telescreen.org

August Pollak weighs in with a hilarious-if-it-weren't-rage-inducing-and-unfortunately-100%-true look at the "Freedom Walk" that took place yesterday. 

(Earlier referenced here -- and perhaps I misapplied the quotes:  should it have been "Freedom?" Walk instead?)

Silhouettes of airplanes from a 1917 observation manual.

Get your Flickr photos printed as posters and books.

There is no way I could make this shit up if I tried:

If you didn't register for the official "Freedom Walk" and try to join anyway, you risk arrest.

How Princess Kay of the Milky Way is selected (and rendered into butter.)

Wow.  What a 24 hours.  After coming home from work Tuesday, I was depressed and angry.  We'd well and truly reached the inevitable point in any disaster coverage where news is outweighed by exploitation -- mawkish glurge, cheap sentimentality, and outright emotional manipulation.  (Have you cried yet, viewer?  We'll make you.)  Bring on the sappy, string-laden, MOR cheese-music!  Cue the slow dissolves between pictures of crying people!

Can this kind of thing come across as anything other than playing emotional tetherball?  Sure.  With appropriate and well-chosen music, with some sensitivity, and not done too often, it's remarkably effective and often poignant.  But "restraint" and "proportion" are not concepts, alas, that teevee nooz really gets on any kind of basis.  And when it veers over the line -- when it goes from portraying the full impact of a story in terms the viewer will understand, and drifts into downright emo-porn (true story: one somewhat hopeful piece about rescues and reunions I did on Monday was criticized as "not sad enough") -- that's when I start muttering dark things about my job and my career choice and my self-respect.

Particularly when you're looking at raw emotions, grieving, desperate people, and bloated dead bodies on a regular basis...and trying to figure out how to slot them in between phrases of overly-melisma-ed pap with sufficient élan to give the folks a nice after-dinner weepfest and, y'know, keep them from switching the channel to "America's Funniest Rescues" or something.  It's draining at the very least, and sometimes you feel like you're the one falling apart, when instead you're just sitting at the console watching other people -- people who've really lost what is near and dear to them -- work through this awful stuff.

So maybe it shouldn't have been such a surprise when the cluster headaches began.  (Have you ever had one?  I don't wish them on anybody, except possibly Dubya.)  And I hadn't been sleeping well anyway, and this kinda blew any other possibility of sleep right the hell out of the water.  Calling in sick seemed like my best option...and eventually, the pain abated.  And a day away from the madness seemed to help as well.

So when Chico came calling with offers of extra tickets to the U.S. open for B. and me, yeah, I was interested.  And good heavens, what an incredible, transcendent match.  (Davenport vs. Dementieva was messy but interesting; Agassi vs. Blake was epic.)  I don't think I've ever seen a sporting event this compelling -- definitely never in person and possibly not on TV.  Agassi was, well, Agassi:  fun to watch, a coiled spring, a guy that looks like he's having fun out there, a consistent machine, endlessly varying his serves and returns, and really, really fast.  Blake had the Cinderella story:  last year he broke his neck on the court, developed shingles, and lost his father.  He fought his way from #210 to #49 in the rankings, entered the Open on a wildcard and made it to the quarterfinal.  Blake took the first two sets 3-6 3-6, playing absolutely flawless, blisteringly fast tennis.  Then Agassi took the next two sets 6-3 6-3, achieving perfect symmetry.  The fifth set was agonizing to watch -- the tension! -- and teetered back and forth until Agassi took it 7-6, forcing it into a tiebreak...which Agassi won on the second match point, 8-6.  Wow.  Riveting, all of it.  And the atmosphere was electric; the crowd gave both players multiple standing ovations, rooting for whoever was behind at the time. 

