Hurricane Gustav is about to bear down on the lovely city of New Orleans, nearly three years to the day Katrina did.

Stay safe.

(& the Republicans, in keeping with their shite response to Katrina, are going ahead with their conference despite it. You’d think they’d show some fucking respect.)

A friend of ours works with a theatre out in IA that’s lost almost everything as a result of the recent floods, and like many others - they had no flood insurance. Worse yet, FEMA considers theatres “non essential services” and so they will receive no funding whatsoever to help them rebuild.

If you’re a theatre person, and you can help, you can contact them:

• Riverside Theatre, 213 N. Gilbert St., Iowa City, IA 52245
• (319) 338-7672
• www.riversidetheatre.org

to see if you can make a donation, of money or stuff, to help them out. Right now they’re performing out of the local high school’s auditorium, as of course, the show must go on.

My thoughts, and condolences, and best wishes for all of you in the midwest who are worried about the Mississippi’s levies breaching (or who are dealing with the ones that already have, in IA).

Recently it’s been as if Mother Nature has decided to show us exactly who’s boss.

Many of you know how much I loved visiting the country of Burma when I got to. Now, after the military junta cracked down on more democracy uprising, there’s been a horrible cyclone that has killed tens of thousands of people.

You can donate directly to the network of Buddhist monks who are doing a great deal of the work in these early days before a lot of international help can get there.

Do donate if you can :https://secure.avaaz.org/en/burma_cyclone/77.php

It’s as if the places I love most have been targets of natural (and unnatural) disasters these past few years. The Washington Post has a beautiful and heart-breaking collection of photos from the cyclone that just devastated Burma.

My only hope is that somehow Mother Nature just accomplished what even Buddhist monks couldn’t: Burmese exposure to the rest of the world.

From the This is Oddly Familiar Department:

Author & New Orleans Times-Picayune journalist Chris Rose has an anthology of essays out called 1 Dead in Attic, all of them written in the aftermath of Katrina. I read a lot of them online, including the one he wrote about battling depression as a result of the devastating hurricane. It turns out his editor got a call from the producers at Oprah, who in turn told his editor that they didn’t want him to talk about his book at all - they just wanted him to talk about his depression. So much for years of journalism, and for writing some of the best essays to come out of Katrina - stripped as an author, he just gets to be a sad guy talking about his experience going on anti-depressants as a result of the storm.

Silly show, Oprah. It really is. You’d think a woman who made her way to stardom via a movie based on a well-received novel would show a little more respect for writers.

& This is Oddly Familiar to me, of course, because it’s exactly what happened to me on The Dr. Keith Show, & Dr. Keith is also the author of books & knows from publicity. They did at least put up something about Chris Rose’s book on Oprah’s website.

Pity they wasted all that time on James Frey, instead of giving airtime to a guy who wrote about what actually happened to him.

We’re right on the border of Sunset Park, one of the neighborhoods here in Brooklyn hit hardest by the storms. I was woken up at 6am or so by lightning & thunder that seemed to be in our bedroom with us; I sleep next to the window with the air conditioner, & half asleep, turned the AC off & pulled the curtain closed. When one loud crack of lightning seemed to go off right next to our bed, poor Endymion dashed out, wide-eyed with fur bristling, from under my night table where he often sleeps. Aeneas sat at the foot of our bed. & Aurora, being Aurora, was sitting in the living room window watching the show.

Our own beautiful trees are stripped of some leaves but otherwise standing; there are a few hundred trees down otherwise, some into buildings & cars, & one woman on Staten Island lost her life. The flooding caused commutes to double in time this morning, with all three subway lines down. They say a tornado funnel touched down in Bay Ridge, even.

The Mayor was just on TV telling everyone that they should call 311 for information about having buildings inspected for safety & the like, & someone asked a question about immigration status & languages. & After clarifying that the City will not ask for someone’s immigration status when finding them a shelter if their home has been destroyed/deemed unstable, he then mentioned there are 150 languages spoken by the operators at 311.

150. Love this town.

Did you see the stunning & empowering Nikki Giovanni delivering a poem at the Virginia Tech service today? Was she remarkable or what? & A snappy dresser, to boot.

When I grow up I wanna be just like her.

It was as if her presence was to prove the point of why we need poets, as a culture. The spontaneous school cheer that went up was heartbreaking and healing, at once.

