Anyone else having a "Dude, Where's My Country?" moment?

[spooked]

Watching the coverage of the people affected by Hurricane Katrina, I am SHOCKED at the level of poverty, and I am feeling a sense of deep mourning, not only for those suffering in this tragedy, but also for the death of an idea that I had believed so long...that this country is the Land of Opportunity.

These people had NO MONEY IN THEIR POCKETS or a car to get out of there and save their lives...

I am SHOCKED as I watch this footage that this is The United States of America that I am seeing...

And as gasoline went up to $3.17 today I wonder how much longer it will be the Land of Opportunity for those of us who have been more fortunate.

[graywarrior]

1. Looks exactly like Bagdad, or Africa, or India.

[Lone_Star_Dem]

2. I said something earlier along the lines of

Our once great Nation is now reduced to an inadequate shadow of its former self.

It's heartbreaking.

[TerdlowSmedley]

3. Moment?

[spooked]

10. Yeah, change that to "Realization"

not a fleeting "Moment" at all...

[oregonjen]

4. This is what the neo-cons want

They want the division between the "haves" and "have nots" to get even wider.

[Digit]

5. No insurance coverage in most cases, either

No jobs, no money, no homes, and in many cases...no town.
It is beyond horrible.

[PatrioticLeftie]

6. I've been having that feeling

For a year now.

[MasonJar]

7. Why did not the government provide them a way out? train?

bus? plane? Why did Bush do nothing for three days? People died.

[datasuspect]

11. umm

it's because 70% of NOLA's population is black.

any government can commandeer vehicles for the sake of public safety.

it wouldn't have taken much to get fleets of greyhound, private coaches, school buses, etc. mobilized. oh, i forgot, someone could have stood to LOSE MONEY.

[bluethruandthru]

16. Why weren't we prepared?

We knew this thing was coming. Why weren't rescue and aid teams in place ready to move in with water, medicine, supplies? Why weren't all the residents of NO bussed out? This shows an utter lack of leadership...from the top!

[pitohui]

17. there's no way out other than automobile

* did nothing because he's on permanent vacation

nagin, blanco, & the rest were very pro-active in trying to get ppl to evacuate but, in the end, the poorest don't have that option, you need a car, you need money for gas, you need either relatives out of state or you need hotel money. you need the ability to give up your paycheck for several days each time you leave town, in the 70s i was fired from a job for evacuating due to a hurricane & don't doubt it still happens to ppl in jobs that are low status

very poor ppl have often never traveled 10 miles from their home in new orleans or bay st louis, neither has their family, so they don't have the extended family resources in multiple states that we upwardly striving middle class ppl do

the fact of the matter is, we have no infrastructure that allows for mass evacuation

do you understand that no automobile evacuation had ever gone smoothly, not ever, that we were still fighting abt jefferson parish evacuating ppl out of order and blocking lower parishes from evacuating at the time of hurricane dennis 3 weeks ago

we have NEVER had a working plan

this is the first time ever that contraflow worked & at least numbers of ppl got out safely in their cars instead of being trapped in their vehicles during the storm

no time to say, hey, it's working, let's buy 1000 city buses to evacuate folks

as far as trains, don't make me laugh, you never heard of rails to trails, train service is a joke

planes were booked to capacity and took out all they could, but still plenty of tourists were trapped

this is one of the poorest states and perhaps the poorest famous city in the usa, without federal funding, we are lacking in what we can do

we have huge, huge holes in our safety net

bush is part of the problem but the problem was here before he was here and will be here after he's gone if we're not careful

[pitohui]

8. there haven't been jobs in new orleans since ronald reagan

25 yrs is a long time to go w/out opportunity

[Obamarama]

9. More like "Dude, where's our National Guard?"

The MSM are all reporting that the big question people are asking is "how come nobody has come to help us yet?"

Answer: They are all in Iraq.

I hope the slow response to this disaster because of lack of NG troops is what makes the wheels come off the Bush Administration cart.

