NED!

NOLA!

I still haven’t figured out what besides sheer desperation convinced Bush’s handlers that the Rockey photo-op was a good idea. It’s the very paradigm of too little, too late. Even if it hadn’t been so evidently staged, it only serves to highlight what Der Shrubbenfuhrer wasn’t doing a year ago at this time.

EvilDrPuma at 3 — well, he’s on vacation again (see my prior post for link), so it’s kind of a deja vu…

Christy Hardin Smith @ 4

EvilDrPuma at 3 — well, he’s on vacation again (see my prior post for link), so it’s kind of a deja vu…

…and you’d think it was pretty obvious that deja vu was the last thing Bush needs where Katrina is concerned.

Habitat for Humanity. Human rights. Jimmy Carter. The last honest president.

Meanwhile, the National Hurricane Center is watching what is now labelled “Tropical Depression Five” off the coast of Venezuela. By Monday morning, they predict it will be a hurricane, and by Wednesday morning it will likely be in the center of the Gulf of Mexico.

I can’t say I like where this thing is pointed . . .

ThinkProgress has created a Katrina time line:

ThinkProgress is counteracting the spin with hard facts. We’ve created a Katrina timeline that documents all the key events over the last year — from the hurricane’s landing to today. Check it out HERE.

Great post Christy. Spotlight this one, folks! Reporters all over the country are looking to do stories on the anniversary, and Christy does the homework for them.

Oh, and that goes for the last post on Iran, too.

Peterr @ 6

Meanwhile, the National Hurricane Center is watching what is now labelled “Tropical Depression Five” off the coast of Venezuela. By Monday morning, they predict it will be a hurricane, and by Wednesday morning it will likely be in the center of the Gulf of Mexico.

I can’t say I like where this thing is pointed . . .

There is also something possibly developing just off the southern tip of FLA according to CNN

EvilDrPuma @ 5

Christy Hardin Smith @ 4

EvilDrPuma at 3 — well, he’s on vacation again (see my prior post for link), so it’s kind of a deja vu…

…and you’d think it was pretty obvious that deja vu was the last thing Bush needs where Katrina is concerned.

This was just simple math: the more mintues the MSM devotes to the phony story, the fewer minutes they have left to devote to the real story. Standard practice. Katrina anniversary will be flooded again with diversions.

this is one fine article I found at Common Dreams the other day– the article is long and chock full of sad and shameful facts.

Bernice Mosely is 82 and lives alone in New Orleans in a shotgun double. On August 29, 2005, as Katrina hit the Gulf Coast, the levees constructed by the U.S. Corps of Engineers failed in five places and New Orleans filled with water.

One year ago Ms. Mosely was on the second floor of her neighborhood church. Days later, she was helicoptered out. She was so dehydrated she spent eight days in a hospital. Her next door neighbor, 89 years old, stayed behind to care for his dog. He drowned in the eight feet of floodwaters that covered their neighborhood.

Ms. Mosely now lives in her half-gutted house. She has no stove, no refrigerator, and no air-conditioning. The bottom half of her walls have been stripped of sheetrock and are bare wooden slats from the floor halfway up the wall. Her food is stored in a styrofoam cooler. Two small fans push the hot air around.

Two plaster Madonnas are in her tiny well-kept front yard. On a blazing hot summer day, Ms. Mosely used her crutches to gingerly come down off her porch to open the padlock on her fence. She has had hip and knee replacement surgery. Ms. Mosely worked in a New Orleans factory for over thirty years sewing uniforms.

When she retired she was making less than $4 an hour. “Retirement benefits?” she laughs. She lives off social security. Her house had never flooded before. Because of her tight budget tight, Ms. Mosely did not have flood insurance.

Thousands of people like Ms. Mosely are back in their houses on the Gulf Coast. They are living in houses that most people would consider, at best, still under construction, or, at worst, uninhabitable. Like Ms. Mosely, they are trying to make their damaged houses into homes.

New Orleans is still in intensive care. If you have seen recent television footage of New Orleans, you probably have a picture of how bad our housing situation is. What you cannot see is that the rest of our institutions, our water, our electricity, our healthcare, our jobs, our educational system, our criminal justice systems – are all just as broken as our housing. We remain in serious trouble. Like us, you probably wonder where has the promised money gone?

Ms. Mosely, who lives in the upper ninth ward, does not feel sorry for herself at all. “Lots of people have it worse,” she says. “You should see those people in the Lower Ninth and in St. Bernard and in the East. I am one of the lucky ones.”

