Those thanks are sincere. New Orleans, aftermath of Katrina-Rita, we're getting alot of press coverage. It's appreciated.
Front-page, at least on the web, of the NYTimes, LATimes, and WaPo - all three, each day - for a couple days running now. We've been on at least two of the three, everyday, for the last week or two. And for the most part, they are pretty good stories, with facts and feelings mixed in.
The story - consistently - is the recovery that isn't happening. What the guvment isn't doing, and what it is doing poorly.
Alot of press, sympathetic press. And alot of guvment inaction. Hmmm. Hmmmmmmm.
the upfront after the flip
So. I'll be upfront. I want the Dems to do something about New Orleans. National Dems. In DC. In your hometown. And down here. As Dems, doing something about New Orleans, upfront and as Dems. Now. Okay, at least beginning now, or least starting sometime real soon.
Yeah, I know the argument that Dems won't be listened to anyway, strategy sez sorta-kinda sit back & let the Repubs fail. Fine. They've failed. It's all over the press, it's in the polls. Bush has failed New Orleans, Repub Congress has failed New Orleans. Failed. Past tense, it's happened.
What we've seen, what we're seeing - that's it. There will be no surge from the White House, FEMA, or Repub Congress, no turning of corners. This is it, as good as it gets from the Repubs - failure and more failure.
On Katrina recovery, there is no national leadership. A vacuum. National Dems, I invite you to step into that vacuum.
Uh-huh, I know what a loaded invitation that is. It's an invitation to the eye of a hurricane.
Tell me, National Dems, you have something better to do? Something better, as a national party, than coming up with a set of solutions that work better than utter failure? Something better than working out something, even partial solutions to an ongoing national tragedy? Something better to do than save the people of a US region in desperate plight from guvment inaction?
National Dems, do you have something better to do, something better than shoving a couple of solutions down BushCo's throat, and getting good press, sympathetic press while doing it? hmm, so, I'm getting a bit edgy there...
Alright. Enough, it's not a very subtle point. I want the Dems to do something about New Orleans.
So. Here's the coverage from the last couple days. National Dems, you gon' take it from here? Or what?
WaPo Sat'day: FEMA Pulls Out of Lower Ninth - link
The Federal Emergency Management Agency pulled all its workers out of New Orleans's Lower Ninth Ward yesterday after threats of violence and planned to request additional police or National Guard support, a FEMA spokeswoman said.
A spokeswoman for Mayor C. Ray Nagin said the police commander for the district knew of no incidents or threat complaints.
...FEMA workers...have been advised against wearing clothing with the agency logo in public.
People are "still pending". The NYTimes Sat'day: here
"You come to these FEMA centers, you sit all day," said Myrna Guity, 43, whose import business was wiped out by the storm, along with her home in New Orleans East. "You get no answers to your questions. They're evasive. You're constantly 'pending.' What are you going to be doing, 'pending' for the rest of your life? I've lost everything."
LATimes says here that "they" just don't trust us.
Sen. Larry E. Craig (R-Idaho) echoed sentiments expressed by many of his colleagues when he insisted recently that every federal dollar sent to Louisiana be strictly monitored.
"Louisiana and New Orleans are the most corrupt governments in our country, and they have always been," Craig told a newspaper in his home state. "Fraud is in the culture of Iraqis. I believe that is true in Louisiana as well."
But even a shamed Repub knows...
"I'm ready to start a revolution," said former Rep. Bob Livingston (R-La.). "This is an absolute outrage. Here we are in Month 4 of a terrible, terrible tragedy, and other than hotel rooms and meals-ready-to-eat and some reconstruction, we haven't gotten squat."...
..."Has the mood soured? Yes," Livingston said. "But are we just going to write off an entire region of the country? Congress ought to get their damned act in order and un-sour it."
You get the gist, here are the links for the Sunday articles in the NYTimes here, the LATimes here, and WaPo here
By the way, the headline for the LA article - "On Their Own in Battered New Orleans"
...National Dems, come on down. And make it for more than a Spring Meet...