Date: Wed, 31 Aug 2005 23:38:49 -0500
The majority of people in the Gulf States who are stranded
and needing help are the poor, and minorities. That does not speak well for the
U.S. unless "it’s the media's fault" again. Here, here—the media must compete,
so they were ahead of the Category 5 hurricane by two days. The government does
not need to compete. They don't work on Saturdays or Sundays or during
vacations, so they didn't have to start thinking about Katrina until Monday as
the people walked on and on, even if they didn't have money, a place to go, or
the strength. For the majority working class, they were civil employees, their
paychecks were due Friday, so they were at the end of their pay periods to boot,
and New Orleans’s salary levels are far below national averages yet their income
from tourism and port fees as the largest port in the nation evidence great
wealth.
Move on economic development, move on Chamber of Commerce, bring in more
tourism, and keep the citizenry slaves. The smoke arising from NO is part
of the hole in the dike, and a convenient smoke screen to once again take our
minds and eyes off "The District."
It is heartbreaking to see women with newborns who have no formula, could not
breastfeed because they cannot find anything to drink to keep them hydrated
enough to produce milk for their infants, and their babies were starving—too
weak to cry, exposed on an open bridge and other locations without shelter from
the sun, and airborne organisms they cannot see—but they are there.
Every woman watching the news felt the terror and the sisterhood viewing those
mothers, knowing that in the United States most women are only three paychecks
away from poverty—and under those bridges.
Where was the FEMA in preparing for this hit? Mothers, children, elders, the
ill, and the handicapped are always the first to be evacuated during
disasters—that is simply basic emergency routine.
Any private pilot knew that the radar of that storm indicated it was going to be
a major disaster somewhere along that coastal area and eastward—"If wishes were
horses then beggars would ride."
It would have all been so much easier on the victims had someone had the
knowledge to plan—and overcome the inertia our nation suffers with
transportation problems in a disaster (in Desert Storm getting mere cots to our
military was virtually impossible without non-military entrepreneurs making it
doable). The able-bodied could have remained in safe areas, ready to "move out,"
and help with the search and rescue once the hurricane had passed. ARC Disaster
training taught me that much, years ago.
Soon the rest of America will become outraged as hundreds of thousands of
citizens from our own nation will be transported into our cities for shelter,
medical care, food, and months of post-traumatic stress disorders. This is not
about the New Orleans’ refugees, the rioters, our starving, dieing sisters, and
brothers—it’s about the hole in the dike.
Oh no, not about the crushed levees we have been warned about since the
1970s, and not about the waters rushing into the Gulf Coast's homes, laden with
cancer-causing agents from crude, destroying everything its path. No, it’s
really about America's need seeping out into full view before all nations in the
world. Our slip is showing.
Even our "collateral forces" can now see that that America’s President and
Congress can spend money $1 billion a day, without a second thought, to invade
one nation, and send money to rescue others because our middle and lower class
Americans have been supporting this nation with their hard work for decades, but
they weren't supposed to be seen. They now realize America cannot be called upon
to help them, when it can not help its own citizens.
How very prophetic—Labor Day 2005 . . . The Medrano brothers would love
speaking with me today, as we did on so many Labor Days in Dallas, Texas.
In California’s last severe earthquake the well-trained local rescue workers
were overwhelmed with 18-wheelers coming in loaded with canned fruits and
vegetables from the ARC, while the state’s crops were rich with fresh food, ala
natural. California's rescue workers were pleading for tents, linens, shoes,
injectable antibiotics, bottled water, and medically skilled volunteers.
In the days preceding Katrina, who was at the helm of planning? The FEMA and the
governors of those states owe America’s taxpayers answers. Where was Louisiana’s
governor on the weekend prior to a Category 5 hitting her state? Why didn’t she
plan ahead with FEMA (only one person was in NO, but the Governor
couldn’t be found)?
The truth be known, the Louisiana governor did telephone the White House on
several occasions prior to the weekend, requesting assistance before NO
was hit. Her taped conversations asking for FEMA, the National Guard, and the
State Department’s assistance was briefly played on all the networks, then, all
became silent. The type of silence Americans do not like to "hear."
Maybe she was silenced to make room for the CNN and Fox heroes risking their
lives before our very eyes to bring the voyeurism into our living rooms. My,
Americans can’t just be told about tragedies without seeing them repeated over
and over, every minute of every day, by those who shouldn’t even be out in the
middle of a hurricane hanging on to poles, and being blown horizontally, gasping
for breath—or the talking
heads, absorbing their admiring guests kudos, from a life of TV news coverage,
and taking few if any public phone queries on their "open line" telephones. No
wonder mental health is an oxymoron in our country—insanity is contagious.
All three governors had a moral obligation to spend the weekend before
Katrina crashed ashore preparing the nation for a possible disaster. How? By
notifying all the bottled water companies, the canine rescue teams in North
America, the cruise lines, buses, Amtrak, trucking companies, the National Guard
preparing them for Medi-vac, and asking the CDC for immunizations and medical
supplies outside of the hurricane's anticipated path, putting everyone on
standby. It appears that NO's governor did just that but was
ignored by those below her—ignored her rights to
requesting immediate aide to her State. Our Secretary of State should have
noticed that the dike was leaking, and acted—that was her home. Just where was
her nibs?
