 |
Sat Sep 06 2008 | |||||||||
|
||||||||||
|
Departments National Issues 911 in New Orleans by Paul Rogat Loeb September 2, 2005 We're told the 911 attacks changed everything for America--that they ushered us in to a new and more dangerous world, where we could no longer afford old illusions. If we take its full lessons, the disaster of Hurricane Katrina challenges us even more profoundly. If the comparison seems overstated, the death tolls from Katrina may well exceed the number of those lost at the World Trade Center and Pentagon. The projected cost of rebuilding New Orleans and its surroundings is now projected at $25 billion and may even approach the $40 billion paid out by insurance companies worldwide related to the 911 attacks. And while New York City beyond the Twin Towers remained intact, a refuge to flee to and base from which to assemble emergency resources, New Orleans is a sea of desolation, a wet and desperate landscape with no place to hide. New York City and the national economy rebounded relatively quickly from the attacks. The New Orleans projections are far grimmer. 911, we were told, required Americans to place unprecedented trust in their president and his advisors, and to scrap longstanding rules of international law and domestic liberties. It justified a preemptive war against Iraq and Bush's reelection, despite all his failures. Of course it might never have occurred if the US hadn't supported bin Laden to begin with, or if our policies hadn't so embittered the Islamic world that a small number of men were willing to murder 3,000 innocent people. But we'd all agree the attacks had a profound global impact. So what are the lessons of New Orleans? We may call hurricanes acts of God, but Katrina was a level 1 storm, the lowest, until blistering temperatures in the Gulf of Mexico supercharged it to level 5. The storm's virulence was related to global climate warming just as surely as the recent forest fires that ravaged Southern California, floods that covered much of Bangladesh, and European heat waves that killed 35,000 people two summers ago. Ironically, Mississippi Governor Haley Barbour played a key role, as an energy lobbyist, in convincing the Bush administration to break its campaign promise to support limits on the carbon dioxide emissions that fuel global warming. This disaster was fueled by more than global climate change. Engineers and software writers talk of "common mode failures," where one mistake magnifies another and the cumulative impact is greater than all the separate parts. The New Orleans levees might never have been breached had the Bush administration not reversed Clinton administration policies prohibiting development of coastal wetlands that once buffered the impact of storms. The levees might have been buttressed and repaired had the administration responded to a 2001 FEMA study warning that a hurricane striking New Orleans was one of the three most likely disasters in the U.S. But instead of honoring the Army Corps of Engineers' request to strengthen and renovate levees and pumping stations, the Bush administration cut the flood control budget of the New Orleans Corps of Engineers by $71 million, 44 percent of its budget. They needed the money for the Iraq war and to give $130 billion a year of tax cuts to a tiny group of wealthy Americans. Finally, this catastrophe built on the slow-burn disaster that's been hitting America's poorest communities for decades. The wealthy and comfortable could evacuate New Orleans and did, though their lives were severely disrupted. But in one of the nation's poorest cities, vast numbers of citizens had nowhere to go, no transportation or money with which to leave, and no friends or relatives with extra space to house them. They are the people left desperately trying to get out, while the helicopters and resources of a third of the Louisiana National Guard are deployed in Iraq. And they will be the ones most damaged and most forgotten when the floodwaters eventually recede. We're told we had to change in the wake of 911 or face future terrorist attacks. I suspect there will still be more attacks on American soil, following London and Madrid, and that our Iraqi invasion makes this far more likely. But it's also probable that unless we change, New Orleans will not be the last of America's great cities to collapse in desperation and ruin. Immediate relief efforts are critical, but we also need to address root crises: global warming, runaway development, deterioration of critical infrastructure, and a malign neglect that leaves more and more Americans poor and desperate. A year ago, the world's second largest reinsurance company, Swiss Re, warned that the economic costs of climate-related disasters threatened to reach $150 billion a year within ten years. We're already seeing storms of exceptional virulence accompanying the heating of our oceans by a single degree. What will be the level of destruction as global temperatures continue to increase? The development patterns that destroyed Louisiana wetlands are being repeated throughout America, with the support of an administration intent on removing all limits on private economic activity. The aging levees are part of a deteriorating national infrastructure that will take billions of dollars to address. The poverty that leaves people helpless to respond to disasters of whatever kind continues to grow, accelerated by government policies that transfer resources away from the poorest. 