[hoplite]

I was looking at crime stats on www.fbi.gov and the occurences of black on white violent crime is absolutely astronomical. If the stats were reversed, the media frenzy would be absolutely boiling! Even the FBI states that your odds of being assaulted are directly proportional to your proximity to blacks!
There is a serious problem in the "black community" and I don't think it has anything to do with racism (institutional or otherwise). Here's a quote from "the reverend" Jesse Jackson: "When I turned around, I was relieved to see the 2 people approaching behind me were white" (!)

[Yavicleus]

Sure, deep down inside, we all do...

But now we can!

http://www.aussiecoupes.com/max.html

[cowboy_wpt]

SuperDome Evacuation
$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('', 'N')EW ORLEANS - The evacuation of the Superdome was suspended Thursday after shots were reported fired at a military helicopter and arson fires broke out outside the arena. No immediate injuries were reported.
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.
Richard Zeuschlag, chief of the ambulance service that was handling the evacuation of sick and injured people from the Superdome, said it was suspending operations "until they gain control of the Superdome."
He said shots were fired at a military helicopter over the Superdome before daybreak.
He said the National Guard told him that it was sending 100 military police officers to restore order.
"That's not enough," Zeuschlag said. "We need a thousand."
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.
He said tens thousands of people started rushing out of other buildings when they saw buses pulling up and hoped to get on. But the immediate focus was on evacuating people from the Superdome, and the other refugees were left to mill around.
Zeuschlag said paramedics were calling him and crying for help because they were so scared of people with guns at the Superdome. He also said that during the night, when a medical evacuation helicopter tried to land at a hospital in the outlying town of Kenner, the pilot reported 100 people were on the landing pad, some with guns.
"He was frightened and would not land," Zeuschlag.

[Jack]

Definitely - the optimists forget the true nature of human-kind.

New Orleans has descended into a Mad Max scenario - in 72 hours.

[RonMN]

I've been a doomer all along...but it's so UNREAL to see with my own eyes! It is truely hard to believe.

[backstop]

Jack -I don't belittle the seriousness, but I guess that these are very exceptional circs, rather than a good guide to future PO reactions. Since:
A/. the people know they were left to drown if a Cat 5 had passed to the west, by a mayoralty that could well afford to evacuate them.
B/. they know that they were again left to drown by the failure to patrol the levees Tuesday night.
C/. they know they've been left to go hungry & thirsty, and that the police have been looting - as one citizen remarked of them - "They got all the best stuff - they're bigger crooks than we are."
D/. the police were so incompetently commanded as to leave stocks of weapons and ammo in stores across the city.
E/. 5 days after the storm, they've still not been evacuated, and people are dying of untreated medical conditions (inside the dome, let alone elsewhere).

By this point, under the summer heat, in the stench of sewage, I'd not be potting at helicopters, but surely it's quite predictable that there are those that will ?
Had the event overall been well managed, or at least the mayor replaced Monday morning, might not conditions now be totally different ?
Regards,
Backstop

[Pops]

What I find interesting – being a 'get away from cities' kind of guy, is that the folks supposedly starving aren’t leaving NO but staying right in the middle of the sh!t.

I could be wrong but I haven’t seen any streams of refugees hoofing it to dry land on the news. And I have heard they aren’t allowed to leave the dome – very bad sign for city folks.

I don’t blame them for expecting more help by now but it is interesting they are staying put.

[medicvet]

What I do not understand is if they have all these people simmering and stewing..literally..why they suspend the evacuation..do they think that if they wait to get the people out that things will get BETTER? unfreakinbelievable..the level of incompetence of our authorities is appalling.

[Grimnir]

Don't forget F/ Evacuation was ordered, so those who are left are to a large extent the dregs of humanity.

[backstop]

Given that both Bush and the LA Govenor have hastened to jump on a zero-tolerance-of-looting wagon, "unbeleivable" incompetence is starting to look right.
I can imagine some of the conspiracy theories making the rounds within the city.
The one way to quash that alienation is to indite the mayor. And what chance of the media calling for that ?
regards, Backstop

[Eli]

Oh please, I would not call authorities incompetent for halting Evac when helicopters are fired upon. It is all you can do.
One lucky shot and you will have a Helo burning on the friggin ground. And all you guys will be screaming "what incompetence!"
Zero tolerance for looters and shoot on site sounds like a plan to me and very reasonable. The fires that people are setting and chaos has the potential to kill allot of people. The only way to restore order is with strong show of force.

[frankthetank]

Pops~Your right about cities. I'm starting to think the city i'm near is a little close for comfort!

Lets not forget that the heat (its somewhere near 100F with HI) down there is just making the situation worse, not to mention the people who stayed behind are probably lower on the economic scale then the people who fled.

