Hurricane Katrina

I've been reading news articles for Poli 41, and since everyone with a pen or computer has said their piece about Hurricane Katrina, I'm going to add my two cents in here. Hopefully you'll be able to make sense of what's a jumbled mess in my head. So here are my points, in no particular order:

The inadequacy of our national emergency response system is striking and very worrisome. While I understand that some emergencies are simply too large to be completely prepared for, the reaction to this emergency was and is ridiculous. Many organizations, cities, and nations wanted to help New Orleans but were unable to because there was too much bureaucratic red tape to get through. Now, the logistics of organizing relief workers and supplies does require some red tape so that volunteers aren't running willy-nilly around a disaster zone. However, there's no reason that official organizations, both national and local, weren't more prepared. This point is even more striking in light on the fact that the Bush administration has diverted billions of dollars of funding to the Department of Homeland Security since 9/11 for the sole purpose of being prepared to respond to emergency situations, including the ever-popular terrorist attacks AND natural disasters. All this time I was thinking that Bush's redeeming quality would be national preparedness, but the DHS failed.

On a more local note, the city of New Orleans is stupid. Everyone is talking about the problem of buliding a city below sea level and how dumb that is, but that's not what I'm talking about. From geoeconomical perspective, New Orleans is at a great location. Personally, I wouldn't want to live there awaiting a Category 5, but I also don't want to live in Tornado Alley or along the San Andreas Fault. I don't blame New Orleaners for not leaving their home. What I mean to say is how horrible their environmental laws are. It's a city notorious for their low environmental standards, and even those low standards aren't enforced well. The biggest long-term problem of this disaster is the contamination of the water supply and of the Gulf. Even worse, this sort of contamination is nearly impossible to clean up. I would think that a city in such a precipitous location would at least be responsible enough to clean its act up. On a side note, many nations point to this catastrophe as an example of the dangers of global warming. They hope to encourage Bush to take more responsibility in the global environment. Recently Bush again declined to support the Kyoto Protocol, an international attempt to reduce emissions and slow/stop global warming.

From an international point of view, might I just add that the entire international community is disgusted with the United States at the time being. (I suggest looking up "How Could This Be Happening to the United States?" in the Washington Post online archives. It's a brilliant article.) Sympathetic gestures have been remarkable: France, Italy, Germany, Russia, and China have offered millions of dollars in aid. Even our dissenters, Cuba and Venezuela, have offered aid in the form of health workers and fuel. What really touched me was the report that some of the poorest developing nations - El Salvador, Bosnia, Kosovo, Belarus, Sri Lanka, Georgia - have offered aid. To my knowledge, no such aid has been accepted yet. The administration stated that they were "analyzing needs." I will be very, very disheartened if these offers aren't taken. It would send the message, which most nations believe, that America is too pretentious to accept help from other nations. Now more than ever we need to send the message that we are an international community and that we help each other regardless of status and wealth. I sincerely hope that the United States will not be too proud.

My last point is the race and class issue. Many people, nationally and internationally, are commenting that the majority of the people left behind in New Orleans were poor and black. Other nations are pointing to this as proof that the American Dream isn't all it's cracked up to be, given the still-rampant racism, discrimination, and a large wealth gap. Obviously, class played a large role in New Orleans. Many lower class citizens simply couldn't evacuate. They had no where to go and no money to take them there. A lot of people are blaming the slow response of federal aid on closet racism, and personally, I think that's bull. I don't think anyone thought, consciously or subconsciously, that the government should not worry so much about providing relief because the victims were poor lower-class African Americans. I do, however, believe that this event has highlighted a huge problem with our society. There's no reason for a high poverty rate or a large wealth gap in our wealthy nation. The international community is fair to point out that we have problems with this issue, although I think there are other issues that are more pressing at the moment. Right now, we should worry about getting New Orleans et al on their feet and providing housing for the hundreds of thousands of refugees. When the mess is cleaned up and everyone is safe, then we can talk about the sensitive issues that surround this crisis. Hopefully we won't forget about them by then.

Wow, that was long. I'm going to bed now. I'm exhausted.