Notes From Inside New Orleans

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http://www.dantewoo.com/blog/archives/2005/0902_notes_from_inside_ne.shtml Notes From Inside New Orleansby Jordan FlahertyFriday, September 2, 2005I just left New Orleans a couple hours ago. I traveled from the apartment I was staying in by boat to a helicopter to a refugee camp. If anyone wants to examine the attitude of federal and state officials towards the victims of hurricane Katrina, I advise you to visit one of the refugee camps.In the refugee camp I just left, on the I-10 freeway near Causeway, thousands of people (at least 90% black and poor) stood and squatted in mud and trash behind metal barricades, under an unforgiving sun, with heavily armed soldiers standing guard over them. When a bus would come through, it would stop at a random spot, state police would open a gap in one of the barricades, and people would rush for the bus, with no information given about where the bus was going. Once inside (we were told) evacuees would be told where the bus was taking them - Baton Rouge, Houston, Arkansas, Dallas, or other locations. I was told that if you boarded a bus bound for Arkansas (for example), even people with family and a place to stay in Baton Rouge would not be allowed to get out of the bus as it passed through Baton Rouge. You had no choice but to go to the shelter in Arkansas. If you had people willing to come to New Orleans to pick you up, they could not come within 17 miles of the camp.I traveled throughout the camp and spoke to Red Cross workers, Salvation Army workers, National Guard, and state police, and although they were friendly, no one could give me any details on when buses would arrive, how many, where they would go to, or any other information. I spoke to the several teams of journalists nearby, and asked if any of them had been able to get any information from any federal or state officials on any of these questions, and all of them, from Australian tv to local Fox affiliates complained of an unorganized, non-communicative, mess. One cameraman told me “as someone who’s been here in this camp for two days, the only information I can give you is this: get out by nightfall. You don’t want to be here at night.”There was also no visible attempt by any of those running the camp to set up any sort of transparent and consistent system, for instance a line to get on buses, a way to register contact information or find family members, special needs services for children and infirm, phone services, treatment for possible disease exposure, nor even a single trash can.To understand the dimensions of this tragedy, its important to look at New Orleans itself. For those who have not lived in New Orleans, you have missed a incredible, glorious, vital, city. A place with a culture and energy unlike anywhere else in the world. A 70% African-American city where resistance to white supremacy has supported a generous, subversive and unique culture of vivid beauty. From jazz, blues and hiphop, to secondlines, Mardi Gras Indians, Parades, Beads, Jazz Funerals, and red beans and rice on Monday nights, New Orleans is a place of art and music and dance and sexuality and liberation unlike anywhere else in the world.It is a city of kindness and hospitality, where walking down the block can take two hours because you stop and talk to someone on every porch, and where a community pulls together when someone is in need. It is a city of extended families and social networks filling the gaps left by city, state and federal governments that have abdicated their responsibility for the public welfare. It is a city where someone you walk past on the street not only asks how you are, they wait for an answer.It is also a city of exploitation and segregation and fear. The city of New Orleans has a population of just over 500,000 and was expecting 300 murders this year, most of them centered on just a few, overwhelmingly black, neighborhoods. Police have been quoted as saying that they don’t need to search out the perpetrators, because usually a few days after a shooting, the attacker is shot in revenge. There is an atmosphere of intense hostility and distrust between much of Black New Orleans and the N.O. Police Department. In recent months, officers have been accused of everything from drug running to corruption to theft. In separate incidents, two New Orleans police officers were recently charged with rape (while in uniform), and there have been several high profile police killings of unarmed youth, including the murder of Jenard Thomas, which has inspired ongoing weekly protests for several months.The city has a 40% illiteracy rate, and over 50% of black ninth graders will not graduate in four years. Louisiana spends on average $4,724 per child’s education and ranks 48th in the country for lowest teacher salaries. The equivalent of more than two classrooms of young people drop out of Louisiana schools every day and about 50,000 students are absent from school on any given day. Far too many young black men from New Orleans end up enslaved in Angola Prison, a former slave plantation where