(snip)

Ultimately, the people of the Gulf Coast are the greatest sign of hope. Despite setbacks that people in the US rarely suffer, people continue to help each other and fight for their right to return home and the right to live in the city they love.

http://www.commondreams.org/views06/0822-31.htm

It is laughable to me that someone would believe this could persuade anyone still living in a trailer that ‘Bush cares’! What are they smoking?

They are truly breathing their own exhaust if they think anyone outside the Beltway would buy this after a year of such spectacular and blatant neglect.

And then, to drive home how much ‘Bush cares’, does he pick up a hammer a la Jimmy Carter? No, he goes on vacation! LOL!

About 10 minutes ago, I walked by the plasma TV in my firm’s reception area, which, for some reason, is always on MSNBC. The banner at the bottom of the screen? “New Orleans Mayor Runs His Mouth.”

I kid you not.

“…and Christy does the homework for them.”

Christy does a lot of homework. Here and there the M$M is showing signs of life, but for the sheer ability and willingness to search out disparate sources of information and tie them into a meaningful whole (while being a full-time mom, etc.), she’s still a fountainhead of knowledge and an inspiration.

al-Scooter at 14 — you know, that’s flattering — but a number of the things that I highlighted here come from corporate media — the NYTimes, the WaPo, and all the local papers (especially the Times-Picayune) have done great work on this issue. I’m just synthesizing it into more digestible bites, is all. I do a LOT of reading every day, it’s true, but really, on this issue, the kudos go to Scout Prime. She’s been doing amazing work on this from day one.

Anne @ 13

About 10 minutes ago, I walked by the plasma TV in my firm’s reception area, which, for some reason, is always on MSNBC. The banner at the bottom of the screen? “New Orleans Mayor Runs His Mouth.”

I kid you not.

Our headline: “U.S. President Runs Away.”

I wish I could be shocked and appalled any more, rather than just appalled. This is pretty much par for the course.

OT: apologies but this is something I want to address in this space, since this is an area well within FDLs purview for range of commentary.

From The NeoCons Ride Again on antiwar.com

“Devilish, diabolical Iran has become the new bipartisan whipping boy. Take the ‘debate’ between Sen. Joseph Lieberman (D-CT) and challenger Ned Lamont in the New York Times yesterday. Lieberman says that he sees Iranian danger in U.S. withdrawal from Iraq, with Iran moving in. ‘We’ve got to wake up to this. It is the test, unfortunately, of not just this generation of American leaders, but of the next generation as well, because this enemy ain’t going away.’

“Lamont’s response? ‘The invasion of Iraq has had one big winner and that’s Iran,’ he argues. Iran is the real threat, Lamont says, and the war in Iraq has made the United States weaker in dealing with the new devil.

“…Hey, Bush and Lamont agree. I don’t know about you, but that make me very nervous.”

As I have said before in this space, the Democrats are not above out-warmongering the GOP on the question of Iran, and that means there is no natural brake on the sociopathic militarism inherent in this administration. After their failure in Iraq, and a brief exile in the wilderness, the neocons are riding high again – and that means endless troubles for us all ….

Somehow I’m beginning to doubt a democratic congress is going to reel in the neo-cons.

With the neo-cons framing the debate via the MSM, and various non-argument ‘talking points’, how can any effective opposing political discourse take place ?

The concern I have is how to make blogosphere discussion and political ‘awareness’, penetrate the ‘cone of silence’ surrounding MSM.

Christy i have to agree with al-scooter that you do a fabulous job putting it all together connecting the dots that MSM folk tend not to do. a hearty thanks.

o/t but last weekend in chicago, wasn’t the DNC going to vote on a resolution about holy joe?

John Casper, if you’re still home, I left you a response on the last thread.

Sophist: It’s a concern. We’re going to have to whip the dems hard on the Bolton hearings shortly to come. We’ll need everyone’s help.

I have a friend who is in charge of a National Guard unit. Following Katrina last year, his unit was called up to drive to LA. He pointed out to his state commanding officer that all his good vehicles had been sent to Iraq, including a high water vehicle and the only vehicles left were broken down or in dire need of repair. The commander said, “Follow your orders. Drive down there.”

They travelled in a convoy, which had to stop every few hours for one or another broken down truck. They had to depend on the kindness and patriotism of mechanics in little towns along the way, who knew the Army would never reimburse them.

The Guardsmen had to sleep in the cramped trucks each night. On the final night, they were so cramped up they slept out on a hill, where they were devastated by mosquitoes. After 5 long days, they arrived in the New Orleans area, unbathed and unshaven.

