by
justeastofeden
on Wed 29 Aug 2007 09:24 PM CDT
Today is the second anniversary of the day Hurricane Katrina devastated New Orleans. Marilyn and I traveled there six months after the storm and what we saw chilled our souls. The core of the venerable old city went almost untouched. Less than ten blocks away, a palpable gloom began surrounding the French Quarter in successive ripples of near total destruction.
Having witnessed in person the 1995 Murrah Building bombing in Oklahoma City, I well remember that the miles of videotape taken of the destruction never came close to portraying the horror done by one extremely large fertilizer bomb detonated from the back of a rental truck. Katrina was worse.
Marilyn and I drove for miles from the town’s center, literally never seeing plant, human or animal – at least that was alive. It seemed like no one cared – not the bureaucrats that had set hundreds of porta-potties in Chalmette and then never bothered to ever dump the shit. The odor was nauseating, but not as bad as the stench coming from our elected officials we all feel that should support us during any natural disaster, much less one of this magnitude.
On a tour of the French Quarters, we were struck by the City’s indomitable spirit, and the gallows humor so prevalent everywhere we looked. I won’t forget the tee shirt that said, “FEMA Evacuation Plan – run motherfucker run!!
I’m not laughing. There is too much truth in those words.
What has happened to New Orleans two years after Katrina? The ethnicity has changed, the city flooded with hard working Hispanics looking for a job and a home. In the Lower 9th Ward, little has changed and it is still largely deserted. Home owners are fighting a new bureaucracy, one that indiscriminately bulldozes their houses, despite improves and renovations. Land speculators have run up property values. Business has moved away, leaving the City only one real industry – tourism.
On the second anniversary of the worst natural disaster ever to occur in modern America, we should all assess in our own minds how we feel about New Orleans. Is the City expendable? Should we think of the people there as no better than inhabitants of some third world country, unworthy of our support and charity? I think not.
We can’t abandon New Orleans any more than we can abandon the entire Gulf Coast, also struck by the disaster of Katrina. It is the home of too much commerce, refineries, seaports and oil and natural gas production. Sure, much of the rest of the country maintains a holier-than-thou attitude. “I can’t soil my pretty little hands with such dirty southern commerce.”
Well here’s a wakeup call. None of us will survive very long without New Orleans and the Gulf Coast region. New Orleans and the Gulf Coast are integral, nay essential segments of the American economy. Cut them off and cast them out and you may as well poke out your own eyes.
Today is the second anniversary of the day Hurricane Katrina devastated New Orleans. The city survived, and is surviving. I can only hope that the rest of this great country will begin to see New Orleans as a valued neighbor and fellow Americans that deserves a helping hand, and not some third world nation located halfway around the world.
http://www.ericwilder.com http://www.gondwanapress.com