911 may have indeed changed our world forever, though I think we've drawn the wrong lessons. We now have a chance to heed those of New Orleans and Katrina, with consequences potentially far worse if we don't. It's up to us how we respond to the power of this warning. -- Paul Rogat Loeb is the author of The Impossible Will Take a Little While: A Citizen's Guide to Hope in a Time of Fear, named the #3 political book of fall 2004 by the History Channel and the American Book Association, and of Soul of a Citizen: Living With Conviction in a Cynical Time. See www.paulloeb.org Email this article to a friend |
Don't forget to check out articles from 2007 and 2008
"Rumsfeld admits to "ghosting" detainee"
December 30, 2005
David Swanson
"A man without a country"
December 28, 2005
David Swanson
"Impeach the Liar-in-Chief"
December 26, 2005
Stephen Crockett and Al Lawrence
"Bush wiretaps threaten national security"
December 25, 2005
Stephen Crockett
"Which Christmas is the 'War Against Christmas' against? "
December 25, 2005
Robert Lockwood Mills
"Rainbow PUSH Wall Street Project plans economic summit in New York City"
December 22, 2005
Rainbow PUSH
"Fear of the devil"
December 22, 2005
Robert C. Koehler, Tribune Media Services
"It's time to impeach Bush for these blatant violations of the law"
December 22, 2005
Andy Ostroy
"December 3 in the USA: a partial report"
December 22, 2005
Ted Glick
"Bush spews more irresponsible rhetoric as senate Extends Patriot Act for Six Months"
December 22, 2005
Andy Ostroy
"The Constitution in Crisis report"
December 22, 2005
Edward Chu
"Privatize Me...Corporatize Me.... Blackwaterize Me..."
December 20, 2005
Jason Miller
"USA Patriot Act defeated: Libertarians celebrate victory"
December 19, 2005
Libertarian Party of Ohio
"The solution we aren't considering"
December 19, 2005
David Swanson
"Panic attack"
December 15, 2005
Robert C. Koehler, Tribune Media Services
"Eugene McCarthy, prophet with honor"
December 12, 2005
Robert Lockwood Mills
"The iron fist of Jesus"
December 12, 2005
Jason Miller
"Progressive primary challenge to Hilary aunched"
December 6, 2005
David Swanson
"An invitation to a tea party"
December 6, 2005
Lucinda Marshall
"Precarious lives"
December 3, 2005
Paul Rogat Loeb
"Criminal trial related to California energy crisis may start soon"
December 3, 2005
Jason Leopold
"Hey board members, leave our kids alone!"
December 3, 2005
Jason Miller
"A Congressman for impeachment"
November 30, 2005
David Swanson
"Friday night Congress: what was that?"
November 23, 2005
David Swanson
"Teach our children well"
November 20, 2005
Todd Huffman, M.D.
"Greenhouse School secures major art donation"
November 18, 2005
Dan Welch
"Parental guidance suggested"
November 16, 2005
Mike Ferner
"Our mothers (and Thomas Paine) warned us about people like the disciples of Strauss"
November 13, 2005
Jason Miller
"Despite his demeanor, Rove's still a Target"
November 13, 2005
Jason Leopold
"Armistice Day 2005"
November 11, 2005
Stephen Edward Seadler
"The Bush-Cheney ethics refresher course"
November 7, 2005
David Swanson
"Vice President lied as White House sought to defuse leak inquiry"
November 7, 2005
Jason Leopold
"53% of Americans support impeachment; ImpeachPAC announced!"
November 5, 2005
David Swanson
"I can't wait"
November 3, 2005
David Swanson
"Nothing to Lose"
November 2, 2005
Daniel Patrick Welch
"The real Rosa Parks"
October 31, 2005
Paul Rogat Loeb
"How has it come to this?"
October 30, 2005
Jim Oberg
"Bush's wheels falling off"
October 30, 2005
Reverend Jesse L. Jackson, Sr.
"Miers, White House surrender to ultraconservatives"
October 27, 2005
Josh Glasstetter
"Prosecutor secures indictment in CIA outing case, lawyers say"
October 27, 2005
Jason Leopold
"Hard conversations about the big easy"
October 24, 2005
Paul Rogat Loeb
"Coalition of 75 groups demand end to Pentagon's youth database"
October 19, 2005
Mike Ferner
"Vice President's role in outing of CIA agent under examination, sources close to prosecutor say"
October 19, 2005
Jason Leopold
"Hard questions about the big easy"
October 19, 2005
Paul Rogat Loeb
"Times reporter entangled in leak case had unusual relationship with military, Iraqi group"
October 19, 2005
Jason Leopold
"Try and catch the wind"
October 17, 2005
Daniel Patrick Welch
"More from the stormfront gulf central"
October 16, 2005
David Lewis
"A deep look at corruption culture"
October 16, 2005
Stephen Crockett and Al Lawrence
"Dems Go After Bennett, Salem Radio Network, FCC"
October 9, 2005
David Swanson
"Bill Bennett’s comments emerge from an ideology that is classic white supremacy, Rev. Jesse Jackson says"
October 5, 2005
Rev. Jesse L. Jackson, Sr.
