Don Singleton

Monday, September 05, 2005

He Held Their Lives in His Tiny Hands

LATimes reported In the chaos that was Causeway Boulevard, this group of refugees stood out: a 6-year-old boy walking down the road, holding a 5-month-old, surrounded by five toddlers who followed him around as if he were their leader. They were holding hands. Three of the children were about 2 years old, and one was wearing only diapers. A 3-year-old girl, who wore colorful barrettes on the ends of her braids, had her 14-month-old brother in tow. The 6-year-old spoke for all of them, and he told rescuers his name was Deamonte Love.

Unfortunately according to this the minimum age to run for Governor is 25, but according to this the only requirement for Mayor is that the candidate shall a citizen of the United States by birth, a qualified elector of New Orleans, and shall have been a resident of New Orleans for at least 5 years immediately preceding the candidate’s election.
The reason I raise this, is that I have two good candidates for Governor and Mayor, Jabbar Gibson and Deamonte Love. Both showed much more initiative that either Governor Blanco or Mayor Nagin. Maybe Jabbar could run for Mayor, and then in seven years, when he becomes 25, he could run for Governor and Deamonte could take over as Mayor of New Orleans (if there is such a place at that time).

Thousands of human stories have flown past relief workers in the last week, but few have touched them as much as the seven children who were found wandering together Thursday at an evacuation point in downtown New Orleans. In the Baton Rouge headquarters of the rescue operation, paramedics tried to coax their names out of them; nurses who examined them stayed up that night, brooding. Transporting the children alone was "the hardest thing I've ever done in my life, knowing that their parents are either dead" or that they had been abandoned, said Pat Coveney, a Houston emergency medical technician who put them into the back of his ambulance and drove them out of New Orleans. "It goes back to the same thing," he said. "How did a 6-year-old end up being in charge of six babies?"

Barbara O'Brien blogged Six-year-old saves baby and five toddlers.

Arthur Silber blogged This really got to me

Roberts Hearings

WaPo reported Faith has factored into previous Supreme Court confirmations, but the John Roberts hearings may be the first to take place on consecrated grounds. Evangelical minister Rob Schenck secretly blessed every piece of furniture in the three Senate hearing rooms where the Judiciary Committee will consider the Roberts nomination.

I bet that ticked off the Athiest Left

The Washington activist, who heads the National Clergy Council, described the exercise as "an act of prayer, in preparation for this whole process." The Supreme Court is central to all of the big Christian conservative issues, including the role of religion in public life and the legality of abortion and same-sex marriage. Schenck and other conservative leaders are hoping that President Bush has found a kindred spirit for them in Roberts, a lifelong practicing Roman Catholic. The degree to which Roberts's religious beliefs may inform his judicial philosophy could be a significant line of questioning, especially given that Roberts is replacing Sandra Day O'Connor, a key vote on many contentious social issues.

That is no longer true. Bush has named Roberts to become the new Chief Justice, so someone else will be named to replace O'Connor.

Muslims ransack Christian village

Jerusalem Post reported Efforts were under way on Sunday to calm the situation in this Christian village east of Ramallah after an attack by hundreds of Muslim men from nearby villages left many houses and vehicles torched.

And this from the Religion of Peace?????

The incident began on Saturday night and lasted until early Sunday, when Palestinian Authority security forces interfered to disperse the attackers. Residents said several houses were looted and many families were forced to flee to Ramallah and other Christian villages, although no one was injured.

The attack on the village of 1,500 was triggered by the murder of a Muslim woman from the nearby village of Deir Jarir earlier this week. The 30-year-old woman, according to PA security sources, was apparently murdered by members of her family for having had a romance with a Christian man from Taiba.

And this deserves the death penalty? From members of her own family? What civilized people these Muslims are.

"When her family discovered that she had been involved in a forbidden relationship with a Christian, they apparently forced her to drink poison," said one source. "Then they buried her without reporting her death to the relevant authorities." When the PA security forces decided to launch an investigation into the woman's death, her family protested for fear that the relationship would be exposed. The family was further infuriated by the decision to exhume the body for autopsy.

So the so-called "honor killings" are not authorized by the Palestinian Authorities? And the response the is to attack other Christians that are not doing you any harm?

The attack is one of the worst against Christians in the West Bank in many years. Residents said it took the PA security forces several hours to reach Taiba. Others complained that the IDF, which is in charge of overall security in the area, did not answer their desperate calls for immediate help. "More than 500 Muslim men, chanting Allahu akbar [God is great], attacked us at night," said a Taiba resident. "They poured kerosene on many buildings and set them on fire. Many of the attackers broke into houses and stole furniture, jewelry and electrical appliances."

I hope Allah creates a nice place in Hell for these 500 to go to.

On Moral Grounds

NYT reported A pregnant teenager went to the grand and imposing county courthouse here early in the summer, saying she wanted an abortion. The circuit court judge refused to hear the case, and he announced that he would recuse himself from any others like it. "Taking the life of an innocent human being is contrary to the moral order," the judge, John R. McCarroll of Shelby County Circuit Court, wrote in June. "I could not in good conscience make a finding that would allow the minor to proceed with the abortion." The teenager was in court because Tennessee, like 18 other states, requires minors to obtain a parent's permission before they can have an abortion. But the state also allows another option. The teenagers can ask a judge for permission to decide for themselves. Judges, however, are starting to opt out. Other judges of the Shelby Circuit Court have recused themselves like Judge McCarroll, and now, according to one judge, only four of the nine judges on the court hear such abortion applications. Judges in Alabama and Pennsylvania have also said they will not take such cases. The actions, similar in some ways to pharmacists' refusal to dispense drugs related to contraception or abortion on moral grounds, have set off a debate about the responsibilities of judges and the consequences of such recusals, including political ones when judges are elected rather than appointed.

This is wonderful news. We have some ethical judges, just as we have some ethical pharmacists. The rabid left will not be happy, because they want everyone, even minors, to have the ability to kill their unborn babies anytime they want. It might have been better for the judge to hear the case, and then rule against the abortion, because the young girl might find a liberal judge that will let her kill her baby.

