Oprano. What is wrong with this?

[Weg Cory]

Seems obvious to me.

--------------------

Convention Center disaster

# FEMA chief Brown: We learned about that (Thursday), so I have directed that we have all available resources to get that convention center to make sure that they have the food and water and medical care that they need. (See video of Brown explaining how news reports alerted FEMA to convention center chaos. -- 2:11)

# Mayor Nagin: The convention center is unsanitary and unsafe, and we are running out of supplies for the 15,000 to 20,000 people. (Hear Nagin's angry demand for soldiers. 1:04)

# CNN Producer Kim Segal: It was chaos. There was nobody there, nobody in charge. And there was nobody giving even water. The children, you should see them, they're all just in tears. There are sick people. We saw... people who are dying in front of you.

# Evacuee Raymond Cooper: Sir, you've got about 3,000 people here in this -- in the Convention Center right now. They're hungry. Don't have any food. We were told two-and-a-half days ago to make our way to the Superdome or the Convention Center by our mayor. And which when we got here, was no one to tell us what to do, no one to direct us, no authority figure.



Uncollected corpses

# Brown: That's not been reported to me, so I'm not going to comment. Until I actually get a report from my teams that say, "We have bodies located here or there," I'm just not going to speculate.

# Segal: We saw one body. A person is in a wheelchair and someone had pushed (her) off to the side and draped just like a blanket over this person in the wheelchair. And then there is another body next to that. There were others they were willing to show us. ( See CNN report, 'People are dying in front of us' -- 4:36 )

# Evacuee Cooper: They had a couple of policemen out here, sir, about six or seven policemen told me directly, when I went to tell them, hey, man, you got bodies in there. You got two old ladies that just passed, just had died, people dragging the bodies into little corners. One guy -- that's how I found out. The guy had actually, hey, man, anybody sleeping over here? I'm like, no. He dragged two bodies in there. Now you just -- I just found out there was a lady and an old man, the lady went to nudge him. He's dead.



Hospital evacuations

# Brown: I've just learned today that we ... are in the process of completing the evacuations of the hospitals, that those are going very well.

# CNN's Dr. Sanjay Gupta: It's gruesome. I guess that is the best word for it. If you think about a hospital, for example, the morgue is in the basement, and the basement is completely flooded. So you can just imagine the scene down there. But when patients die in the hospital, there is no place to put them, so they're in the stairwells. It is one of the most unbelievable situations I've seen as a doctor, certainly as a journalist as well. There is no electricity. There is no water. There's over 200 patients still here remaining. ...We found our way in through a chopper and had to land at a landing strip and then take a boat. And it is exactly ... where the boat was traveling where the snipers opened fire yesterday, halting all the evacuations. ( Watch the video report of corpses stacked in stairwells -- 4:45 )

# Dr. Matthew Bellew, Charity Hospital: We still have 200 patients in this hospital, many of them needing care that they just can't get. The conditions are such that it's very dangerous for the patients. Just about all the patients in our services had fevers. Our toilets are overflowing. They are filled with stool and urine. And the smell, if you can imagine, is so bad, you know, many of us had gagging and some people even threw up. It's pretty rough.(Mayor's video: Armed addicts fighting for a fix -- 1:03)



Violence and civil unrest

# Brown: I've had no reports of unrest, if the connotation of the word unrest means that people are beginning to riot, or you know, they're banging on walls and screaming and hollering or burning tires or whatever. I've had no reports of that.

# CNN's Chris Lawrence: From here and from talking to the police officers, they're losing control of the city. We're now standing on the roof of one of the police stations. The police officers came by and told us in very, very strong terms it wasn't safe to be out on the street. (Watch the video report on explosions and gunfire -- 2:12)



The federal response:

# Brown: Considering the dire circumstances that we have in New Orleans, virtually a city that has been destroyed, things are going relatively well.

# Homeland Security Director Chertoff: Now, of course, a critical element of what we're doing is the process of evacuation and securing New Orleans and other areas that are afflicted. And here the Department of Defense has performed magnificently, as has the National Guard, in bringing enormous resources and capabilities to bear in the areas that are suffering.

# Crowd chanting outside the Convention Center: We want help.

# Nagin: They don't have a clue what's going on down there.

# Phyllis Petrich, a tourist stranded at the Ritz-Carlton: They are invisible. We have no idea where they are. We hear bits and pieces that the National Guard is around, but where? We have not seen them. We have not seen FEMA officials. We have seen no one.



Security

# Brown: I actually think the security is pretty darn good. There's some really bad people out there that are causing some problems, and it seems to me that every time a bad person wants to scream of cause a problem, there's somebody there with a camera to stick it in their face. ( See Jack Cafferty's rant on the government's 'bungled' response -- 0:57)

# Chertoff: In addition to local law enforcement, we have 2,800 National Guard in New Orleans as we speak today. One thousand four hundred additional National Guard military police trained soldiers will be arriving every day: 1,400 today, 1,400 tomorrow and 1,400 the next day.

