Critical Moment #13 – Compilation 2
CONTENTS:
1. Hurricane Katrina -- Our Experiences
2. Benton Harbor chart
3. Notes on the Camp Casey Detroit Project
4. re: The Recent Northwest Bankruptcy
5. The New New Orleans
6. The Current Disaster
Maybe we can use part of this.
Michelle
------------------------------------
Hurricane Katrina -- Our Experiences
by Larry Bradshaw and Lorrie Beth Slonsky
Two days after Hurricane Katrina struck New Orleans, the Walgreen's
Store at the corner of Royal and Iberville streets remained locked. The
dairy display case was clearly visible through the widows. It was now 48
hours without electricity, running water, plumbing. The milk, yogurt,
and cheeses were beginning to spoil in the 90-degree heat. The owners
and managers had locked up the food, water, pampers, and prescriptions
and fled the City. Outside Walgreen's windows, residents and tourists
grew increasingly thirsty and hungry.
The much-promised federal, state and local aid never materialized and
the windows at Walgreen's gave way to the looters. There was an
alternative. The cops could have broken one small window and distributed
the nuts, fruit juices, and bottle water in an organized and systematic
manner. But they did not. Instead they spent hours playing cat and
mouse, temporarily chasing away the looters.
We were finally airlifted out of New Orleans two days ago and arrived
home yesterday (Saturday). We have yet to see any of the TV coverage or
look at a newspaper. We are willing to guess that there were no video
images or front-page pictures of European or affluent white tourists
looting the Walgreen's in the French Quarter.
We also suspect the media will have been inundated with "hero" images of
the National Guard, the troops and the police struggling to help the
"victims" of the Hurricane. What you will not see, but what we
witnessed, were the real heroes and heroines of the hurricane relief
effort: the working class of New Orleans. The maintenance workers who
used a fork lift to carry the sick and disabled. The engineers, who
rigged, nurtured and kept the generators running. The electricians who
improvised thick extension cords stretching over blocks to share the
little electricity we had in order to free cars stuck on rooftop parking
lots. Nurses who took over for mechanical ventilators and spent many
hours on end manually forcing air into the lungs of unconscious patients
to keep them alive. Doormen who rescued folks stuck in elevators.
Refinery workers who broke into boat yards, "stealing" boats to rescue
their neighbors clinging to their roofs in flood waters. Mechanics who
helped hot-wire any car that could be found to ferry people out of the
City. And the food service workers who scoured the commercial kitchens
improvising communal meals for hundreds of those stranded. Most of these
workers had lost their homes, and had not heard from members of their
families, yet they stayed and provided the only infrastructure for the
20% of New Orleans that was not under water.
On Day 2, there were approximately 500 of us left in the hotels in the
French Quarter. We were a mix of foreign tourists, conference attendees
like ourselves, and locals who had checked into hotels for safety and
shelter from Katrina. Some of us had cell phone contact with family and
friends outside of New Orleans. We were repeatedly told that all sorts
of resources including the National Guard and scores of buses were
pouring into the City. The buses and the other resources must have been
invisible because none of us had seen them.
We decided we had to save ourselves. So we pooled our money and came up
with $25,000 to have ten buses come and take us out of the City. Those
who did not have the requisite $45.00 for a ticket were subsidized by
those who did have extra money. We waited for 48 hours for the buses,
spending the last 12 hours standing outside, sharing the limited water,
food, and clothes we had. We created a priority boarding area for the
sick, elderly and new born babies. We waited late into the night for the
"imminent" arrival of the buses. The buses never arrived. We later
learned that the minute the arrived at the City limits, they were
commandeered by the military.
By day 4 our hotels had run out of fuel and water. Sanitation was
dangerously abysmal. As the desperation and despair increased, street
crime as well as water levels began to rise. The hotels turned us out
and locked their doors, telling us that the "officials" told us to
report to the convention center to wait for more buses. As we entered
the center of the City, we finally encountered the National Guard. The
Guards told us we would not be allowed into the Superdome as the City's
primary shelter had descended into a humanitarian and health hellhole.
The guards further told us that the City's only other shelter, the
Convention Center, was also descending into chaos and squalor and that
the police were not allowing anyone else in. Quite naturally, we asked,
"If we can't go to the only 2 shelters in the City, what was our
alternative?" The guards told us that that was our problem, and no they
did not have extra water to give to us. This would be the start of our
numerous encounters with callous and hostile "law enforcement".
We walked to the police command center at Harrah's on Canal Street and
were told the same thing, that we were on our own, and no they did not
have water to give us. We now numbered several hundred. We held a mass
meeting to decide a course of action. We agreed to camp outside the
police command post. We would be plainly visible to the media and would
constitute a highly visible embarrassment to the City officials. The
police told us that we could not stay. Regardless, we began to settle in
and set up camp. In short order, the police commander came across the
street to address our group. He told us he had a solution: we should
walk to the Pontchartrain Expressway and cross the greater New Orleans
Bridge where the police had buses lined up to take us out of the City.
The crowd cheered and began to move. We called everyone back and
explained to the commander that there had been lots of misinformation
and wrong information and was he sure that there were buses waiting for
us. The commander turned to the crowd and stated emphatically, "I swear
to you that the buses are there."
We organized ourselves and the 200 of us set off for the bridge with
Great excitement and hope. As we marched past the convention center,
many Locals saw our determined and optimistic group and asked where we
were headed.
We told them about the great news. Families immediately grabbed their
few belongings and quickly our numbers doubled and then doubled again.
Babies in strollers now joined us, people using crutches, elderly
clasping walkers and others people in wheelchairs. We marched the 2-3
miles to the freeway and up the steep incline to the Bridge. It now
began to pour down rain, but it did not dampen our enthusiasm.
As we approached the bridge, armed Gretna sheriffs formed a line across
the foot of the bridge. Before we were close enough to speak, they began
firing their weapons over our heads. This sent the crowd fleeing in
various directions. As the crowd scattered and dissipated, a few of us
inched forward and managed to engage some of the sheriffs in
conversation. We told them of our conversation with the police commander
and of the commander's assurances. The sheriffs informed us there were
no buses waiting. The commander had lied to us to get us to move.
We questioned why we couldn't cross the bridge anyway, especially as
yhere was little traffic on the 6-lane highway. They responded that the
West Bank was not going to become New Orleans and there would be no
Superdomes in their City. These were code words for if you are poor and
black, you are not crossing the Mississippi River and you were not
getting out of New Orleans.
