NYTIMES' TOM FRIEDMAN - IDIOT

Friedman:

Besides ripping away the roofs of New Orleans, Katrina ripped away the argument that we can cut taxes, properly educate our kids, compete with India and China, succeed in Iraq, keep improving the U.S. infrastructure, and take care of a catastrophic emergency - without putting ourselves totally into the debt of Beijing.

[...] So many of the things the Bush team has ignored or distorted under the guise of fighting Osama were exposed by Katrina: its refusal to impose a gasoline tax after 9/11, which would have begun to shift our economy much sooner to more fuel-efficient cars, helped raise money for a rainy day and eased our dependence on the world's worst regimes for energy; its refusal to develop some form of national health care to cover the 40 million uninsured; and its insistence on cutting more taxes, even when that has contributed to incomplete levees and too small an Army to deal with Katrina, Osama and Saddam at the same time.

These are stupid non-sequitors, which perpetuate a couple of falsehoods: that we have a "trade deficit" with China, one which makes us indebted to them and therefore makes us weak.

The first central flaw of Friedman's is that he hypostatizes a heurisitc device: the figure known as "trade deficit." This figure is derived by subtracting the goods we sell to a country from what we buy from them - AS IF THAT WAS REAL, AND AS IF IT WAS IMPORTANT. It is NEITHER. Here's why the concept "trade deficit" is PURE BUNK (HUGE hat tip Walt Williams):

(1) American companies buy things from China. They pay for them. With Letters of credit, mostly. Effectively: CASH. That's an even-steven/square deal. There is NO IMBALANCE. They get U.S. MONEY (as much as they wanted for the goods); the US company gets the GOODS (for EXACTLY what they were willing to pay for them).

We no more have a "trade deficit" with them (because we "BUY MORE FROM THEM" then we "SELL TO THEM" then you have a "trade deficit" with your grocer when you buy groceries! YUP: you buy stuff from your grocer; you don't sell him a dang thing! You do not have a deficit with him. He gets money; you have groceries. It's an even-steven square deal. You gave him assets, he gave you goods. There is NO DEFICIT.

(2) When the deal is done, China then has MONEY. They can do with it WHATEVER they want. Very VERY often they buy US T-Bills. Because, it s a good safe investment. When they buy T-BILLS, we GET THE MONEY BACK. They get another IOU, this time with a little interest.

(3) The fact that SO VERY MUCH of the dollars that China's get from selling us stuff ends up back here is GOOD for us. And it makes it LESS likely that China will ever do ANYTHING to upset our bilateral relationship.

So Friedman is WRONG. Again. Katrina and China and Osama are as related in REALITY as Moon-beams, salad dressing and firetrucks.

In the end, all Freidman was arguing for was... drumroll please: HIGHER TAXES. No surprise here: That's a liberal's answer for EVERYTHING. And Freidman is NOTHING if he is not a liberal. The "trade deficit" is most often used by isolationists; it's a staple of their demagogery to claim that "it will ruin our economy! And send jobs overseas"

Friedman, though, is pro-trade. So he uses the bogus figure called the "trade deficit" to argue for higher taxes on energy. It's a clever variation on an old favorite Left-wing theme. Which is why the Left loves him.

The second major flaw in Friedman's column is that he perpetuates the LIE that the Bush Administration budget cuts were somehow reposnible for some of the damage which Katrina wreaked on New Orleans. Chief of Engineers LTG Carl A. Strock of the Army Corps has flatly and repeatedly DENIED THIS on TV interviews MANY TIMES - including an appearance tonight on TV. First, the LEVEES DID NOT FAIL. A few canals failed. And the canal which failed MOST (the 17th Street Canal) was one which was COMPLETELY FUNDED AND JUST COMPLETED ACCORDING TO THE MOST RECENT DESIGN SPEC'S. Here's STOCK at a DoD briefing:

"The area where the levee leaks -- where the levee breaks occurred was at its final design configuration. So that was as good as it was going to get. And what does that mean? Actually we knew that it would protect from a Category 3 hurricane. In fact, it has been through a number of Category 3 hurricanes. The intensity of this storm simply exceeded the design capacity of this levee. And those two points-- and others were over top, but those are the two main points of trouble. But that is the basic problem here, is that this storm exceeded the design capacity. ... The other question is, in general is the civil works budget of the Army Corps of Engineers suffering because of the war in Iraq? Not in my opinion. And the reason I say that is that if you look at the funding levels of the corps from pre-war days of 2001 and 2002, it has been a fairly steady level. We are spending a lot of money and the Corps of Engineers is involved in the reconstruction of Iraq and Afghanistan, but we're able to balance that with our human resources and it is not directly affecting our budget. "

ALSO: Clinton cut the Army Gulf Coats budgets. And the NYTIMES caslled them BAD LEGISLATION. SO - if Freidman wanted to be fair in how he applied a lie to fabricate a smear - he would have also criticized Clinton and his OWN editorial board. He did not. He deliberately used discredited line-of-attack against Bush in spite of the fact that it is false, and that he applied it in a biased way. You CANNOT get much lower than that! Only Krugman can, I think. And Herbert. And Dowd. (HEY: That has a kind of catchy ring to it: "KRUGMAN AND HERBERT AND DOWD - OH MY!"

