why is the govermsnt not helping those in need?

[triceracops]

I have a big ? for those who see the news at night and see those people crying, and dieing becase of no food, and water! this is usa! and it looks like a 3rd world country down there! why is the government just getting there now after 5 days of suffering? I very consurened about how those in need can't get even basic food, water, and sheter? why is that so hard! and why is the reporters having to show what none is even there? the government even put up a check point by the convention center and none can enter or even leave that heck hole! I feel thats not how we should treat those in need!

[RedFeather]

What? They're not letting anyone leave? That's simply ridiculous. They need to get off of their high horses and realize just how it would be if all of this had happened to them.

www.redcross.org

[Barry]

They're not letting anyone leave? Yes, That's ridiculous.
The reason why it's taking so long for the government
to respond is because of the area's condition.
It is so messed up down that it is nearly impossible
to get in there. And plus they have to take care of
all that looting and stuff to make it secure for them to get in safely. I know I wouldn't want to step in the middle of
a riot to help people until its secured first. That will be stupid.

www.foxnews.com/

[Vorchia]

Actually I typed up a whoel post about the after-storm chaos just this morning but then the computer ATE iot and I had no time to RETYPE. Computers always have an amazing appetite for posts and emails when you don't have time to redo them.

Opening any newspaper, I can't read more then one or two alineas. After that, I'm either so angry I can't sit or so close to crying I can't read.
I don't cry easily. Well I do but not usually over news. However, to see how the richest and most powerful nation treats their own people after a disaster... To see a storm smashed city in an area where tropical storms have been there for centuries STILL the local government haven't got a clue as to what to do and how to protect its people in case of the inevitable BIG storm. One line, one line in the newspaper.... "After last years storms the emergency plans were tried and it was found that the black people, the handicapped and the elderly would not be able to get transport out of town. They would not be ABLE to evacuate and no alternative transport was arranged. " They bloody well knew what was going to happen should a big storm hit, they KNEW there'd be people stuck in the city... They did nothing to make sure it didn't happen. There aren't even decent waterworks, I hear the 'waterworks' can only last a level 3 storm... I was like ....WHAT?!?!?!... Our own waterworks were made the way they are after the disaster in 1953 when an unusually high tide combined with a storm managed broke the dikes and flooded half a province. Even then, back in nineteenfiftythree the army was sent to the region to evacuate and assit the people. NINETEENFIFTYTHREE and it wasn't the kind of chaos the USA have now and it was in a tiny European country that hadn't yet economically recovered from WWII. Nineteenfiftythree and the great waterworks were begun, expensive, yes, very expensive but the money is nothing to the value of human LIFE. No tide or storm has ever let the sea flood the Netherlands since. Now in 2005 this tiny country and many others are sending help to the richest nation in the world because the usa itself doesn't seem to be doing much to help its own children. In 2005 in a part of the STates were the weather and the sea give a risk of disaster so much greater then any the Netherlands have ever faced and they don't even have dikes of a decent size... Heck, they can't even pump the water OUT of New Orleans efficiently! I'd laugh if it wasn't so painfully true!
In America, nobody with any power takes care of anyone if no money can be made of it, isn't it? It sure looks like it, even the police is plundering and the only 'help' sent at first were soldiers with guns whose only job it was to point guns... The millitary should be used yes, to set up emergency help, transport, food, medicine, hospitals, electricity, water..... Your politcians go flying over the freaking area then come tell on TV "Omigoshitlookslikethetsunami!!!" but do they start to set up help? Nooo, they wait with that untill the world reacts in shock to the way the richest and most powerful (and extremely liberal) nation is letting its free people their liberty, liberty to, starve, drown, dehydrate, die from lack of even the most basic needs in a piece storm smashed ready made third world in the United States of America. The free people, free enough to let your own people die in their storm smashed city. I'm so disgusted. Has American politics NO morale? Must people in need only receive proper care if MONEY can be made of it? It sure looks like it.

[RedFeather]

As I heard someone say, "They can send people to the Middle East in 24 hours, but it takes them four days to start helping their own people."

[Barry]

That's your politicians and liberals for you.

[aric]

dwaggie67 said:

That's your politicians and liberals for you.

Dwaggie, why would liberals be blamed for the current inability of the government to react quickly to this crisis?

Think about it. National Guard units are stretched thin in Iraq. That's why there was some trouble getting troops to New Orleans to maintain order. Secondly, Louisiana has been begging for YEARS for billions of dollars in federal funds to reclaim the marshlands and shore up the waterworks. When FEMA was lumped in with the Office of Homeland security, money that would normally have gone to preventative measures for disaster relief instead went to security projects. Not to mention that a certain monkey boy in the oval office passed a three hundred billion dollar tax cut right before initiating a war that has thus far cost 200 billion dollars already.