Our small group retreated back down Highway 90 to seek shelter from the
rain under an overpass. We debated our options and in the end decided to
build an encampment in the middle of the Ponchartrain Expressway on the
center divide, between the O'Keefe and Tchoupitoulas exits. We reasoned
we would be visible to everyone, we would have some security being on an
elevated freeway and we could wait and watch for the arrival of the yet
to be seen buses.
All day long, we saw other families, individuals and groups make the
same trip up the incline in an attempt to cross the bridge, only to be
turned away. Some chased away with gunfire, others simply told no,
others to be verbally berated and humiliated. Thousands of New Orleaners
were prevented and prohibited from self-evacuating the City on foot.
Meanwhile, the only two City shelters sank further into squalor and
disrepair. The only way across the bridge was by vehicle. We saw workers
stealing trucks, buses, moving vans, semi-trucks and any car that could
be hotwired. All were packed with people trying to escape the misery New
Orleans had become.
Our little encampment began to blossom. Someone stole a water delivery
truck and brought it up to us. Let's hear it for looting! A mile or so
down the freeway, an army truck lost a couple of pallets of C-rations on
a tight turn. We ferried the food back to our camp in shopping carts.
Now secure with the two necessities, food and water; cooperation,
community, and creativity flowered. We organized a clean up and hung
garbage bags from the rebar poles. We made beds from wood pallets and
cardboard. We designated a storm drain as the bathroom and the kids
built an elaborate enclosure for privacy out of plastic, broken
umbrellas, and other scraps. We even organized a food recycling system
where individuals could swap out parts of C-rations (applesauce for
babies and candies for kids!).
This was a process we saw repeatedly in the aftermath of Katrina. When
individuals had to fight to find food or water, it meant looking out for
yourself only. You had to do whatever it took to find water for your
kids or food for your parents. When these basic needs were met, people
began to look out for each other, working together and constructing a
community.
If the relief organizations had saturated the City with food and water
In the first 2 or 3 days, the desperation, the frustration and the
ugliness would not have set in. Flush with the necessities, we offered
food and water to passing families and individuals. Many decided to stay
and join us. Our encampment grew to 80 or 90 people. From a woman with a
battery powered radio we learned that the media was talking about us. Up
in full view on the freeway, every relief and news organizations saw us
on their way into the City. Officials were being asked what they were
going to do about all those families living up on the freeway? The
officials responded they were going to take care of us. Some of us got a
sinking feeling.
"Taking care of us" had an ominous tone to it.
Unfortunately, our sinking feeling (along with the sinking City) was
correct. Just as dusk set in, a Gretna Sheriff showed up, jumped out of
his patrol vehicle, aimed his gun at our faces, screaming, "Get off the
fucking freeway". A helicopter arrived and used the wind from its blades
to blow away our flimsy structures. As we retreated, the sheriff loaded
up his truck with our food and water. Once again, at gunpoint, we were
forced off the freeway. All the law enforcement agencies appeared
threatened when we congregated or congealed into groups of 20 or more.
In every congregation of "victims" they saw "mob" or "riot". We felt
safety in numbers. Our "we must stay together" was impossible because
the agencies would force us into small atomized groups.
In the pandemonium of having our camp raided and destroyed, we scattered
once again. Reduced to a small group of 8 people, in the dark, we sought
refuge in an abandoned school bus, under the freeway on Cilo Street. We
were hiding from possible criminal elements but equally and definitely,
we were hiding from the police and sheriffs with their martial law,
curfew and shoot-to-kill policies.
The next days, our group of 8 walked most of the day, made contact with
New Orleans Fire Department and were eventually airlifted out by an
Urban search and rescue team. We were dropped off near the airport and
managed to catch a ride with the National Guard. The two young guardsmen
apologized for the limited response of the Louisiana guards. They
explained that a large section of their unit was in Iraq and that meant
they were shorthanded and were unable to complete all the tasks they
were assigned.
We arrived at the airport on the day a massive airlift had begun. The
airport had become another Superdome. We 8 were caught in a press of
humanity as flights were delayed for several hours while George Bush
landed briefly at the airport for a photo op. After being evacuated on a
coast guard cargo plane, we arrived in San Antonio, Texas. There the
humiliation and dehumanization of the official relief effort continued.
We were placed on buses and driven to a large field where we were forced
to sit for hours and hours. Some of the buses did not have
air-conditioners. In the dark, hundreds if us were forced to share two
filthy overflowing porta-potties. Those who managed to make it out with
any possessions (often a few belongings in tattered plastic bags) we
were subjected to two different dog-sniffing searches.
Most of us had not eaten all day because our C-rations had been
confiscated at the airport because the rations set off the metal
detectors. Yet, no food had been provided to the men, women, children,
elderly, disabled as they sat for hours waiting to be "medically
screened" to make sure we were not carrying any communicable diseases.
This official treatment was in sharp contrast to the warm, heart-felt
reception given to us by the ordinary Texans. We saw one airline worker
give her shoes to someone who was barefoot. Strangers on the street
offered us money and toiletries with words of welcome. Throughout, the
official relief effort was callous, inept, and racist. There was more
suffering than need be. Lives were lost that did not need to be lost.
I want to submit the chart I created at:
<http://michiganimc.org/mod/comments/display/10706/index.php>
Sorry, I don't know a good way to put the chart in this message. I would revise
the chart and write an intro for it, making refernce to the Glick article in #12 which
I hope will be online at our site by #13. Before I put the work into revising it, I'd
like to know if there is support for publishing it.
Michelle
Notes on the Camp Casey Detroit Project
By Abayomi Azikiwe
This has been a tremendous three weeks since we set up Camp Casey Detroit
on August 22, 2005 at the corner of Woodward and Adams in Grand Circus Park.
I cannot recall anything similar in regard to the peace movement in the Detroit
area. Special thanks should go out to all the members of the Michgian
Emergency Committee Against War & Injustice (MECAWI) and the many people
who came and joined the Camp over the last several weeks.
Camp Casey Detroit lifted the anti-war and peace movement to a new level. This
was no ordinary protest or conventional demonstration. It represented a
community of activists making decisions and creating new forms of expression
on a round the clock basis. The character of the debates and discussions during
the last three weeks were highly charged and probative. In order for the Camp to
survive sucessfully for 21 days it required a high degree of discipline,
commitment and mutual respect among the participants.
