Wait, turns out New Orleans is screwed after all

[Sponger15SB]

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You fellas know what martial law is, right?

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Hey c'mon I already made a joke like this in the other thread!

Link

[JDErickson]

Watched an interview this morning of 2 French Canadians on vacation in New Orleans. They were lamenting how they had no water or power in their hotel and how hot it was.

Are people really that dumb? They knew the hurricane was coming and they were told to evacuate but they stay anyway and then bitch about it. sigh

[M2d]

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Hey c'mon I already made a joke like this in the other thread!

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sorry, man. didn't see it.

[Sponger15SB]

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Hey c'mon I already made a joke like this in the other thread!

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sorry, man. didn't see it.

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I am just messing with you. Yours is actually better than mine because someone set you up for it.

[LethalRose]

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Why are people allowed to build homes in these areas that look no different then a house you would see anywhere else in the country?


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I dont think building codes exist that can withstand a cat 5 hurricane. And if you build the entire area out of houses that theoretically could nobody could afford them. Its a question of money, they know its dangerous to live there.

[HopeydaFish]

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Watched an interview this morning of 2 French Canadians on vacation in New Orleans. They were lamenting how they had no water or power in their hotel and how hot it was.

Are people really that dumb? They knew the hurricane was coming and they were told to evacuate but they stay anyway and then bitch about it. sigh

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You answered your own question.

These are the same people who wear black socks and sandals to the beach, after all.

[HopeydaFish]

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Are there no 'inexpensive areas to live' in the northern part of the state?

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Yes, but if their jobs are in the southern half of the state (in New Orleans, or with the oil industry), living in the northern half doesn't make much sense.

A state like Louisiana has a choice -- enforce strict building codes and drive up the housing prices so that no one can afford their own homes, or let people live in "unsafe" homes and cross their fingers that a Katrina-sized hurricane doesn't hit. Unfortunately, driving up housing prices with your policies would be a perfect way of *not* getting re-elected, so you can see why politicians are reluctant to rectify the situation.

It's much easier and safer (politics-wise) to get disaster relief once every 20 years or so when a hurricane blows through than to actually be proactive about the situation.

[Ed Miller]

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There are two main ways out of the city: I-10 and the Causeway (linking to I-12 north of the lake).

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Make that WERE two ways out of the city. Saw on a blog somewhere that the Causeway is destroyed.

I could be wrong. This is not written with the classic OOT snide humorous tone, just adding some news here.

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The bridge that was widely reported destroyed yesterday was the I-10 bridge east out of the city (across about a six mile stretch of the lake). So yes, I-10 is toasted. I don't know about the Causeway, but I wouldn't be surprised when all is taken into account to find that it too is kaput.

[tek]

Pentagon devising scenarios for martial law in US
By Patrick Martin
9 August 2005

According to a report published Monday by the Washington Post, the Pentagon has developed its first ever war plans for operations within the continental United States, in which terrorist attacks would be used as the justification for imposing martial law on cities, regions or the entire country.

The front-page article cites sources working at the headquarters of the military’s Northern Command (Northcom), located in Colorado Springs, Colorado. The plans themselves are classified, but “officers who drafted the plans” gave details to Post reporter Bradley Graham, who was recently given a tour of Northcom headquarters at Peterson Air Force Base. The article thus appears to be a deliberate leak conducted for the purpose of accustoming the American population to the prospect of military rule.

Military lawyers have studied the legal implications of such deployments, which risk coming into conflict with a longstanding congressional prohibition on the use of the military for domestic policing, known as posse comitatus. Involving the National Guard, which is exempt from posse comitatus, could be one solution, Admiral Keating told the Post. “He cited a potential situation in which Guard units might begin rounding up people while regular forces could not,” Graham wrote.

Graham adds: “when it comes to ground forces possibly taking a lead role in homeland operations, senior Northcom officers remain reluctant to discuss specifics. Keating said such situations, if they arise, probably would be temporary, with lead responsibility passing back to civilian authorities.”

A remarkable phrase: “probably would be temporary.” In other words, the military takeover might not be temporary, and could become permanent!

In his article, Graham describes the Northern Command’s “Combined Intelligence and Fusion Center, which joins military analysts with law enforcement and counterintelligence specialists from such civilian agencies as the FBI, the CIA and the Secret Service.” The article continues: “A senior supervisor at the facility said the staff there does no intelligence collection, only analysis. He also said the military operates under long-standing rules intended to protect civilian liberties. The rules, for instance, block military access to intelligence information on political dissent or purely criminal activity.”

Again, despite the soothing reassurances about respecting civil liberties, another phrase leaps out: “intelligence information on political dissent.” What right do US intelligence agencies have to collect information on political dissent? Political dissent is not only perfectly legal, but essential to the functioning of a democracy.

The reality is that the military brass is intensely interested in monitoring political dissent because its domestic operations will be directed not against a relative handful of Islamic fundamentalist terrorists—who have not carried out a single operation inside the United States since September 11, 2001—but against the democratic rights of the American people.

The plans of Northcom have their origins not in the terrible events of 9/11, but in longstanding concerns in corporate America about the political stability of the United States. This is a society increasingly polarized between the fabulously wealthy elite at the top, and the vast majority of working people who face an increasingly difficult struggle to survive. The nightmare of the American ruling class is the emergence of a mass movement from below that challenges its political and economic domination.

As for the claims that these military plans are driven by genuine concern over the threat of terrorist attacks, these are belied by the actual conduct of the American ruling elite since 9/11. The Bush administration has done everything possible to suppress any investigation into the circumstances of the attacks on the World Trade Center and the Pentagon—most likely because its own negligence, possibly deliberate, would be exposed.

The anti-terrorism scare has a propaganda purpose: to manipulate the American people and induce the public to accept drastic inroads against democratic rights. As the Pentagon planning suggests, the American working class faces the danger of some form of military-police dictatorship in the United States.

[ThaSaltCracka]

Ed, I hope your friends and family are safe down there. I have a let of relatives in Louisiana and Eastern Texas.