Katrina devastated the south, gas 6 $ a gallon

[Royal Dragon]

You know, I understand the fact that the local government dropped the ball, but the president should have just moved in right away anyway. I'm not sure the effect of precident on things, but ultimately doesn't human life mean something too?

[ZIM]

Depends on who you read, I guess.

[SPJ]

Personally, I think that there are 2 types of journalism.

When you are a reporter, you report what and when something happens.

When you are an editor or writing a column or an editorial section, you may share your opinions and why.

When I read the news on the papers, internet or watch news on TV. I really do not care what the anchorman or reporter "think" what is happening. I do not care what 60 min or good morning america "think" etc

He or she may report that people are frustrated that helps are not coming soon enough.

Mayor of N.O. said lives are lost and property are lost unnecessary and he would scream louder etc.

There will be hearing, investigations and even books after books about what happened surrounding the largest disaster in US history.

We all will make our own decisions about our opinions. No journalist or reporter should dictate what people "think".

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[TaiChiBob]

Greetings..

There are many perceptions of the Katrina Experience.. there are arguements of responsibility, rights and politics.. but, it the short view, anyone unwilling to see past the trivia to the problem, that people were dying while available resources sat idle.. should be held accountable on moralistic grounds..

Much went wrong leading up to the disaster, poor planning, poor preparation, corruption.. much went wrong after the disaster.. but, first things first, save lives.. THEN worry about who and how many get crucified for the inept roles..

I am not nearly as concerned with the nuances of protocol as i am with the issues of compassion and straight-forward action in the face of crisis.. Katrina was a wake up call for preparedness and system over-haul.. The government, at every level, has a moral responsibility to the governed.. and that responsibility should not be trumped by protocol.. sometimes it is more responsible to ask for forgiveness later than to seek permission now..

Be well..

[YuanZhideDiZhen]

I am not nearly as concerned with the nuances of protocol as i am with the issues of compassion and straight-forward action in the face of crisis.. Katrina was a wake up call for preparedness and system over-haul.. The government, at every level, has a moral responsibility to the governed.. and that responsibility should not be trumped by protocol.. sometimes it is more responsible to ask for forgiveness later than to seek permission now..

Be well..

i have some sentiment for your pov, but if permission had been sought, for say some fictional story the war in Iraq and Afghanistan could have been avoided. protocols and rule of law must ALWAYS be adhered to before any action is administrated. otherwise you have a despotism ruining a constitutional republic.

[MasterKiller]

http://media.putfile.com/d1-24720025216

[SPJ]

President contrite

[Yamesk]

The hurricane hit most of my area, but the coastal regions got the worst of it. We only had a few power lines knocked down. Please pray for the victims and if you have some spare time, call up your local Red Cross and do volunteer work.

May any victims of the hurricane that be here or that once were here on these forums have God watch over them. (I mean no offense to those that do not believe.)

[Mr Punch]

Depends on who you read, I guess.

Some reasonable stuff. But a lot of dodgy nonsense.

The fact (if it is so, I notice the author does what he accuses the 'liberal media' does by not mentioning a source) that Bush responded quicker to this hurricane than any other hurricane response in US history is not important. The fact that

a) the Administration (and of course local admin) knew about the hurricane's likely path and strength for as much as three full days before it hit should have given emergency services ample time to find their way down their and start help before the hurricane! Plus one would hope that the previous failures in disaster management would have taught subsequent govts something! I would hope the response would have been better than that to Hurricane Andrew - that was 13 years ago!

b) Time magazine (it's on their site) published an article by leading climatologists and various other scientists five years ago about what would happen when the big one hit NO. The prediction was uncannily an exact description of what did happen. The estimated cost at the time of levee repair was 14 billion, and no human life. Compare that with over 100 billion and as yet unknown human life. The administration failed.

c) That site also implies that there is a possibility that the national govt should in no way be responsible... I'm with Churchill in MK's link. Good luck fighting the next war if you don't look after your populace, esp the dispossessed who are more likely to join your army.

What people like the meecer and the extremist paranoiacs on that site Zim linked to don't seem to realise is that there were failures on all levels. Of course Bush is the main target; he is in a position of the most responsibility for the safety of the people let alone any talk of personal responsibility for failures.

[SPJ]

dolphins missing and found

[ZIM]

An update:

It was LIES!!! All - or nearly all - of the tales of brutal RAPES and throat-slitting of LITTLE GIRLS and murder and all that cr@p - RUMORS! Reported as fact!

Basically, the reporters that were there didn't do investigations like, you know, actually WALKING INSIDE the Superdome and VERIFYING anything. They took it all as Gospel from unfounded rumors and panicking local officials.

Anybody p1ssed?

All that drama for a LIE?

Here's an incident of *blood libel* on an urban black population, foisted upon everybody for the sake of ratings. And nobody's p1ssed?

