theBreeze

Like the Picayune Times reporting, there is an article, a diary, by Marc Ellis which conveys on a real level, what it was like ( August 29th - ) just following Katrina. A few abstracts follow. The full text may be found at:

Riding My Bicyle by Marc Ellis

"I'm writing this on September 5th, and the only word we have from lower Plaquemines Parish is that the Gulf of Mexico has reclaimed the towns in that area. A good friend of mine is from down there."

"I needed to go back to my office in New Orleans East.... I'd have to make the trip by bicycle."

"...another wall of debris. This one was comparable to the one I crossed in Slidell. But the Lake Catherine debris piles were more unpleasant than the ones in Slidell. There were large numbers of dead animal carcasses in the debris of Lake Catherine. Mostly dead Nutria and Cottonmouths."

"...the Chef Menteur Bridge. Like the Rigolets bridge, this bridge was not open also. A barge had been lifted up from the storm surge and had come to rest on the east side of the bridge in the middle of the road, tilting on a rail. But on a bike, I could get across."

"Here I met a young Vietnamese-American, Louisiana-born, riding his bike. He owns a shrimp processing plant there and a fleet of shrimp boats. He told me he's lost around 1.5 million. He was awfully cheerful though. Always had a smile and was helpful."

"Alligators on Chef Highway?", he said.

I told him I was going to my office in the Vietnamese Village. He said he was going there too, to visit friends. So we decided to ride back through the gators together. Two of us had a better chance than one.

Can someone contact Hollywood to get Marc Ellis a movie deal?


Addendum - The Times Picayune is currently running the 2002 study on hurricane damage - an incredible prediction with unbelievable facts and graphics. See:

WashingAway

Tell me again why PACs are not guilty of political bribery?
[fill in any answer here]
Then, they will be OK with their contributions going unnamed.

I received this reply:
"PACs build relationships and help break through the clutter of 4000 other registered PACs and 70000 registered lobbyists and, and do not solicit for influence."

I recall this comment of one congressman:
"We get so much money, we don't know what to do with it."

I turned the TV on about 8 o'clock this morning to watch the memorial for 9-11. CBS, NBC and ABC didn't bother to carry it. I forgot. They regard content programs only as the space between commercials.

This is the beginning of a new stage
I say to myself,
As I walk through the valley of death.
I remember the young small person I used to be,
Time to grow, feel difference.

Not so very long ago I believed Santa was a real guy
I think Dad still believes, so maybe I will too.
The Easter Bunny brought me eggs, and may still,
I believed in the tooth fairy,
I had faith in whatever my friends told me.

Playdates were arranged, now I can be on my own.
Toys and bubble gum make a space for girls.
Music, reading, homework, sports, pals.
New adventures at each turn.
Yet this newness shares a lot
From when I was a little kid.

It’s like learning to walk in a different way.
No hurry to be an adult.
Here is the famous middle ground,
To be a teen!
And yet, thank God,
I am still me.

From a local newspaper, The Times - Picayune, comes a story that reaches within the catastrophe in some very real way.

Read:

Thursday, September 08, 2005
A week in the ruins of Mississippi
By Leslie Williams

Katrina Diary

by getting to the stricken regions too fast. "You all know how much trouble it is to buy gasoline? Think how bad it would be if a bunch of trucks were added to this mess."




You can read letters from Americans to Mister President, to Laura, to Congress; know the shared frustration. The following website also provides a simple way to write emails to these hirelings:
http://www.congress.org/congressorg/home/

There it is. The defiance. The defiance of humans, the defiance - survival, the defiance of the citizens of New Orleans.

Today, Molly’s in the French Quarter is open, serving; without the ice. And, God Love Them, there on the street there is music, and a meager parade with a few instruments, and all the heart the human race can muster. A Labor Day parade on Bourbon Street.

I understand the Washington bureaucrats we entrust our money to, the ones we entrust our country to, those same ones in whose hands our lives depend, are still on vacation. They plan to return as usual on Tuesday, after their August vacation [do you get an August vacation? Are you exempt from Social Security?].

If there is a power on earth, let it send them back home, without a job, without a pension, without severance pay. Let us tell them others have taken their place. others willing to work. Slime. Let God damn their light in flames, and forgive my anger.

just how useless this President is. His personal solution is arrange for an announcement that he has made a personal money contribution to aid in hurricane Katrina devastation.

His public solution is to ask the public for donations to help with Katrina victims. I ask you to think. What is the purpose of government? Is it to support the people, or to ask the people to take care of problems themselves by suggesting private contributions? We need a gazillion dollar government for this???

Bureaucracy with no accountability. Let us bring criminal charges against the lot of them

By now, it's pretty certain no weapons of mass destruction exist in Afghanistan and Iraq. It's been suggested that the President can therefore safely remove the troops and resources, and utilize them for the USA catastrophe.

Abject failure to perform; surrounding self with selected incompetence. Perhaps the time is here to clean out these useless, money sucking, grinning politicians.