Lindsay Beyerstein blogged First pharmacists, now judges

Monday, September 5

This Day In History

1698 Russia's Peter the Great imposed a tax on beards.
1774 The first Continental Congress assembled in Philadelphia.
1793 The Reign of Terror began during the French Revolution as the National Convention instituted harsh measures to repress counterrevolutionary activities.
1836 Sam Houston was elected president of the Republic of Texas.
1881 The first disaster relief provided by the American Red Cross benefited thousands of fire victims left destitute this day by the Great Fire of 1881. It had been a long hot summer in the ‘thumb-area’ of Michigan and small forest fires were burning. A southwest gale fanned the flames into an inferno. The fire raged for three days, scorching over a million acres. Over 125 people died in the blaze. The American Association for the Relief of Misery on the Battlefields was a result of the International Red Cross and the forerunner of the American Association of the Red Cross. Clara Barton was instrumental in establishing the American chapter in 1881.
1882 The nation's first Labor Day parade was held in New York.
1901 The National Association of Professional Baseball Leagues was formed in Chicago. It became the first organized baseball league.
1905 The Treaty of Portsmouth, ending the Russo-Japanese War, was signed in New Hampshire.
1914 The First Battle of the Marne began during World War I.
1939 The United States proclaimed its neutrality in World War II.
1945 Iva Toguri D'Aquino, a Japanese-American suspected of being wartime radio propagandist ''Tokyo Rose,'' was arrested in Yokohama.
1957 ''On the Road'' by Jack Kerouac was published.
1958 ''Doctor Zhivago'' by Russian author Boris Pasternak was published in the United States.
1975 President Gerald R. Ford escaped an attempt on his life in Sacramento, Calif., by Lynette ''Squeaky'' Fromme, a follower of Charles Manson.
1977 The United States launched the Voyager 1 spacecraft two weeks after launching its twin, Voyager 2.
1997 Nobel Peace Prize winner Mother Teresa died in Calcutta, India, at age 87.
1997 Conductor Sir Georg Solti died in France at age 84.
2002 Afghan President Hamid Karzai survived an assassination attempt in Kandahar.

Happy Birthday To

1638 Louis XIV (‘The Sun King’ [he chose the sun as his royal emblem]: King of France [1643-1715]; died Sep 1, 1715)
1897 Arthur Charles Nielsen (market researcher: founder of A.C. Nielsen Co.: radio and TV audience surveys; International Tennis Hall of Famer: avid player, generous patron; died June 1, 1981)
1902 Darryl F. (Francis) Zanuck (producer)
1921 Jack Valenti (movie executive: president of Motion Picture Association of America)
1929 Bob Newhart (actor, comedian: The Bob Newhart Show, Newhart; LP: The Button Down Mind of Bob Newhart)
1932 Carol Lawrence (Laraia) (singer, actress: West Side Story, General Hospital)

Sunday, September 04, 2005

This is stupid

Corante blogged Box-Wrap" Patent Infringement - What’s that, you ask? Evidently, it’s when you ignore the terms written on the side of Lexmark printer cartridge box, refilling the cartridge with ink even when the company has designated it “single use only.” According to the Ninth Circuit ruling [PDF] this week in ACRA v. Lexmark, opening the package means you agree to Lexmark’s wishes. And if you break that agreement, you could face claims under contract and patent law.

I see it is the Ninth Circuit, the most reversed circuit in the country. They have really come up with a stupid one, this time

Hat tip SlashDot

Who is responsible?

The angry left is desperately trying to blame President Bush and FEMA for the slow response to the problem in New Orleans.

Update 9/5: What advance notice did the Governor and the Mayor have?

On June 3, 2004 an IEM Team to Develop Catastrophic Hurricane Disaster Plan for New Orleans & Southeast Louisiana involved James Lee Witt Associates. Make note of that name, because we will see James Lee Witt later

December 21, 2004 the Louisiana Board of Regents received the Assessment and Remediation of Public Health Impacts Due to Hurricanes and Major Flooding Events which reported

The 2004 Hurricane Pam Catastrophic Hurricane Planning Exercise demonstrated the strong need for a scientific basis for casualty estimates. This scenario-based exercise was constructed around the scenario of a strong Category 3 hurricane striking New Orleans, inundating Orleans Parish and major portions of surrounding parishes. The contractor creating the exercise developed casualty estimates for the NOAA-provided storm surge conditions. Their initial estimate was well over 80,000 fatalities. When this was presented to FEMA and state and local emergency managers during a pre-exercise development briefing, it was met with much skepticism and disbelief. Based on complaints from these groups, the figure was reduced to something on the order of 60,000,
That is a fantastic way to plan for problems. If the estimates show more damage than you are prepared to accept, lower the estimates.
which was still highly controversial.

They certainly had a lot of plans. Did they follow them?

Update 9/5: As NOLA.com reported 8/28 10:48 am 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.

As JunkYardDog shows, the New Orleans school system owns 205 buses, and elsewhere we learned there were 364 buses owned by the New Orleans public transit. Why did the Mayor not make use of these buses to send people from the Superdome (and elsewhere) to Houston, or any other major city?

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.

Why exempt the hotels? Was it ok for the tourists to die, but not New Orlenas residents, or did he deliver them supplies of water and food so they could survive in the hotels?

"We are facing a storm that most of us have long feared," Nagin said. The storm surge most likely could topple the city's levee system, which protect it from surrounding waters of Lake Pontchartrain, the Mississippi River and marshes, the mayor said. The bowl-shaped city must pump water out during normal times, and the hurricane threatened pump power.... He told those who had to move to the Superdome to come with enough food for several days and with blankets. He said it will be a very uncomfortable place and encouraged everybody who could to get out.

Since he anticipated flooding, which would mean power failures, loss of water pressure, and hence inability to flush the toilets, did he provide Port-a-poties?

What is FEMA's responsibility in the City of New Orleans Comprehensive Emergency Management Plan? As I read the document:

The ATO shall either utilize materials prepared by other agencies such as the Louisiana Office of Emergency Preparedness, and the Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA), or shall develop materials directed at the specific needs or concerns of our local population.
These sites shall be established at geographically strategic sites, providing all affected citizens with access to available programs, and shall provide representatives from numerous federal, state, local, and private relief agencies. Locations of the centers, as well as information on FEMA's teleregistration program, shall be made known via ESF?14, Public Information, and all other available information outlets
At the briefing, public officials shall be oriented on available assistance and procedures, and shall receive "Notice Of Interest" forms to be filed with state and federal officials. Subsequent "Project Applications" shall be filed with FEMA for further processing. State and federal authorities will evaluate the project applications and determine justification for assistance.
Applications for LOEP/FEMA courses will be submitted to the Director, Office of Emergency Preparedness for approval and submittal to LOEP.
The Director of the Office of Emergency Preparedness shall endeavor to take full advantage of courses offered by the Louisiana Office of Emergency Preparedness (LOEP), the Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA), the Louisiana Emergency Preparedness Association (LEPA) and other agencies, as well as conferences, seminars and workshops that may from time to time be available, most notably state hurricane conferences and workshops and the National Hurricane Conference.