"Why the nomination of Harriet has to be looked at below the radar"
October 5, 2005
Cynthia L. Butler, an Attorney licensed in PA, NJ, DC, CA
"In support of weakness on national security"
October 3, 2005
David Swanson
"Bill Frist, The Former 2008 Presidential Candidate"
September 27, 2005
Jason Leopold
"Winds of change blow through DC, Bush flees"
September 26, 2005
Bob Fitrakis
"More New Orleans stories"
September 25, 2005
David Lewis
"From the stormfront: experiencing Rita in New Orleans"
September 25, 2005
David Lewis
"The GOP’s fiscal policies turned a natural disaster into a man-made catastrophe"
September 23, 2005
Jason Leopold
"The Devil in the Details: Carter-Baker, California, and the Integrity of American Elections"
September 22, 2005
Warren Stewart, Director of Legislative Issues and Policy, VoteTrustUSA
"Hurricane Katrina-Our Experiences"
September 21, 2005
Larry Bradshaw, Lorrie Beth Slonsky
"A Fraction of Democracy"
September 20, 2005
Greg Coleridge
"Bring back New Orleans: the politics of disaster"
September 20, 2005
David Lewis, Photos by Aaron Geiser
"Rev. Jackson Recommends a 21st Century Marshall Plan That Reinvests in the Gulf Coast"
September 20, 2005
Rev. Jesse L. Jackson, Sr.
"Division of funeral corp. charged with desecrating corpses hired to collect deceased victims of hurricane Katrina"
September 19, 2005
Jason Leopold
"FEMA Chief Brown paid millions in false claims to help Bush win Fla. votes"
September 15, 2005
Jason Leopold
"Indefinite Detention"
September 9, 2005
Daniel Sturm
"Seems like more people died than prospered under Pres Bush’s leadership"
September 8, 2005
Jason Leopold
"Politics, timing and the so-called terrorist Nuradin Abdi: the mall bomber who wasn't"
September 7, 2005
Bob Fitrakis
"Paul Allen's other yacht"
September 4, 2005
Paul Rogat Loeb
"Katrina: A tragedy made worse"
September 4, 2005
Rev. Jesse L. Jackson, Sr.
"The President’s priorities: state of marriage took precedence over state of Louisiana"
September 3, 2005
Jason Leopold
"Notes from inside New Orleans"
September 3, 2005
Jordan Flaherty
"Rev. Jackson Makes Second Rescue Mission into New Orleans"
September 2, 2005
Rainbow/PUSH Coalition
"Bush Strafes New Orleans, Where's Huey Long?"
September 2, 2005
Greg Palast
"911 in New Orleans"
September 2, 2005
Paul Rogat Loeb
"Global Warming and Widespread Blackouts Are Just as Deadly as Terrorism"
September 1, 2005
Jason Leopold
"The mothers are coming!"
August 30, 2005
Sheila Samples
"Update from Leonard Peltier"
August 16, 2005
Leonard Peltier
"Leonard has been transferred to USP Lewisburg"
August 16, 2005
Michael Eckhardt
"Against Discouragement"
August 15, 2005
Howard Zinn
"Open Letter to Cindy Sheehan, Crawford, Texas"
August 11, 2005
Ralph Nader
"Regarding the 40th Anniversary of the Voting Rights Act of 1965"
August 4, 2005
Sabrina Williams
"Lawyers, guns and money: Just put down that lawsuit, pardner, and no one gets hurt"
August 1, 2005
Greg Palast
"Forgotten Victims of America’s Plutocracy"
August 1, 2005
Jason Miller
"Spine, spine everywhere a spine"
July 29, 2005
Rady Ananda
"Speaking truth to Roberts"
July 28, 2005
Paul Rogat Loeb
"Business as usual with Judge Roberts; straight corporate, with Pepto-Bismol chaser"
July 21, 2005
Alexander Cockburn and Jeffrey St Clair
"The Record of Judge John Roberts"
July 20, 2005
Gene C. Gerard
"The Enemy of Our Enemy May Still Be the Enemy of Democracy"
July 13, 2005
Paul Rogat Loeb
"Mr. Rove and the Access of Evil: Tell Us Your "Source," Judy"
July 13, 2005
Greg Palast
"The Economy Turned the Corner and Is Headed in the Wrong Direction"
July 8, 2005
Gene C. Gerard
"July 4th Declaration of Impeachment"
July 4, 2005
Mike Ferner, Veterans for Peace
"They Died for Their Country"
July 1, 2005
Paul Rogat Loeb
"Energy adviser who solicited Enron to help write national energy policy to be named Chair of FERC"
July 1, 2005
Jason Leopold
"Big Food Strikes Back; Ag industry aims to strip local control of food supplies"
June 26, 2005
Britt Bailey and Brian Tokar
"The fantastical world of Studley McMuffin"
June 25, 2005
Sheila Samples
"Counter-Recruitment: Preventing the Military from Getting More Youth for their Wars: An Interview with Counter-Recruitment Activist Clint Coppernoll"
June 25, 2005
Kevin Zeese
"A matter of education..."
