us have ever seen in our lifetimes (I sure as hell don't remember anything this bad natural or unnatural in my 33 years)

in the United States on american soil, I mean.

damn, that water down there looks worse and worse...we got some problems ahead with all that toxic water in the gulf

The toxic levels in the waters are a huge concern among many other things of course - I'm afraid we'll be feeling the repurcussions of this hurricane for a long time to come.



This whole ordeal has been very distressing to watch unfold. To be honest I flipped channels, catching bits and pieces of the hurricane as it was happening and didn't watch it closely until directly afterward. Still trying to get my head around everything that's happened, and what will happen...



What's been awesome in all of this is all the aid coming from everywhere around the globe. And of course all the generosity coming from all over the States. It's nice to see people coming together and helping their fellow man for a common good.

Very interesting story with pics here:



http://www.kodakgall...&Uy=nyvoby&Ux=1

piss on a bush



fight idiotisim!

From cnn.com



"Katrina exposed serious problems in our response capability at all levels of government and to the extent the federal government didn't fully do its job right, I take responsibility," Bush said during a news conference.





------



What exactly does this mean? Take responsibility? How? Fire lesser-ranked people who also didn't do their jobs? Show "leadership" by glad-handling mourning Southerners? Invade another country? Fucks sake.....

This whole thing is so frustrating, and I'm beat. Completely burnt out enough to where if I were to start ranting and raving here, I wouldn't even know where to begin. There's so many levels to the incompetence, the suffering, the strides made so far to renovate and repair the damage on all fronts, along with the racial divide that was blown wide open for the entire planet to see... the whole thing, honestly, it gives me a tremendous headache trying to piece it all together.



But on a ligher side..







This ain't no photoshop job, either.

snopes won't share images I guess. Here's the funny in all its unadultered glory, courtesy of sky news (Ireland).

Darkstarexodus Escribi�:

What exactly does this mean? Take responsibility? How? Fire lesser-ranked people who also didn't do their jobs? Show "leadership" by glad-handling mourning Southerners? Invade another country? Fucks sake.....

You've gotta hope he'll offer his resignation after a comment like that, but I doubt it'll happen.

Now that's just wishful thinking! :P



On one hand it's good he's finally owned up to this massive blunder. First time in years he's admitted fault. On the other hand, I can't help but think this is all a publicity stunt to turn around the blame so it's shifted solely on the shoulders of the local and state governments of Lousiana.



I'm not saying the local and state governments aren't to blame to some degree - there's many levels of incompetency in this whole mess.



But when you're at the top of the chain like the federal government is, the buck's gotta stop somewhere.



We'll see if this apology/admittance to inadequacy helps in the president's approval rating which is the lowest it's ever been.

whirlygirl Escribi�:

We'll see if this apology/admittance to inadequacy helps in the president's approval rating which is the lowest it's ever been.

isnt like 34% or something? X-D .....i think its actually lower but the media covers it up

i'm from the area...the storm has changed just about everything; my house survived as well as my family, and I'm thankful for that :)

dekane, glad to read that you and yours is safe!!! :)

Hey and welcome ! Glad to see u made it safe...always nice to see some good news after all this bad stuff.

I like Jazz and blues...from New Orleans.

and I am interested in the place still.

I believe South of US will be ok ASAP...

People can help each other.

I believe.



:)



~one love~

dekane Escribi�:

i'm from the area...the storm has changed just about everything; my house survived as well as my family, and I'm thankful for that :)

Hi,dakane!

nice to meet you.



I am pink shoes from Japan!

Allthough Bush is an awfull president, you have to admit he's kinda funny...



At the FN meeting where all the worlds leaders are gathered:



What he writes: ”I think I MAY NEED A BATHROOM break? Is this possi…”



Then he shows the paper to Condoleezza Rice to ask for her advice :D