On August 26, the Governor declared a State of Emergency. I could not locate their "Emergency Response And Recovery Program" on their web site but her declaration does put the response under the "command of the director of the state office of Homeland Security and Emergency Preparedness"

On August 28, she sent a letter to George Bush requesting a declaration of a major disaster, which George Bush did on 8/29 The press report for that is dated 8/27 and it said the aid was to begin on 8/26. It is a little unclear exactly what date to assign it, but Bush certainly acted before the storm hit.

She also said that she had directed execution of the State Emergency Plan

Which has two references to FEMA:
Alert FEMA of the situation and advise that the State may need Federal assistance.
Request FEMA send representatives to coordinate and prepare for possible deployment of the Advance Emergency Response Team.

, she asked for Hazard Mitigation for eligible applicants that have a FEMA Approved Local Hazard Mitigation Plan, and asked for some more monetary funding, and help with debris removal. She did not authorize active duty military, reserves, or National Guard from other states.

She issued a number of executive orders which recognize that "under the provisions of Louisiana Homeland Security and Emergency Assistance and Disaster Act, and R.S. 29:724 in particular, the governor (not the President) is responsible for meeting the dangers to the state and people presented by emergencies or disasters"

Sept 1 Emergency Occupation Of Hotel And Motel Rooms
Sept 1 EMergency Evacuation By Buses
Sept 2 Emergency Evacuation By Buses
Sept 2 Public Health Emergency Declaration

None of which authorizes active duty military, reserves, or National Guard from other states.

On 9/2 she said she "previously requested significant federal support to include: an additional 40,000 troops; trailers of water, ice and food; commercial buses; base camps; staging areas; amphibious personnel carriers; deployable morgues; urban search and rescue teams; airlift; temporary housing; and communications systems." but I find no indication of that request on their website, but in this letter she did request the return of her National Guard that are in Iraq (which obviously would take some amount of time), but she did request a number of other items, which arrived the same day.

WaPo reported on 9/3 that Shortly before midnight Friday, the Bush administration sent her a proposed legal memorandum asking her to request a federal takeover of the evacuation of New Orleans, a source within the state's emergency operations center said Saturday.

The administration sought unified control over all local police and state National Guard units reporting to the governor. Louisiana officials rejected the request after talks throughout the night, concerned that such a move would be comparable to a federal declaration of martial law. Some officials in the state suspected a political motive behind the request. "Quite frankly, if they'd been able to pull off taking it away from the locals, they then could have blamed everything on the locals," said the source, who does not have the authority to speak publicly.

A senior administration official said that Bush has clear legal authority to federalize National Guard units to quell civil disturbances under the Insurrection Act and will continue to try to unify the chains of command that are split among the president, the Louisiana governor and the New Orleans mayor.

Louisiana did not reach out to a multi-state mutual aid compact for assistance until Wednesday, three state and federal officials said. As of Saturday, Blanco still had not declared a state of emergency, the senior Bush official said.

"The federal government stands ready to work with state and local officials to secure New Orleans and the state of Louisiana," White House spokesman Dan Bartlett said. "The president will not let any form of bureaucracy get in the way of protecting the citizens of Louisiana."

Blanco made two moves Saturday that protected her independence from the federal government: She created a philanthropic fund for the state's victims and hired James Lee Witt, Federal Emergency Management Agency director in the Clinton administration, to advise her on the relief effort. Remember where we heard that name before?

Update 9/5: Commenters speculated that the appointment of James Lee Witt, the former director of FEMA, may have been an effort to prevent George Bush riding in on a white horse and stealing all her headlines and accolades for the rescue response, and that maybe he made an ill-advised suggestion to Governor Blanco to reject Bush's proposed legal memo to federalize the state and local evacuation procedures prior to Katrina's arrival? In other words the was willing to sacrifice the safety and security of Louisiana residents to cover up for her failures to protect her citizens

It seems pretty clear that Blanco was doing everything possible to avoid asking for the help that the President is now being blamed for not providing immediately after Katrina struck.

Since 1878 Posse Comitatus has prevented the the Army, Navy, Air Force and Marines from operating on US soil. An exception is made for National Guard troops under the control of state governors, and I believe the governors can request military support (such as National Guard troops from other states), but they must explicitly request them.

Does anyone want the President of the United States [Democrat or Republican] to decide to deploy active duty military, reserves, or National Guard from other states without the specific request and approval of the Governor of that state?

Some are trying to blame the Bush administration for not funding the levee repair. Chicago Tribune reported The U.S. Army Corps of Engineers said Thursday that a lack of funding for hurricane-protection projects around New Orleans did not contribute to the disastrous flooding that followed Hurricane Katrina.

In a telephone interview with reporters, corps officials said that although portions of the flood-protection levees remain incomplete, the levees near Lake Pontchartrain that gave way--inundating much of the city--were completed and in good condition before the hurricane.

However, they noted that the levees were designed for a Category 3 hurricane and couldn't handle the ferocious winds and raging waters from Hurricane Katrina, which was a Category 4 storm when it hit the coastline. The decision to build levees for a Category 3 hurricane was made decades ago based on a cost-benefit analysis.

"I don't see that the level of funding was really a contributing factor in this case," said Lt. Gen. Carl Strock, chief of engineers for the corps. "Had this project been fully complete, it is my opinion that based on the intensity of this storm that the flooding of the business district and the French Quarter would have still taken place."

Strock also denied that escalating costs from the war in Iraq contributed to reductions in funding for hurricane projects in Louisiana, as some critics have suggested. Records show that corps funding for the Louisiana projects has generally decreased in recent years.

Several critics, including a former head of the Corps of Engineers, suggested in a Tribune story Thursday that the flooding in New Orleans could have been less severe had the federal government fully funded projects to improve the levees and drainage in the city.

