Evacuees being turned away from Houston's Astrodome

[krazyace5]

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I know I'll be told to take it to another forum, so I'll just say that the lack of leadership here has been apalling.

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I agree 100%, They really dropped the ball on this one.
Total bullshit.

[blatz]

I don't know what phase in dealing with a tragedy rage and blame comes in,, but for me it has arrived. I'm sitting here helplessly far away having escaped, watching the situation spin out of control, and have one question; If this hurricane hit San Diego, would the response to people begging for water after 3 days at the Convention Center, a spot that the rescued were sent be "Oh, we didn't know people were there, just sit tight, help is on the way, but dont try stealing juice in the meantime, or we'll shoot you"

We made jokes the next day, before it became apparent that the situation would get worse not better, that the only Democratic pocket in the Deep South would be gladly ignored by our nations leaders. The lack of response, since then, beyond platitudes, is sickening, and I pray that Venezuela, or some rich guy, breeches airspace and delivers some water to our dying countrymen.

We are supposed to be America, a country that can kick ass and take care of business. When it comes out that the amount of people who died post hurricane dwarves the amount who died during it, I hope we take a serious look at ourselves.

[Jaskohouston]

So let me get this straight - they are supposed to just let everyone into the Astrodome? What do you think would happen if they didn't control how many people were let in there? I'll say No thanks to a Superdome in my backyard, thank you very much.

None of this is going to go smoothly - it just isn't going to happen.

A big injustice in this is that people that actually listened to the order to leave New Orleans weren't allowed in the Astrodome. Those that didn't leave, at least some of them, had a reserved spot.

(I'm aware many couldn't leave - but there are a whole lot of people there that waited this thing out in their house, and when that levee broke, they were screwed. Many of them should NEVER have been there.)

you might be right about the blame thing and I will try to be cautious about pointing fingers but I just couldn't bear to see those people at the Convention Center. Even if it was their fault for not leaving the city during the evacuation it is so hard to watch people who might be dying soon. I'm not saying anyone is to blame as much as saying let's fix the system so that there is a quicker response.

I mean my God we're such a wealthy country and the food and water is only one state away. Why can't we get it to them quicker?

[Edge34]

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I think a reporter this evening summed it up best...

We're in Iraq under the pretense that we are defenders of peace and helping the oppressed citizens.....

And this is how we handle the suffering in our own country.
What must the world think now?

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Yeah, because people aren't honestly doing their damnedest to get this thing taken care of. Obviously nobody gives a [censored].

We're the guys that get out and raise a ton of money for tsunami victims and stuff, and what does "the world" give back to us?

That's right.

[MyTurn2Raise]

My question, If Cuba pissed the US off, wouldn't the US be able to put 50,000 troops in Havana in 2 days?

Why couldn't we have 2,000 bad@$$ mothertruckers in New Orleans by last night?

[blatz]

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Not the easiest thing that is going on right now to fix. It is way too early to tell how the response effort has been.

Only so much is humanly possible! Too much blame going on right now.

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Thats a bunch of crap. Schools are cancelled all around New Orleans and there is a road out...Commandeer every bus around and use them.

Shots may or may not have been fired, so let's stop trying to rescue anyone? Our national guard risks there lives every day in Iraq, but they can not here at home?

Did you watch the press conferences today where everyone of those buffoons contradicted themselves, showed a lack of knowledge of the situation on the ground as Americans die of thirst?

Place blame, and place it fast, because people who don't have to are dying, and somebody needs to step up.

[Jaskohouston]

A lot of the people that will be found dead after all that water recedes are people that were caught completely by surprise by the ensuing flood. Those people should NEVER have been there - many of them could have left, but decided not to.

There were safety personnel and vehicles ready to go as soon as this thing hit, but they couldn't get in there because you couldn't get mass amounts of vehicles into the city quickly due to the rising waters.

This isn't a tsumani, where water comes up, blows [censored] away, and you can just start the cleanup, however bad it is. The problem causing everyone to be in such dire straits CONTINUED TO GET WORSE as the days passed. That has to be taken into account here.

[ThaSaltCracka]

Most of the people we see in the video footage from NO are black.

[sam h]

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Not the easiest thing that is going on right now to fix. It is way too early to tell how the response effort has been.

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I'm not so sure. It seems pretty obvious that the response effort has been well intentioned but largely incompetent overall. It doesn't take a rocket scientist to figure out that you would need to move those people out of the Superdome after a couple days, and to have a well thought out plan for doing so. Similarly, they seem to have no real idea concerning how to fix the levee.