Where are the Hollywood celebrities holding telethons asking for help in restoring Iowa and helping the folks affected by the floods? Where is good old Michael Moore?
(This is from a email that has been passed around and the statements ask a very important question and data seems accurate)...
Why is the media NOT asking the tough questions about why the federal government hasn't solved this problem?
......Asking where the FEMA trucks and trailers and food services are?
Why isn't the Federal government moving Iowa people into free hotels in Chicago and Minneapolis ?
When will Spike Lee say that the Federal government blew up the levees that failed in Des Moines ?
Where are Sean Penn, Bono, and the Dixie Chicks?
Where are all the looters stealing high-end tennis
shoes, cases of beer and television sets?
When will we hear Governor Chet Culver say that he wants to rebuild a 'vanilla' Iowa .. because that's what God wants?
Where is the hysterical 24/7 media coverage complete with reports of shootings at rescuers, of rapes and murder?
Where are all the people screaming that Barack Obama hates white, rural people? My God, where are Angelina Jolie and
Brad Pitt, Oprah, and Ray Coniff Jr?
How come you will never hear about the Iowa flooding ever again? Where are the governmentbail out vouchers? The government debit cards?
There must be one hell of a big difference between the
value of the people of Iowa and value of the the people
of Louisiana . Pass this unedited, un-doctored, factual
information forward ..... to get Americans thinking.
14 comments:
Obama Hates White People?
GREAT! GREAT QUESTIONS, PHOTOS!!
SO TRUE....and, well, yes, it would seem so with the facts.
One thing he hates is the UNBORN, white or black, he's even willing to let a baby die that survives a botched abortion. Heaven help him! That is unbelevable!!
Duh! This happened last June. Who was the President then?
The floods in Iowa were back in June and I believe the writer of this email piece was aking where is the outrage the same way there was with Bush with Katrina\Rita.
Which is a good question for I have not seen anything of "Hollywood" or the attention or ridicule that was present during Katrina. The writer ask several interesting questions to show the difference in reaction by the "Victims" of Iowa as compared to Katrina\Rita...
By date the writer may be wrong as to who the President was at the time of the flood but presents the question of where is the criticism.
By associating Obama with the Iowa flood may be inaccurate, but what about Obama and the ice storms of Kentucky as in: http://rightsideva.blogspot.com/2009/02/is-obama-going-to-kentucky.html
Where was Obama's visit to the people of Kentucky and where was "Hollywood"?...
Iowa
5 inches of rain
8,000 flee
8 – 10 billion in damages
National Guard immediately available
Happens every year
New Orleans
Category 3 winds (111- 130 mph)
28 foot storm surge
55 foot sea waves
$125 billion in damages
14 inches of rain
Up to 15 feet of water – the city flooded due to improperly FEDERALLY built levees which were authorized by Congress in 1965 and was supposed to take 13 years to complete
90 % of southeast Louisiana evacuated: 1,000,000 people evacuated the city and surrounding areas
1,464 dead
25,000 took refuge in the Superdome alone
1/3 of New Orleans’ police force deserted
Government failures: By September 1, the facility, like the Superdome, was completely overwhelmed and declared unsafe and unsanitary. However, even though there were thousands of people who were evacuating at the center, along with network newscasters, pleading desperately for help on CNN, FOX, and other broadcast outlets, FEMA head Michael Brown and Homeland Security Secretary Michael Chertoff both claimed to have no knowledge of the use of the Convention Center as a shelter until the afternoon of September
Yes.
And New Orleans as well as the Gulf coast has to deal with potential and actual hurricane hits each year.
But yet the Governor of Louisiana declined and refused to activate the National Guard when available during Katrina.
Other communities along the Gulf coast during Katrina suffered justa as bad damage and loss but yet they did not react as "Victims" the way the people of New Orleans have and still do.
The maning of these photos and the email\post is to show the difference between those who take care of and provide for themselves as compared to those who continue to depend on the Government to take care of them...
people, take the info. given and make a rational logical judgement. The intended purpose here was first of all to point out the lack of ongoing coverage of an American tragedy caused by a weather related condition. I will not speculate on anything, but I would like to know if there was any failing of governmental infrastructure involved in the Iowa tragedy??? anyone???
rightside va is the clearest bell here. This is a societal question about the value system in place for for certain facets in certain demographics when confronted with disaster. Questions of accoutability, race relations, presumable prediction of disaster afetr the fact, etc.
Anonymous...VERY GOOD! But the people who will buy into this as if somehow "Bush" was not around last June-2008 as President...well they really aren't interested in what the facts are...They just want to pretend the facts are not REAL...But good try to use common sense and logic with people who don't even know what logic and common sense are.
This forward offends me so much I can hardly breathe. And is does not, btw, contain "factual information." It contains mostly falsehoods, misleading statements, overblown rhetoric, & offensive stereotyping. And a lot of stupid questions.
First of all, I would say the "big differences" would be some of the following...
Iowa Floods: Flooding occurred from June 7- July 1. Many people had quite a long time to prepare/evacuate.
Katrina.: A major urban city had approximately 36 hours to evacuate. 90% of said city did manage to evacuate (the fastest & largest evacuation our country had ever witnessed). Flooding caused by faulty engineering of the federal government occurred over a span of hours, not weeks. ( http://www.levees.org/faq )
Iowa Floods: 40,000 Iowans displaced.