[spooked]

13. It would be nice if people finally woke up

and realized that there is a PRICE to pay for this invasion of Iraq...

and we're paying it now.

[[e-mail]]

12. yes

for a long time
just more hours in my day now
thanks BUSH
I'm in Mn gas is $2.88-$3.20
I know a guy that worked at a refinery here for over 30 years and he said its bull shit what we are paying here and now...another long story

[really annoyed]

14. Absolutely!

It is an absolute shock to see. I hope this wakes up people who have been asleep for the past few years.

[Lin]

15. despair is the only word that describes how I feel, sick, heartsick,

at the poverty, at the s-l-o-w rescue, at the lack of outrage for the s-l-o-w rescue, (lone voice being Anderson Cooper...imagine that?) two days IN and ppl are STILL waving hankies/towels out WINDOWS?!
Bush's Amerika isn't anything like the country I grew up in AND NOBODY IS DOING ANYTHING ABOUT IT!!!

[tnlefty]

18. As I have stated to my repub relatives often, and then to whoever

I have a chance to encounter: It's the greed that is killing us. The more the CEOs and others take from the top in total disregard of those who helped accumulate the wealth the more we all will suffer. Not too many people are in that upper 1% ya know.

This situation has laid bare for me the schism between the haves and have nots and how our society has become so accustomed to slamming the poor, the sick, than anytime in my 40 something years on this planet. I vacillate between rage, despair, and an overall feeling that short of the r word that we're not supposed to mention, I don't know how anything will change.

[spooked]

19. Oh yes, it's never been so exposed for the WHOLE WORLD to see

the gaping chasm between the Haves and Have Nots in this country.

I wonder what is the rest of the world is thinking!

[TerdlowSmedley]

20. I lived in New Orleans in the 70s and despite all its treasures,

it is a city with a lot, i mean a lot of very poor people. The people you're seeing in desperation there are people who are too poor to have had any options other than to wait, pray and try to survive. These are not people that Bush has heretofore shown one wit of concern for. So, don't expect to see any, other than some platitude-spewing photo op. He'd just as soon all these people perished. They're not his people.

[RUMMYisFROSTED]

21. Groundhogs Day.

[KatyaR]

22. Honest to God, at this point I don't give a shit about gas prices--

what I want to know is why the hell isn't something being done for these people? Everyone I know is absolutely devastated over this situation, but I see very little being done to help them. I guess at this point nothing much can be done, and people can't get into these areas, but damn, sooner or later these areas will be accessible, and we need a plan! I think the whole country is suffering from PTSD.

As for the government's response, I think we'll be lucky to see a little bit, if any, but nothing more than that. Someone on a website somewhere (sorry, I've read so much I can't remember where it was) compared the government's response to this hurricane as opposed to previous hurricanes in Florida. Emergency response was almost instantaneous in the past; today it will take days or weeks to get help. Of course the situations are a little different--Katrina seems to have done more damage after the fact than during, but still, I think these people are pretty much on their own.

Again, I don't have the link because I read it at work, but late today there was a release from someone connected with FEMA, I think, that said that the effect of this hurricane would be "minimal." MINIMAL?? Seriously, minimal--I guess everything I've see was just an illusion. The release sounded very positive, that the cleanup and reconstruction would create new jobs--isn't that wonderful--an apocalyptic event, but we've got new jobs--WOOO!!! The last kicker was that gas prices wouldn't be affected that much. We already know that's a lie.

So basically, they're lying to us right and left, trying to cover up their mistakes and the fact that they really don't give a damn.

Fuck 'em all.

And yes, I really do care about gas prices, but right now I just can't think about anything but these poor people and this whole miserable mess.

[spooked]

23. After 2 stolen elections, & the government complicit in a terrorist attack

as well as an illegal aggressive war in Iraq, I wouldn't be surprised if all thinking people are suffering from PTSD.