Once there, they were ordered to remain in their quarters and not go out to help the residents. They had to remain in quarters for three long weeks and weren’t permitted to help anyone. Don’t ask me why, no one knows. Folks, that’s BushCo for ya!

Christy, thanks for calling out (in a good way) your sources. I based my comments on your postings over the months since I stubled onto the site. It’s all such a blur that I’m not even sure when that was, but it was a couple of weeks before Pach first became a front-pager.

I understand that practicing journalists have deadlines and that news organizations often find themselves under-resourced vis-a-vis infotainment operations, but I just wanted to highlight what you’ve been doing to re-establish the quality of the narrative. In an era of journalism-as-stenography, you and the other FDL front-pagers are standouts.

I don’t really see this as flattery, I’m just kind of telling some truth here. Now I’ll proceed to get caught up in whatever topic’s under discussion.

Thanks op99, I did get it. I look forward to those bullet points.
New thread: When Ned met Hillary

EPU’d from last thread:

Did anyone see this yet?

Dems use ignored rule to oust gay candidate
Alabama party committee disqualifies winner, loser in primary runoff

The money quotes:

“Patricia got the most votes in two separate elections — the primary and the runoff — but party bosses didn’t like the outcome, so now they want to simply handpick a candidate. What happened today in Montgomery was unfair, undemocratic, un-American and unwise,” Dison said.

and

Democratic Party executive director Jim Spearman testified that as far as he knew, no Democratic candidate had filed a disclosure statement with the chairman since 1988

Why even bother with the primaries if they’re going to pull this kind of nonsense?

–-MarkusQ

I wrote the 23rd comment, and it’s already EPUed.

Is that some kind of record?

On topic,

Anybody reading Redd’s great NOLA post here needs to remind the world that JOE LIEBERMAN OKed BROWNIE FOR BROWNIE’S DHS WORK.

That’s right – Joe gave us “heckuva job” Brownie. Didn’t even bother to read Brownie’s bio, for all I’ve been able to learn from angie’s video of the DHS confirmation hearing for Brownie, led by Joe.

Tie Joe to Brownie, everbody, because Joe is 100% responsible for Brownie getting into a position to do so much damage.

Man, that video is swinging. I played with that bass player once at a pickup jam in the Ninth Ward. it was at a little dive called Diana’s, hosted by Mr. Kermit Ruffins.

I was nervous as a cat and could barely play because my hands were shaking…. very hard to play drums with shakey hands.

I sure wish we had played that “Black and Blue” song that night. We played “Red Top” and “(I’ll be Happy When You’re Dead) You Rascal You.”

God, I miss New Orleans. I had my own thoughts on the Potemkin Pizza Man, yesterday.

Bastards. I want the Crescent City back. Is it Impeachment Time yet?

Patrick at 27 — yeah, I loved the video. I’ve played it twice now…awesome stuff.

I wish that they’d played “(I’ll be Glad When You’re Dead) You Rascal You,” actually. It suddenly occurred to me how appropriate it MIGHT be…

;-)

Thanks for the affirmation Pach. I’m eager to see Dems not fall into lockstep with Neo-Con foreign policy.

On another note, Nat Hentoff has an article about a move by the WH to change the War-Crimes Act in the wake of the Hamdan vs Rumsfeld ruling.

http://villagevoice.com/news/0…..221,6.html

OT:

re Hillary and Iran, in response to sophist here at #18, OKKiddo, angie, me to me and John Caspar in the preceding post:

Hillary at the spring 2005 AIPAC convention:

“And of course, one of the areas I am deeply concerned about is Iran, and its pursuit of nuclear weapons, because a nuclear-armed Iran would shake the foundation of global security to its very core. Israel would be most immediately and profoundly threatened by this development, but Israel would not be alone. Knowing of Iran’s historic and present ties to terrorist networks, how would we feel, here in America, if the Iranians could start producing nuclear weapons at will? How would the Europeans feel if Iran could start nuclear weapons at will?

So let us be unequivocally clear. A nuclear-armed Iran is unacceptable, but it is not just unacceptable to Israel and to the United States. It must be unacceptable to the entire world, starting with the European governments and people.

I know that during your conference and in the lobbying that you will be doing on Capitol Hill, you’re trying to draw attention to the threat that is posed by a nuclear Iran. And I commend you for these efforts; this is one of our most serious security and foreign policy priorities. And we need to make working with our allies to prevent an Iranian nuclear weapon a top priority.”