Congress in 1999 authorized the corps to conduct a $12 million study to determine how much it would cost to protect New Orleans from a Category 5 hurricane, but the study isn't scheduled to get under way until 2006. It was not clear why the study has taken so long to begin, though Congress has only provided in the range of $100,000 or $200,000 a year so far.

Al Naomi, senior project manager in the corps' New Orleans District, said it would cost as much as $2.5 billion to build such a system, which would likely include gates to block the Gulf of Mexico from Lake Pontchartrain and additional levees. If the project were fully funded and started immediately, Naomi said it could be completed in three to five years.

A project to build up the levees to withstand a Category 3 hurricane was launched in 1965 after Hurricane Betsy and was supposed to be completed in 10 years, but it remains incomplete because of a lack of funding.
If a project launched in 1965 and supposed to be completed in 10 years is still not completed, due to funding cutbacks in many administrations, hopefully no one is stupid enough to suggest that the above $2.5 billion project would make any sense at all. New Orleans should be moved, not rebuilt in place
In recent years, funding has dropped precipitously, which some officials attributed in part to the escalating costs of the Iraq war. Funding for a drainage project in New Orleans went from $69 million in 2001 to $36.5 million in the current fiscal year, while funding for such hurricane-protection projects as levees around Lake Pontchartrain declined from $10 million in 2001 to $5.7 million this year, according to figures provided by the office of Sen. Mary Landrieu (D-La.).

Funding for these projects has generally trended downward since at least the last years of the Clinton administration. Congressional records show that the levee work on Lake Pontchartrain received $23 million in 1998 and $16 million in 1999. It was not clear how much the drainage project received in 1998, but records show it received $75 million in 1999.

Neither the White House nor the Corps of Engineers would confirm the numbers, nor would they provide funding levels dating to previous administrations.

You're on your own

Guardian reported British families trapped in New Orleans last night claimed that US authorities had refused to evacuate them as Hurricane Katrina approached the city.

I think this is a lie. I did not see any indication that any assistance was provided by state or local authorities for anyone to get out before the storm, and I did not see anyone checking passports to get on the buses after the storm.

Although assistance was offered to US residents, British nationals were told they would have to fend for themselves. According to those who remain stranded in the stricken city, police had visited hotels and guest houses on the eve of the hurricane offering to evacuate Americans, but not Britons.

Political Science

NYT reported When Donald Kennedy, a biologist and editor of the eminent journal Science, was asked what had led so many American scientists to feel that George W. Bush's administration is anti-science, he isolated a familiar pair of culprits: climate change and stem cells. These represent, he said, ''two solid issues in which there is a real difference between a strong consensus in the science community and the response of the administration to that consensus.'' Both issues have in fact riled scientists since the early days of the administration, and both continue to have broad repercussions. In March 2001, the White House abruptly withdrew its support for the Kyoto Protocol on climate change, and the U.S. withdrawal was still a locus of debate at this summer's G8 summit in Scotland.

Support for Koyto was not withdrawn because of Science, it was because the proposed solution would have just hurt Western Economies, and not done anything significant for the problem, since India and China, the two largest growing economies, would add more polution than all the Western nations together could reduce.

And the administration's decision to limit federal funds for embryonic-stem-cell research four years ago -- a move that many scientists worry has severely hampered one of the most fruitful avenues of biomedical inquiry to come along in decades -- resulted in a shift in the dynamics of financing, from the federal government to the states and private institutions.

President Bush is the first president to allow ANY funding for stem cell research. He just did not allow as much as the scientists wanted, or allow them to kill more embryos to do the research. And it was for moral reasons, not science reasons. And he did nothing to block state or private funded research.

In November 2004, Californians voted to allocate $3 billion for stem-cell research in what was widely characterized as a ''scientific secession.''

Lose New Orleans

Annie Rice wrote in NYT Do You Know What It Means to Lose New Orleans? - What do people really know about New Orleans? Do they take away with them an awareness that it has always been not only a great white metropolis but also a great black city, a city where African-Americans have come together again and again to form the strongest African-American culture in the land?

A culture in which blacks with cars followed the manditory evacuation orders and left the city, but did not take less affluent blacks lacking transportation with them. And in which a Black mayor had 364 buses owned by the New Orleans public transit or the 205 buses owned by the New Orleans school system at his disposal with which he could have evacuated those without transportation, and instead he just sat in his new offices in a hotel that was not flooded, sent the tourists staying in that hotel to the front of the line at the Superdome to get out of town on buses provided by the Federal Government, and just sat by crying and complaining the Federal Government was not doing enough, quickly enough.

Why did the people of New Orleans elect him? Was it not his job to do all he could to protect his citizens?

.... Now nature has done what the Civil War couldn't do. Nature has done what the labor riots of the 1920's couldn't do. Nature had done what "modern life" with its relentless pursuit of efficiency couldn't do. It has done what racism couldn't do, and what segregation couldn't do either. Nature has laid the city waste - with a scope that brings to mind the end of Pompeii

A city which was not rebuilt after it's disaster, and New Orleans should not either, at least not in the same place

..... I share this history for a reason - and to answer questions that have arisen these last few days. Almost as soon as the cameras began panning over the rooftops, and the helicopters began chopping free those trapped in their attics, a chorus of voices rose. "Why didn't they leave?" people asked both on and off camera. "Why did they stay there when they knew a storm was coming?" One reporter even asked me, "Why do people live in such a place?" Then as conditions became unbearable, the looters took to the streets. Windows were smashed, jewelry snatched, stores broken open, water and food and televisions carried out by fierce and uninhibited crowds.

Water and food is understandable. Televisions, jewelry, and guns were just taken by thieves.

Now the voices grew even louder. How could these thieves loot and pillage in a time of such crisis? How could people shoot one another? Because the faces of those drowning and the faces of those looting were largely black faces, race came into the picture. What kind of people are these, the people of New Orleans, who stay in a city about to be flooded, and then turn on one another?

Well, here's an answer. Thousands didn't leave New Orleans because they couldn't leave. They didn't have the money. They didn't have the vehicles.

And they had a Black mayor with had 364 buses owned by the New Orleans public transit or the 205 buses owned by the New Orleans school system at his disposal who did NOTHING with them.

They didn't have any place to go. They are the poor, black and white, who dwell in any city in great numbers; and they did what they felt they could do - they huddled together in the strongest houses they could find. There was no way to up and leave and check into the nearest Ramada Inn.