There's a certain variety of New York sports fan who can be incredibly annoying at times, with the constant we-root-for-the-WINNERS-and-screw-you-if-you're-not mentality.  But I was pleased and even proud of this crowd; at the end of the match, Agassi took his richly-deserved bow to the four corners, and trotted over to do his postgame interview.  But then the PA announced James Blake's name, and the crowd gave him a standing ovation that was as long and loud as Agassi's.  Classy.  And that's the word I'd use to describe the whole match.  No showboating.  No arguing.  Just two incredible performers, surprising themselves and us with the power, finesse, and beauty of their game.

Bmarkey has posted (along with a brilliant review of the Stooges) what I think is the most appropriate response to the Katrina debacle.  I'll let him tell it:

I’ve spent a fair amount of time thinking of ways in which I, as a regular American citizen, can make my displeasure (to put it mildly) with the federal response to this disaster. What I came up with is enormously impractical and probably impossible to pull off. Still, it has distracted me a little from the grim reality of things as they stand, so I will pass it along in the hope that it may do the same for you.

My idea is this: a silent march on the White House. No signs, no placards, no slogans. Just a silent mass of pissed-off Americans, all dressed in black, marching behind a second line. When they reach the White House, the band stops. There are no speeches made. The entire group folds their arms and stares at the White House, in silence, for at least five full minutes. The crowd then disperses.

As I say, I doubt it could be pulled off. Somebody would have to spout off, which would ruin the entire effect. Silence is key to the whole thing. But I find the image of 100,000 angry Americans staring down the White House and its inhabitants to be very soothing.

If anybody out there thinks they can pull this together, feel free to run with it.

I agree; I think it'd be near-impossible to execute.  But oh, how I'd love to see this.

Bush Disaster, originally uploaded by adampsyche.

Funny 'cause it's true...

Grab bag, because I'm still too upset (read: livid) to write at length about Katrina:

• While Bush was posturing, Al Gore quietly got hospital patients out of New Orleans.
• Scott McClellan dissembles, has his ass handed to him.
• Rob Walker (of Slate et al.) writes a gorgeous, elegiac piece about why you should care about New Orleans.
• AP: Fema Chief Waited Hours To Ask For Homeland Security Help.
• When Congress finally got around to considering $10.5B in emergency funding, where was House Speaker Dennis Hastert?  At a fundraiser.
• Speaking of absent high-ranking politicos, has anyone seen Dick Cheney?  Is he still on vacation in Wyoming?  Or has Site R installed a new PlayStation or something?
• S-P Times: On Sunday the 28th, the director of the National Hurricane Center briefed Bush on Katrina's force and destructive potential.  (Photographic evidence!)
• Bush to lead investigation into himself.  Wonder what it'll find?  (Is O.J. Simpson available to testify on his investigative methods in his "search for the real killers"?)
• Salt Lake Trib:  1,000 firefighters, summoned by FEMA, learn their primary function is to be "community-relations officers" and hand out fliers.  That is, when they're not being dispatched to serve as a human backdrop for a photo op featuring....you guessed it, President Bush.

Barbara Bush:  Let them eat cake.

Don't forget that she raised our current President.  And, evidently, the apple doesn't fall far from the tree.

(P.S.:  Not the first time she's been guilty of an appalling lack of empathy.  Must be a family trait.)

Lord Of War, originally uploaded by Vidiot.

The other day, while I was walking to work, I spotted a guy who was carrying a skeleton and waiting for the light to change.

(Another reason why I love New York.)

Okay, I know it's been a couple days.  But I can't sit down to write without getting either choked-up sad or SO FREAKIN' ANGRY...either way, it's not conducive to any kind of organized thought.  It's still gonna take me a little while, I think.

So go check out ColdChef's Katrina pictures, okay?

Why is the Red Cross not in New Orleans?

Short answer: because the National Guard won't let them in.

Houston Chronicle:  Halliburton Hired for Storm Cleanup

Quelle surprise.

The creamiest, dreamiest soft ice cream may come from Mister Softee...but beware of ice cream pirates.

Blow the whistle, get punished.