# Nagin: I continue to hear that troops are on the way, but we are still protecting the city with only 1,500 New Orleans police officers, an additional 300 law enforcement personnel, 250 National Guard troops, and other military personnel who are primarily focused on evacuation.

# Lawrence: The police are very, very tense right now. They're literally riding around, full assault weapons, full tactical gear, in pickup trucks. Five, six, seven, eight officers. It is a very tense situation here.

[Hell Puppy]

If Brown were a quarterback, he'd be pulled, sat on the bench, and the second stringer would be in the game by now.

[SykkBoy]

If Brown were a quarterback, he'd be demoted to shoveling french fries in the consession stand (and have 2 supervisors watching him to make sure he didn't fuck that up)

[Dravyk]

You think McNabb has it bad?

If he was quartering the Eagles -- and you know how we Philly fans are -- and the coach let him stay in the game, the fans would take him out, literally, by giving him a concussion with beer bottles!

... And then boycott all home games until he was traded!!

[ThrobX]

Yep, he's on our payroll, and his name is now Brown. Your tax dollars at work.

[XxXotic]

Originally Posted by Dravyk

You think McNabb has it bad?

If he was quartering the Eagles -- and you know how we Philly fans are -- and the coach let him stay in the game, the fans would take him out, literally, by giving him a concussion with beer bottles!

... And then boycott all home games until he was traded!!

or batteries, we LOVE throwing batteries

[Dravyk]

Originally Posted by XxXotic

or batteries, we LOVE throwing batteries

Oh? Where are you from?

Writing this down ... D size go farther and cause the best "thunk" ...

[XxXotic]

Originally Posted by Dravyk

Oh? Where are you from?

Writing this down ... D size go farther and cause the best "thunk" ...

i grew up in philly I live in baton rouge louisiana now. I used to be a huge barry sanders fan, and decided to wear my jersey to the eagles/lions playoff game 10-11 years ago (where mayberry guaranteed victory for det lol) and lost like 55-10 or some shit. Crazy blowout by eagles

I'll never get over the sound of 10,000 people chanting "aaaaaaaaaaaasshole" and throwing snowballs at me I wasnt a det fan, i was rooting for the eagles the whole time, just showing respect for what in my opinion is the best running back to ever play the game and I almost got killed

god i love philly fans!

[Biggy]

To be honest, its a combination of both Brown and Bush. I put more blame on Bush than Brown, compare their powers... Bush is always lackadaisical when it comes to things that aren't in his interest, and you can get that impression just by his overall attitude towards everything including life. He's very selfish, and unless something is on his agenda (or directly affects him), it gets 2nd priority. When he wants to do something he does it - for example like taking vacation and invading Iraq. He seems like a guy who likes to party, relax, etc - not the worker and intelligence you'd want in the white house.

This is what happens when you elect a president with a low IQ and who is an overall moron. IMO, he's only done one good thing in office: create the Homeland Security division which so far has prevented another 9/11 from happening. Except for that, hes been a complete wash, and what happened down in Louisiana was a direct result of his poor leadership skills (failure to act??). Its no wonder he bankrupted a few companies before his presidency, its a shame what politics has become. He seems clueless.

The success of the past few days I give full credit to Ray Nagin for... for calling a spade a spade. Every single one of his remarks was true, and it takes a true leader to speak the way he did. Without those remarks.. I wonder how long it would have gone on for more.

[XxXotic]

Originally Posted by Biggy

To be honest, its a combination of both Brown and Bush. I put more blame on Bush than Brown, compare their powers... Bush is always lackadaisical when it comes to things that aren't in his interest, and you can get that impression just by his overall attitude towards everything including life. He's very selfish, and unless something is on his agenda (or directly affects him), it gets 2nd priority. When he wants to do something he does it - for example like taking vacation and invading Iraq. He seems like a guy who likes to party, relax, etc - not the worker and intelligence you'd want in the white house.

This is what happens when you elect a president with a low IQ and who is an overall moron. IMO, he's only done one good thing in office: create the Homeland Security division which so far has prevented another 9/11 from happening. Except for that, hes been a complete wash, and what happened down in Louisiana was a direct result of his poor leadership skills (failure to act??). Its no wonder he bankrupted a few companies before his presidency, its a shame what politics has become. He seems clueless.