What's more, thousands more who could have left stayed behind to help others. They went out in the helicopters and pulled the survivors off rooftops;

So they had helicopters, but not 569 buses?

they went through the flooded streets in their boats trying to gather those they could find. Meanwhile, city officials tried desperately to alleviate the worsening conditions in the Superdome

How did they try to help? Did they send the people out on the 569 buses? Did they bring PortaPotties in so the place would not turn into the disaster it did?

, while makeshift shelters and hotels and hospitals struggled. And where was everyone else during all this? Oh, help is coming, New Orleans was told. We are a rich country. Congress is acting. Someone will come to stop the looting and care for the refugees. And it's true: eventually, help did come. But how many times did Gov. Kathleen Blanco have to say that the situation was desperate?

How many times did she call for aid? Her letter of 8/28 asked for a declaration which was issued the next day, and help with debris removal. She then asked on 9/2 for troops, that arrived the same day.

How many times did Mayor Ray Nagin have to call for aid?

Did he do all he could with the resources he had at his disposal, or did he just expect the Federal government to come in when State and Local governments did little or nothing to help themselves?

Why did America ask a city cherished by millions and excoriated by some, but ignored by no one, to fight for its own life for so long? That's my question.

Natasha @PacificViews blogged Anne Rice writes in the New York Times about what it means to lose New Orleans.

Arthur Silber blogged Given the prominence of New Orleans as the setting for many of her novels, I assumed Anne Rice would have a few things to say about this week’s events. And so she does

Looting

WaPo reported Iraq's deputy ambassador to the United Nations yesterday drew a comparison between the way U.S. troops have been sent to New Orleans to put down looting and the failure in 2003 of coalition forces to halt looting in Baghdad and other Iraqi cities.

Emphasizing that he was speaking as an individual and not in his official capacity, Deputy Ambassador Feisal Amin Istrabadi said at a meeting of the American Political Science Association that he thought about the U.S. forces' lack of action two years ago to halt the extensive looting in Baghdad as he followed the events in New Orleans. He added: "I hope others did, too."

In Iraq Saddam emptied his jails of all but political prisoners and the looting was just criminals doing what they had been trained to do

In New Orleans the prisoners were kept in jail (in fact I heard a story about the Chief of Police swimming over with handcuffs in his mouth so he could remove the prisoners one by one and get them to safety). The looting and shooting in New Orleans was done by the gangs (which the New Orleans police had never gotten control of) that did not evacuate, but stayed behind to do exactly that.

Arthur Chrenkoff: blogged For the angry left, this is the perfect storm; everything they said Iraq was - chaos, bloodshed, confusion, humanitarian nightmare, looting, not enough troops, negligent Administration, no contingency plans - except it's better because it's not on the other side of the world but in the heart of America.

Navy Turns to Halliburton

NYT reported Facing extensive damage by Hurricane Katrina to naval installations in Mississippi, the Navy turned immediately to the Halliburton Company's KBR subsidiary for tasks like restoring electricity, repairing roofs and clearing debris at bases that are urgently needed for response efforts. It is a familiar role for KBR, which under longstanding contracts has delivered the engineering equivalent of first aid to the Navy and other military and government agencies after natural disasters for more than 15 years. This time, the Halliburton unit's performance is likely to be watched especially closely, as its work under separate contracts in Iraq has come under extensive criticism in the past two years. The Naval Facilities Engineering Command turned to Halliburton after the hurricane under terms of a five-year contract worth up to $500 million, renewed in 2004 after competitive bidding, that calls on the company to provide immediate services on demand after natural disasters, in humanitarian crises or in military conflicts. Last year, the Navy invoked the same contract after Hurricane Ivan hit Florida.

TheAnchoress blogged If Don Singleton is right, Gov. Blanco did not write her letter to the feds asking for help until the day they got there. But maybe the thing is just a formality and doesn’t really enter in. We’ll have to find out.

As I acknowledged here she did write another letter on 8/28 requesting the declaration that Bush did on the next day but it did not ask for troops, but just money and help with debris removal

Oh, and President Bush caused Katrina, so Halliburton could make more money. I’m just saving you time, folks, now you don’t have to go read it on the lefty blogs or in the MSM!

Lorie Byrd blogged A Polipundit reader predicted this one early on and I commented here.

The MSM is jumping on the Navy using Haliburton and its subsidiary KBR as a jab against the VP, but the reason they use Haliburton and KBR is they have worked with them for many years and they know they can get things done. Disclosure, I worked for Brown and Root (now KBR) one summer, and again for about a year after I left college.

Ghost Town

Independent reported New Orleans will have to be abandoned for at least nine months, and many of its people will remain homeless for up to two years, the US government believes.

I believe it should be a ghost town for 900 years. They should tear down the levee, rather than trying to repair it, and allow silt from the Mississippi to cover up the reminents of a city that has had to be abandoned, and then turn the area into a huge landfill for a New New Orleans built near by, but on land that is ABOVE SEA LEVEL.

It is not right to try to fight Mother Nature, by trying to maintain a city that is below the level of a river on one side, and a lake on the other side, and a gulf rapidly getting closer on the third side.

What Happens to a Race Deferred

Jason DeParle wrote in NYT The white people got out. Most of them, anyway. If television and newspaper images can be deemed a statistical sample, it was mostly black people who were left behind. Poor black people, growing more hungry, sick and frightened by the hour as faraway officials counseled patience and warned that rescues take time.

New Orleans racial mix was 28.05% white, 67.25% black, so a lot of blacks followed the manditory evacuation orders. And the black mayor had 364 buses owned by the New Orleans public transit or the 205 buses owned by the New Orleans school system at his disposal. How many of them did he use to get the poor (black AND white) that had no way to get out without help, out of New Orleans, either before the storm, after the storm but before the levee broke, or after the levee broke?

What a shocked world saw exposed in New Orleans last week wasn't just a broken levee. It was a cleavage of race and class, at once familiar and startlingly new, laid bare in a setting where they suddenly amounted to matters of life and death. Hydrology joined sociology throughout the story line, from the settling of the flood-prone city, where well-to-do white people lived on the high ground, to its frantic abandonment.