June 23, 2005
Sheila Samples
"Violations of Civil Liberties are an American Tradition"
June 17, 2005
Gene C. Gerard
"Rumsfeld: Beyond the Point of No Return"
June 13, 2005
Gerald Rellick
"Peltier hearing to address Lakota Nation soverignty"
June 11, 2005
Russ Redner and Barry Bachrach
"Extraordinarily rancid justices"
June 10, 2005
Paul Rogat Loeb
"Former Army Sec, Enron VP, Thomas White Wants Gov't Funding For New Energy Project"
June 8, 2005
Jason Leopold
"Imposing minority views"
June 8, 2005
Stephen Crockett
"When is Someone Going to Toss Rumsfeld into a Cage?"
June 8, 2005
Jason Leopold
"Republicans: The Anti-Christian, Christian Party"
June 8, 2005
Stephen Crockett
"Watergate Proves That Even Presidents Will Break Laws To Achieve Goals"
June 1, 2005
Jason Leopold
"Oral Histories of the 1970 Kent State Shootings "
May 22, 2005
Candi Clevenger, Communications Manager, OhioLINK
"Blurb: End the filibuster -- in 2015"
May 20, 2005
Paul Loeb
"The Beginning Of The End Of The Age Of Reason"
May 16, 2005
Todd Huffman, M.D.
"Nuking Democracy"
May 14, 2005
Paul Loeb
"Conscientious Objection on Trial: The Court Martial of Keith Benderman"
May 10, 2005
Kevin B. Zeese
"Barnum on Steroids"
May 9, 2005
Jason Miller
"Mother’s Day Without Mom"
May 7, 2005
Phil Tajitsu Nash
"An Open Letter to Howard Dean"
May 5, 2005
Dennis J. Kucinich
"Appeals Court Nominee Janice Rogers Brown Merits the Filibuster"
May 3, 2005
Gene C. Gerard
"Activists Spur Historic Call to Exit Iraq"
April 24, 2005
William Rivers Pitt
"John Bolton & the Battle for Reality"
April 24, 2005
Robert Parry
"Videos expose false arrests at 2004 Republican Convention protests in New York"
April 24, 2005
Peter Daniels
"Wal-Mart's Free Market Fallacy"
April 24, 2005
Jonathan Tasini
"Howard Dean Becomes Leader of the Other Pro-War Party; Dean on Iraq: “We're There and We Can't Get Out”"
April 24, 2005
Kevin Zeese
"You have to pick your team"
April 20, 2005
Sonya Vetra Tinsley, as told to Paul Rogat Loeb
"What They Should Fight For"
April 20, 2005
David Swanson
"Vigilante Republicans"
April 13, 2005
Steven Rosenfeld
"Congresswoman Cynthia Mckinney Urges Reform of Voting Process at Historic Conference"
April 12, 2005
Anna Thompson
"Abortion and Schiavo -- The stories we tell"
April 5, 2005
Paul Rogat Loeb
"How and Why We're Working to Block the Bankruptcy Bill"
April 1, 2005
David Swanson
"Statement on the Passing of Terri Schiavo"
March 31, 2005
Reverend Jesse L. Jackson, Sr.
