Most of us are aware of the total devestation left by Hurriance Katrina, especially in New Orleans. Well, ironically, if you live there, I don't know how much media access you'd have, so maybe they don't get the birds-eye view.
Anyway. I digress. What I would like to know, however, is what is taking so long for aid to arrive? And why does President Bush feel the need to say (and I para-phrase), 'offers of help are nice, but we'll take care of this'?
I suppose what I don't understand (other than the rapes, violence, and looting - minus one million points for mob mentality) is the lack of prepardness.
The US government knew Katrina was coming. They knew it could be bad. And yes, they didn't maybe project it to be this bad - but I'm sure they had some 'worse-case' scenarios laid out.
So why wasn't anything pre-positioned? Why does it take four days to put the National Guard in place? Isn't that their duty?
Why are four hospital ships steaming out of port almost four days after the fact? Why didn't they pre-position at least one, so the response time would be less?
I just don't understand.
It seems to me in many of life's situations that we rather take a recative approach. In case it's not as bad as 'worse-case', nobody seems to want to be responsbile for calling in the cavalry - or at least having them ready.
Is the cost of prepardness not worth it?
And then there's the not asking for help bit. The Canadian Forces DART team, which could very quickly be on the ground setting up water purification systems, is currently sitting on one-hour ready to move status. One hour. They just need the word from the Fed. Why hasn't that been given?
Furthermore - why is Congress on a break now, but the Senate met at 4am to discuss if Terry Schivao should live or die? Right now, an entire city is dying.
And my last beef - why is gas so expensive in Canada? We don't get our oil from the Gulf Coast. Fucking price gouging.
President Bush - if the war in Iraq isn't enough for you to resign, then I think the handling of this natural disaster should be. I have a feeling that if a terriost attack happened in the French Quarter, the US Army would be there a whole lot quicker.
-R.