The pictures of the suffering vied with reports of marauding, of gunshots fired at rescue vehicles and armed bands taking over the streets. The city of quaint eccentricity - of King Cakes, Mardi Gras beads and nice neighbors named Tookie - had taken a Conradian turn. In the middle of the delayed rescue, the New Orleans mayor, C.Ray Nagin, a local boy made good from a poor, black ward, burst into tears of frustration as he denounced slow moving federal officials and called for martial law.

So we have a poor black mayor crying in frustration, and blaming it on federal officials. Did he use the New Orleans police to restore order? Did he use the 364 buses owned by the New Orleans public transit or the 205 buses owned by the New Orleans school system to try to get people out of New Orleans, or did he just cry and complain?

Captain Ed blogged Unfortunately for DeParle, the problem of the people left behind squarely falls into the incompetence of local government to follow its own emergency response plan -- a local government headed up by the "local boy made good from a poor, black ward," Mayor Ray Nagin. Certainly he of all people would have known that an evacuation order might disproportionately affect the poorer citizens of his city. Yet Nagin and his office never engaged the EOC, never got the buses out of the yards, and never attempted to rescue those who wanted to leave New Orleans but lacked the means to do so. Does DeParle claim that Mayor Nagin acted out of racial animosity rather than incompetence?

Baldilocks blogged Back when I was growing up, real men took charge and made decisions. They protected women and children--especially their own children--and got them out of harm’s way; out of the way of things like hurricanes, especially when they had days of advance warning. And if they made the wrong decision, they tried to make things right and/or took the consequences. Like young Jabbar Gibson. They didn’t expect someone else to be the protector—be the man—and then whine about how the substitute man wasn’t being the substitute man fast enough. No one should wonder that gangs of thieves, terrorists, rapists and murderers plagued the refugees. Such are the rotten fruit of fatherless societies--societies with a dearth of real men.

Jerry blogged To look at the coverage, the ONLY place affected by Katrina was New Orleans. I know, I know, the media just wants to 'help' by pointing out the problems. And now they're tossing the race card on top, trying to ... what? Try to deflect blame from the NOLA mayor and the failed city disaster prep folks? Yet if the media won't acknowledge and detail the scope of the actual problem, how can they effectively suggest remedies?

It's not about taking care of the disaster victims or possibly fixing the problems- it's about dragging down Bush. They've got great pictures to do it with, and over the next few months EVERYTHING is going to be Bush's fault - even when all the evidence is pointing precisely where the real problem was

My response to War and Piece

As Laura Rozen from the War and Piece said to me, "I jumped on your site. You know, my father is from Tulsa and shares your politics and to a surprising degree I understand where you're coming from. But I don't agree with almost anything you write and I suspect neither you of me."

She is correct, but I enjoy a good debate with those on the other side, if they can be reasonably factual in their arguments, and not fall back to just ad hominum attacks, against either me or President Bush, who I support. I incouraged her to post comments here, or on her blog and to trackback to my post, since her blog did not support either comments or trackbacks, but instead she enabled comments on one post and I have been carrying on a discussion with some of her readers. Ocassionally they made jabs, but when I ignored them, and came back with facts rather than jabs on my part, they really started coming up with some facts which needed to be addressed. I addressed them there, but I wanted to post a couple of their posts here, and show my responses, in case any of my readers have anything to add.

Elrod said I agree that Nagin comes in for some blame here. The point about the buses is true. They were actually owned by a private contractor - not the city - but I doubt he would have had trouble commandeering them. Who knows?

But the point about the Governor not allowing the National Guard is incorrect. First, Louisiana has no "martial law", so she couldn't have signed such a decree. Second, according to Bush's FEMA order that you've cited numerous times, the DHS had full authority already to use any means for rescue, recovery and security. As the FEMA directive says, "FEMA is authorized to identify, mobilize, and provide at its discretion, equipment and resources necessary to alleviate the impacts of the emergency." Sounds like the Feds had all the authorization they needed even before the storm hit. They didn't need any special order from the state. But before the storm, Gov. Blanco did specifically request help following Bush's FEMA order. http://gov.louisiana.gov/Disaster%20Relief%20Request.pdf

Her letter includes many specific requests, and the actual disaster to follow clearly superceded the ones mentioned in her letter. But it is quite clear that she was actively seeking Federal help before the storm.

So, the Feds were ready to offer help, and the Louisiana state government was willing to ask for help, yet...the help never arrived until it was too late. In our Federal system, the Federal government takes primary responsibility in cases of national emergency - which the DHS's own mission statement even specifies. The primary responsbility for this failure lies with the Federal government.

My response: Elrod, the New Orleans transit buses may be owned by a private contractor, but as you said, Nagin probably could have gotten them, and I suspect the City owns the 205 buses referenced here, and only one was used, as far as I know, and the 18 year old using it to save lives is in legal jeapordy

How much suffering could have been avoided if both the Transit and the School buses had been loaded up once the mandatory evacuation order was signed, to get those without transportation out of the area.

You are correct that on 8/28 she requested the declaration of a major disaster, and that was done on 8/29

She also requested a bunch of individual assistance programs (money) and help on debris removal.

I know Louisiana does not have "martial law", despite Mayor Nagin declaring it, but the Governor does have the power to declare an emergency (which she did) and to request federal forces (which she did on 9/2)

But I did not see any request for National Guard people from other states (she has the power to call up the Louisiana national guard, and although 40% are in Iraq, 60% are not), nor did I see authorization for US Military (enabling him to waive Posse Comitas) prior to 9/2.

Do you really want the President (whether Democrat or Republican) to have the power to send troops (active military, reserves, or federalized National Guard) into a state without the authorization of that state's Governor? That request came on 9/2, the same day the convoys arrived.

wcw said My mistake, Don. Apologies for the unkind words about your post (no apologies on the blog, though; ugh).

For the record, while the FEMA timestamp is 8/29 hence the same as landfall, I found news outlets registering that declaration by the 28th. It might well have gone over the wires as early as the day before, giving the aforementioned two days.

I remain interested in any links to actual (not nominal) federal efforts on the 27th or 28th. Being wrong tends to spur my efforts, but I couldn't find anything concrete there, or really anything at all.

My response: wcw, I agree I recall hearing about the declaration a day or two earlier, but at least it was on or before 8/29

I dont have any other links to say they brought in aid before 9/2, but they certainly staged it close to the area, because the trucks brought it in on 9/2, and initially they thought Katrina was going to hit New Orleans directly, but instead it turned to the east and focused on Mississippi (and to some extent Alabama) and it was well on land before the levee (a levee which had recently been upgraded, not the levee for whom work was planned but not funded) broke. And once it broke, communication was drastically reduced, and access drastically restricted due to flooding.