"Veterans for peace call for Congressional action to impeach George W. Bush and Richard Cheney"
March 30, 2005
Veterans For Peace
"Zealot and Proud of It"
March 27, 2005
Jason Miller
"Non Volunteers, Non-Recruiters, And A Non War "
March 19, 2005
Eric Straatsma
"Meet Your New FCC Chairman: Kevin Martin"
March 17, 2005
David Bailey
"E.P.A. Nominee Supports Testing of Chemicals on Human Subjects"
March 11, 2005
Gene C. Gerard
"A luncheon break with Michael Jackson"
March 11, 2005
Robert Lockwood Mills
"Gannongate and Asian Pacific America"
March 9, 2005
Phil Tajitsu Nash
"I'd rather not say good-bye, Dan"
March 9, 2005
Greg Palast
"Free Trade and Frivolous Lawsuits"
March 7, 2005
Cyril Mychalejko
"Experiencing Hunter, Experiencing Death: A Eulogy"
February 28, 2005
Tom Luffman
"The inevitability trap"
February 18, 2005
K.C. Golden
"Bush’s Judicial Nominations are Hardly Mainstream"
February 17, 2005
Gene C. Gerard
"Senators Clinton and Boxer, Representative Tubbs Jones and others unveil major election reform bill"
February 17, 2005
Offices of Sen. Clinton and Rep. Tubb Jones
"The difference between bi-partisanship and non-partisanship"
February 15, 2005
Robert Lockwood Mills
"Bush & the Rise of 'Managed-Democracy'"
February 13, 2005
Robert Parry
"Yesterday's Gallup Poll Showing Bush Approval At 57% Had 9% More Republicans Than Democrats"
February 12, 2005
Steve Soto
"J20 Through my eyes"
February 11, 2005
Ryan Mishler
"Bush's Budget: The War on Working People Continues"
February 11, 2005
International Action Center staff
"Bush’s Budget is at Odds With His Rhetoric"
February 11, 2005
Gene C. Gerard
"Direct Action For Peace?"
February 7, 2005
Bill Scheurer
"State of the Union speech falls short, says Rev. Jesse Jackson"
February 3, 2005
Rev. Jesse Jackson, Rainbow/PUSH Coalition
"The Black Perspective"
February 3, 2005
Judith Powell
"Save American Democracy: Curb Corporate Power"
January 29, 2005
Stephen Crockett
"Who's Paying for all this Freedom?"
January 29, 2005
Darryl Cramer
"Yes, there is a crisis in Social Security"
January 29, 2005
Richard Hayes Phillips, Ph.D.
"Agitation Time"
January 25, 2005
Ted Glick
"The 10 Worst Corporations of 2004"
January 25, 2005
Russell Mokhiber and Robert Weissman
"They Doth Protest Too Little"
January 24, 2005
Chris Colin
"Thousands take to the streets to oppose the inauguration of George W. Bush"
January 24, 2005
troopsoutnow.org
"A Warm Oasis in a Snow Storm; The Progressive Democrat Summit in Washington"
January 24, 2005
Cynthia L. Butler, Esq.
"The Politics of SpongeBob"
January 23, 2005
Gene C. Gerard
"Mis-Defining Terrorism"
January 20, 2005
John Janney
"Marines stretching movement"
January 19, 2005
Mike Ferner
"Bush’s Mythical Mandate and Social Security Piratization"
January 19, 2005
Stephen Crockett and Al Lawrence
"Happy Birthday Martin Luther King, Jr. "
January 16, 2005
Chuck Zlatkin
"Bush’s Choice for Energy Secretary Was One of Texas’ Top Five Worst Polluters"
January 16, 2005
Jason Leopold
"Bush, God, Fox, and the International Criminal Court"
January 13, 2005
David Swanson
"The real reason Bush wants to privatize Social Security"
January 12, 2005
Robert Lockwood Mills
"CBS' cowardice and conflicts behind purge"
January 11, 2005
Greg Palast
"Bring them home -- Sooner rather than later"
January 1, 2005
Sheila Samples
"The third wave of victims of Katrina/Rita"
November 15, 2005
"An inside look at the not so Big Easy"
November 15, 2005
"While Bush rested: The emergence of the new global terrorism and the meaning of Hurricane Katrina "
November 15, 2005
"Keeping his eyes on the prize"
September 8, 2005
"Four Years On"
September 8, 2005
"Sheehan uses the "f" word as Bush flips us off"
September 8, 2005
"WAL-MART - The high cost of low price"
July 20, 2005
"The timebomb is not Social Security in 2048, it’s global warming in 2015"
March 21, 2005
Read Articles by Year:
2007 2006 2005 2004
2003 2002 2001 2000
All content © 1970-2008
The Columbus Free Press
Disclaimer