Here's more:
http://www.dfw.com/mld/dfw/news/nation/12761493.htm

Tales of rape, murder in Superdome appear false

By Michelle Roberts

The Associated Press

NEW ORLEANS - On Sept. 1, with desperate Hurricane Katrina evacuees crammed into the convention center, then-Police Chief Eddie Compass reported, "We have individuals who are getting raped; we have individuals who are getting beaten."

Five days later, he told Oprah Winfrey that babies were being raped. On the same show, Mayor C. Ray Nagin said, "They have people standing out there, have been in that frickin' Superdome for five days watching dead bodies, watching hooligans killing people, raping people."

The ugliest reports -- children with slit throats, women dragged off and raped, corpses piling up in the basement -- soon became a searing image of post-Katrina New Orleans.

The stories were told by residents trapped inside the Superdome and convention center and were repeated by public officials. Many news organizations, including The Associated Press, carried the witnesses' accounts and officials' pronouncements and in some cases later repeated the claims as fact without attribution.

But now, a month after the chaos subsided, police are re-examining the reports and finding that many have little or no basis in fact.

They have no official reports of rape and no eyewitnesses to sexual assault. The state Department of Health and Hospitals counted 10 dead at the Superdome and four at the convention center. Two of those are believed to have been killed.

One of those victims, found at the Superdome, appears to have been killed elsewhere before being brought to the stadium, said Bob Johannessen, the agency spokesman.

"It was a chaotic time for the city. Now that we've had a chance to reflect back on that situation, we're able to say right now that things were not the way they appeared," police Capt. Marlon Defillo said.

Sally Forman, a spokeswoman for Nagin, said the mayor "was listening to officials, trusting that information they were providing was accurate."

To be sure, conditions at both sites were chaotic. Water was rising around the Superdome, where 20,000 evacuees stayed. Toilets were backing up, garbage was rotting, fights were breaking out. Food was in short supply at the convention center, where about 19,000 people took shelter from the rising waters. The temperature was climbing. The elderly and very young were desperate for food, water and medicine.

Police said they saw muzzle flashes at the convention center, and a National Guardsman was shot in the leg when an evacuee tried to take his gun.

A week after the floodwaters poured into the city, New Orleans' Times-Picayune newspaper quoted an Arkansas National Guardsman as saying soldiers had discovered 30 to 40 bodies inside a freezer in the convention center's food area. Guardsman Mikel Brooks told the newspaper that some of the dead appeared to have met violent ends, including "a 7-year-old with her throat cut."

When the convention center was swept, however, no such pile of bodies was found.

Lt. Col. John Edwards, the staff judge advocate for the 39th Infantry Brigade of the Arkansas National Guard, said Tuesday that Brooks told the Times-Picayune reporter only that he had heard rumors of bodies in the freezer, not that he had seen them.

"We have never found anybody who has any firsthand knowledge of dozens of bodies in the refrigerator," Edwards said. He said Brooks was unavailable for comment.

Lt. Col. Jacques Thibodeaux of the Louisiana National Guard said reports of violence at the Superdome and the convention center were exaggerated. He was chief of security at the Superdome and led the 1,000 military police officers and infantrymen who went in to secure the center Sept. 2.

"The incidents were highly exaggerated" because of fear and hopelessness, he said. "For the amount of the people in the situation, it was a very stable environment."

Thibodeaux said his guard unit received no reports of rape.

Blood libel? In America? Without apology, retraction, or protest?

Or maybe that's what we expect from the news media these days...

[SPJ]

Ethics vs sensationalization/attention grabbing "reports".

If you did false reports, you would lose street credits or credibilities fast. and the mag, TV programs or newspapers will be labled as Ba Gua in Taiwan.

Which is it? Honest report or "crying wolf". or Ba Gua?

Always cite your source or reference and verify the reports.

If hearsay, then report it is hearsay.

I wrote and reported in school journals from high school to college.

My articles were always cited as reliable sources. Because I did a good research and gave proper credits to the sources or references.

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[FuXnDajenariht]

im not surprised. but i think the damage is already done. i doubt this report even gets out. it'll probably be hushed up, then 4 or 5 months from now some "brave" "maverick" reporter will come out with an expose'. then it'll disappear again after a week. and the people of new orleans will still just be a bunch of animals who took advantage of a crisis in most peoples minds.

[KC Elbows]

Depends on who you read, I guess.

The problem with that article's claims, and any claim based on previous response times, is that not one of those other instances completely submerged a modern US city. The comparison is highly strained. There is on reasonable approach that suggests the response time should not be shorter in more extreme cases: it's organizational inflexibility, not a defense against criticism.

Additionally, the feds shot themselves in the foot. While individuals and groups in the field may have done well, there is little premise for saying that FEMA operated efficiently or that the President did not essentially create his own problem by delaying the end of his vacation, regardless of however symbollic the vacation was or was not.