BY THE WAY: does Friedman REALLY think that ANYONE can get elected in this country by calling for HIGHER energy prices or HIGHER engery taxes!? So, he's not only wrong on his facts, and incorrectly applying his incorrect deduction (and idiotically connecting it to the war on terror); he's suggesting that his incorrect conclusions be used to pass bad legislation which would only raise the cost of gasoline, increase unemployment and decrease personal discretionary spending. ON TOP OF THAT (as if that wasn't IDIOTIC enough) campaigning on his suggestion would cost Democrats seats! (This is the only part of it I like! And I'm a Democrat - but a Zell Miller one, NOT a Pelosi-Reid-Dean one!)

His idea - raising the gas tax - would have, though, increased the money the feds could have to spend on whatever pork-barrel projects they like. And that's music to a liberal's ears.

[ASIDE: I suggest that if Friedman really wants high taxes and pretty flood photo opp's (standing in carefully scouted floodwaters - like so many overpaid TV newsanchors!) that he move to GERMANY! He can watch as floodwaters his socialist president (chancellor), wades into floodwaters, and he can have high taxes (on gas and everything else!) and the high unemployment which high taxes cause.]

MORE AT POWERLINE.

RED CROSS: "SUPERDOME DEBACLE BLANCO'S FAULT!"

I saw this story on FOX. POWERLINE and BETSY'S PAGE and RADIOBLOGGER and ALL HEADLINE NEWS are reporting it, too.

It's a BOMBSHELL! Here's an excerpt from a transcript of an interview that Hugh Hewitt (HH) did with MAJOR GARRET (MG) - the reporter who broke the story MINUTES after the story broke:

HH: You just broke a pretty big story. I was watching up on the corner television in my studio, and it's headlined that the Red Cross was blocked from delivering supplies to the Superdome, Major Garrett. Tell us what you found out.

MG: Well, the Red Cross, Hugh, had pre-positioned a literal vanguard of trucks with water, food, blankets and hygiene items. They're not really big into medical response items, but those are the three biggies that we saw people at the New Orleans Superdom, and the convention center, needing most accutely. And all of us in America, I think, reasonably asked ourselves, geez. You know, I watch hurricanes all the time. And I see correspondents standing among rubble and refugees and evacuaees. But I always either see that Red Cross or Salvation Army truck nearby. Why don't I see that?

HH: And the answer is?

MG: The answer is the Louisiana Department of Homeland Security, that is the state agency responsible for that state's homeland security, told the Red Cross explicitly, you cannot come.

HH: Now Major Garrett, on what day did they block the delivery? Do you know specifically?

MG: I am told by the Red Cross, immediately after the storm passed.

HH: Okay, so that would be on Monday afternoon.

MG: That would have been Monday or Tuesday. The exact time, the hour, I don't have. But clearly, they had an evacuee situation at the Superdome, and of course, people gravitated to the convention center on an ad hoc basis. They sort of invented that as another place to go, because they couldn't stand the conditions at the Superdome.

HH: Any doubt in the Red Cross' mind that they were ready to go, but they were blocked?

MG: No. Absolutely none. They are absolutely unequivocal on that point.

HH: And are they eager to get this story out there, because they are chagrined by the coverage that's been emanating from New Orleans?

MG: I think they are. I mean, and look. Every agency that is in the private sector, Salvation Army, Red Cross, Feed The Children, all the ones we typically see are aggrieved by all the crap that's being thrown around about the response to this hurricane, because they work hand and glove with the Federal Emergency Management Agency. When FEMA is tarred and feathered, the Red Cross and the Salvation Army are tarred and feathered, because they work on a cooperative basis. They feel they are being sullied by this reaction.

HH: Of course they are. Now Major Garrett, what about the Louisiana governor's office of Homeland Security. Have they responded to this charge by the Red Cross, which is a blockbuster charge?

MG: I have not been able to reach them yet. But, what they have said consistently is, and what they told the Red Cross, we don't want you to come in there, because we have evacuees that we want to get out. And if you come in, they're more likely to stay. So I want your listeners to follow me here. At the very moment that Ray Nagin, the Mayor of New Orleans was screaming where's the food, where's the water, it was over the overpass, and state officials were saying you can't come in.

UPDATES:

Now - according to BETSY'S PAGE; the RED CROSS is confirming this on their webpage.

AND VIA POWERLINE: it was reiterated during an interview with... NPR! (click link on left side of page) the comment is about 35:40 into the show.

RANK DISTORTION FROM THE NEW YORKER MAGAZINE

The crudely (naively?...primitively??) painted cover for the latest NEW YORKER magazine (9/12/05; the grandiosely titled: "REQUIEM" by Ana Juan) depicts a black jazz instrument-playing man standing on what's supposed to be a cast-iron balcony overlooking the flooded streets of the French Quarter; the floodwaters are so high that the street sign pole - (it says Bourbon Street) - is partly underwater.

ONE PROBLEM: the French Quarter remained dry, (as did MOST of ther city which was near the river).

I WONDER: Why did they run a cover that so patently distorts the truth, and that also plays into anachronistic racial and regional stereotypes?

The cover - (sort of a "poster" for the editorial content of the magazine) - reveals more about the New Yorker magazine's penchant for knee-jerk "thinking" and stereotypes, and their own narrow, facile prejudices than it reveals about New Orleans and its flood.

My guess is that they feel they have "artistic license" to depict the catastrophe in a way which their readers will find accessible - and which will reiterate and dramatize their editorial stance toward the flood. Which says a lot about the disdain they feel for the truth and their readers. They are - in effect - saying: "Why let the truth get in the way of a good cover/good story!?"

