The Earth's Most Damnable Homeless Shelter

[WhiteTara]

The Superdome: Monument to a Rotten System

By DAVE ZIRIN

There is nothing "unnatural" about the disaster of New Orleans. When politicians smirk at global warming, when developers look at our wetlands and dream of mini malls, when billions are flushed in the name of war and tax-cuts, when issues of poverty and racism don't even register in Presidential debates, all it takes is wind, albeit 145 mph wind, to expose a sturdy super power as a house of cards.

Nowhere is this personified more painfully than in a monument to corporate greed that has rapidly become the earth's most damnable homeless shelter, the Louisiana Superdome.

The Superdome is perhaps the most unintentionally appropriate name since Mr. and Mrs. Cheney looked at their newborn son and said, "Dick." It was birthed in 1975 with pomp and bombast, as the largest domed facility in the world. It was also funded entirely on the public dime. In a case of brutal foreshadowing that would shame a B horror flick, the dome was constructed on an old cemetery for the poor. The burial grounds were dug up and discarded with a promise that the Superdome would the centerpiece of a New Orleans "Central Business District" that would benefit
all. The results are certainly now in plain, ugly view. This past week, 25,000 people, walked through its doors, many for the first time. They entered a stadium where tickets go for 90 bucks a pop, season passes cost $1,300 and luxury boxes can run for as much as $109,000. The arena boasts of having a capacity that can comfortably seat 72,000 people, with 9,000 tons of air conditioning, and 88 massive restrooms. But for the 25,000 that can't afford the oxygen, there has been no air conditioning and bathrooms without electricity, running water, or working toilets. Feces and garbage now pack the upper decks. The traumatized people finally emerging tell of dead bodies on the 50 yard line. One man even committed suicide, throwing himself off the upper deck. Democratic Governor Kathleen Blanco called the Superdome shelter strategy an "experiment", when asked if it could hold the storm or the flood. Chuck D's line about Housing Projects comes to mind when he said, "What is a project but another word for experiment?"

http://counterpunch.com/zirin09032005.html

David Zirin is great! I see the tide turning when the sports writers eloquently tell the tale.

[babylonsister]

1. Excellent! Thanks, BNL. I wouldn't have read this in a

sports section.

"The Superdome is perhaps the most unintentionally appropriate name since Mr. and Mrs. Cheney looked at their newborn son and said, "Dick." :rofl:

[WhiteTara]

2. My thoughts about a sports writer too...but this

guy is great. I saw him on Amy Goodman's show and he is right there.