The Camp had to make democratic decisions after weighing the merits of various
issues. We had to work out how we would deal with each other as well as the
supporters of the Camp. In addition, we had to develop strategies for dealing with
the various people who stopped by the literature table to discuss a myraid of
issues that the Camp represented. There were many pledges of support and we
changed some minds and hearts as it relates to the war policies of the current
government in Washington, D.C.
At the same time there were detractors who sought to upset the Camp
participants with denunciations of the peace movement. Our response varied but
we never reacted violently to any of the negative forces that came to our
literature table. We often debated those who could not understand why it was
necessary to stage an extended peace camp with such determination and vigour.
Moreover, we worked out means of relating to the various street people who
approached the Camp in various ways. We fed and provided water as well as
advice to many homeless and destitute people who live in and around Grand
Circus Park because they have no where else to reside. We were provided with a
glimpse of the depths of poverty, exploitation and oppression that far to many
people have fallen victim to in Detroit. We saw clearly that there are at least three
Detroits converging in downtown.
There are the successful business owners, professionals and retirees who
represent the new emerging elites in the downtown area. These people live in the
newly renovated lofts, apartments and condos. Then there are the working
people who are struggling to survive and prosper in the economically distressed
city of Detroit. Also there are the low-income people, the mentally ill, drug and
alcohol addicted who have either accepted their plight or are struggling to rise
above it and change the conditions under which they live.
To all of these residents and the people who transit through downtown going to
work, to shop or attend entertainment centers, we brought an uncompromising
anti-war message: "Bring the Troops Home Now, Money For Our City, Not For
War."
Also the city of Detroit employees were highly supportive. There were bus drivers
who took petitions calling for an end to the war. These petitions were delivered
when the drivers returned from their routes. The work crews were quite
accomodating and even assisted us in keeping the Camp clean by sweeping and
empyting the garbage containers. Most of the top level police officials stated that
they would not close down the Camp. We had problems with only three
sargeants who sought to harass us by asking us to remove hanging banners and
crosses that represented the war dead from Michigan.
Eventually we were granted a permit for the Saturday September 10 rally.
Councilwoman JoAnn Watson attended the rally and spoke. Attorney Charles
Brown, who works on Councilwoman Watson's staff served as the Camp's legal
represntative in residence. Atty. Brown spent a considerable amount of time at
the Camp both day and night. His participation was essential in keeping the
entire process smooth and yet militant in its determination.
Our decision to end the Camp on September 11 was related to the visit and
departure of the "Bring the Troops Home Now" Tour which left Crawford, Texas
(home of the original Camp Casey) on September 1. The people who
represented the backbone of the anti-war project in the heart of Crawford left the
area surrounding the vacation home of President Bush on September 1 after
Bush returned to the White House. They are travelling the country in three
trailers. The visit of these unique and couragous inviduals represented the high
point of the three week Detroit Camp Casey project.
Saturday's rally at the Camp was very inspirational as well as emotional. The
speeches of local activists and the tour participants energized all of those in
attendance. The potluck on Friday night when the tour participants arrived was a
festive occasion of historical significance.
We had collected hundreds of signatures on a petition to President Bush calling
for bringing the troops home now. These petitions were turned over to the tour
participants who indicated that they would be delivered to the US Congress when
they arrive in Washington, D.C. for the massive weekend of action starting on
Saturday September 24. MECAWI and the Detroit Area Peace and Justice
Network (DAPJN) are taking buses to the march which will begin outside the
White House.
The Camp Casey Detroit project brought together a number of peace
organizations including both MECAWI, DAPJN, Pointes for Peace, Peace Action,
Women in Black, Veterans for Peace and others. The Camp represented how
groups can work together on an equal and mutually respectful basis.
As a member of the Michigan Emergency Committee Against War & Injustice
(MECAWI) we wish to extend our deepest gratitude to all that made this
important project a success.
From: martinvouks@peoplepc.com
To: Thomas J Laney
Sent: Friday, September 16, 2005 3:53 PM
Subject: Re: the recent Northwest bankruptcy
TO: Top management - Northwest Airlines
Dear Union Busting Pricks,
We Minnesota taxpayers have watched your recent filing of bankruptcy
with great interest. You have spent an estimated $55 million to $110
million over the past twelve months preparing for a strike. You started
planning for the strike like before you even thought of negotiating in
good faith with your mechanics. Now you've basically destroyed the
mechanics union and have filed bankruptcy in an attempt to duck out on
your responsibility for $42 million in pension obligations that were due
this past week. Thanks to your actions, we in Minnesota, are now at the
top of the list of creditors as you enter bankruptcy.
You see, some years ago, you borrowed some $800 million dollars from us
to help you expand and to help you build two maintenance bases and a
telephone center on our Iron Range. The maintenance bases never
materialized and the phone center is only a shadow of what was promised.
The $800 million seems to have vanished into the Ether. As collateral
for this loan you promised to give us the "flying rights" to several
quite lucrative overseas flight routes. You also promised us the money
you collect from your control of concessions at our main terminal.
We in Minnesota are having trouble controlling our costs too! We've had
trouble over the last several years balancing our budget. You are
basically now are our, how should I phrase it, OUR EMPLOYEES! As such,
in this environment, we have no choice but to wring these costs out of
YOU! We would like our $800 million back as soon as possible. With
interest. If you find this incontinent, please remit the rights to the
flight routes and concessions as soon as possible. Also, we are going
to have to speak to your top management and board regarding
compensation. After looking at the rates you've been paid the last
several years we've determined that you are not competitive on the world
market. You are far too many in number as well and we are going to trim
the headcount in your ranks. We are not trying to be cruel - this is
just the Free-Market working it's magic. "As ye sow - so shall ye Reap"
Thank you for your attention,
The Taxpayers - The State of Minnesota
The New New Orleans by Marcellus Andrews
In the American imagination, New Orleans was a mysterious city where
fantasy and reality merged, where the heat and humidity liberated
desires and softened America's color lines.
But the real New Orleans was a hard society deeply divided by color and
class, growing more segregated and unequal as real estate boomed and
real wages fell for regular folks, especially black people in low wage
jobs.
Still, it was a wise, erotic place where painful inequalities were
balanced by a feeling that the life of the senses was partial payment
for suffering.
That New Orleans is dead - embraced by Katrina's deadly waters or
shipped far away after being reduced to living in filth or stealing to
survive.
Now, the free market will turn the big Easy into the big Disney, a theme
park for the well-to-do. All with Uncle Sam's help.
The levees will be fortified with federal money to keep out the water.
Once the new city is made secure from hurricanes, with its black
population drowned or "relocated" far away, the new New Orleans will be
"Manhattanized".