A more truthful cover might have depicted the Convention Center - itself (like the French Quarter) sitting on dry land, flooded only in a sea of self-inflicted human filth, and human misery born of the mayor's neglect; their own understandable fear, and no one able to take charge and establish order. In other words: a HUMAN tragedy caused (or at least COMPOUNDED) by HUMAN NEGLIGENCE (of Mayor Nagin), and not SIMPLY a natural disaster.

But this truth wouldn't look so nice on coffee-tables. They'd rather have a deceitful yet pretty picture under their masthead than the awful truth. I think that says everything you need to know about The New Yorker magazine.

[Inside the ON-LINE magazine, Nich Lemann - a former contributing editor to The New Yorker, and Nawlins native - can't help but speak SOME truth:

"But it’s also true that, after the levees broke, we watched every single system associated with the life of a city fail: the electric grid, the water system, the sewer system, the transportation system, the telephone system, the police force, the fire department, the hospitals, even the system for disposing of corpses. Perhaps it is all the fault of the force of the storm; I suspect that, as we move into the yearned-for realm of reliable information, we will find out that society and nature were co-conspirators in the tragedy. And the societal fault won’t all have been the federal government’s."

As someone who lived in Nawlins for a few years - and LOVES the city - I believe the truth of this observation will eventually be driven home. That the worst problems were caused by the local "government" - mostly by Nagin...

ASIDE: the LEVEES did NOT fail; a few canals did - chiefly the 17th Street CANAL. The chief of the canal system has said that it would take 20 years to reinforce the canals and make them able to hold back a category 4+ hurricane. Therefore, it is disingenuous to blame Bush - or Clinton, for that matter. This VULNERABILITY would have to have been addressed beginning in the 1980's if is was to have been corrected in time for Katrina.]

A better cover might have depicted the Superdome as an ark - as poor vulnerable people streamed in - AT THE BEHEST OF MAYOR NAGIN - BEFORE the storm - not knowing what was going to be in store for them... not knowing that this ark and its Noah would fail... It would have been a much more sadly ironic and more truthful cover.

ARAFAT'S COUSIN ASSASSINATED IN GAZA

BBC:

"Former Palestinian security chief Moussa Arafat has been shot dead in Gaza, police and doctors say. A cousin of the late Palestinian leader Yasser Arafat, he had survived at least two earlier attempts on his life. Moussa Arafat, 65, was a founder of the ruling Fatah movement, whose Revolutionary Council was due to meet later on Wednesday. ... Police said that Arafat was dragged from his house and killed on the street outside. ... His eldest son, Nimhel, a senior Palestinian security official, was either kidnapped or escaped, according to police at the scene quoted by the Associated Press news agency. ... As chief of military intelligence in the 1990s, Moussa Arafat earned a reputation for ruthlessness, including a 1996 crackdown on Hamas and Islamic Jihad militants, when he shaved the heads and beards of detainees as a form of humiliation."

Er... um, let's give them a state!

NAGIN FINALLY ORDERS FORCED REMOVAL

NOLA.COM: Mayor orders forced removal of civilians

Mayor Ray Nagin today issued an emergency proclamation calling on all law officers and military members to begin using force, if necessary to compel all civilians to leave New Orleans. (CLICK HERE TO READ NAGIN'S PROCLAMATION.)

Why didn't he ENFORCE THE MANDATORY EVACUATION BEFORE the hurricane hit!? He could have. He had the authority and the means. It would have been EASIER then, too. When Nagin ordered a mandatory evacuation on Sunday, he allowed too much wiggle room, and he opened the (unprovisioned) Superdome and Convention Center up as shelters.

IMHO: Becasue he failed to forcibly evacuate before the storm hiot, and because he failed to provision the shelters with food or crowd control personnel, Nagin is the blame for most of the human suffering and lawlessness (in Nawlins and in the 'Dome and the Conventions Center) for those first 72 hours. Those people should NOT have been in town, and being there they should have at least had provisions for a few days (as FEMA advises). That CANNOT be blamed on FEMA or Bush.

[Well ... not by... er um... anyone rational. Which means the Left can still do it. They are. And the MSM is helping them. Why? Because they're dominated by the Left and because the "blame game" - like the shocking images of human suffering - (and now non-stop images of pet-suffering, and photo opp's of their overpaid anchors wading in carefully scouted foul floodwaters) - it raises ratings. IOW: the MSM is exploiting Katrina for political and commercial gain. They have no shame.]

BLANCO/CNN: SUPERDOME TO BE DEMOLISHED

MICHELLE blogged that CNN reported that a spokesman for Governor Blanco said the Superdome will have to be demolished.

I don't believe it for two reasons: (1) Blanco is a useless hysterical dithering mendacious dolt; (2) CNN sucks.

I think that PERHAPS the dome of the Superdome will have to be replaced.

Some years back, I lived in Nawlins for a few years -and have frequently visited over the years. I LOVE Nawlins. I NEVER loved the Superdome. Its LACK of architectural details and stark white roof made it impossible to see the Superdome and get any sense of its scale - or any perspective. I think that when they redo the roof of the Superdome, they should also redo the facade, and give it some details - like some setbacks and columns and use larger scaled pieces at the bottom and smaller scaled pieces at the top. The Astrodome on Houstion is nicer.

I think that the roof and facade of the Superdome - and ALL of Nawlins - will be reconstructed much MO'BETTER than ever.