Our President and Vice-President should have been working the weekend before
regardless of their planned vacations, "fishing trip," or cake eating party in
California on Monday when NO was being washed away. The Nation was bereft
of leadership, blown away by a hurricane, a force of nature. The Executive
Branch jumped ship—off the Pacific Coast, no less.
Those actions are only a part of what should have been done. Even the looters
could have been "cuffed up" together to begin working instead of letting them
go—but, they were crazed, victims who lost everything, told to
"evacuate"—evacuate what and where—leave one's soul?
The crass ignorance by the head of FEMA comes from a dangerously bad
Presidential appointment, another conflict-of-interest, naming someone with no
experience. In fact, "Brownie" should have known better, himself. If he had been
qualified his Appointment he would have told CDC to have several thousand med
students-interns-residents, retired physicians, RNs and other licensed medical
workers ready to head into the area with vaccines and injectable antibiotics, to
inoculate everyone to ward off hepatitis, cholera, pneumonia, dysentery,
dehydration, smallpox, serious wound infections, and all the dangerous
communicable childhood viruses. It will take more than eight months to a year,
if then, to find all the bodies, to stop the disease, to provide homes for those
lost souls, who were sent to other locations.
Could anyone with an IQ of 100 remotely believe there were no post-operative
patients in that Region, hospitals, nursing homes, at home recovering, expectant
mothers about to give birth, or who’d just given birth by Caesarian? Would you
believe there were no residents of senior and extended care facilities?
The Lubbock, Texas food bank is the top desiccated food operation in the
nation, as well as the LDS groups everywhere—they were no doubt waiting for the
calls to come in. Every resource could have been standing by—outside Memphis.
The suffering will have no relief if one more weekend passes. It isn’t doable.
Can you or I say if we were President this would not have happened to the
hundreds of thousands in Louisiana? You bet we could. We would not have stayed
"on vacation." We would have made certain the Vice President (who’s been
noticeably absent the past few weeks), the President’s Cabinet, and Secretary of
State was "on the job" even if the President was continuing his vacation
regardless of what was to befall those he is mandated to protect with all
judicious and powerful means available to him. The DHS should have been ahead in
planning with the Gulf Coast Governors, with at least a phone call to Chertoff.
The three Governors are being framed for negligence in not utilizing the EMAX
provision to request the National Guard and US Military to standby in case they
were needed—such is permitted (using the National Guard and US Military) under
EMAX in a state of emergency—implemented with the thought that there would be NO
warning. But, are they are fault? Where did the Louisiana governor’s telephone
tapes to the White House and FEMA go? They will most certainly be in the George
W. Bush Presidential Library, with all the other now sealed records from
Midland, Texas, so we have to wait and visit Texas, after-the-fact, to learn
about our present-history.
Each state had received funds by DHS to prepare for evacuations in cases of
emergencies (after "9-11"). Everyone in America would be wise to ask their
Governors for a detailed accounting of how DHS allocations were been spent, and
ask to see their State’s plan.
The President is telling people to "give money to the American Red Cross."
Where is the ARC, not in NO—at least not now. Smirking in mid-sentence,
President Bush said, (sic) we all like to have things done yesterday. Is that
what he told us to do for the Tsunami victims?
Note: the National Guard is "on its way." No one knows where they are in fact,
or where they have been. (JUST IN: ". . . there are 100 on a C140 expected to
arrive at 10 PM". The General admitted, "nobody was clairvoyant enough..." to
plan in advance for this disaster. Pompous arrogance—add him to the list of
criminally negligence officials.
I want, ETAs, what, whom, where, when, and what they will do for more than
20,000 people (only in one city). Do you want some answers? Are your loved ones
there? If not, "visualize," and stop and think about it for a few minutes in
quietness. Then, ask for clarity to sort out what to do next.
I want to know why ARC tent cities were not set up so that families may
remain together, to help with their mental and physical health. We are helping
human beings, not rounding up cattle.
If a General doesn't know scientific literature on hurricanes, or at least how
to access www.weather.com he needs to be retired without a pension. If one more
person casts blame on the people in the Superdome we need to add them to the
fray for some experiential exposure.
A "Faith-Based Administration" should take a clue from Islam. Their people
count. Women, children, the elders, ill and infirm, come first. In many Islamic
sects, women are well-educated and hold a higher percentage in their "Congress"
than in the US. Iran is an example.
There is no excuse for NOT knowing those levees would not hold—they knew it in
the 1970s—and we kept being warned, read http://www.hurricane.lsu.edu/_in_the_news/houston.htm
The issue is there was no preparation to evacuate the people in the coastal
areas and save lives by providing the basic necessities of life: food, water,
shelter, and healthcare. Someone asked me if the helicopter lifts "there" were
segregated—great observation—but the problem is still the hole in the dike. What
is happening right now to American’s middle and lower class has seeped out like
water through an enlarging hole in a dike. The realities of Greenspan’s economy,
is exactly that: reality.