Pricey real estate will prevent all but the moneyed from owning a piece.
Instead, the city and its rich history of slavery, miscegenation, jazz,
blues and cheerful flouting of Puritan mores will be honored in museums
and by the absence of black people.
The beautiful pastels and wrought iron scroll work of the French quarter
will spread, in updated, soulless form, throughout the new village,
turning this seedy, sexy city into a lovely shopper's paradise.
But the free market composed of Gap and Starbucks will not erase
hierarchy in the newly risen New Orleans. Instead, it will mask it.
New Orleans will need low wage labor of whatever color.
The shiny new city, protected by federal investments, will need bedpans
emptied, bathrooms cleaned, buses driven, meals cooked and served, baby
bottoms wiped, streets swept, garbage collected, drugs sold and the pleasures of
sweet young bodies exchanged for cash.
The grit of New Orleans will return. The police will have to keep an eye
on the poor, lest their resentment of the city's owners lead to unlovely
and uncooperative behavior.
The fight between rich and poor, black and white in the old New Orleans
was softened by mixed blood and a shared culture where no amount of
race-talk could hide the fact of the family ties of the people of the
Crescent City.
Blood will be less mixed in the new city, where money and power are the
only ties that bind.
The Current Disaster
by Joshua Breitbart
"The responsibility of ministers for the public safety is absolute, and requires
no mandate. It is in fact the prime object for which governments come into
existence." – Winston Churchill
"This is the government the taxpayers are paying for, and it's fallen right flat
on its face, as far as I can see, in the way it's handled this thing." – Jack
Cafferty
Everything that you feared has turned out to be true. Global climate change
is
redrawing our coastline, killing thousands without mercy. The infrastructure to
hold it back has eroded. And the government charged with protecting you has
shown that it is entirely incapable of the task.
If you thought that global warming was still a ways off or if you still hoped
your elected and unelected officials would keep you safe in a time of crisis,
you are feeling utter shock and horror as you watch the aftermath of Hurricane
Katrina unfold.
Forces beyond your individual control are coming to kill you. Your
government
will not protect you. The rich will survive (for now). The poor will be left to
fight it out. The sick and the old will die first.
This is the world we live in. It is the one we lived in before Katrina. But now
it is apparent to everyone. Ask your neighbor. Ask your barber. Ask your aunt or
uncle. You are not the only one who thinks this.
Our traditional ways of responding to crises will not work in this situation.
If we allow these events to be forced into the context of life-as-usual, we
will be calmed. But we will be left with a persisting sense of dread. And then
it will happen again. Worse.
BLAMING BUSH
We are already seeing attempts to assign blame for the murderous
mishandling of
Katrina's aftermath. The media has zeroed in on Michael Brown, head of the
Federal Emergency Management Agency. Some want to climb the chain of
accountability from there to Homeland Security Secretary Michael Chertoff or to
his boss, George Bush.
The White House meanwhile is trying to spin the blame to the state and
local
level. In the case of Louisiana, that conveniently means Democrats: Governor
Kathleen Blanco, Senator Mary Landrieu, and Mayor Ray Nagin. It also means
two
women and a Black man. The federal officials are white men.
Progressives are ready to line up on the side of the Democrats. Many sense
the
vulnerability in the Bush administration they've been waiting for and want to
take revenge for all of his terrible policies. Paul Krugman takes this tack in
a September 2 editorial, calling the Bush administration "A Can't-Do
Government" for the way it failed to deploy federal resources in Katrina's
wake, cut the budgets for the Army Corps of Engineers' flood control projects,
and shifted FEMA's attention from natural disasters to terrorism. United For
Peace and Justice issued a statement linking the two "Gulf Wars." "Both
disasters flow from the criminal behavior of the Bush administration and are
closely related," it argues.
There is no doubt that the federal system to mitigate the devastation of
natural disasters failed and that the people running that system repeatedly
made decisions that compounded that failure. Once they started making
decisions
that is: While the hurricane ravaged the Gulf Coast and then flooded New
Orleans, George Bush was strumming a guitar in California, Dick Cheney was
vacationing in Wyoming, and Secretary of State Condoleeza Rice, who could
have
been accepting offers of aid from foreign countries, was taking in the Monty
Python musical comedy "Spamalot!" in New York.
Even after she returned to DC and sent out an urgent call for international
assistance, the State Department couldn't figure out how to accept most of the
offers from 95 separate countries. On September 3, Sweden loaded a Hercules
C-130 transport plane with water purification equipment, emergency power
generators and components for a temporary cellphone network, but on the 7th
they were still waiting for the go ahead from the US.
Michael Brown, the head of the Federal Emergency Management Agency,
is a crony
with little experience managing natural disasters. He got a job at FEMA in 2001
while his college buddy Joseph Allbaugh was heading the agency. Brown had
been
fired from his previous job as commissioner of judges for the International
Arabian Horse Association. In 2003, after FEMA had been folded into the
newly-created Department of Homeland Security, Bush appointed Brown the
Under
Secretary of Homeland Security for Emergency Preparedness and Response.
That
means it was his job to protect and save the people we have watched suffer and
die over the past week. Putting him in that position was an act of
unconscionable irresponsibility.
Hours after the storm hit, Brown sent a cordial memo to his boss, DHS
Secretary
Michael Chertoff, suggesting that he send 1,000 DHS workers to the stricken
area
over the course of 48 hours and then 2,000 within seven days. Part of their
mission, he said, would be to "convey a positive image of disaster operations
to government officials, community organizations and the general public." He
urged first responders in the region to wait for explicit orders before
deploying.
Michael Chertoff, too, was apparently incapable of responding to this crisis
in
a humane and effective way. Chertoff waited a day and a half to declare Katrina
an incident of national significance, the first step in a National Response
Plan that allows him to cut through red tape and bypass overwhelmed local
officials in response to a Katrina-level disaster. His main qualification for
the job of DHS Secretary was his authorship of the post-9/11 detention
policies. Not surprising then that he seems to feel the most critical item for
disaster relief is an M16 with a full clip.
Those who showed initiative in saving lives were punished. The New York
Times
reported that two Navy helicopter pilots and their crews were reprimanded for
helping bring 100 hurricane victims to safety the day after Katrina hit.
Commander Michael Holdener said they were supposed to be delivering food
and
water to military bases along the Gulf Coast. The Commander also ordered a halt
to civilian relief efforts.