Sunday, September 4

This Day In History

1781 Los Angeles, California was born. The Mexican Provincial Governor, Felipe de Neve, founded El Pueblo de Nuestra Senora la Reina de Los Angeles, originally named Nuestra Senora la Reina de Los Angeles de Porciuncula, by Gaspar de Portola, a Spanish army captain and Juan Crespi, a Franciscan priest, who had noticed the beautiful area as they traveled north from San Diego in 1769. El Pueblo de Nuestra Senora la Reina de Los Angeles translates into the Village of our Lady, the Queen of the Angels ... L.A. for short.
1833 Barney Flaherty answered an ad in "The New York Sun" and became the first newsboy. Actually, Barney became what we now call a paperboy. He was 10 years old at the time. Show us a 10-year-old who reads a newspaper today. Those were the days! Of course, there was no radio, no TV, no MTV, no computers, no Internet. What was a kid to do?
1882 Thomas Edison displayed the first practical electrical lighting system. The Pearl Street electric power station, Edison’'s steam powered plant, began operating and successfully turned on the lights in a one square mile area of New York City.
1885 On this day, the Exchange Buffet opened in New York City. It was the first self-service cafeteria in the U.S.
1888 George Eastman received a patent for his roll-film camera and registered his trademark: Kodak.
1917 The American expeditionary force in France suffered its first fatalities in World War I.
1948 Queen Wilhelmina abdicated the Dutch throne for health reasons.
1951 In the first live coast-to-coast television broadcast, President Harry S. Truman addressed the nation from the Japanese peace treaty conference in San Francisco.
1957 Ford Motor Co. began selling its ill-fated Edsel line.
1967 Michigan Gov. George Romney said during a TV interview that he had undergone a ''brainwashing'' by U.S. officials during a 1965 visit to Vietnam.
1972 U.S. swimmer Mark Spitz won a record seventh Olympic gold medal in the 400-meter relay at the Munich Summer Olympics.
1997 Three Buddhist nuns acknowledged in Senate testimony that their temple outside Los Angeles illegally reimbursed donors after a fund-raiser attended by Vice President Al Gore, and later destroyed or altered records.
2002 Singer Kelly Clarkson was voted the first ''American Idol'' on the Fox TV series.

Happy Birthday To

1803 Sarah Childress Polk (First Lady: wife of 11th President of the United States, James Knox Polk; died Aug 14, 1891)
1917 Henry Ford II (industrialist: head of Ford Motor Co. [1945-1980]; died Sep 29, 1987)
1918 Paul Harvey (news commentator: “Hello Americans. Stand by for news!”: The Rest of the Story)
1928 Dick (Richard Allen) York (actor: Bewitched)
1930 Mitzi Gaynor (Franchesca Mitzi Marlene de Charney von Gerber) (singer, dancer, actress)
1949 Tom Watson (golf champion)

Saturday, September 03, 2005

Criticism of Bush mounts

Guardian reported George Bush arrived last night in the ravaged Gulf coast region amid mounting criticism of his handling of the crisis and a prediction by one senator that the death toll in Louisiana alone could top 10,000 people.

Why blame Bush for the deaths? I think the Hurricane was responsible for most of them, and the New Orleans police were totally ineffective at controlling the gangs that ignored the evacuation notices and stayed to loot and kill innocent people to establish their control over particular areas. If they are complaining about the speed Bush tried to help, he declared Louisiana a disaster area on 8/29, before Katrina hit land. And Mayor Ray Nagin and Governor Kathleen Blanco were a lot more responsible for things the first few days. Her letter to George Bush requesting assistance was on September 2, two days after the levee breach, and the same day the convoy arrived, and Bush signed the $10.5 billion aid package.

Planned Parenthood

The Dawn Patrol blogged Planned Parenthood, the government-subsidized so-called nonprofit that made a $35.2 million profit last year, is shamelessly milking Americans' compassion for Katrina victims—by using the disaster as an excuse to raise money.

Is Planned Parenthood offering evacuees food? No! Water? No! Shelter? No! First aid? No!

The front page of Planned Parenthood's Web site features a heart-tugging photograph of hurricane victims lining up on a New Orleans sidewalk. The victims in the foreground are black. The text reads:

Help Those Affected by Hurricane

Planned Parenthood staff are on the frontlines aiding patients in the aftermath of Hurricane Katrina. You can help. 100% of your tax-deductible contribution will go directly to supporting our efforts.

Clicking the "more" link leads to an page that reads:
Help Those Affected by Hurricane

Planned Parenthood clinics in the states of Louisiana, Mississippi, Alabama, and Texas are doing everything possible to attend to the needs of patients in the aftermath of Hurricane Katrina. Women and families escaped the storm with their lives,

Note it says "women and families." Not just "victims," or "women, men and children." Women first, then families—men and children nowhere in sight. It's like that famous New York Times headline parody: "World Ends; Women, Minorities Hit Hardest."
The pitch continues:
leaving behind birth control and other items critical to their well-being.
It's really all about birth control. If Planned Parenthood were providing "other items critical to their well-being," they'd say what those items were.

The pitch translates to: "You've seen those masses of displaced black people on TV. Give us money and we'll make sure that, when they come to your town, they don't breed!"

It continues:
Those desperate for care are rushing to their nearest health center to get the care and treatment they need. Despite the horrific events of the past few days, affiliates and health centers in this region are determined to serve all those that come through the door.

Support Planned Parenthood and their patients during this time of great need. 100% of your tax-deductible contribution will go directly to helping Planned Parenthood affiliates and health centers in this region serve women and families who have nowhere else to turn.
If those refugees have nowhere else to turn but Planned Parenthood, they're really in trouble.

I started to say this is obscene, but then just about anything Planned Parenthood does is obscene. But to try to take advantage of people's generosity, thinking they are helping the people displaced by Katrina find food, water, shelter, and first aid, is ,,,, obscene.

Looting and Buses

Michelle Malkin blogged In case you missed it: Meant to link this incredible story yesterday. Here's another account. Some are characterizing the young, first-time bus driver's act as "looting." But the bus that Jabbar Gibson "commandeered" had been abandoned on a New Orleans street. He took it upon himself to rescue dozens of families--grandmothers, young parents, toddlers, and an 8-day-old infant. That is not "looting." (This is.)

