It seems to me that it does not make much sense to rebuild in an area where another hurricane of such magnitude will obviously re-strike again. I guess this is very easy to say from the security of being 1K inland, however, given the level of destruction and the fact that New Orleans is below sea level, would it not be easier to re-build the city on a more secure site, perhaps further inland.


Would this be practial, or would the industry of the city (oil refining) be too badly affected by this move? Additionally, I read today that the Black Caucus in Congress is accusing the administration of prejudice against the poor and the blacks in New Orleans.. I thought that we as a society were past racial prejudices.. people are people!!!! DAMM IT HELP THESE PEOPLE ASAP!!

Us Canadians have offered our water purification units of the Canadain Armed Forces. They can deploy and set up in less than 24 hours.. Please take advantage of them.. They saved many lives in the Tsunami disaster and can purify sewage water at a rate of 20,000 litres per day.

I would suggest that the authorities in the US hire some consultants from the Netherlands, as their dyke and levy system is considered the finest in the world and supposedly could withstand such a force.

My heart certainly goes out to the people affected by Katrina..I have no doubt that they will overcome this tradgey and the city will be finer than ever.

I have a question since I have been working etc and havent seen a Map of the flooding, but if they can get buses in and people are waiting on buses, why cant they walk out of the city using the same path? I watched them march on the convention center, why not march out of the city where they can get some help rather than waiting for the help to come to them? This in no way is meant to belittle the situation. I realize we are talking about the poorest of the poor here, but if the help isnt coming, go to the help.

KT, they can start walking but there is NOTHING around for them to go to. We are talking about 50-100 miles before they can get to "civilization". And for the poorer people, when they get there, there is nothing that they can do.

You may have come across these sites already but Ill post the links anyway. I found them very interesting.

Weblog of a company that is staying insided the city to keep their clients' servers online---this company will expand exponentially when this thing is over

Satelite shots of before and after

I believe that NO should be rebuilt further up the mississippi and not in the same spot. Let's face it, New Orleans will never be the same again. Part of its mystique was its age and history, but if those historic buildings and landmarks have been destroyed or needing to be rebuilt it will not be the same history. Its mystique will be gone forever. "The Big Easy" as it has been known, no longer exists. It will now be known as the the town the Katrina destroyed.

This post has been edited by XYZ Factor: 09/03/05 9:20am

Question...does any of this oil in NO and the gulf go to any of these contributing countries??? If so...theres your answer on why they're helping...they would need our oil back up too.

well.... if we lose oil it takes it our of the BIG pot that everyone uses... my thought is this. we have afganistan and Iraq... they have oil.... we are already there.... ummm.... lets take some oil as a reward for their freedom, to the victor goes the spoils!

walking 3-5 MPH for 24 hours = 72-120 mile...
poor, rich... all the same now... no one can get money and if they have it what does it matter?
during a time of chaos other things matter... Booze, smokes and dope. all are a high value tradable commidity. you can trade them for just about anything. my question is this if you are stuck the first thing I would look for is a tractor the can be started... probably in the out lying areas and a trailer. they can go through 3-4 feet of water (going slow) seeing as the stacks are so high. hook a trailer and load it full of people and drive out. not easy as i said it is but might happen if you are lucky and able to find such things long as they are not destroyed. and water hasnt got into the fuel system (more then likely it has and wont run...). I cant believe that there is 25000 people in the astro dome and people are getting raped... wtf is wrong with thyat picture... 25000 people and they havent influenced mob justice and ripped them apart... dont get it...

Just got word from friend...in Dallas...waiting to here whats going on and if he needs me to go pick him up. Still no phone to him...text messaging...slow going.

This is just an amazing situation.

I was in New Orleans for Mardi Gras a few years ago and I can honestly say that I have never met nicer people in my life.

Just to comment on the Racial aspect of this, FEMA was on the ground within a few hours of Hurricane Andrew, a hurricane that struck a largely white population with a high percentage of voters, namely blue-haired republicans. There are reports that in some areas of the Gulf Coast FEMA hasn't even been seen as of today.

Looking at it from the other side, would you want to try and help people that are firing at rescue helicopters, that are raping and killing fellow survivors? I sure as hell wouldn't. A lot of these animals' problems are caused by themselves and they need to realize that.

On a sidenote, I found it funny that Kwame stated on live TV that 'Bush hates black people.'. What, a racist Republican? The hell you say!

Cypher

I hate to say this, but a police officer told me last nite that they had already arrested 3 men for carjacking at Reunion Arena and 2 women for prostetution. And just a small percentage of refugees were there. Working in the closest food and entertainment area, I'm a little worried about tonite. I saw a whole bunch of the charter busses heading that way this morning.

This post has been edited by Bargod: 09/03/05 4:55pm

I just double-checked. It seems that Andrew struck during the tenure of one of the most brilliant Presidents in this nations history. I knew there was a reason it was handled so much better than this fiasco.

I wonder if there are any Republicans left in New Orleans now?

Cypher

God I wish people would stop making this about polictics and racism.

Just for the record, Homestead Florida is predominently black and was completely leveled by Andrew. Miami is also predomently a Cuban/Black/Immigrant area so the whole rasist or republican view here is absurd. Of course FEMA and the Red Cross (The Mayor of NO asked the Red Cross not to go in the city because they couldnt protect them) are having problems here, Its flooded and there is rampant groups of punks with guns. So It isnt racism, it is the select group of victims who have decided to act out because they seem to think that they wont get in trouble for the acts they are commiting. Remember, somewhere, some dildo is catching all of this shit on a camcorder and a vast majority of these fuckers will be caught or herded into the lake.

I don't know that you can take either out of the equation, they are intertwined in our nations fabric. This is a disaster, plain and simple. Unavoidable and inevitable.

Bush acknowledged that he screwed this up from the start, was there an underlying racism involved there? Does he value the lives of blacks less than the lives of whites?

Kt, nice to see you in the forums, I'm sorry I can't see more of you on the battlefield. When I talked of Florida, of course I was referring to the large population of sunbirds and New Yorkers that own property there. I think everybody knows that FL is mostly one giant suburb of Cuba.

Cypher

I dont think its about racism or politics. the country is unprepared for a disaster of this level. we need something else besides fema and the NG to step in. we needed Vol. ready to leave in moments notice with trucks and supplies alredy on the trucks (army surplus) and water tankers heading out on trains to the affected areas. they could have been there in a day. from all across the country, diverse and unpaid...

heres something that no one hit on....\

were are all these Militias that are in this country that "are there to protect the people..."

they have guns and say they will help when in dire striats? wtf bunch of all talk boneheads!

I'm sure your police friend was probably accurate in his information but be careful of rumors from the public. We have several thousand here in Lafayette and there have been a few incidents that the police have verified but there have been LOTS of rumors started by the public. One was that a local gun and western store was robbed and many guns and ammunition was stolen. It was false but you should have seen the amount of people I saw buying guns at Academy Sports and Outdoors. They sold 60 weapons in a 3-hour period.

Take heed to the information by the police but be careful of the rumors.