The failures are so clear that even some conservatives are criticizing the
executive branch. Mitt Romney, Massachusetts' Mormon governor and a likely
2008
presidential candidate called the response "an embarrassment.'' "I look at FEMA
and I shake my head,'' he said. Commentator David Brooks told the News Hour
audience, "As you know I support his policies quite often... I'm angry at the
guy. And maybe it will pass for me. A lot of people and a lot of Republicans
are furious right now."
THE LOCAL LEVEL
Actions at the local level are also responsible for dooming thousands. At
this
point, the pre-Katrina warnings that New Orleans was at risk of flooding and
devastation are well known: the Times-Picayune's 2002 Series, "Washing Away";
the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change ranking New Orleans as the
North
American city most vulnerable to the impact of climate change; FEMA's own
2004
New Orleans hurricane drill that revealed unresolved problems such as
evacuating the infirm from the Superdome and providing shelter to tens of
thousands of refugees. (Funding for further planning to resolve those problems
was cut.) Shortly before Katrina struck, the National Weather Service warned
that downed power lines and shortages of potable water would cause "human
suffering incredible by modern standards."
Through it all, the city of New Orleans stuck with the plan, which was simply
to tell people to leave. To alleviate traffic for those evacuating by car, the
city allowed people to use both sides of the highway. (While common-sensical,
this move was apparently so innovative that they gave it a name: Contraflow.)
Flights out were available to paying customers. The railroads went
underutilized. No buses for the carless. No ambulances for the sick. The only
rides the city offered were short ones to the Superdome, but only minimal
provisions of water and food were laid in there. No other public provisions
were stashed anywhere except on the shelves of supermarkets that hadn't
managed
to sell out of staples before the storm. This was the plan. They called it
Operation Brother's Keeper.
The only resource the state and city offered the poor residents of New
Orleans
was a DVD telling them to leave in the case of a hurricane. "The primary
message [of the DVD] is that each person is primarily responsible for
themselves, for their own family and friends," community activist Rev. Marshall
Truehill said. The title of the DVD was "Preparing for the Big One." It was
still on the shelves, waiting to be distributed when Katrina struck.
"You're responsible for your safety, and you should be responsible for the
person next to you," local Red Cross executive director Kay Wilkins told the
Times-Picayune in a pre-Katrina report on the DVD.
As musicologist Ned Sublette observed, "It's as if you had advance notice
that
mohammed atta's crew was coming to the world trade center and evacuated all
but
the poor from it." He worried what might happen if the Superdome did not hold up
under the storm. "Chronicle of a genocide foretold," he wrote.
Should we be surprised? As the blog Lenin's Tomb observed, New Orleans
Mayor
Ray Nagin is a lifelong Republican with no prior experience in political
office. According to Wikipedia, he was a vice president of cable provider Cox
Communications and had supported George Bush's presidential bid in 2000. He
switched to the Democratic Party just before he ran for mayor in 2002 on a
campaign to clean up corruption. But, in contrast to the populist reformers in
American history, Nagin seems to be one of a current breed that wants to
replace low-level corruption with corporate profiteering, that believes the
government should leave as much as possible to the private sector because all
government does is skim off the top.
So no wonder he left the poor to their churches and own devices. Mike
Davis,
who in October 2004 after Hurricane Ivan saw the deadly racism in the city's
evacuation plan that the rest of us all see now, said Nagin "was reportedly
worried that lower class refugees might damage or graffiti the Superdome"
during that hurricane. Before Katrina, the Times-Picayune reported Nagin was
holding off on issuing a first-ever mandatory evacuation order for New Orleans
out of concern that the city might be held liable for closing hotels and other
businesses. When catastrophe struck, Nagin almost immediately ordered his
police force to stop helping people and start protecting private property.
The problems with the local response were apparent down to the level of
first
responders. The New Orleans Police Department proved entirely incapable of
offering support or security to the people of their city. A week after the
hurricane, nearly a third of the 1,600-member police force were unaccounted
for. Some of those were looking for their families or may have died in the
course of doing their jobs. At least 200 just walked off. Given the horrific
circumstances, it might be hard to blame them for that. But there were also
reports that police were among those grabbing what they wanted in the days
after the storm.
Again we should not be surprised. Human Rights Watch, in a 1998 report
titled
"Shielded from Justice: Police Brutality and Accountability in the United
States," summarized that the NOPD led the nation in brutality, corruption, and
incompetence. Throughout the 1990s the New Orleans Police Department was
openly
regarded as corrupt, cruel and ineffective, even by urban police department
standards. While the city topped the per capita murder charts, more than 50
officers were eventually convicted of crimes including murder, rape, drug
trafficking and robbery. Two of them are currently on death row. Two others are
under investigation by the FBI in connection to the death of 48-year-old Raymond
Robair.
At the state level, the San Jose Mercury News reported that three top
emergency
management officials were recently indicted for misusing disaster relief funds
following last year's Hurricane Ivan.
The white supremacism of front line rescuers was apparent in reports that
white
people were given preferential treatment. A group of white Britons were
evacuated from the Superdome while thousands of African-Americans from New
Orleans were left behind. At the Convention Center, "the police were afraid to
do anything," according to Chantelle, a black 22-year-old, as reported in the
UK Guardian. "They wouldn't come in. They took two white guys out one night
but
left the rest of us in here." The Houston Chronicle reported on September 2 that
the emptying of the Superdome was interrupted while 700 mostly white guests
from
the Hyatt across the street were moved to the head of the evacuation line. The
National Guard blocked one young man from the Superdome who tried to join
their
line while other guardsmen reportedly helped the "well-dressed guests with their
luggage." Sexism was also on display: One British vacationer-turned-storm victim
said he saw policemen offering to rescue "a load of girls on the roof of the
hotel" if they bared their breasts, Mardi Gras-style. When they refused, the
police passed them by.
They weren't the only ones. 19-year-old Correll Williams told the Guardian
UK,
"The police were in boats watching us. They were just laughing at us. Five of
them to a boat, not trying to help nobody. Helicopters were riding by just
looking at us. They weren't helping. We were pulling people on bits of wood,
and the National Guard would come driving by in their empty military trucks."
Stéphane Ciblat, a researcher in a pharmaceutical lab in Montreal,
described
his evacuation experience to a blogger at Talking Points Memo. Aside from
chaotic, unsanitary conditions, the danger came largely from the actions of
those who were supposed to be helping. "One time, to amuse themselves," he
writes, "the soldiers threw bottles as hard as they could into the crowd, like
in baseball. A woman was hit in the head."
