Here I am, home before the long weekend, drinking lemon tea and looking forward to NYC.
Someone fucked up big time in New Orleans. To quote the Mayor to the feds: "Get off your asses". I was reading this thing by Sanjay Gupta (I know, CNN again, but like a moth to a flame...) about a hospital in New Orleans with ventilator patients having air manually pumped by exhausted staff because of the lack of electricity. Of course that probably happens every minute somewhere in Africa, every day of the year. There are people without water, simple water, in the richest country in the world. I realize that the foundation of emergency planning is the individual, yes, but how are you supposed to stock up if you don't have enough for the day to day living already? As Rosie says in her blog, how do you evacuate when you have no car?
I suppose the lesson here is that if it can happen there, it can happen anywhere. And we really should be better prepared. But having said that, it's a colossal failure when a country is trying to fix things overseas and can't fix things in their own backyard. Dubya has spent the last four years trying to convince people that fighting terrorists abroad makes it safer at home. Hard argument to make if you (used to) live in New Orleans. Thank god, for me and my family and friends, the glass is half full. With clean water. At least for now.
Someone fucked up big time in New Orleans. To quote the Mayor to the feds: "Get off your asses". I was reading this thing by Sanjay Gupta (I know, CNN again, but like a moth to a flame...) about a hospital in New Orleans with ventilator patients having air manually pumped by exhausted staff because of the lack of electricity. Of course that probably happens every minute somewhere in Africa, every day of the year. There are people without water, simple water, in the richest country in the world. I realize that the foundation of emergency planning is the individual, yes, but how are you supposed to stock up if you don't have enough for the day to day living already? As Rosie says in her blog, how do you evacuate when you have no car?
I suppose the lesson here is that if it can happen there, it can happen anywhere. And we really should be better prepared. But having said that, it's a colossal failure when a country is trying to fix things overseas and can't fix things in their own backyard. Dubya has spent the last four years trying to convince people that fighting terrorists abroad makes it safer at home. Hard argument to make if you (used to) live in New Orleans. Thank god, for me and my family and friends, the glass is half full. With clean water. At least for now.
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