Why do we have to raise funds from private sources, again, yanking our chains
of sympathy when we have the money to take care of this? The people, we, funded
those states in fact. The Salvation Army and ARC are the two most highly endowed
non-profits in the nation. Let them dig into their endowments for this—or maybe
their investments didn’t earn as much in this Market. Oh, my—back to that
privatization of Social Security-thing, again. See, this really is about a hole
in the dike.
I shudder to think what will happen next. Did we not learn anything from
9-11? For years, architects warned if one of those towers was hit by a plane of
any kind those columns would not hold! VOILA! Yet the NYFD was didn’t know to
stay out of the upper floors and instead work to help save people coming out,
and on the ground when they did fall. Emergency crews couldn’t get in to help
people on the streets when the first tower fell, much less the second. And,
pray-tell, who under-wrote the insurance on the WTC? Who was the beneficiary?
Does anyone realize three buildings went down? Why? How did jet fuel burn
through iron girders, when only dynamite can do that (jet fuel burns at a lower
temperature than that required to destroy iron girders)? We have questions,
America.
Not only about leadership—our former presidents became buddies, and solemnly
faced the nation together, to tell us how much money they were raising for the
people "of the Gulf Coast," but, which Gulf Coast? And, why were they coming out
of hiding at the same time? Ah, distraction is a might tool when bad things
happen to good people. This is not about political party-ism, it’s about the
truth, ethics, respect for life, and death, but the majority of us have this all
wrong, don’t we…it’s about money to those who don’t want us to know about the
hole in the dike.
So voyeuristically, we mourn on, over, and over, without looking for an
answer to avert another disaster. We "chase" terrorists through our dreams, and
through our televised talking heads, on and on, and never stop to realize, the
dike has been leaking for a very long time.
It is
coming, and its airborne now—infected mosquitoes and the winds, so we can
blame chickens, and SARS—but Americans will not be able to believe it. Its
easier to blame anything and any stranger, than to think we did this all by
ourselves, or permitted others to do it to us. Then, we'd have to say "no"
to Daddy or Mommy or maybe even worse, give up things to save others.
We can ignore the fact all we want to, but this is about money, not lives. As
a banking executive reported, "You know the one thing I learned about government
people when I called on them in the banking business is that first, their day
ends at 4:00 PM, second, don't expect them to take home any responsibility, and,
thirdly and most importantly, as long as they have the authority to levy or wage
a tax—they'll never be broke but never have to be competitive as WE have to be
to damn survive.
The National Guard is going to have to deal with some folks sick of big business
and big brother in New Orleans. The reason the media "staged" the Southeast on
Saturday and Sunday was because they have to compete. The reason the government
lackeys didn't respond until Monday A.M. was because they were "OFF" on
Sunday! God help us we are going to pay for this one.
And if that ignorant Fed Chairman A.G. raises rates after this gas thing it's
really all over. He vowed to raise rates 3 more times by year end? The increase
in gas prices is like 12 rate hikes, immediately. Monetary policy has a lagging
affect on the economy. Gas prices don't take so long. But for every 3 bucks in
gas you buy 1.30 of it goes to big brother. Thank you very much.
Greenspan knows that the wealthy people do not have floating rate
interest-only mortgages. Therefore he must create more separation between the
haves and the have-nots. The have-nots were creeping in on the haves. And, the
sad truth is that Americans have been lied to—the real reason for raising the
rates is to suck people out of real estate and get them back in the stock market
(where they can't see what they own), and then corporate America and
shareholders everywhere like the Rockefellers, Buffets, and Bush's start to make
money again.
You see, everybody putting their hard earned dollars to work in American in
real estate is the very principle our frontier country was founded on. But, the
rich can't control the wealth this way. Haven't you noticed that mortgage rates
have remained relatively low and stable when short-term floating rates have been
going through the roof. This is all a plan (have nothing but 15 yr loans on
properties). There is nothing coincidental about all of this and the 10 rate
hikes over the past year. They will drive everyone but the really wealthy out of
the real estate market.
But guess what happened yesterday and today? The bond market rallied in
Greenspan's face. As he used words to sow the fear of inflation and "booming
economic times" in the ears of investors, and the Bond Market gave Greenspan the
Finger. . ." Hmmm. Big Business isn't always blind, is it.
-30-
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Carol Hinkley Thompson is president of
LORAC Publications, Inc. (&
Puddintaine Publications, Inc—children's literature division), 3709 19th
Street, #291, Lubbock, Texas 79410.
Tel: 806/832-5683. Thompson is a member of the American Medical Writers
Association, Cassell Network of Writers, Society of Children's Book Writers &
Illustrators, and is many editions of Who's Who-1995 to present. Thompson has
press privileges, is a published author who now has multiple dis-ABILITIES
("renewed abilities" ©) and welcomes new assignments based on her schedule, and
rush jobs are considered in the areas of children's literature, healthcare,
consumer information, brochures, grant reviews, press releases, letters, and web
site content.
mext