inmates still do manual farm labor, and over 90% of inmates eventually die in the prison. It is a city where industry has left, and most remaining jobs are are low-paying, transient, insecure jobs in the service economy.Race has always been the undercurrent of Louisiana politics. This disaster is one that was constructed out of racism, neglect and incompetence. Hurricane Katrina was the inevitable spark igniting the gasoline of cruelty and corruption. From the neighborhoods left most at risk, to the treatment of the refugees to the the media portrayal of the victims, this disaster is shaped by race.Louisiana politics is famously corrupt, but with the tragedies of this week our political leaders have defined a new level of incompetence. As hurricane Katrina approached, our Governor urged us to “Pray the hurricane down” to a level two. Trapped in a building two days after the hurricane, we tuned our battery-operated radio into local radio and tv stations, hoping for vital news, and were told that our governor had called for a day of prayer. As rumors and panic began to rule, they was no source of solid dependable information. Tuesday night, politicians and reporters said the water level would rise another 12 feet - instead it stabilized. Rumors spread like wildfire, and the politicians and media only made it worse.While the rich escaped New Orleans, those with nowhere to go and no way to get there were left behind. Adding salt to the wound, the local and national media have spent the last week demonizing those left behind. As someone that loves New Orleans and the people in it, this is the part of this tragedy that hurts me the most, and it hurts me deeply.No sane person should classify someone who takes food from indefinitely closed stores in a desperate, starving city as a “looter,” but that's just what the media did over and over again. Sheriffs and politicians talked of having troops protect stores instead of perform rescue operations. Images of New Orleans’ hurricane-ravaged population were transformed into black, out-of-control, criminals. As if taking a stereo from a store that will clearly be insured against loss is a greater crime than the governmental neglect and incompetence that did billions of dollars of damage and destroyed a city. This media focus is a tactic, just as the eighties focus on “welfare queens” and “super-predators” obscured the simultaneous and much larger crimes of the Savings and Loan scams and mass layoffs, the hyper-exploited people of New Orleans are being used as a scapegoat to cover up much larger crimes.City, state and national politicians are the real criminals here. Since at least the mid-1800s, its been widely known the danger faced by flooding to New Orleans. The flood of 1927, which, like this week’s events, was more about politics and racism than any kind of natural disaster, illustrated exactly the danger faced. Yet government officials have consistently refused to spend the money to protect this poor, overwhelmingly black, city. While FEMA and others warned of the urgent impending danger to New Orleans and put forward proposals for funding to reinforce and protect the city, the Bush administration, in every year since 2001, has cut or refused to fund New Orleans flood control, and ignored scientists warnings of increased hurricanes as a result of global warming. And, as the dangers rose with the floodlines, the lack of coordinated response dramatized vividly the callous disregard of our elected leaders. The aftermath from the 1927 flood helped shape the elections of both a US President and a Governor, and ushered in the southern populist politics of Huey Long.In the coming months, billions of dollars will likely flood into New Orleans. This money can either be spent to usher in a “New Deal” for the city, with public investment, creation of stable union jobs, new schools, cultural programs and housing restoration, or the city can be “rebuilt and revitalized” to a shell of its former self, with newer hotels, more casinos, and with chain stores and theme parks replacing the former neighborhoods, cultural centers and corner jazz clubs.Long before Katrina, New Orleans was hit by a hurricane of poverty, racism, disinvestment, deindustrialization and corruption. Simply the damage from this pre-Katrina hurricane will take billions to repair.Now that the money is flowing in, and the world’s eyes are focused on Katrina, its vital that progressive-minded people take this opportunity to fight for a rebuilding with justice. New Orleans is a special place, and we need to fight for its rebirth.Jordan Flaherty is a union organizer and an editor of Left Turn Magazine (www.leftturn.org). He is not planning on moving out of New Orleans.Below are some small, grassroots and New Orleans-based resources, organizations and institutions that will need your support in the coming months.Social Justice:jjpl.orgiftheycanlearn.orgnolaps.orgthepeoplesinstitute.orgcriticalresistance.org/index.php?name=crno_homeCultural Resources:backstreetculturalmuseum.comashecac.org198.66.50.128/gallerynolahumanrights.orgfreewebs.com/ironrailgirlgangproductions.comCurrent Info and Resources:neworleans.craigslist.org/about/help/katrina_cl.htmlposted September 02, 2005 in politics, print. 