The success of the past few days I give full credit to Ray Nagin for... for calling a spade a spade. Every single one of his remarks was true, and it takes a true leader to speak the way he did. Without those remarks.. I wonder how long it would have gone on for more.

ok i'm EASILY the biggest bush hater on the planet. I really am, but to say he has a low IQ and is not smart is pretty ridiculous. Especially since it's usually his advisors that set policy and just tell bush what to say and when to say it. Bush has trouble speaking, nothing more. He's bad at public speaking, so am I, that doesn't make either of us dumb or possess a low IQ.

In regards to this being a direct result of bush that's bullshit too. Believe me, I'd LOVE to be able to blame dubya for this but you can't. This is a fuckup that started years ago With mayor morial in new orleans as well as then governor mike foster. Funds were there to tweak the levees and make new orleans safer but city and state government wasted the money on porkbarrel shit (mainly casino's) and not spending the money where it needed to be, protecting LA from an event like this. The whole reason new orleans is sinking is because the previous levee system didn't allow new minerals or sediment to be deposited anywhere except around the city, so essentially everything else is rising where new orleans is just staying at its current level which makes it "sink" in a sense. Now, had the levee system been re-worked to deposit new soil where it needed to be 10-15 years ago when they discovered this, most likely this situation would not be an issue.

Its easy to look at bush and pass the blame, but this ball has been rolling so to speak for a long, long time now. Bush/Blanco and Nagin just happened to be the ones in charge when the shit finally hit the fan.

now, what bush is to blame for is the lack of response after the event. This blame lies solely on his shoulders. Having a major metropolitan area wiped out and taking 2 more days for vacation and going to cali to learn a few gee-tar riffs before sending help here is also another dick move on his part. He cant be blamed for the event itself, but he can certainly be blamed for dropping the ball and letting it roll into the sewer on the rescue/aide effort

[Biggy]

Originally Posted by XxXotic

ok i'm EASILY the biggest bush hater on the planet. I really am, but to say he has a low IQ and is not smart is pretty ridiculous. Especially since it's usually his advisors that set policy and just tell bush what to say and when to say it. Bush has trouble speaking, nothing more. He's bad at public speaking, so am I, that doesn't make either of us dumb or possess a low IQ.

In regards to this being a direct result of bush that's bullshit too. Believe me, I'd LOVE to be able to blame dubya for this but you can't. This is a fuckup that started years ago With mayor morial in new orleans as well as then governor mike foster. Funds were there to tweak the levees and make new orleans safer but city and state government wasted the money on porkbarrel shit (mainly casino's) and not spending the money where it needed to be, protecting LA from an event like this. The whole reason new orleans is sinking is because the previous levee system didn't allow new minerals or sediment to be deposited anywhere except around the city, so essentially everything else is rising where new orleans is just staying at its current level which makes it "sink" in a sense. Now, had the levee system been re-worked to deposit new soil where it needed to be 10-15 years ago when they discovered this, most likely this situation would not be an issue.

Its easy to look at bush and pass the blame, but this ball has been rolling so to speak for a long, long time now. Bush/Blanco and Nagin just happened to be the ones in charge when the shit finally hit the fan.

now, what bush is to blame for is the lack of response after the event. This blame lies solely on his shoulders. Having a major metropolitan area wiped out and taking 2 more days for vacation and going to cali to learn a few gee-tar riffs before sending help here is also another dick move on his part. He cant be blamed for the event itself, but he can certainly be blamed for dropping the ball and letting it roll into the sewer on the rescue/aide effort

hey XxXotic - my remarks were meant specifically about the response. I mentioned in another thread, when I talk about this, its hard to talk about anything but the direct response.. what was in Mother's Nature way was in Mother Nature's way. We can always say "What if we had done the levee system," - its like on 9/11 saying "what if we had taken terrorism more seriously with the reports about a possible attack?" Those issues will always be there, its the direct response I am talking about and am very upset about, so I think we are in agreement Preventable and unnecessary deaths is what boils my blood.. If I was at the Superdome with my family like those families were, my own father would of died, I can say that with 99% certainty. I'm sure many people with loved ones who aren't the healthiest and on many important medications can say that...

[XxXotic]

Originally Posted by Biggy

hey XxXotic - my remarks were meant specifically about the response. I mentioned in another thread, when I talk about this, its hard to talk about anything but the direct response.. what was in Mother's Nature way was in Mother Nature's way. We can always say "What if we had done the levee system," - its like on 9/11 saying "what if we had taken terrorism more seriously with the reports about a possible attack?" Those issues will always be there, its the direct response I am talking about and am very upset about, so I think we are in agreement

right on, i wasnt really talking about what was inmother natures way, more of it being something that could have been prevented years ago with preparation. We didn't know 9/11 was coming, but we've been expecting this storm for a long, long time now. So response actually technically should have started years ago with rebuilding the levee system as well as making sure there were contingency plans to get everyone out and get those who couldnt get out immediate help.

sorry for any confusion left by my post.

[JoesHO]

I agree with you , Biggy