Disgusting:

Hundreds of storm refugees are being evicted from Tallahassee hotels to accommodate fans coming to Tallahassee for the Miami-Florida State game Monday night. "There is absolutely no compassion here whatsoever," Lynne Bernard wrote on a Web bulletin board of The Times-Picayune of New Orleans. Hoteliers said there was little they could do to help those who fled homes in Louisiana, Mississippi and Alabama because they had to honor longstanding reservations for the football weekend. "This weekend has been booked for a couple of months," said Antwan Hinkle, the front-desk manager of the Quality Inn. "We're going to have a whole bunch of angry people."

Oh, you have a bunch of angry people, all right.

Good God.  It's like Lord of the Flies down there.

(Or Baghdad-on-the-Mississippi.)

From NOLA.com's hurricane blog:

5851. BAPTIST HOSIPTAL EMERGENCY
by Jillybean82, 8/31/05 16:52 ET
Baptist hospital has been taken over with guns. it is horrible. I talked to my friend who is a nurse. she was screaming that is terrible. there are bodies just everywhere. people are stealing all there supplies.

i don't know how to get this information to the news station. This is first hand information.

there is 25ft of water in the hospital. Please please help.

And, of course, Nero is fiddling strumming while Rome burns.  Too bad he's dismantling FEMA and cutting money from hurricane damage prevention efforts and levee construction.

We need good leadership.  Too bad it'll take at least another three years to get here.

ADDENDUM:  Shots fired at Superdome evacuation helicopters:

The scene at the Superdome became increasingly chaotic, with thousands of people rushing from nearby hotels and other buildings, hoping to climb onto the buses taking evacuees from the arena, officials said. Paramedics became increasingly alarmed by the sight of people with guns.

The operation to bus more than 20,000 people to the Houston Astrodome was suspended  “until they gain control of the Superdome,” said Richard Zeuschlag, head of Acadian Ambulance, which was handling the evacuation of sick and injured people from the Superdome.

He said that military would not fly out of the Superdome either because of the gunfire and that the National Guard told him that it was sending 100 military police officers to gain control.
“That’s not enough,” Zeuschlag. “We need a thousand.”

He said medics were calling him and crying for help because they were so scared of people with guns at the Superdome.

Lt. Col. Pete Schneider of the Louisiana National Guard said the military — which was handling the evacuation of the able-bodied from the Superdome — had suspended operations, too, because fires set outside the arena were preventing buses from getting close enough to pick up people.

Zeuschlag said shots were fired at a military helicopter over the Superdome before daybreak, adding that when another evacuation helicopter tried to land at a hospital in the outlying town of Kenner overnight, the pilot reported that 100 people were on the landing pad, and some of them had guns.

“He was frightened and would not land,” Zeuschlag said.

ANOTHER ADDENDUM:  Did craven political maneuvering and Bush budget cuts make this disaster worse than it could have been?

"I'm not saying it wouldn't still be flooded, but I do feel that if it had been totally funded, there would be less flooding than you have," said Michael Parker, a former Republican Mississippi congressman who headed the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers from October 2001 until March 2002, when he was ousted after publicly criticizing a Bush administration proposal to cut the corps' budget.

That from the Chicago Tribune.  (More on Michael Parker's firing here.)

Bush on GMA this morning:  "I don't think anyone anticipated the breach of the levees."

Really?  The first four grafs of the Trib story (emphasis mine):

WASHINGTON -- Despite continuous warnings that a catastrophic hurricane could hit New Orleans, the Bush administration and Congress in recent years have repeatedly denied full funding for hurricane preparation and flood control.

That has delayed construction of levees around the city and stymied an ambitious project to improve drainage in New Orleans' neighborhoods.

For instance, the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers requested $27 million for this fiscal year to pay for hurricane-protection projects around Lake Pontchartrain. The Bush administration countered with $3.9 million, and Congress eventually provided $5.7 million, according to figures provided by the office of U.S. Sen. Mary Landrieu (D-La.).