2002trackback url: ******************************************************************************************************************** http://rense.com/general67/email.htmEmail From DoctorIn New Orleans RevealsMuch Horror9-3-5(9-1-5) --This is a dispatch from New Orleans from Dr. Greg Henderson, apathologist who recently moved from Wilmington....Thanks to all of you who have sent your notes of concern and your prayers. Iam writing this note on Thurs. at 2 p.m.. I wanted to update all of you asto the situation here. I don't know how much information you are getting butI am certain it is more than we are getting. Be advised that almosteverything I am telling you is from direct observation or rumor, fromreasonable sources. They are allowing limited internet access, so I hope tosend this dispatch today.Personally, my family and I are fine. My family is safe in Jackson,Miss.,and I am now a temporary resident of the Ritz Carleton Hotel in NewOrleans.I figured if it was my time to go, I wanted to go in a place with agood wine list. In addition, this hotel is in a very old building on CanalStreetthat could and did sustain little damage. Many of the other hotelssustained significant loss of windows, and we expect that many of the guestsmay be evacuated here.The first floor of all downtown buildings on Canal street, is underwater. Ihave heard that Charity Hospital and Tulane are limited in their ability tocare for patients because of water. Ochsner is the only hospital thatremains fully functional. However, I spoke with them today and they too areon generator and losing food and water fast.The city now has no clean water, no sewerage system, no electricity, and noreal communications. Bodies are still being recovered floating in thefloods. We are worried about a cholera epidemic. Even the police are withouteffective communications. We have a group of armed police here with us atthe hotel that is admirably trying to exert some local law enforcement. Thisis tough because looting is now rampant. Most of it is not maliciouslooting. These are poor and desperate people with no housing and no medicalcare and no food or water trying to take care of themselves and theirfamilies.Unfortunately, some of the people are armed and dangerous. We hear gunshotsfrequently. Most of Canal street is occupied by armed looters who have a lowthreshold for discharging their weapons. We hear gunshots frequently. Thelooters are using makeshift boats made of pieces of styrofoam to access. Weare still waiting for a significant national guard presence.The health care situation here has dramatically worsened overnight. Manypeople in the hotel are elderly and small children. Many other guests haveunusual diseases. ... There are (Infectious Disease) physicians in at thishotel attending an HIV conference. We have commandeered the world famousFrench Quarter Bar to turn into an makeshift clinic. There is a team ofabout seven doctors and PAs and pharmacists. We anticipate that this will bethe major medical facility in the central business district and FrenchQuarter, until we are all rescued.Our biggest adventure today was raiding the Walgreens on Canal under policeescort. The pharmacy was dark and full of water. We basically scooped theentire drug sets into garbage bags and removed them. All under policeescort. The looters had to be held back at gunpoint. After a dose ofprophylactic Cipro I hope to be fine.In all, we are faring well. We have set up a hospital in the French Quarterbar in the hotel, and will start admitting patients today. Many will be fromthe hotel, but many will not. We are anticipating dealing with multiplemedical problems, medications and acute injuries. Infection and perhaps evencholera are anticipated major problems. Food and water shortages areimminent.The biggest question to all of us is where is the National Guard. We hearjet fighters and helicopters, but no real armed presence, and hence therampant looting. There is no Red Cross and no Salvation Army.In a sort of cliché way, this is an edifying experience. One is rapidlyfocused away from the transient and material to the bare necessities oflife. It has been challenging to me to learn how to be a primary carephysician. We are under martial law so return to our homes is impossible. Idon't know how long it will be and this is my greatest fear. Despite itall,this is a soul-edifying experience. The greatest pain is to think aboutthe loss. And how long the rebuild will take. And the horror of so many deadpeople.PLEASE send this to all you think may be interested. I will send moreaccording to your interest. Hopefully, their collective prayers will beanswered. By the way, suture packs, sterile gloves and stethoscopes will beneeded as the Ritz turns into a MASH unit.Greg Henderson, MDMainPagehttp://www.rense.com «¤»¥«¤»§«¤»¥«¤»§«¤»¥«¤»§«¤»¥«¤»§«¤»¥«¤»§«¤»¥«¤«¤»¥«¤»§«¤»¥«¤»§«¤»¥«¤»§«¤»¥«¤»Paranormal_Research - Scientific Data & Health Conspiracies Paranormal_ResearchSubscribe:... 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