UPDATE: MICHELLE POSTS THIS:

This AP story contradicts CNN: NEW ORLEANS (AP) - A Superdome official insisted Tuesday there were no plans to tear down the building that housed evacuees during Hurricane Katrina and was damaged by the storm. Doug hornton, regional manager for the company that runs the Superdome, said it would take 45 to 60 days for teams to assess the damage to the indoor stadium, which included a leaking roof, problems with electrical and mechanical systems, and loads of human waste left behind after those who rode out Katrina inside were moved elsewhere. He said that while there was ``no doubt'' that the Superdome suffered damage, its structural integrity remained intact, and there was no truth to rumors that officials have decided to tear it down.``To say that the Dome has to be torn down at this point is purely conjecture and speculation,'' Thornton said.

I was RIGHT! About the Superdome AND Blanco!

CITY HAD ENOUGH BUSES TO EVACUATE AT LEAST 30,000 BEFORE HURRICANE STRUCK

ACE ASKS: IS IT Bush's Fault?

205 schoolbuses, owned and operated by the city of New Orleans (and not the federal government) sat idle asthe ocean swept into the city, and still sit in three foot deep water.

Did Karl Rove order the Mayor of New Orleans not to take the rather simple step of running those buses 24/7 to evacuate the poor (who supposedly didn't have enough money to leave)?More... And nevermind the additional 364 buses of the NO transportation system, which similarly sat in their parking lots while the levees broke.

Remind me again -- who's in charge of a city's transportation system?

Still More... Galveston, Texas had all of its available buses fueled and ready to roll should Katrina hit that city. Why didn't New Orleans!?

By my calculation, 564 buses could have taken AT LEAST 30,000 poor "personal transportation-less" people to safety on Saturday night when mandatory evacuation was ordered and BEFORE the storm struck on Sunday. If they made two trips they might have evacuated EVERYONE WHO HAD NO INDEPENDENT WAY TO EVACUATE! I blame Mayor Nagin and Governor Blanco, NOT FEMA or Bush.

GOD BLESS OUR TROOPS EVERYWHERE - including the thousands helping Hurricane victims right here at home!

The US military has used helicopters to RESCUE more than 4000 people since Monday - that's 50/hour 24 hours a day for 5 days NON-STOP! Often refueling in the air to save time! Picking up stranded victims OFTEN ONE AT A TIME! This effort is HEROIC and GREAT and BRAVE and not laggardly or non-chalant. ANYONE who says the response was bad due to lack of effort is either misinformed or DELIBERATELY LYING SCUM. Here are a few articles which describe your military at work:

Guard Pours Into Gulf Region, Engineers Focus on Draining New Orleans
WASHINGTON, Sept. 2, 2005 – As National Guard vehicles forded floodwaters in downtown New Orleans today delivering critical relief supplies and helping law enforcement officials restore order, workers from the Army Corps of Engineers were focused on draining the city and repairing gaps in its levee system. Story

Full-Scale Hurricane Response Continues
WASHINGTON, Sept. 2, 2005 – Military support for the Hurricane Katrina response focused today on continuing to evacuate people stranded along the hurricane-ravaged Gulf Coast and getting food, water and medical care to the storm's victims. Story

More Soldiers Deploy to Help with Relief
WASHINGTON, Sept. 2, 2005 – Thousands of National Guard and active-duty Soldiers from across the nation are deploying to the Gulf coast to help with Hurricane Katrina recovery operations. Story

Airmen Help on ‘Front Lines’ in New Orleans
CAMP BEAUREGARD, La., Sept. 2, 2005 – In a cramped conference room, Airmen from the 122nd Air Support Operations Squadron here operate and monitor a satellite radio linked to tactical air control party airman in New Orleans to help coordinate disaster relief efforts. Story

Navy Seabees Deploy to Support Recovery
PORT HUENEME, Calif., Sept. 2, 2005 – Naval Mobile Construction Battalion 40 began deploying a detachment of 125 personnel to Gulfport, Miss., Sept. 1 to provide humanitarian assistance and conduct debris removal in the aftermath of the devastation caused by Hurricane Katrina. Story

Coast Guard Continue Rescue Operations
ST. LOUIS, Sept. 2, 2005 – More than 4,000 people have been rescued from rooftops, flooded neighborhoods and hospitals throughout the Gulf Coast region since rescue operations began Monday, and joint-agency rescue operations are continuing day and night. Release

Arkansas National Guard Opens Centers
CAMP ROBINSON, Ark., Sept. 2, 2005 – At the request of the governor, the Arkansas National Guard is preparing to open 59 readiness centers (formerly referred to as armories) in 58 counties on Saturday and Sunday to assist with efforts to register hurricane evacuees in Arkansas. Story

Medical Team Aids Hurricane Victims
NAVAL HOSPITAL JACKSONVILLE, Fla., Sept. 2, 2005 – Medical personnel from Naval Hospital Jacksonville, Fla., boarded buses to Naval Air Station Pensacola, Fla., Sept. 1 to rendezvous with the USS Bataan. From there, to New Orleans to provide urgently needed support to relief efforts for residents impacted by Hurricane Katrina. Story

Mobile Utilities Experts Support Relief Efforts
PORT HUENEME, Calif., Sept. 2, 2005 – Naval Facilities Engineering Command’s Mobile Utilities Support Equipment technicians deployed Aug. 31 to Gulfport, Miss., where they will assess damage and urgent utility needs for Naval Construction Battalion Center Gulfport. Story

FALSE, ANTI-BUSH KATRINA MEMES DEBUNKED

FALSE MEMES:

False Claim #1: "The imperfect response to this tragedy was due to GOP/BusHitler racism and the fact that those hurt by Katrina were mostly black."