The local CD group CDI is having a fundraiser for the victims of Hurricane Katrina. The organization will match all contributions up to $500, so if attendees donate $500, the hurricane victims will get $1000.

I think this is a brilliant idea, and I’ve donated a signed copy of my book for them to use as a fundraiser. I’d welcome requests from any other TG groups who’d be interested in doing the same thing. My contact information is right here.

Below are more details about the event, and even more can be found on the MHB Boards.

BBQ Fundraiser for Victims of Hurricane Katrina
Wednesday, September 14 at the Open House Dinner at 8:00pm

Here’s the title of a Press Release up on FEMA’s website:

First Responders Urged Not To Respond To Hurricane Impact Areas Unless Dispatched By State, Local Authorities

I wish I was kidding.

As someone who already had PTSD when 9/11 happened, I’ve been very attuned to the fear-mongering that’s been going on in his country for the past four years. I’ve been aware of it because it works on me - works in that I start to fear getting on a subway or a plane. And let me say, there’s been a lot of it, all of it focused on what the terrorists might do. There’s been so much that I understand why Americans are fearful, and even why they voted for Bush: they wanted to be safe. So do we all.

But it strikes me that on this Sunday morning, what we have all feared terrorists doing has now happened, and it wasn’t terrorists who did it. We have lost a great American city to a combination of natural disaster and incompetence. We gave up our civil liberties, we gave the President new, sweeping powers, we funded the Department of Homeland Security. And for what? Because we thought, we hoped, that doing so would keep us safe; that a small sacrifice, like letting the government in on what I’ve been reading, would give the government enough power to handle something disastrous quickly and well.

They didn’t. There’s a lot of blame-laying going around: ironically, Republicans (who are usually for giving more power to state and local governments) are blaming the state and local governments for not being prepared, and Democrats (who tend to like big, nation-wide planning) are blaming the Feds. The irony that the current Republican Party says it’s for smaller government when it has increased the powers of said government is not lost on me.

Gov. Blanco (D-LA) called a state of emergency on August 26th. She asked the President to do the same on August 27th, which he did.

So what happened? FEMA has said that all the emphasis has been placed on terrorism, not natural disasters, which is why this went as wrong as it did. But surely the response to a natural disaster or a terrorist attack requires the same mobilization, supplies, and swiftness, yes? Why, if on August 27th, FEMA were alerted that they might have to help Louisiana with the aftermath of Katrina, are people’s moms still dying as of Friday night? I’m sure there isn’t a simple answer, although it’s pretty clear to me that the White House - along with Chertoff, Brown of FEMA, and the President himself - have shown themselves to be incompetent, or, as a recent editorial by Greg Mitchell pointed out, they are guilty of dereliction of duty. One that’s proved fatal, not just to thousands of American citizens, but to a great American city.

My question, then, is when do we get our civil liberties back? If we traded them in for safety and security as promised by the Bush Administration, and we are not getting those things, shouldn’t we get them back now, due to breach of contract? Because if a hurricane - which is one of the most predictable types of natural disasters - caught these guys unprepared, then how on earth can anyone still believe that they will be prepared for a terrorist attack, which is not predictable at all?

(Much thanks to the blogosphere for doing the legwork: Josh Marshall, Atrios, Kos, and Kevin Drum.)

Molly Ivins has a word to say about why politics matter, and why Katrina has made that clear.

Here’s something that I could have written - straight from a New Yorker who has had enough of this charade of a Presidency.

And finally, the Rude Pundit (not for those who don’t like swear words!) on leadership and the lack of it. Look, I didn’t like Rudy Giuliani, but I’d take all of his bullshit twelve times over for the leadership he showed on 9/11, a leadership that is obviously lacking with Katrina, and in the person of George Bush Jr. If people think that’s leadership, we really aren’t teaching history in school anymore.

Leaders are people like Mother Jones, John L. Lewis, Eugene Debs, Cesar Chavez: the people who brought you Labor Day weekend, the 40-hour work week, and weekends. None of them were perfect, but all of them understood something that Dubya does not: that what people need is power, not promises.

Happy Labor Day, folks.

This piece was written by Sidney, a friend of a friend. She can be reached at jsoliver@cox.net.

These are random thoughts, feelings.

