Nothing gets past EchoMouse and she's pulled together some great links to blogs based in the disaster area. Great stuff Mouse and thanks for doing that - some amazing stuff here. I find it incomprehensible that the US is refusing offers of aid!
Friday, 2 September 2005
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I keep hearing that other countries have better coverage than we do....and if it's true that GW is refusing offers of Aid......
I don't know what to say...It's sp frustrating to watch this.
Bush Visits
I don't think I've ever agreed with Newt before, but this quote...I agree with ""I think it puts into question all of the
Homeland Security and Northern Command planning for the last four years, because if we can't respond faster than this to an event we saw coming across the Gulf for days, then why do we think we're prepared to respond to a nuclear or biological attack?" said former House Speaker Newt Gingrich.
Yeah, I voted Bush and I am really disgusted with this whole thing. The National Guard should have been activated the minute thay knew the storm was a cat 4. They could have loaded up MRE's and water and had it at the Superdome by Sunday...the govt dropped the ball big time and we may never know how many elderly and babies died from exposure, lack of med and dehydration.
Cheri - It looks like Gingrich has hit the spot, every bone in my body is screaming "What have I got for my money??" and right now the answer has to be absolutely now't, nothing, nada, big splat zero.
Wendy - I'm not convinced it's just the elderly and the babies is it? Five days on and people are still dying. Not long ago we were banging on about poverty in Africa but yesterday and today and tomorrow this is in the US and while nobody suggests that there is a magic wand which makes the pain go away the sights we're seeing right now are obscene.
My rhetorical question of the week is "How the hell did it take so long to get engaged?" - people were dying on our TV screens and they weren't a long way away in a third world country - they were in the good ole US of A and the people charged with protecting them were asleep at the wheel. My own view is that if you want the big rewards you have to be there when the crap hits the fan and right now, the view from here, it's difficult to see where anyone was "protecting and serving". It's simply shit all ways up - wherever they come from there are people dying and there is nothing we can (practicably) do to help them. It's the same in Rwanda, Zimbabwi, Sierra Leone, etc, etc. The difference has to be that the States should have had their stuff together a good deal more.
We should have had our act together. We let our own people down big time. And this will not be forgotten. Damn, people are dying because bush cannot get his act together! Some leader he is.
Sadly I'm sure you are right Squid. Far better to let a few thousand die in absolute squallor than accept help from friends. Meanwhile, of course, the world is watching in shock and awe as we hit what - day 5? day 6? - and people are still suffering and dying. A test of any society is how it treats those less fortunate. I'm guessing that Bush will turn down the offer of 1,000 doctors from Cuba and food and fuel from Venuzuela? Much better that a few thousand more poor people die than admit to being in pain.
Squid isn't right, the only 'aid' money you spend down here is on you're own military bases. Yeah thanks GW!
It's pretty sad when our Prime Minister was seriously thinking about sending in our own people to get our nationals out. The only reason why it hasn't already happened is that GW rang him and told him to butt out.
But I'm sure we wouldn't be a help, it's not like we have any experience with this kind of thing, we only co-ordinated the entire relief effort for the Tsunami.
I can never understand what is meant by the term ‘Our money’ and who it actually includes. As far as I can see, the world’s resources and its problems belong to us all. I know that money and politics can't be avoid but I think that priorities need to change. People can change their politicians.
Yes, the only part of Squid's comment that is in error is the aid money part. I can't speak for other countries but Canada provides to the USA, not the other way round. The rest I agree with.
Word comes today that Canadian ships are being deployed today and that our government is going in to rescue Canadians still trapped there. But I remember seeing a couple from Scotland who are stranded in a hotel in N.O. and wonder how they are faring.
This is all so freakish. Knowing the resources of the USA, I blame this squarely on the american government and not it's citizens.
Oh, and thanks for the link Nog. Your BBC link is great too. I've added it to my daily reads.
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