The Briton said the men in helicopters snapped pictures rather than perform
rescues. "I could not have a lower opinion of the authorities, from the police
officers on the street right up to George Bush," he told the Liverpool Evening
Echo. "I couldn't describe how bad the authorities were. Just little things
like taking photographs of us, as we are standing on the roof waving for help,
for their own little snapshot albums." He added: "The American people saved us.
I wish I could say the same for the American authorities."
PEOPLE
Countless examples back up this Briton's claim about "people" saving
others,
often despite the actions of "authorities."
A group that was stranded in the French Quarter organized themselves to
get to
safety, but they had their chartered buses commandeered – one could say looted
– by the military, were shut out of the Superdome and Convention Center by the
National Guard, were given the runaround by the New Orleans Police and were
shot at by the neighboring Gretna sheriffs. Finally, they set up camp on the
Ponchartrain Expressway. Someone who had stolen a water truck dropped off
the
water and took as many old and sick people and children that he could fit in
the truck out of town. They gathered C-rations that had fallen off of a
National Guard truck.
"Now secure with the two necessities, food and water; cooperation,
community,
and creativity flowered," EMTs Larry Bradshaw and Lorrie Beth Slonsky wrote in
a well-publicized account of the group's experiences. "This was a process we
saw repeatedly in the aftermath of Katrina. When individuals had to fight to
find food or water, it meant looking out for yourself only. You had to do
whatever it took to find water for your kids or food for your parents. When
these basic needs were met, people began to look out for each other, working
together and constructing a community."
At the same time, inside the Convention Center, which had been
abandoned by
local authorities and was unknown to federal authorities according to then FEMA
chief Michael Brown, people were taking it upon themselves to keep order and
secure food and water. Ira Glass of This American Life asked Denise Moore, who
took refuge at the Convention Center about the "packs of men" with guns that
the media portrayed as the source of the violence and terror inside there.
"They were securing the area," she said. "These guys were criminals. They were,
you know. But somehow these guys got together, figured out who had guns, and
decided they were going to make sure that no women were getting raped.
Because
we did hear about the women getting raped in the Superdome. You know, that
nobody was hurting babies and nobody was hurting these old people. They were
the ones getting juice for the babies. They were the ones getting clothes for
people that had walked through that water. They were the ones fanning the old
people. Because that's what moved the guys, the gangster guys the most: the
plight of the old people."
She continued, "They started looting. They started looting on St. Charles
and
Napoleon. There was a Rite-Aid there. And you know, you would think they
would
be stealing... fun stuff or whatever because it's a "free city" according to
them, right? But they were taking juice for the babies, water, beer for the
older people, food, raincoats so they could all be seen by each other and
stuff. You know I thought it was pretty cool and very well organized... I saw
what they did and I was really touched by it. I liked the way that they were
organized about it and that they were thoughtful about it because they had
families that they couldn't find, too. You know, and that they would put
themselves out like that on other people's behalf. You know, I never had a real
high opinion of thugs myself, but I tell you one thing, I'll never look at 'em
the same way again."
Even when authorities reportedly tried to help, they were outdone by regular
folks who took initiative. The first bus to arrive at the Astrodome was not one
of the government-organized ones sent to evacuate the Superdome. It was one
driven by 20-year-old Jabar Gibson, who had grabbed it out of the Superdome
parking lot (apparently with police permission). He picked up people stranded
on the highway. "We had walked on the interstate for two hours. (Officials)
were passing us up. They weren't even worrying about us. They were just
worrying about the people in the Superdome," Makivia Horton, one of Gibson's
passengers, told Houston's KPRC channel 2.
Three sophomores from Duke University drove their two-wheel drive
Hyundai all
the way from North Carolina to the New Orleans Convention Center at a time
when
the authorities were still not delivering aid. The National Guard had turned
them away at first, but stolen and forged press passes overcame that obstacle.
While government-coordinated search and rescues were splitting up families,
these untrained kids were able to return to the same location three times,
taking a total of seven people – with wives in one trip and husbands in another
– all the way to the LSU medical center in Baton Rouge before seeing them off
on
a bus to Texas.
The government-controlled evacuations were so haphazard and ineffective
that
even a week after the storm, Glenn Mack preferred his water-engulfed home and
the support of his neighbors. He told New York Daily News reporter Tamer
El-Ghobashy that he could survive with his family for six weeks on the supplies
brought to him by "those Robin Hoods." "The majority of looters weren't looting
for the hell of it, they came out and passed out the food," he said. A support
network seemed to have formed in his neighborhood, with George Davis rowing
to
each of his neighbor's houses, distributing supplies and checking up on folks.
These acts are not unique to Katrina. "In the hours after sudden disaster
strikes, most lives are saved by the courage and resourcefulness of friends and
neighbours," according to the home page for the 2004 World Disasters Report
from
The International Federation of Red Cross and Red Crescent Societies. Rebecca
Solnit cites this report in her Harper's article "The Uses of Disaster,"
written before Katrina but published afterwards, and concludes, "'The
authorities' are too few and too centralized to respond to the dispersed and
numerous emergencies of a disaster. Instead, the people classified as victims
generally do what can be done to save themselves and one another. In doing so,
they discover not only the potential power of civil society but also the
fragility of existing structures of authority."
A FAILURE OF GOVERNMENT
What we really see is a failure of our government. We've seen this before in
our daily lives or in past disasters, as Rebecca Solnit recounts. But Katrina
has provided an astoundingly clear and well-publicized set of excruciatingly
deadly examples of this failure. Time and again in Katrina's wake, we saw
people in positions of official authority thwart the initiatives of everyday
people that would have saved lives and alleviated suffering.
It is difficult to say why the authorities acted that way. Reflecting on the
clearly-incompetent Michael Brown, it almost seems like his idea of competence
was centralizing all decisions in him. Instead of pushing resources down to the
affected area, he wanted to remain in control of every boat, fireman, and bottle
of water under FEMA's auspices. This meant that people who knew what were
happening – to some extent the mayor but also the people still inside the city
– could not get what they needed to respond without explaining the situation to
Brown. Even in the best conditions, that would greatly slow the response. With
phones and power lines down, it was impossible.
"Bureaucracy has committed murder here," is how the president of
Jefferson
Parish, Aaron Broussard explained it, accusing the Federal Emergency
Management
Agency of blocking deliveries of water and diesel fuel into the parish.