This isn't a result of liberalism. It's a result of measures undertaken by a Republican White House and a Republican-dominated Congress that have increasingly favored security and military programs over basic humanitarian needs. Not to mention favoring the rich over everyone else thereby shortchanging the ability of the federal government (remember, Big Government is bad according to conservatives) to handle situations like these. This is conservatism at work, not liberalism.

Maybe you need to stop taking your cues from an unabashedly conservative mouthpiece like Fox News.

"Fair and Balanced" my foot.

- Aric

[Stouthorn]

Hear, hear, Aric. That's the trick to winning an election as a Republican: dupe poor Americans into voting against their own interest.

[Buttercup]

My whole family lives in different parts of Louisiana and I spent about seven years living there. Did any of you know that the unofficial state motto is thank God for Mississippi? It means that the only state worse than them in scholling, public works, economics, and job employment (and whatever else you care to think of) is Mississippi. They are the only thing that stops Louisiana from being considered the worst state, statistically speaking. I am not saying that I agree with this but I am expressing a common viewpoint of the Louisiana people. So is it really any surprise to discover that money that was needed for waterworks and transportation and all other sorts of back-up plans went elsewhere? I think not. For one thing, yes, the government needs to step up to the plate and do more, but remember to only blame the politicians that are responsible, not the law enforcment officers and voluteers taht are trying. I saw a news piece that showed a female cop wrestling with a man who literally was desperate for food out of a store. She let him go because she didn't want to arrest him, he was only hungry and he wasn't hurting anyone. There is still human compassion out there, and i don't think the focus should be what politicians were responsible or which party spent the money where. The focus needs to be on the here and now and we need to fix the problem RIGHT NOW, and save as many lives as we can before we lose more to starvation and disease. That will be the next biggest worry, with all the dead bodise floating around, bloated from the water and the sun, they will become prime breeding ground for disease of all sorts so we also need to be concerned with the dead as well. Remember that I am not only speaking of the human bodies, but imagine all of the wildlife and livestock as well down around there and other areas. Not only New Orleans was hit but other areas around as well......Sorry, it just kinda all got to me. But, we need to quit crying and come together to fix it. That's all I have to say.

[Barry]

I just found a audio from Coast Guard in Louisiana

Check it out here:

69.18.113.212:8088

Very interesting stuff going on here.

[aric]

Once the immidiate dangers of rotting bodies and saving survivors have been taken care of, what about the future? Does anybody here actually think New Orleans should be rebuilt? I've been watching the news and quite a few New Orleans residents seem intent on staying where they are even though they now have the opportunity to get evacuated. They still stay there despite the fact that there's no power and running water. Not to mention the looming danger of water-borne diseases.

When I see people doing that, I just say to myself, "What a bunch of morons." I mean really, New Orleans is dead. This situation has been predicted for at least ten years. Sure we can rebuild the levies and reclaim marshlands, but global warming and rising sea levels are going to wipe out those reclaimed marshlands in no time. Then when the next storm hits, New Orleans is going to get destroyed. Again. That's billions of dollars and potentially another several thousand lives down the toilet.

Forget about NO. It's finished. The same kind of thinking urging people to rebuild the city is the same kind of short-sighted insanity that exacerbated the crisis in the first place. Absolutely no planning for the future. We need to cut our losses and concede this battle to Mother Nature. It's one she's going to win anyway. There's no need to waste time, money, and energy into saving a city that's going to be gone in a few decades anyway.

*rant off*

- Aric

[Christopher]

Agreed, if New orleans is going to be rebuilt, it shoudln't be put in the same spot. It's a shame to lose an entire city (especially one as famous as New Orleans), but it's better we just give up on it now, than let this disaster happen again (or something similar), later down the line.

[aric]

BTW buttercup, how are you fairing? Hope you didn't get too stressed out from Katrina. At first I thought you lived in Louisiana, but then Anonymous pointed out your profile says Florida. Oh well. It still passed over Florida.

I wonder if any one else here was directly effected by the hurricane.

- Aric

[RedFeather]

My family lives in North Florida, but fortunately, they didn't suffer anything too bad. That was in Tallahassee. And fortunately, my bro, who lives in Arkansas, is okay, too.

[Barry]

I just got word that a bus load of people from
Louisiana are moving in where I live.
A neighbor just down the road told me about this
the other day. Well I don't know if this is related but,
that morning I had to see my landlord to sign papers, for God knows what for. I don't think it was because of these people coming in. I do these papers every year but, this time there was a mess of them. Back to the people from Louisiana, If it is true and not here-say, This would very interesting. If I get a chance, I will ask if New Orleans is going to be rebuilt or not.