I’ve been immersed in this because my dearest friend of 40 years, and her family, live in Gulfport and there’s no way of knowing for sure whether they’re alive or not. She’s a life-long resident and a minister. I change my mind every second about whether she left or stayed, lived or died. The emotional roller coaster is text-book, but because it’s me, I’m feeling desperate and crazed.

If I’m feeling crazed, as safe, dry, fed, watered, and well as I am, and with all the support in the world that I need, I can begin to comprehend the desperation they and all the dear souls in New Orleans and on the Coast must be feeling.

I can’t express my shame and rage that this is occurring in my country. Past the grief and shock of the natural disaster is the utter shame at the boggling incompetence in response to, and the chaos in New Orleans. I can’t. I stammer. I find it hard to breathe. Sometimes I feel such rage and frustration that I think my chest will burst.

At last I hear somebody REAL on TV. CNN’s Jack Cafferty said something like “. . . and the elephant in the living room that nobody’s willing to talk about, the race and class factor going on here.” I could weep for relief that the glad-wrapped whiteout is finally beginning to break down. You know and I know that if this were Dallas, we’d be seeing a totally different play. That it took a — what, what do you call this? “Disaster?” I think frankly that we’re past that now — if it took an obliteration of this size to reach the flinty little hearts of the corporate newsfaces absolutely appalls me, but I’ll force myself to find the good news: At least it is happening now. Long may it reign.

I heard our ghoulish new national Director of Homeland Security first thing this morning give a press conference on how September would be “preparedness month.” The mind congeals. I heard the president say that looters should be dealth with ruthlessly. I had to laugh. I didn’t hear him say that about what’s happening in Baghdad. I had to laugh, for the first time in days. It wasn’t a happy laugh.

My questions are without end. I imagine Europe looking on. I imagine a whole world led for decades to believe that the mighty USA could clean up a mess like this in 24 hours, looking on in a wonder of grief and disillusion, slightly disoriented by the disconnect between what we’ve been told and what we are seeing. I imagine that they, like me, see themselves in the stinking, deadly soup that’s suffocating New Orleans. I imagine Osama tapping his bony fingers, thinking “Now would be a good time.” I imagine that all the world, like me, wonders what will happen to us when the big one comes. I fear I’m seeing the future. I think I’m watching the chickens coming home to roost.

This morning I opened one of the survivor link-up sites. I had posted two search messages there, one for each of my friends. The site format limited what I could say to listing the names and locations, and a drop-down menu of “alive,” “dead.” “missing,” and “unknown.” I had chosen “unknown.” I opened the site this morning, dully, numb and despairing, and clicked on my post for Jane Stanley, expecting what I’ve found for two days : no news. But someone has changed “unknown” to “alive.” I feel something shift inside. My heart ca-thunks. Ca-thunks again. I am clinging to this, using every power of faith I can muster to believe it. Believe. Believe. Believe. Don’t let go.

Memories of the Coast. The beach where caskets lie like pill boxes today is the beach I walked on almost every day for two years. I remember the sounds of the surf, the smell at low tide, the lovely pale sunrises. Girls in their whites around a huge bonfire. Happier days. My then best friend could watch the sea like no one else I’ve ever known. She seemed to meld with it, finding in it a consolation for wounds that no one knew but she. I learned something about that from her in that first year there.

My favorite teacher and I crossing 90, heading back to campus, when a dog darted across in front of us. I knew it would be hit. It was, and yet it fled too fast to rescue.

The very first time I ever got drunk was on that beach, the first week of my freshman year. I wasted no time sowing my wild oats. A pack of Keesler men had come to hunt us, bringing inner tubes with holes sewn closed on the bottom, to serve as coolers. They’d tie a rope to the tube and float it out into the water to chill the gin and Southern Comfort, vodka, bourbon, rum, and coke. Who knew not to drink in the hot sun? Who knew not to mix the liquors? Who knew even how much to drink? Certainly not I. There are half a dozen women alive now who may remember dunking me in ice cold water in the tub until I was sober enough to take the carefully meted-out hazing that the upper class dispensed at any act of serious idiocy. This particular act could have cost my parents their tuition and me my education, because drinking there was a shipping offense.

