The Grey Lady gets snarky (this is the 3rd paragraph - would this be the nut graf, Teppy?)

"Today, Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld arrived in Louisiana and toured a medical facility at the New Orleans international airport. He spoke to and shook hands with military and rescue officials, but walked right by a dozen refugees lying on stretchers just feet away from him, most of them extremely sick or handicapped, Reuters reported."

"Today, Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld arrived in Louisiana and toured a medical facility at the New Orleans international airport. He spoke to and shook hands with military and rescue officials, but walked right by a dozen refugees lying on stretchers just feet away from him, most of them extremely sick or handicapped, Reuters reported."

Look, you go to disaster sites with the lack of compassion you have, not the compassion you wish you had.

Bwah!

I'm dubious about roaming rape gangs and thrill killers. But everything I've heard does indicate that there were organized armed gangs. That is one of the reasons why they couldn't clear out the hospitals, or get close to the Convention Center.

I agree that roaming rape gangs are unlikely and organized armed gangs likely. I wonder, however, if the gangs as reason for the inability to empty the hospitals and convention center were a big fat excuse. "Oh, we were right there, but the gangs, see, yeah, that's why we didn't get you." For example, the "gunshots at the helicopters" reports I've seen varry widely -- from 'something that sounded like gunshots' to 'snipers shooting at anything that moved toward the doors of the hospital'.

Trudy,

an eyewitness account on a NO tv (NBC affliate I think) website said people were shooting at helicopters to get their attention. I can imagine this as a more likely explanation for MOST of the gunshots.

wonders where she can buy flare gun

an eyewitness account on a NO tv (NBC affliate I think) website said people were shooting at helicopters to get their attention

That makes a lot more sense than, "this is OUR flooded out, filthy, corpse-strewn, hospital/convention center and you ain't gonna take it."

AND I can see how that would easily spin into rumors of "not safe to land, they're shooting" (or BE spun, as I personally suspect, as an excuse).

While I don't think racism/classism is the CAUSE for the horribly mismanagement this is one example of how it could be exascerbating the quagmire -- Those crazy black folks! They won't even LET us rescue them! They're shooting at us!

Theo, in NO a flare gun wouldn't have helped. The eyewitness said that people were waving their arms at the National Guard troops who they LOOKED IN THE EYES, but they wouldn't stop to help them - even when women nearby were being abused and they ran out of water.

Given that circumstance, I think I would have become very desperate - and I may have tried to call attention to myself using unusual means.

Trudy, that said, I did hear about hospitals being invaded. So...? There were really desperate people and there were desperate criminal people. Disaster preparedness would have had plans for helping the former people and preventing the latter people from doing too much damage.

I did hear about hospitals being invaded. So...? There were really desperate people and there were desperate criminal people. Disaster preparedness would have had plans for helping the former people and preventing the latter people from doing too much damage.

Very very true.

I suspect that the assumption of evil intent was heightend because of the blackness though. With white people we may have heard about "a few bad apples". (this is speculation of course)