New Orleans
Kate’s son is volunteering in New Orleans and in a recent phonecall has been describing conditions:
The volunteers are still finding dead bodies. They end up not being counted if no one claims them. The authorities issue no death certificates and there’s no attempt to identify them. They are not counted as among the dead. From what he’s being told (his co-workers, wearing full hazmat gear, are still finding bodies in the buildings they go in to gut), there are countless numbers who have been dealt with that way. The death toll is way higher than what we’ve been told.
Since there will be no repercussions (these are just poor black folk remember) (hell, I bet they’ll be re-elected in 2008), I just hope that there’s a special place in hell for the people responsible for this.
June 20th, 2006 18:48
This has not been mentioned in the press here. I mean, the not counting bodies in the death toll thing. Or if it has, I haven’t seen word of it. I am not a news junkie, however.
It’s sickening, really. Karma will catch up with those who let Katrina’s aftermath be such a huge disaster. I hope that makes sense.
June 20th, 2006 19:06
It does make sense Alison, I just wish Karma had a faster bike :-)
June 20th, 2006 20:25
Groan. True, the news is not carrying this news, but the internet is. This world, the Bushites have painted is truly hell and we only know the half of it.
June 21st, 2006 00:57
You all do realize that the media has been outright lying to the gullible public about NOLA and the aftermath of Katrina, don’t you?
And, on a per capita basis, more whites died than blacks. The highest number was among well-to-do white elderly.
If you want someone to blame, take a good hard look at Ray Nagin … did he ever sell off those flooded buses that just sat idle in the days before the hurricane?
June 21st, 2006 05:53
I’d heard about it, but then I know some of the people doing the clean-up. There are also a lot of bodies suspected to be in the bottom of the Ponchatrain Lake which haven’t been recovered (and likely never will be).
June 21st, 2006 12:04
Anonymous commenter: do you have any figures to back up your first statement? I’d be interested to see them.
As to Nagin and “did he ever sell off those flooded buses that just sat idle in the days before the hurricane?” – I’m sure he’s not blameless but I think that Ray Nagin became (and continues to be) the punchbag for a lot of the anger at the disgraceful events, both at the time and in the aftermath. I can find no reputable news source on that story, just the speculation of a few (right wing) pundits. Again, if you have any information about this, please share.
Finally, were there enough buses to evacuate everyone?
Here’s the Media Matters version:
…But Pruden dramatically overstated the number of New Orleans school buses. As of 2003, the most recent year for which data appears to be available, the Orleans Parish school district, which operates New Orleans’ public schools, owned only 324 school buses. In addition, a Louisiana Department of Transportation and Development profile of the New Orleans Regional Transit Authority (RTA), last updated May 5, notes that RTA owned 364 public buses, bringing the total of the city’s public transit and school buses to fewer than 700 (assuming the fleet of school buses has not been dramatically increased since 2003), far fewer than the 2,000 Pruden claimed.
…
Pruden’s claim that the city possessed 2,000 school buses that could have been used for a pre-storm evacuation appears to be an exaggeration of a September 1 Associated Press photograph of school buses parked in a flooded lot in New Orleans. The photograph was widely reported on conservative websites, including the Media Research Center’s NewsBusters weblog, the Instapundit weblog, and Michelle Malkin’s weblog. A September 6 MSNBC.com article that described the scene in the AP photograph noted, “Some 200 New Orleans school buses sit underwater in a parking lot, unused. That’s enough to have evacuated at least 13,000 people.”