I remember walking west on 90, past the little Catholic church on a Sunday morning, to Little Man’s, the tiny cafe where we hid out from mandatory church attendance. We called it “St. Little Mans.” The damp chill of a wintry Coast morning. The sound and feel of the sand on the pavement under my feet, or in my dorm room. The glint of Biloxi lights on a moonlit night, and the scent of gardenias mixed with orange blossom on a warm Coast night.

I sit in wonder at the wealthy white men who are right this minute making decisions that will seal the fate of thousands of my countrymen and women, and, like every other American, I suppose, I wonder where I’d be if my fate depended on their wisdom and, dare I say it, compassion. I have a better sense where I’d be now than I had last week, that’s for sure.

I see Perry hogging the limelight for Texas, and while I am grateful for the aid, I want to ask him: “Governor Goodhair, do you plan to house queer refugees in your astrodome?”

I just heard that the Speaker of the US House, Dennis Hastert, thinks it’s a waste of good money to rebuild the Big Easy. What does that mean? I mean, What. Can. That. Possibly. Mean.

Somehow the Red Cross was able to pre-position — word of the week — its “assets.” Somehow the Coast Guard was able to get in there and get in gear. Wonder why the US government wasn’t? You know, it’s 5:47 pm, Thursday, September 1, 2005, and I STILL DON’T SEE THE GUARD in New Orleans. I STILL DON’T SEE 500 B-52s offloading troops, cots, blankets, medicines, food, water, toilets, walkie-talkies.

These guys can set up a rally on the Mall for 250,000 in 24 hours, but they can’t fly in a few large speakers and microphones to begin to coordinate communications in New Orleans?

My mind spins one moment and melts to aspic the next.

I called McCain’s office. At the end of my enraged tirade, I said, “I suppose you’ve gotten lots of calls today.” “Yes,” she said. “Callers saying, ‘O I just LOVE George Bush! I think he’s the BEST president in US history!’” She said, “Not exactly.”

Copyright JS Oliver, 2005. All rights reserved.

“In 2001, FEMA warned that a hurricane striking New Orleans was one of the three most likely disasters in the U.S. But the Bush administration cut New Orleans flood control funding by 44 percent to pay for the Iraq war.”

First a letter from one RenaRF to the President which was also posted on Daily Kos. It sums up how I’m feeling, too.

RenaRF also provided a list of organizations that are focusing their efforts on the Gulf.

Also, here’s a good article on the funding issue, & why the region wasn’t prepared.

& Another one that appeared in Salon

There is *no reason* that in this country, with our resources and technology, the poor folks of the South were left to evacuate by their own means, except for the short fall of empathy.

And God bless that man who had to let go of his wife’s hand.

As expected, Southern Decadence, which was supposed to start tomorrow in New Orleans, has been cancelled.

The more coverage we see of Katrina, the more our hearts go out to the folks down south who are going through this.

My guess is that Southern Decadence is cancelled, but I haven’t heard/seen anything official about that.

I hope that hurricane moves on, and quickly. NOLA is one of my all-time favorite cities. Laissez les levies tenez!

Artist Matt Rinard, who owns a business in the French Quarter, holed up on the fifth floor of a Canal Street hotel and watched the storm roll in.

He said pieces of sheet metal and plywood, billboards and pieces of palm trees flew down Canal, which borders the Quarter, as huge gusts of wind blew through the city.

“It’s blustery. You can see the speed of it now, it’s unbelievable,” he said. “The power went out about an hour and a half ago and so now I’m just watching the occasional dumbass walking down Canal Street.”

As it turns out, the U.S. government has pledged less money to aid those desperate folks in South Asia than we’re planning on spending on the inauguration.

What I wish:

* that we had a president I’d be happy about inaugurating.
* that I could go to South Asia and work to help make things better.
* that we’d all call off all the freaking wars and killing going on to help clean up the whole area, clean the water tables, and set up a system to warn people of disasters like this, so they can at least survive with their families & a set of clothes, if nothing else.

Some days it feels like the planet herself is trying to let us know that we’re jackasses, and we keep not listening.

But you can urge Pres. Bush to up the U.S.’ contribution.

A tired and sad,
Helen

I’m not the type to ask for prayers, ever, for anything, but Southeast Asia is a place near and dear to my heart. It’s going to take years for them to recover.

Please donate to your charity of choice (Betty & I favor Doctors Without Borders).