Beyond structural inefficiencies, the government appears to have
intentionally
withheld aid from the people of New Orleans and other affected areas. There are
clear cases of this at a micro-level, where food deliveries or the serving of
lunch were delayed so George or Laura Bush could fly in for a photo op. But the
number of times that FEMA officials actively prevented aid from arriving –
accepting only one truck of a large offer from Chicago, tying up in red tape
New Mexico's offer of National Guard troops, turning away 500 local boatsmen
ready to search for survivors – would make anyone wonder if they were trying to
help.
Some have described the government's handling of Katrina as a twenty-first
century Tuskegee experiment in disaster response: a chance to study an
American
city under the kind of stress that war and nature have in store for us. Local
residents claim to have heard explosions when the levees ruptured, hearkening
back to the intentional flooding of poor, rural areas to save the city of New
Orleans during a 1927 flood. Questions about the levees being intentionally
dynamited to flood poor neighborhoods and save the French Quarter go past the
point.
We don't need an investigation to tell us what we saw. We don't have to
split
hairs. The government has been withholding aid from poor people in the Gulf
Coast region since Reconstruction. People were starving, living in adequate
shelter, and not receiving health care before the storm struck. Why would we
think they would receive anything afterwards?
So we have to be clear that there are not good authorities and bad
authorities
among those that were supposed to do something about this disaster. They are
all
part of a single system that caused the death of thousands of people.
The media is already working to portray the battle over blame for Katrina as
a
choice between Democrats and Republicans. Within a week, the Washington
Post
was writing articles with headlines like "GOP Agenda Shifts as Political Trials
Grow: Katrina Puts Estate Tax Repeal on Ice." Only a sadist could stay focused
on repealing the estate tax in a time like this. (That's the best way to
describe Grover Norquist, head of Americans for Tax Reform, who has said he
wants to drown government in a bath tub and who issued an immediate
statement
after Katrina that the estate tax was just what Gulf Coast residents needed to
rebuild.) Then the New York Times followed with "Democrats Step Up Criticism
of
White House" and "Katrina Divides Rather Than Unifies U.S." They're right about
the divide, but wrong that it's between Republicans and Democracts.
If we allow the response to Katrina to become a partisan battle playing out
in
Washington DC, we will ensure another catastrophe just like it in the near
future and the continued suffering of our nation's poor in the meantime. If we
learned anything from the 9/11 Commission, it was that a bi-partisan commission
of Washington insiders will find no one to blame. An investigation led by George
Bush himself cannot be taken seriously.
If we're going to have a federal government, disaster mitigation and
response
is definitely one of the responsibilities they should have. A more capable
FEMA, like the one headed by James Witt under Clinton, would likely have
responded sooner and more effectively. Clinton had cut funding to New Orleans's
levees, but not to the extent that Bush did. Bush cancelled Project Impact, the
mitigation program created by the Clinton administration.
But no matter what FEMA does, whether it focuses on natural disasters or
terrorism, whether it leaves 20,000 to die or 1,000, civilian response will
always be the most immediate and significant component of disaster relief.
That's why every disaster will reveal the extent of impoverishment and
incapacitation at the local level. Watching a disaster offers a window onto the
stark imbalances in different communities' health and wealth caused by
capitalism and white supremacism.
George Bush may be the worst of the characters in the story of Hurricane
Katrina. But put any of the other public officials – Chertoff, Brown, Bianco,
or Nagin – in his place and local police departments would still care more
about property than people, devastating climate change would proceed, and
millions of people in the United States and billions around the world would
remain in poverty with their situations getting worse. Fire who you want, fire
them all, but we need to address these fundamental problems.
We are ready to argue that our choice is between centralized government
and
self-government. Having witnessed the clear and utter failure of their
government at all levels, millions of people are now ready to hear this. Rather
than taking the side of this or that politician, we should adopt the slogan of
the popular uprising in Argentina: They all must go.
Of course, this is not to be confused with reducing government in favor of a
"reliance on the private sector." In the short term, the most we could expect
is that these politicians are merely replaced with others that are more
responsive to their constituents and more willing to put resources and
decisionmaking power into the hands of local communities, even if it means
taking them away from large corporations. But we also need to fully realize
what actions we can take without waiting for the approval of any outside
authority.
THE RESPONSE
Whether we like it or not, we are in line for more Katrina-like cataclysms. If
New Orleans is the city in North America most vulnerable to climate change,
which city is number two? While I support the community activists who are
calling to rebuild New Orleans, even the most business-oriented development
plans strike me as utopian in the face of our new reality. Miles of homes are
coated in oil and petrochemicals. The region was already known as Cancer Alley.
And the way the toxic floodwaters are being pumped into Lake Pontchartrain is
making matters worse. "It will take 10 years to get everything up and running
and safe," EPA expert Hugh Kaufman told The Independent.
Our country has the resources to clean up the mess and rebuild the city in
any
fashion we choose. And regardless of all other factors, we need to proceed with
a cleanup; thousands of people are still in the area and plan to live their
lives there. We could easily pay for it with the money we are currently using
to fight the war in Iraq. Or, as the conservative Heritage Foundation suggests,
Congress could redirect the pork barrel funding from their recently-enacted
highway bill. Those are just the easy ones.
Billions of dollars are already starting to flow into the region with little
oversight. Community involvement in the allocation of those funds is critical,
even when they're not directed towards residential areas. It's the only check
on the massive graft and patronage that characterize government spending,
especially in Louisiana and Mississippi, two of the most corrupt states in the
nation. War profiteers like Halliburton, Bechtel, and Fluor have already
secured rebuilding contracts. Without a doubt, displaced residents need to
organize to respond with coordinated power to their current situation.
But if we take a long, hard look at our situation we see that we will have a
hard enough time just holding the line of devastation where it is right now
without trying to push it back to where it was before Katrina. At its heart,
rebuilding New Orleans is a conservative response, even if it's also an
emotional one. These are radical times. The deep challenges of global climate
change, peak oil, massive poverty, fragile health, and continuing racism
require our focused attention. Perhaps a community-directed, ecologically-sound
rebuilding of the Gulf Coast will be an inspiration or laboratory for addressing
them. But our primary focus must be on mitigating future natural and humanmade
disasters.
To be ready for the coming disasters, we need massive resources deployed
at the
most local level throughout the country and, of course, the world. If the
government will provide them, great. If not, we need to work to secure them
ourselves.
To start, we must put an immediate end to hunger and homelessness in the
United
States. After Katrina, we can no longer pretend that poverty does not exist
within our borders. We have no excuse. Poverty in the United States is like the
levees in New Orleans. The warning signs are there and people will die if we do
not heed them.