[tpm]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('', 'I')'ve been a doomer all along...but it's so UNREAL to see with my own eyes! It is truely hard to believe

[backstop]

Eli -Not me - as regards risking a chopper through light ground fire under the present emergency conditions.
I also share entirely your will to drop anyone who fails to drop a weapon when so ordered. They are undoubtedly hindering a rescue operation, and logically their lives therefore come second.
I hope I'm wrong in the suspicion that a politicos' strand of distraction from their incompetence is getting going via 'zero-tolerance' rhetoric.
Regards, Backstop

[aflurry]

All this making big claims about human nature on the basis of a few (rumored) shots at a helicopter is retarded.
And also, what makes this particular crisis the litmus test for the character of your fellow man? Is history suddenly without other examples of crisis? The character is in fact many and varied. And the possibility of hostility makes camaraderie when found, more sweet.

WAY too much emphasis is placed on the the looting, as if a few waterlogged Air Jordan's are the only things protecting us from the swamps of anarchy. I heard the news anchor on CNBC ask the field reporter why looters weren't being "shot on sight." Ugh, civilization is so jealous. And looting like this is just a spasmodic reaction. If a few ignorant poor people pick up a couple items that have been waved under their noses for years, does it bring us any closer to collapse? Three blocks later they will put them down again anyway, as their weight in the Louisiana sun will generate a looter's remorse just a surely as buyers remorse would have set in for the would-be purchaser of those useless foam sponges if Katrina had never come.

If people help one-another in various small ways to get through this it will not show up in news stories, not now anyway, when money is being made on stories describing carnage.
You may think you are being a hard nosed realist, but you are only being an aloof elitist. Mad Max was a cartoon. Why does it serve as this generation's Hobbesean remonstration against the state of nature?
Hmm, well this is a very overblown a reaction to this short thread. Nothing against your post specifically, Jack. My bad. But I am commenting on a common theme posted here, that the hordes, masses, dirty and unwashed, are set to descend on the compound as soon as we let the oil fires grow dim. I'm under no illusions that things will not get tough down the road here. But it won't be human nature eating us up. Human nature is an explanatory fable told after the fact. I do not believe it is consumer comforts that cusion us against it. If anything they aggravate pettiness. If anyone feels unfairly accused, perhaps I mischaracterize. The internet is a poor means for communication in many ways, as is evidinced by the growing range of emoticons to your left (which I will NOT use, no matter how misunderstood I become).

[richardmmm]

it's probably not as bad as it all seems in the moment.
but imagine if a major earthquake demolished chunks of LA next week.
or another hurriance rips apart Miami and then barrels across the gulf, wacking more rigs and finally piles into Houston.
Or there's a major volcanic erruption in Washington State.
Or frustation with gas shortages leads to major civil unrest, rioting and looting in Atlanta.

Then of course there's always the volcanos in Tennerife which are set to errupt sometime sending a Tsunami across the Atlantic into the entire east coast, that will make last decembers asian one look like a couple of ripples on a garden pond.
The problem is not so much one specific event, its the compounding of several in a short time frame.
the government could do a better job. I mean it was pretty obvious that the power was going to go out during the hurricane, but no one bothered to arrange a couple of diesel generators and enough fuel for 4-5 days. Food for 10,000 people etc.

It was obviously going to be chaotic, but the level of organisation is a joke. It's all so casual and by the by. There is no sense of urgency.
That attitude comes right from the very top.

[Petro]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('Eli', 'O')h please, I would not call authorities incompetent for halting Evac when helicopters are fired upon. It is all you can do.
One lucky shot and you will have a Helo burning on the friggin ground. And all you guys will be screaming "what incompetence!"
Zero tolerance for looters and shoot on site sounds like a plan to me and very reasonable. The fires that people are setting and chaos has the potential to kill allot of people. The only way to restore order is with strong show of force.

[Jake_old]

I think the difference nowadays especially with the US and now UK is that we are culturally entrenched in the economics of self interest and notions of the individual as the most important thing in the world.
We have never had this level of individual freedom. There isn't any comparison in history so to see this leads me to expect the worst in people, and as has already been said, was already a doomer, I just don't like it being confirmed.
I am sure too that there are instances of good will and altruism which will go unreported, that is criminal in itself but I expect the good deeds were far fewer.

[Petro]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('RedJake', 'I') think the difference nowadays especially with the US and now UK is that we are culturally entrenched in the economics of self interest and notions of the individual as the most important thing in the world. ... I am sure too that there are instances of good will and altruism which will go unreported, that is criminal in itself but I expect the good deeds were far fewer

[DigitalCubano]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('aflurry', 'A')ll this making big claims about human nature on the basis of a few (rumored) shots at a helicopter is retarded.