FACT (This point is lifted from James Taranto of the WSJ via NRO's KJ LOPEZ) : "Here are the 2000 US Census's racial breakdowns of the populations of those five Louisiana parishes, along with Mississippi's coastal counties, which suffered a direct hit" - [only New Orleans is majority black; there may be more fatalities and certainly a greater loss of private property outside of New Orleans - but the MSM has foucsed on the city of New Orleans. In fact, one parish adjacent to New Orleans has the same total population as the city of New Orleans and has been virtually wiped out. W = white; B = black]:

Parish or county
Jefferson, La.
W69.8%
B22.9%
Orleans, La.
W28.1%
B67.3%
Plaquemines, La.
W69.8%
B23.4%
St. Bernard, La.
W88.3%
B7.6%
St. Tammany, La.
W87.0%
B9.9%
Hancock, Miss.
W90.2%
B6.8%
Harrison, Miss.
W73.1%
B21.1%
Jackson, Miss.
W75.4%
B20.9%

QUESTION: by focusing on the blacks in NOLA, is the MSM TRYING to make Bush look bad and racist? Could it be that the Left-wing partisan/pro-Democrat MSM is very concerned that the GOP is making major in-roads in the black community, and they are exploiting Katrina to diminish Bush's scuccess on this front!?

FALSE CLAIM #2: "BUSH TOOK THIS EVENT LIGHTLY BEFORE IT HAPPENED."

(2a) "UPI NewsTrack TopNews -- Aug. 27, 2005 at 10:05PM: Hurricane Katrina heads toward Louisiana MIAMI, Aug. 27 (UPI) -- The National Hurricane Center in Miami extended a Hurricane Watch for Louisiana and Florida Saturday as Hurricane Katrina churned across the Gulf of Mexico. President Bush late Saturday declared a state of emergency in Louisiana."

(2b) "Mandatory evacuation ordered for New Orleans -- NEW ORLEANS (AP)" [hat tip POWERLINE] — "In the face of a catastrophic Hurricane Katrina, a mandatory evacuation was ordered Sunday for New Orleans by Mayor Ray Nagin. Acknowledging that large numbers of people, many of them stranded tourists, would be unable to leave, the city set up 10 places of last resort for people to go, including the Superdome. The mayor called the order unprecedented and said anyone who could leave the city should. He exempted hotels from the evacuation order because airlines had already cancelled all flights. Gov. Kathleen Blanco, standing beside the mayor at a news conference, said President Bush called and personally appealed for a mandatory evacuation for the low-lying city, which is prone to flooding."

The Left, and the MSM they still dominate, are trying to exploit this horrific event for political partisan gain. THEY HAVE NO SHAME.

KATRINA AND THE ROOT CAUSE OF LAWLESSNESS; and how to make NEW New Orleans a "Shining City on a Levee"

What separates lawlessness, and the social chaos which results from that lawlessness, from order is NOT just a thin blue line of police hired to enforce social norms and maintain law & order. It is the conscience of each person. The potential and the INCLINATION to do evil and to commit acts of lawlessness IS within each of us. But MOST of us control it. Our ability to control our behavior and to be "pro-social individuals" has to do with how we are RAISED and NOT OUR GENES (except perhaps in the case of clinically sociopathic criminals).

Many people are raised BADLY - with no respect for law or life. We see this most graphically in parts of Palestine where and when jihadistic parents dress their children up as sucide bombers and extol to them the "loveliness" of committing genocide.

Poverty does NOT cause children grow up badly and to behave in this way - nor does ethnicity; bad parenting does. Some of the finest parents in the history of the world were poor. Or ARE poor! Some of the worst are rich. Poor people can - and DO - raise WONDERFUL children who grow up to be good people (regardless of whether they become rich or poor themselves). And poor persecuted people can also raise wonderful kids. So racism is NO EXCUSE.

The breakdown of LAW AND ORDER in New Orleans is widespread BUT PERPETRATED by RELATIVELY FEW PEOPLE -- by THUGS and CRIMINALS - these are people who were thugs and criminals BEFORE the flood, and they are merely using the flood as an excuse to do what they ALWAYS want to do and often do when tthere is no flood and they think no one is looking!

Primarliy the lawlessness is the fault of the lawbreakers. As I have written and linked to in other posts: lawbreakers have been tolerated for way way WAY TOO LONG in New Orleans. This must stop. Adult lawbreakers must be dealt with harshly and imprisoned. Parents and schools must be made accountable for raising good LAW-ABIDING citizens.

After the clean up, and BEFORE reconstruction, we must plan a "NEW NEW ORLEANS" with better housing, better plumbing, better schools, and better jobs. Whole sections of the city will be bulldozed and perhaps the stae and the city and ther feds should declare vast tracks PUBLIC - by eminent domain - and then redeveloped with factories and schools and churches and everything that makes a city's physical plant attractive to investment, businesses, and the middleclass. I belive that New New Orleans might very well become a shining city on a hill - or levee, (HEH! - you should please PARDON the bad joke!).

With a new urban physical plant - properly zoned and financed by a combination of private and public sources - and with a new public committment to pro-social values and a new INTOLERANCE for lawlessness I am ABSOLUTELY SURE that NEW New Orleans will be mo' better than ever!

