Disaster 2005: Pro & Con

I’ve been crying off and on for days now… I’m human. I’m sensitive.

It seems that we Americans (I hate the term “Americans” for citizens of the United States of America, as I deplore the use of the term “America” for the United States; there are many Americas – Central America, South America, etc. It’s the dominance of the USA in economic arenas which leads people to call the USA “America”) have failed both ourselves and each other. Hurricane Katrina leveled cities and savaged towns. People were killed instantly and are dying by the minute still. Lawlessness has erupted. Chaos has ensued. Riots have broken out.

People are hungry, thirsty, scared, desperate, frustrated, feeling isolated, feeling dirty, confused, and abandoned. That’s right. While you or I watch the horror unfurling on CNN or other news channels, or as we read the stories in the newspaper during our comfortable commute on the train or tram or bus to work each day, people are DYING, starving, thirsting to death, lacking medicine, and/or needing a cool place in which to sleep and shelter themselves. Where is the seemingly “omnipotent United States Federal Government?” Nowhere. Nowhere – fast.

There’s absolutely NO REASON for this sort of miscommunication or lack of communication in the year 2005 in the United States of America. None. One would almost suspect that Washington, D.C. had also been deluged with floodwaters as well, given the utter lack of information we’ve experienced… We’re hearing nothing but vague condolences and promises of relief for refugees/evacuees “sometime soon” or “by the weekend.” That’s NOT acceptable. The United States of America can blow up the entire surface area of Earth many times over, engage hundreds of thousands of military troops and transport them halfway across the globe within mere days, yet, as people who live approximately 1,000 miles from the USA’s capital are dying each moment, we hear and see virtually nothing. Where’s our leadership? Where’s the swift commanding action? Where’s the mightiest nation on Earth when its denizens suffer, die, and starve?

Anarchy and chaos are becoming more and more and more prevalent. Tempers are flared and some people have begun to “snap.” Where is the relief? It’s not as if everyone needs a 4-star hotel accommodation and that cannot be arranged. No. This is about basic necessities. Plane-loads of food and water could have been flown into Mississippi and Louisiana and cargo drops of food, supplies, batteries, and many medicines could have been done. We have not seen that. It has not been done. People are dying, minute-by-minute, and the government (our elected leaders and representatives) is sitting on its hands acting impotent and bewildered. This is not rocket science, by ANY stretch of the imagination. In a mega-crisis, get every available man, woman, and able-bodied older child and get the machines going – food, water, shelter, and medicine are BADLY needed, so you just GET THEM THERE….forthwith, regardless of cost or opinion polls or politics. Politics can be cleaned up and “spun” later. I cannot imagine having to even “spin” a decision to send emergency aid and supplies into a disaster zone is hardly something which I’d ever entertain as having to be politically “spun,” but apparently that’s the cause of the delay. Sad. Again….where’s our leadership?

People need basic food, water, and shelter to survive. Sick people need medication and health care. The pharmaceutical companies, who profit IMMENSELY with each sale of their medications, are not feeling particularly philanthropic, apparently – where are the donated TRUCKLOADS of anti-biotics and other critical drugs and medicines for the disaster victims? Oh…I forgot…if you cannot show proof of insurance, you’re left dying. Someone’s got to pay, right? People are dying and being pushed aside amidst the chaos, their corpses rotting in the summer sun and floodwaters. It’s a sad, sad, sad state of affairs.

“The cavalry is coming,” we’re told. Perhaps I’m naïve, but as early as Friday morning of last week, CNN began a “countdown to mayhem” sort of approach to hurricane Katrina. We all KNEW what was coming, and roughly which areas would be most affected. Still, our elected government sat on its hands and did nothing. No proactive relief. WHY does it take 3 days ex post facto for the decision to be made to send relief buses to get people out of New Orleans and into Houston? It could have been set up a week ago, or earlier, BEFORE the mess happened. There’s currently a Naval hospital ship en route to the New Orleans area. That’s wonderful. However, it takes many days for a ship to sail from Maryland to New Orleans. Why the hell wasn’t the ship dispatched PROACTIVELY last Friday to the area IN CASE it was needed? We KNEW it was going to be a disaster zone somewhere in the area, so WHY are we sitting here waiting now? It’s just inexcusable, in my opinion. Someone was SERIOUSLY “asleep at the wheel” here. That sort of ineptitude is criminal, essentially, I think, and it’s completely unforgivable.

The United States government has failed us, fails us still, and it’s intolerable and unacceptable. We have a representative government beholden to mega-corporate interests, watching bottom lines and dividend statements, stockholder earnings, etc. and people are dying on the streets. Nice.

I’d EXPECT this level of public service from certain countries and governments, but NOT in the United States. Not to say that the USA is superior, etc., but the utter LACK of organization and timely response, particularly since we KNEW in advance what we’d be facing with the hurricane -- it’s simply appalling.

We, here in the United States of America, needn’t tolerate “all talk and no action” politics. It’s time for a change. It’s time for relief and legitimate help. We need international aid as well, of course. Every penny counts. No small amount of charity is too small. I’ll be following up on this shortly, but please visit www.redcross.org if you feel inclined in the slightest way to help. Please.

Every penny counts – just not every life, it often seems. What a sad state of affairs. I’m ashamed and embarrassed. No one is kidding about the situation, I think – reports are that “hundreds are dead, and the count could go higher.” It’s NOT hundreds who’ve been killed by the hurricane and resulting floods. It’s NOT AT ALL hundreds – it’s THOUSANDS. Al Quaeda could not have done a “better job” had THEY been behind all of this (which they were NOT, of course, although they certainly are gleeful about this disaster, something they could never accomplish themselves, despite all aspirations).

I’m just saddened and frustrated. G.W. Bush offered some comments today about the topic. We, ALL of us, should try to help with donations (not food or clothes – the cost of shipping is prohibitive [gas prices have skyrocketed], plus cash stimulates local economies near the stricken areas) as soon as possible. I agree. I’m certainly no G.W. Bush supporter, but I do concur with him on THAT. He just needs to put his proverbial money where his mouth is. He can talk the talk, but can he walk the walk? We’ll see.

Cheers – I suppose. Please donate either a humble or a generous bit of funds, if you can, to this relief effort. Thanks for reading.

-- Nightfly

Update: President Bush has visited some of the disaster areas now. He made a public announcement about how poorly his administration has failed in this matter. That’s good public relations, but an admission of failure is still an admission of failure. Let’s hope and pray that President Bush sets things straight and that things are done right, and are done forthwith.