What the young man did was heroic. But according to reports, he may face criminal charges. Bryan Preston points out the real New Orleans bus crime. After you read the story, go over to Slight Clutter's place at Flickr. The photographer was there when the renegade bus arrived. Pulitzer Prize-level photos, if you ask me. I hope the Houston Chronicle or local bloggers can keep track of Jabbar Gibson and the other children on the renegade bus. Perhaps the boneheaded Reliant Astrodome officials who initially refused to let the passengers in after their 13-hour journey can make up for their poor judgment by establishing a Renegade Bus Riders Relief Fund. Or maybe someone else in Houston can pick up the ball?

Breaking into a grocery store to get something to eat or drink, under conditions like existed in New Orleans is not looting.

Breaking into a Walmart and stealing all of the guns is looting

Breaking into a drug store to get medical supplies is not looting (and some police did this in New Orleans)

Breaking into a drug store and stealing all of the narcotics is looting

Taking an abandoned bus and driving a bunch of people to safety is not looting

Sending people to the head of a line of buses so they will get out of a hotel that you want to use for your people probably isn't looting, even when done by the Mayor of New Orleans, and failing to use the 364 buses owned by the New Orleans public transit or the 205 buses owned by the New Orleans school system, and just blaming the President for not sending you buses earlier is not looting either, it is just plain stupid.

And take a look at this. It does not matter what color you are, what you are taking, and why you are taking it, determines whether you should be called a looter.

Confabulator blogged You hear about the rampant looting, shooting, rapes and various other crimes against humanity by some of the remaining people in NOLA and then I ask you have you heard about what Jabar Gibson did, probably not as it is a story from Houston. He demonstrates what calm thinking and looking at options available is what many others in NOLA should have done.

Rancher blogged There are looters and there are looters. In the first case we have dirty cops, which of course contribute to a bad tone in a city. In the second we have a hero that may face prosecution for utilizing an asset that the city should have utilized.... Maybe the Mayor should be prosecuted for failing to see that school buses should be utilized in an emergency when they obviously aren’t going to be used to transport kids to school. Help is on the way.

And speaking of buses, look at this

B. Preston blogged This is infuriating:

An angry Terry Ebbert, head of New Orleans' emergency operations, watched the slow exodus from the Superdome on Thursday morning and said the Federal Emergency Management Agency response was inadequate. The chaos at the nearby New Orleans Convention Center was considerably worse than the Superdome, with an angry mob growing increasingly violent and few options for refugees to leave the scene. "This is a national disgrace. FEMA has been here three days, yet there is no command and control," Ebbert said. "We can send massive amounts of aid to tsunami victims, but we can't bail out the city of New Orleans."

Ebbert's job is to coordinate New Orleans' response to emergencies. Somebody should show him this picture and tell him to stop blaming everyone but himself:

New Orleans owns those buses. Here's their significance:
I count 205 busses. When I was a kid, I remember that school busses could carry 66 people. If that is still the case, 13,530 people could be carried to safety in ONE trip using only the busses shown in that picture.

One trip.
Houston is 350 miles from New Orleans. At 50 miles per hour, 13,530 people could have reached Houston in seven hours. Turn the buses around. 14 hours later another 13,530 people are in Houston, far away from Katrina's wrath. In a little more than a day's time, you've gotten the poorest people who wanted to leave but couldn't leave on their own out of the city. And you don't have to drive them as far as Houston. It's the closest huge city, but there are lots of smaller towns you could ferry people to more quickly. The shorter the drive, the more trips you can make. Pretty soon 26,000 saved becomes everyone saved. If anyone left behind in the storm survives and then loots, at least they're not endangering thousands of innocent people. Those innocent people aren't there to be endangered. They're somewhere else.

You see, buses have these interesting features on them, Mr. Ebbert, called wheels. They allow buses to move about the streets of a city under the control of a human. Because of their wheels, buses can go to where the people are and offer them a ride. You could tell people to congregate at street corners for easier pickup. Moreover, since the buses are on the road picking up people and moving them out of the city, they're not in the path of the flood when the levee breaks. So you can keep using them to get the few stragglers who managed to survive the storm and the floods. And you can use them to haul in supplies. Troops. Whatever you need.

But since no one mobilized these buses before the storm--ahem, Mr. Ebbert--since no one mobilized them before the storm, the poor in New Orleans had no way of getting out. And now the buses are waterlogged and useless. All 205 of them. They will go on the expense side of the ledger instead of the asset side. That's your fault, Mr. Ebbert. The blame rests with you, sir. You knew the city owned those buses, you knew where to get them, where to fuel them and you probably had a list of the drivers who operate them. Yet there they sit, half submerged.

One emergency manager with half a clue and a couple hundred drivers could have more or less saved New Orleans from turning into Mad Max territory. Terry Ebbert can blame everyone else all he wants, but this crisis is almost entirely his fault.

Bill Hobbs is on the same page. He notes that New Orleans public transit has 364 buses it could have used to carry out the mandatory evacuation. Those buses could have ferried 22,000 New Orleans residents to safety in one single trip. But they were never pressed into service.

Greyhawk blogged The only way the city management of New Orleans can avoid being lynched at noon on Rue Burbon is to keep blaming the President, loud and often. It will work, too.

Slogging, and Blogging, Through Katrina

WaPo reported When people prepare for hurricanes, they do many things: top off gas tanks in cars, fill bathtubs with water, buy water, charge up mobile phones and check evacuation routes. I did all these things. And I started a blog.

Sounds like Kaye has her priorities straight. I would have skipped the charge up mobile phone step, because I don't have one, but otherwise it is just as I would have done. <grub>

Hearing that Hurricane Katrina was making her way to Louisiana, I started the blog to keep my loved ones updated about my safety. Even though I have been through many hurricanes, this would be the first I would go through alone. Why not just leave? I thought I had to work on Tuesday. I didn't naively assume that the audience for Kaye's Hurricane Katrina Blog was limited to my loved ones; I knew others might be interested in my "coverage." Even so, I blogged my account in a very personal way. Within hours my readership expanded from my family in Florida, Kansas and Texas to people in Israel, Germany and across the United States. With A-list blogs (whose audiences rival those of small weeklies) linking to my site, the word that I was blogging the storm spread quickly.

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