Besides the perp's themselves, the LOCAL AUTHORITIES BEAR THE MOST RESPONSIBILTY for allowing the conditions which permitted the lawlessness to be so rampant. The local government was inept and utterly incompetent. They should have been better prepared and had a plan to get poor people out of the city and to prevent looting in the otherwise vacated city. They did neither.

FOR INSTANCE, (as had been noted elsewhere), the locals could have AND THEREFORE SHOULD HAVE commandeered ALL CITY BUSES to forcibly evacuate EVERYONE BEFORE THE HURRICANE. They had the buses. They did nothing. The buses are now flooded, and useless because hey weren't even moved to higher ground for use AFTER a flood! This is UTTER INCOMPETENCE by LOCAL GOVERNMENT - (and somewhat by the state and the feds for NOT CATCHING IT BEFOREHAND).

The slowness of relief is another matter. Water and food should have been air-dropped at all central gathering locations (such as the Dome and the Convention Center) within the first 48 hours. It wasn't. For this the FEMA chief should be FIRED. But the slowness of relief is NO EXCUSE FOR LAWLESSNESS.

NOW: I think that the president ought to appoint Colin Powell and Tommy Franks and Rudy Giuliani (and a staff) nto lead a 3-man "Katrina Reconstruction Presidential Oversight Commission" to advise and assist the 3 effected governors (and all the effected mayors) and to make sure that they DO THE RIGHT THINGS with federal assistance.

My prayers are with everyone suffering from this horrific event.

GERMANY AT THE CROSSROADS: will it elect a Thatcher or a Chavez?

UK GUARDIAN (excerpts):

Sixteen years after the fall of the Berlin wall, Ellen Müller looks back with nostalgia at her life in the then communist East Germany. ... a surge of support for Germany's newest political party, the Linkspartei or Left party ... could ... determine Germany's general election in a fortnight. "All the other parties are interested in strengthening capitalism," says Mrs Müller. "We reject it." The party is the result of a merger earlier this year between east Germany's former Communist party and the Work and Social Justice party, a new group founded by disaffected activists from Gerhard Schröder's Social Democrats. After a euphoric start, the Left party ... is expected to capture up to 30% of the vote. If the party does well enough, it could prevent Angela Merkel's conservatives from forming a centre-right government with the FDP, her coalition partner. ... Germany's mainstream political parties have all heaped abuse on the Linkspartei, and in particular, the party's populist star candidate, Oskar Lafontaine. A former chairman of the social democratic party, the SPD, and finance minister, Mr Lafontaine was instrumental in bringing the Social Democrats back into power after 16 years in the wilderness during the Kohl era. But he resigned from Mr Schröder's first government in 1999 in protest at the chancellor's business-friendly policies. He has been a bitter critic ever since. This summer he quit the SPD and announced he was joining the Left party, prompting claims of treachery. The party's other star candidate is Gregor Gysi, a sharp east German lawyer and the leader of the PDS, the former Communist party. ... the Linkspartei's solutions for getting Germany out of its mess include big tax increases, among them a new 50% tax rate on earnings over €60,000 (£41,000) a year. In return, the party promises a minimum wage of €1,400 a month and generous benefits for pensioners and families.

Now let me get this straight: since the Reagan/Thatcher Revolutions the USA and the UK have had HALF the unemployment as Germany and France and twice the economic growth, and yet the Left Party in Germany wants to emulate Cuba and Venezuela and Zimbabwe - and have the government get even MORE involved in the economy (instead of reducing the size of geovernment and cutting taxes). If they do raise taxes and make the job market less free, they'll get what they deserve: a one-way ticket on the road to serfdom.

WHEN LEVEES BREAK - or "I know what it means to miss New Orleans" PART II

A levee is a barrier built to prevent overflow. A literal levee prevents an overflow of water, a flood. Figurative levees are barriers to others things; for instance, a police force is a "levee" against the "flooding" of crime. When there is no police force - or when the police force is seen as weak or unwilling to use force - criminal elements "overflow" - all hell breaks loose. And this is as tough to contain and drain as real floodwaters.

After the liberation of Baghdad, in the absence of a police force willing to use deadly force to maintain order - all hell broke loose. Now, in central Iraq, (including Baghdad) similar criminal sociopathic elements reek havoc and prey upon the general populace, trying use genocidal terror to create the chaos and power vacuum they need to establish the jihadist tyranny they crave. (THEY WILL FAIL.)

Now, in New Orleans a criminal sociopathic element is also reeking havoc upon the populace, exploiting the chaos caused by the levee failure to loot and rape and pillage and desecrate their own city. And for what: a passing selfish moment, a false sense of personal power and an inglorious glory.

We have seen this many times before - after the Rodney King verdict in 1992 in LA; after Hurricane Hugo, to name just a few recent examples. They are criminals "acting out" and they should be squashed.

Commentators who argue that the root cause is either the poverty of the perpetrators, or their hopelessness, slander poor people everywhere.

The "root cause" is BAD PEOPLE; people who are amoral and immoral - and NOT class, NOT race, and NOT creed. NO class or or race or creed is immune from people who are bad. There are criminals in every race, every class, and every creed. LOOK AT IT THIS WAY: if 15% of America is poor, then are 15% of Americans criminals!? Of course not. Poor people are most often victims of crime. And the poor suffering people stranded in Nawlins have been victimized again by the criminal element that has been hampering the relief efforts. So, WHAT'S THE ANSWER?