Anybody interested in reading her entire speech, in which Sen. Clinton gave her overall Middle East perspective at that time (May, 2005), can read or watch it here:

http://clinton.senate.gov/~cli…..24910.html

Just released:

NEW ORLEANS, Aug. 25 /U.S. Newswire/ — The damage wrought by Hurricane Katrina included catastrophic human, cultural and economic damages for the Gulf Coast region. A year later, as the nation reflects on the anniversary of that tragic day, an expert engineering panel formed by the American Society of Civil Engineers (ASCE) today released a set of essential recommendations for overcoming the deficiencies in the city’s hurricane protection system and instituting real change in its governance, management and engineering.

“There was far too little priority or urgency given to the hurricane protection system by its designers, operators, political leaders at all levels of government, and the people who lived in its shadow,” said Hurricane Katrina External Review Panel (ERP) Chair Dr. David Daniel, P.E., president of the University of Texas at Dallas. “The lessons we have learned from the devastating tragedy in New Orleans will have profound implications for other American communities, and should serve as a sobering reminder to people nationwide that we must place the protection of public safety, health and welfare at the forefront of our nation’s priorities.”

http://releases.usnewswire.com…..p?id=71257

OT, ET then there’s this:

Speaking at a boisterous rally for Israel near the United Nations headquarters this afternoon, Senator Hillary Rodham Clinton said she supported taking “whatever steps are necessary” to defend Israel against Hamas, Hezbollah, Iran and Syria in the military conflict in the Middle East.

Senator Clinton, addressing a crowd of several thousand people, said the United States must show “solidarity and support” for Israel in the face of the “unwarranted, unprovoked” seizure of three Israeli soldiers by members of Hamas and Hezbollah, which she referred to as among “the new totalitarians of the 21st century.”

“We will stand with Israel because Israel is standing for American values as well as Israeli ones,” said Mrs. Clinton, who was joined by two dozen political and religious leaders on a stage along 42nd Street.

http://www.commondreams.org/he…..718-03.htm

angie @ 34

OT, ET then there’s this:

Speaking at a boisterous rally for Israel near the United Nations headquarters this afternoon, Senator Hillary Rodham Clinton said she supported taking “whatever steps are necessary” to defend Israel against Hamas, Hezbollah, Iran and Syria in the military conflict in the Middle East.

Senator Clinton, addressing a crowd of several thousand people, said the United States must show “solidarity and support” for Israel in the face of the “unwarranted, unprovoked” seizure of three Israeli soldiers by members of Hamas and Hezbollah, which she referred to as among “the new totalitarians of the 21st century.”

“We will stand with Israel because Israel is standing for American values as well as Israeli ones,” said Mrs. Clinton, who was joined by two dozen political and religious leaders on a stage along 42nd Street.

http://www.commondreams.org/he…..718-03.htm

I’m an American. Born and raised. Israeli governmental policy does NOT stand for my values. Nor a lot of other folks’ values either. Hillary can be so aggravating. In foreign policy, Clinton attempting to speak for Americans is god-awful presumptuous and arrogant.

That was too smooth. That last song was NOLA.

New catchphrase for something which is totally messed up. NOLA!!

That situation in Iraq is straight NOLA.

Alright maybe not.

How great to start the music and then read on…..I wasn’t able to take the time to thank Scout for her amazing work during the most recent Katrina post. The videos are second to none, and I am so horrified by what remains of the devastation and how little has been done to return our NOLA to even a shadow of its previous life. No, it wasn’t a perfect place, yes there were problems in government, in the schools system, health care delivery and in all the other pesky areas such as crime and corruption. Same as nearly every where else. But this city is one of OURS, and these people are our brothers and sisters and fellow citizens and our national government let them down big time. No new sentiments or words here, but thanks for returning Katrina and NOLA and the surrounding areas to our attention time and again.

Great, great video Christy. Thanks for posting it. I’ve sent it far and wide….

I watched Spike Lee’s documentary this week. Haven’t been the same since. Last year at this time I spent with my parents watching New Orleans on television. My parents were vacationing with us when the storm hit. Their house was on Bellaire Drive in New Orleans. It is gone. And every day that has gone by since has been cloaked in the knowledge that our government killed a unique cultural jewel and many innocent people and pets.

Christy:

Thanks for the link to the Democrats report. I looked for it yesterday after I read about it, but of course I couldn’t find it because the traditional media don’t actually link to things.

I need it because I am working on my first campaign! My friend David Gereighty is running for Louisiana’s first congressional district seat against Bobby Jindal.

I am so excited about working on my first campaign. Thanks for inspiring me every day! You women are truly and inspiration.

Excellent vid. Love Branford. Caught him “Playin’ in the Band” one time at the Meadowlands…

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