After surveying 27 cities, the U.S. Conference of Mayors recently
announced
that hunger and homelessness are on the rise in major cities. Nearly half of
the cities surveyed reported that emergency food assistance facilities may have
to turn away people in need due to lack of resources. "These are not simply
statistics," Nashville Mayor Bill Purcell, who co-chairs the Conference's Task
Force on Hunger and Homelessness, said. "These are real people, many are
families with children, who are hungry and homeless in our cities."
Our country has enough resources to feed, clothe, and house every person
in it.
Once every person displaced by Katrina has been provided this security, the
airdrops of water and MREs should begin in Detroit, Anacostia, Appalachia, and
every Native American reservation. I am not naive enough to believe this will
happen under our current government. But every day that it doesn't is another
Katrina in slow motion.
We must confront the healthcare crisis in the United States, which
disproportionately impacts African Americans. More than 50 evacuees have
already died in Texas. Officials suggested that many of them, like Clarence
"Gatemouth" Brown who died in Orange, Texas, after being evacuated from New
Orleans, had pre-existing health conditions. In the United States, being Black
is a pre-existing health condition. “When it comes to your risk of stroke, you
get a penalty for being African American, you get a penalty for living in the
South, and you get an ‘extra’ penalty for being an African American living in
the South,” Dr. George Howard said after analyzing stroke death data from 1997
through 2001. The American Heart Association will tell you that African
Americans are at increased risk for hypertension and heart disease. The
countless stories of stranded New Orleans residents needing insulin exposed
what the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention's statistics had already
proven: that Blacks are 30 percent more likely to have diabetes than whites.
While the rates of diagnosis for diabetes is declining for both groups, it is
declining twice as fast for whites as for Blacks. In short, the poor overall
health of New Orleans' African Americans put them at greater risk during the
hurricane, flood, and evacuation, just as it puts them at greater risk in
everyday life.
Even beyond this systemic level, it is clear that racism directly caused some
of the death and suffering in Katrina's wake – again, just as it causes death
and suffering everyday. Whether in the Gretna Sheriffs' refusal to allow
evacuations on foot or in the media's portrayal of "looters" that helped
justify the decision to order police and National Guard to "shoot to kill,"
American white supremacy brought violence and repression to African
Americans
in their most desperate moments before it brought them food and water. This,
too, happens everyday. Racism is so ingrained in the fabric of America that it
is hard to imagine that we could overcome it as a country. Increased community
control over resources, decisions, and media would help considerably.
Since catastrophes strike the disenfranchised the hardest, disaster
preparedness is a form of redistribution of wealth. The only way to mitigate
the effects of a catastrophe is to make sure that everyone has food, clothing,
shelter, good health and strong communication networks before it hits. The
public awareness following Katrina provides an opportunity for us to make
demands of our government officials and to take our own actions to prepare our
communities.
Urban centers must immediately publish their full evacuation plans. If they
can't do so, they should admit to being unprepared and then they should start
getting prepared. The New Orleans plan of "you're on your own" is not
acceptable. Security at this level is a primary function of government. Anyone
who's in the government should fulfill this part of their job or quit. Every
city and region in the country must publish immediately its plan for evacuating
every resident in case of a catastrophic emergency.
"A plan should not be some requirement," Florida's emergency
management chief,
Craig Fugate, told the Palm Beach Post in an article about Louisiana and
Mississippi's failed or non-existent hurricane response plans. "It should truly
reflect what your real needs are, and what your real resources are."
After seeing the government's response to Katrina, few people trust that it
will keep them safe. They want proof, not some bullshit excuse that you won't
share the information with the public because then the terrorists will have it.
People will no longer accept that. Government incompetence is a bigger danger
than any terrorist.
Start investing seriously in public transportation, including light-rail
systems that would be capable of handling mass evacuations. At other times,
these light rails can replace fuel-inefficient long-haul trucking.
Sign the fucking Kyoto treaty already. And then start figuring out how to cut
emissions even further. The state-level pact recently completed in the
northeast is a fine strategy, but the world needs to drastically reduce the
amount of greenhouse gases in the air.
Get together with other countries to reduce disasters. The UN World
Conference
on Disaster Reduction is a good place to start. So is Cuba, where they were
able to evacuate 1.5 million people ahead of last year's Hurricane Ivan – a
category 5 – with nearly zero lives lost and no looting or curfews. Marjorie
Cohn, in an article for Truthout, explains Cuba's success with a quote from Dr.
Nelson Valdes, a sociology professor at the University of New Mexico, and
specialist in Latin America: "The whole civil defense is embedded in the
community to begin with. People know ahead of time where they are to go...
Shelters all have medical personnel, from the neighborhood. They have family
doctors in Cuba, who evacuate together with the neighborhood, and already
know,
for example, who needs insulin."
Emergency stores of food and water should not be held in FEMA bunkers or
National Guard armories. They should be available in every area of 10,000
people as an emergency food and water depot whose location is well-publicized.
The last two weeks have shown that we need more than food and water to
survive.
We need basic survival skills like first aid, emergency medicine, and fire
safety. We have also seen that we need to be able to organize ourselves in
times of crisis. In short, we need to be able to survive without government.
This includes setting up communication networks. A major problem in the
Gulf
Coast was the lack of access to correct information. As with water, food,
clothes and shelter, communication is a human right. We need methods for
speaking with each other and the ability to adapt those methods to even the
worst of circumstances.
This does not mean a Magnetic Acoustic Device, like the prototype that was
sent
to the Gulf Coast allegedly to provide a "communications infrastructure to get
information or instructions out to people," according to Wired News. A MAD can
direct sound signals from over a mile away; it can also be used as an "area
denial option," using painful sonic blasts to attack and clear crowds.
Rather, we need participatory communications networks, especially in the
hands
of people that are shut out of traditional broadcast outlets. This might
include low-power radio and shortwave radio, text messaging and other
phone-based tools. It can also mean websites or newspapers, especially when
connected to community organizing efforts, since otherwise those can exclude
people who don't read or get online. Sometimes a gathering point or a bulletin
board can suffice. Whatever the method, they're available to us right now and
we should be implementing them more and more.
So let's make our own DVD, one with real information on how to help your
family
and neighbors. The possible content of such a DVD is vast, including suturing,
Morse code, generator maintenance, and water purification. It would be great if
it worked in print and audio as well as video, and was in multiple languages.
Let's teach each other what to do in a natural disaster. Hell, let's teach each
other what to do in the current disaster.