Applying brute force and unabiguous moral clarity to the rogues. Tolerating NO lawlessness. Rudy Giuliani cleaned up NYC this way. For too long, Nawlins has tolerated too much mayhem and lawlessness. They're suddenly reaping what for decades they sowed.

I KNOW: I lived in Nawlins, years back - when it was safer! And even then - nearly 30 years ago - you could walk 2-3 blocks in any direction and be in danger of losing your life. Part of the reason was that desperately poor and neglected people were scattered thoughout Nawlins: it's part of the levee/slavery heritage; except for the 9th Ward and the newer projects, there WERE no "ghettos"; poor people lived adjacent to planations all over the city, plantations that grew like spokes off the levees. WHITE FLIGHT since the 1970's has exacerbated the situation, and made the CITY of New Orleans poorer and poorer. The local and state government's response to this was permissiveness and the pernicious policies of LOW EXPECTATIONS. The result: a profusion of bad behavior swamped the urban poor: high incidence of teen pregnancy, of highschool dropouts; and crime.

This was NOT benign neglect. Neglect is never benign. It was MALIGNANT NEGLECT. The poor were neglected as much as the levees.

Now, eveyone should see that it was not benign; we should see that DECADES of laissez faire policies and (for all intents and purposes permitted) corruption and ineptness (born of low expectations) have left the ENTIRE city vulnerable to its worst elements - elements which probably INTENDED FROM THE VERY FIRST HURRICANE WARNING to remioan in the otherwise evacuated city JUST IN ORDER to loot.

MORE than the levees will have to be rebuilt.

The city will have to rebuild a sense of moral outrage and an intolerance for crime and anti-social behavior. Only a chastened city, with new found moral courage born of moral outrage will have the fortitude to rebuild. The city whose charm exploited the sexy allure of the liminal and the spicy scent of danger, must re-awaken or redevelop in itself more temperate and more subtle and more sophisticated enticements.

In Nawlins - a city of rich blends, this will lead to the creation of a new and "odd blend." There will have to be more overtly Puritanical standards, and an more intensified Protestant work ethic (in business and government). And this must be achieved while protecting the "le bonnes temps roulets" attitude and the cultural gumbo/racial melange which almost always ONLY arises from a relatively open society which encourages cultural exchange and experimentation.

I believe this new hybrid can be bred. If it doesn't, then the literal and figurative bayou will reclaim Nawlins, swallow it up and leave posterity only a legend of what once was.

I'm praying that the people of New Orleans (and the surrounding parishes) rise to the occasion. Just as the levees are rebuilt and the floodwaters held back, so too can their churches and schools and civic organizations "rise up" and take control, drain the city of its foul waters, and revitalize that lovely, that sweet, that sweet and pungent tropical city. Together - with a new spirit that is as strong as the mighty Mississippi, and that is just as intolerant of crime, corruption and ineptness, and that has an ambition as strong as the region is diverse - they can cook up a future as deliciously rich and as fascinatingly complex and as tantalizingly satisfying as any gumbo or etouffe or bourbon cocktail, and as intriguing as any Jazz improvization, and as complex as the jasmin, honeysuckle and stale-beer laden music-filled air itself.

It won't be easy. In the meantime, I'm praying for all the suffering people, in Nawlins and along the Gulf Coast - that their suffering is soon ended. Godspeed.

UPDATE: Nicole Gelinas at CITY JOURNAL (hat tip POWERLINE) has a great essay which reiterates some of my themes. Here's an excerpt:

The vicious looters aren’t the face of New Orleans’ poor blacks. Their victims are: the thousands of New Orleanians who made their way to shelter before the storm, and who rescued others and brought them to shelter during and after the storm—but who now cannot get the help they desperately need. This week’s looting was predictable. When Hurricane Georges, another potentially catastrophic storm (it spared New Orleans at the last minute) was about to hit in 1998, I foolishly refused to evacuate my Uptown apartment. More than one person said I should evacuate not due to the storm, but because looters would terrorize the city afterward. Was this week’s looting preventable? Failure to put violent criminals behind bars in peacetime has led to chaos in disaster.

Like I said. And RTWT. More HERE.

CNN: ASTRODOME FULL UP! REFUGEES TURNED AWAY...

... According to Sean Callebs of CNN who was reporting from the scene as buses were turned away (c.11PM local time)! According to a polceman Callebs interviewed, a local Fire Marshall said the 'Dome was FULL UP, and local police had to enforce this decision. Shocking. FEMA - and state authorities - who said that the 'Dome could accommodate 20,000 seem incompetent.

THEORY: BSE SPREAD FROM CJD HUMANS TO CATTLE?

BBC: The first cases of BSE or "mad cow disease" could have been caused by animal feed contaminated with human remains, says a controversial theory. It proposes that some raw materials for fertiliser and feed imported from the Indian subcontinent in the 60s and 70s contained human bones and soft tissue. ... The UK imported hundreds of thousands of tonnes of whole bones, crushed bones and carcass parts in the 1960s and 1970s to make fertiliser as well as meat and bone meal feed. Nearly 50% came from Bangladesh, India and Pakistan, where gathering large bones and carcasses from the countryside and from rivers is an established local trade. ... Human remains have been described in material delivered to processing mills. And during the 1960s, human material was confirmed in consignments of bones shipped into French docks from Asia. A spokesman for the Department for Environment Food and Rural Affairs (Defra) said it went along with the findings of a 2001 report into the origin of BSE, where a favoured hypothesis was that BSE had its origins with scrapie. But the spokesman said the department was open minded about new findings. ... only a tiny amount of contaminated brain tissue is needed to transmit human CJD to nonhuman primates in the lab. On the other hand, nothing is known about the transmission of human prion diseases to cattle. It was shown in the 1980s that prion proteins could survive the entire chain of processes leading to the production of animal feed in an infectious form. The feeding of mammalian meat and bone meal to farm animals has been banned since 1996. Yet sporadic cases of BSE have occurred in the UK and in Europe, where regulations were also tightened, since the ban. These cases remain unexplained.