Because of the shortfalls, which were caused in part by the rising costs of the war in Iraq, the corps delayed seven contracts that included enlarging the levees, according to corps documents.

Or how about this Houston Chronicle article, from 2001?

New Orleans is sinking.
And its main buffer from a hurricane, the protective Mississippi River delta, is quickly eroding away, leaving the historic city perilously close to disaster.
So vulnerable, in fact, that earlier this year the Federal Emergency Management Agency ranked the potential damage to New Orleans as among the three likeliest, most castastrophic disasters facing this country.  The other two? A massive earthquake in San Francisco, and, almost prophetically,
a terrorist attack on New York City.  The New Orleans hurricane scenario may be the deadliest of all.  In the face of an approaching storm, scientists say, the city's less-than-adequate  evacuation routes would strand 250,000 people or more, and probably kill one  of 10 left behind as the city drowned under 20 feet of water. Thousands of refugees  could land in Houston. 

Economically, the toll would be shattering.  Southern Louisiana produces one-third of the country's seafood, one-fifth of its oil and one-quarter of its natural gas. The city's tourism, lifeblood of the French Quarter, would cease to exist. The Big Easy might never recover.

More on the cronyization of FEMA, from a September 2004 article in my hometown's Independent Weekly (again, emphasis mine):

Among emergency specialists, "mitigation"--the measures taken in advance to minimize the damage caused by natural disasters--is a crucial part of the strategy to save lives and cut recovery costs. But since 2001, key federal disaster mitigation programs, developed over many years, have been slashed and tossed aside. FEMA's Project Impact, a model mitigation program created by the Clinton administration, has been canceled outright. Federal funding of post-disaster mitigation efforts designed to protect people and property from the next disaster has been cut in half, and now, communities across the country must compete for pre-disaster mitigation dollars.

As a result, some state and local emergency managers say, it's become more difficult to get the equipment and funds they need to most effectively deal with disasters. In North Carolina, a state regularly damaged by hurricanes and floods, FEMA recently refused the state's request to buy backup generators for emergency support facilities. And the budget cuts have halved the funding for a mitigation program that saved an estimated $8.8 million in recovery costs in three eastern N.C. communities alone after 1999's Hurricane Floyd. In Louisiana, another state vulnerable to hurricanes, requests for flood mitigation funds were rejected by FEMA this summer. . .

In addition, the White House has pushed for privatization of essential government services, including disaster management, and merged FEMA into the Department of Homeland Security, where natural disaster programs are often sidelined by counter-terrorism programs. Along the way, morale at FEMA has plummeted, and many of the agency's most experienced personnel have left for work in other government agencies or private corporations.

In June, Pleasant Mann, a 16-year FEMA veteran who heads the agency's government employee union, wrote members of Congress to warn of the agency's decay. "Over the past three-and-one-half years, FEMA has gone from being a model agency to being one where funds are being misspent, employee morale has fallen, and our nation's emergency management capability is being eroded," he wrote. "Our professional staff are being systematically replaced by politically connected novices and contractors." . . .

In case Congress hasn't gotten the message, former FEMA director James Lee Witt recently restated it in strong terms. "I am extremely concerned that the ability of our nation to prepare for and respond to disasters has been sharply eroded," he testified at a March 24, 2004, hearing on Capitol Hill. "I hear from emergency managers, local and state leaders, and first responders nearly every day that the FEMA they knew and worked well with has now disappeared. In fact one state emergency manager told me, 'It is like a stake has been driven into the heart of emergency management.'"

It seems as if the chickens are roosting all around us. 

(And as I'm writing this, at 2:45pm, Bush is speaking from the Oval Office.  And he seems way more concerned with oil and gasoline than the thousands of stranded, starving, dying people down in the Gulf.)

YET ANOTHER ADDENDUM:  Yep.  Two paragraphs about saving lives; six paragraphs about oil and gas.