Katrina: over 1,200,000 displaced
Iowa Floods: Damages of 6+ Billion Dollars (this number is for the ENTIRE midwest, btw, so Iowa alone is significantly less)
Katrina: Damages of 81.2 Billion Dollars (in 2005 dollars)
The only "big difference" that really matters?
Iowa: 1 death (13 deaths in entire Midwest)
Katrina: 1,836 confirmed deaths, 705 missing
That makes for a "difference" of between 1823-2528 human lives. PEOPLE. Mothers, fathers, sisters, brothers, sons, & daughters. I'd say that IS "one hell of a big difference." A hell of a big F-ing difference.
>"Why is the media NOT asking the tough questions about why the federal
> government hasn't solved this problem? Asking where the FEMA trucks and
> trailers and food services are?"
Maybe, because we learned from the GIANT clusterf*ck known as Michael "Heckuva Job" Brown, at the expense of people during Katrina. FEMA declared Iowa a disaster May 27th, & had disaster offices open in Iowa June 5th ( http://www.fema.gov/news/newsrelease.fema?id=43776 ), BEFORE the flooding. I think finally someone was put in into that position who was more than just one of Bushie's buddies and perhaps had qualifications beyond just being able to run a bleeping horse show. The fact that we are all, individually & as a country, better prepared, is one blessing to come out of Katrina.
Btw, there was looting in Iowa, too: http://www.iowaflood.com/20938/women-accused-of-looting-flood-ravaged-oakville-wqad.html , http://www.kcrg.com/news/local/22736259.html
And people in the Midwest happily received individual Federal assistance, too. By June 23rd, FEMA had already handed out $81 million in housing assistance funds alone.
(http://www.usatoday.com/weather/floods/2008-06-23-fema_N.htm)
All this being said, I think the floods in Iowa were a tragedy. But to somehow equate the two is ludicrous. This email is all about stereotyping. Good, (mostly white), hardworking rural heroes pulling themselves up by their bootstraps all by themselves versus poor, (mostly black) lazy urban "victims" sitting around doing nuthin' and waiting on a handout. There are a lot of good folks in Iowa working hard on their own to recover from a tragedy. But there are lots of folks (of all colors) here on the coast & in Nola doing the same thing. There have been some unfortunate lazy people (of all colors) taking advantage of a tragedy down here. But I'm pretty sure there are a few of those up in Iowa, too. Folks in both places are taking assistance when offerred. Sadly, our culture seeks out the sensationalistic (which is generally negative), and the media, both liberal AND conservative, generally obliges. (see: SWINE FLU! PANDEMIC!) (see also: grossly exaggerated and mis-reported violence during Katrina) Because that's what brings in the ratings & the bucks. Sadly, there's lots of good going on that doesn't get reported.
I am thrilled and thankful that Iowa was a totally different situation. But let us be clear, it WAS a "big difference." A completely different story. Apples and oranges. I think we should all be grateful this was the case, and not use that tragedy to further demonize people who suffered through one of America's worst disasters.
http://rightsideva.blogspot.com/2007/02/super-bowl-of-blame-games.html
Re: Blame.
Bush was blamed, as were local & state governments (ALL justifiably so). Was the local & state response poor & mis-managed? YES, absolutely. I am thrilled that Blanco is gone & furious that C. Ray was re-elected. He’s an unstable clown that makes us look bad every week. But here’s the thing– without the complete FAILURE of the FEDERALLY built levees, N.O. would have made it through Katrina just fine. Nagin & Blanco would not have NEEDED to be any more competent than they were (though of course it wouldn’t have hurt). But it was the shoddy levees built by the Feds & espoused to be safe at Katrina levels that CAUSED the problem, NOT the local & state response to said problem. Do I put this all on Bush? No. Do I think he is an idiot that lied & handled the situation as poorly as it could have been handled? Yes. Do I blame him for greatly compounding the problem with the irresponsible appointment of a grossly incompetent buddy as HEAD OF FEMA?!? Yes. Do I also blame Nagin & Blanco for their incompetence? Definitely. But first and most, I blame the criminals of the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers.
All this being said, it doesn’t change the FACTS laid out in my response, or the thought that to compare Iowa to Katrina is wrong, delusional, & damaging. It doesn’t change the fact that most of the “questions” presented here are misleading & factually incorrect.
1836 American citizens died in Katrina. 1 American citizen died in the Iowa floods. It is not right to compare the two.
This has turned out to be an interesting debate as far as viewpoints and opinions made by both sides of the issue. I posted the original piece from a email that was going around that showed the diff in the reaction to 2 natural disasters and the reaction by the victims of both. Yes they two different magnitudes with two different results but I view the examples the way I believe the email writer intended with the piece...
There was failure on many aspects of the situation and it comes down to how the people reacted and continue to react. Somebody posted an earlier post that shows the incredible amount of fraud there was and continues to be from the Katrina incident. There was also fraud and theft during Iowa but by no means the same scale or percentage per 1oo,ooo as reported by the Dept of Justice. I am sure there was looting in Iowa but was it the same type as Katrina where people were stealing wide screen T.V.'s?
I believe the intended message of the original email was to show the dependence on the government, both local and federal, by people instead of looking out for themselves. To get political it is dependence on Govt like the govt the new administration is pusing that scares the hell out of many...
seriously both Iowa and Katrina were bad events why blame anyone they where acts of nature what is happening to the good old USA when people cared about other people now its about who got more and have their hand out for more. Why would you put a death toll on here even one death is to many to the family involved.
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