Fascinating.

WASHPOST: US TO PUT MORE EVEN PRESSURE ON SYRIA

The WASHPOST writes it up today. I wrote about it three days ago. Stay tuned.

LEVEE FAILURE: THE CLINTON YEARS

EU ROTA (hat tip NO PASARAN) details how from 1993-2000 the Clinton Adminstration refused to allow the Army Corps - or anyone else - to get the funding they needed to redo the levees and rebuild the marshes/bayous. The list is comprehensive and damning.

From the facts EU ROTA marshalls, one must conclude that Clinton ignored the dangers on this front as he did the dangers from jihadoterrorism. I'LL GO FURTHER: I believe that - in twenty or thirty years - most historians will look back on his presidency as 8 wasted years in which we mispent the peace dividend, did nothing on emerging crises in energy and immigration and heathcare - while we dreamed a silly dream of a "new economy" as the jihadoterrorists attacked us over and over and over again. IOW: it was an eight year disaster.

CAUTION: WILL JIHADISTS TRY TO STRIKE US NOW - HIT US WHILE WE'RE DOWN?

Gentleman never strike a man when he is down. The jihadists are NOT gentleman. That's why I think the Jihadists are probably trying very VERY hard to hit us right now, right here at home, while we're down. After all, due to Katrina and the ensuing NOLA levee failures, we have just sustained a major jolt: a key section of an entire region is demolished and reeling; oil markets are tense, and domestic oil refining and mining is very STRAINED; National Guard resources are starined as they shift to help; a million people are displaced. These pains and losses are effecting the entire nation, in negative way, economically and emotionally.

If I were a jihadist I'd say a attempting a major terrorist attack against NYC or DC or Houston or a major port RIGHT NOW would be very VERY high on my list. Because we are already reeling, the effects of a major terrorist attack (or a series of minor ones) would be compounded dramatically - in real and emotional terms. The would be more terrifying than ever. I hope the DHS and FBI are listening...

WHAT'S THE FUTURE OF OIL, OIL-SHALE, AND COAL - AND AMERICA'S POTENTIAL ENERGY INDEPENDENCE

BETSY'S PAGE has a fascinating post on an article about the VAST amounts of oil shale in the USA, deposits which contain 100 times the amount of oil as there is in Saudi Arabia. She believes that we will eventually find a way to extract the oil which is both clean and economical - especially if oil stays around $70 a barrel.

There's ANOTHER vast reserve of oil-containing reserves in the USA in the form of COAL. And the technology to convert coal into oil ALREADY exists - it's been around since the 1930's:

"REUTERS" - 8/26/05 - HELENA, Montana - Montana's governor wants to solve America's rising energy costs using a technology discovered in Germany 80 years ago that converts coal into gasoline, diesel and aviation fuel. The Fischer-Tropsch technology, discovered by German researchers in 1923 and later used by the Nazis to convert coal into wartime fuels, was not economical as long as oil cost less than $30 a barrel. But with US crude oil now hitting more than double that price, Gov. Brian Schweitzer's plan is getting more attention across the country and some analysts are taking him very seriously. Montana is "sitting on more energy than they have in the Middle East," Schweitzer told Reuters in an interview this week. "I am leading this country in this desire and demand to convert coal into gasoline, diesel and aviation fuel. We can do it in Montana for $1 per gallon," he said. "We can do it cheaper than importing oil from the sheiks, dictators, rats and crooks that we're bringing it from right now." The governor estimated the cost of producing a barrel of oil through the Fischer-Tropsch method at $32, and said that with its 120 billion tons of coal -- a little less than a third of the U.S total -- Montana could supply the entire United States with its aviation, gas and diesel fuel for 40 years without creating environmental damage. An entry level Fischer-Tropsch plant producing 22,000 barrels a day would cost about $1.5 billion, he said.

LET'S BUILD TEN! (There's more at the "Reuters" article; go there and RTWT!)

KATRINA: THE LARGEST NATURAL, HUMAN AND CULTURAL DISASTER IN AMERICA'S HISTORY

My heart goes out to all who are suffering as a result of the Hurricane and ensuing floods. The devastation along the Gulf Coast is mind-boggling, and heart-rending.

I'm especially pained by the devastation of New Orleans. Years ago, I lived there and I still have friends there. And though I have been back frequently, in some ways I have never left. The city stays with you - not unlike my other favorite town, Paris; as Hem' wrote, "Paris is a moveable feast." So is New Orleans. I pray that the city comes back - MO' BETTA DEN EVA! In some ways, it will. Buildings and levees will be rebuilt. Other losses can never be regained: the loss of life. But losing New Orleans would be as tragic to our nation's culture and cultural history as Italy losing Venice. That's a loss no one can allow to happen. We won't.