One Over X News

Some Comments on Katrina

In the late sixties, I recall hearing about Camille; seeing horrifying pictures of the flooding on the CBS Evening News with Walter Cronkite. If you weren't around back then, the year 1969 was quite a time for news, BTW. Not only was the Vietnam War still grinding away at the national will but despite all the change and turbulence of the 1960's, NASA was riding high on the achievements of the lunar landing program. Chicago Transit Authority was the latest sound (they later were sued by the real CTA and had to shorten their name to just Chicago) and of course along with Grand Funk Rail Road they were one of my favorite bands.

I especially remember Camille as I was just staring the 9th grade in high school. I was going off to a military school - which would prove to be a fiasco. But despite how messed up the domestic society was back then, and how much my own part of the world was about to change, the future ahead of me seemed pretty damned bright. I guess it is all a matter of perspective.

I look at what is going on now with the latest natural disaster and wonder how the poor people on the Gulf Coast are ever going to recover from the ravages of Katrina. I hear a lot of blame being thrown around in the media. The price of gasoline has shot up almost instantly to $3 locally and as much as $6 elsewhere. There doesn't seem to be any reason for it other than a combination of panic and greed, two of the worst attributes of human beings.

Back in 1969, one of my relatives decided that the world was ending and Camille was a sign of it. She said that it was God's retribution for the US landing on the Moon in July of that year. I have also heard some similar logic about Katrina punishing New Orleans for all its purported decadence. I have as much trouble blaming God for big storms as I do believing what chaos theory suggests. Why, Katrina may actually be my fault; as a sequence of events began way back in 1969 when I swatted a mosquito. To me there is no clear connection. It seems to me that in this life we navigate as best we can around the sometimes hostile phenomena in our environment and whenever we feel punished or even feel that maybe we have done something wrong enough to be punished, largely we do it to ourselves or allow others to do it to us.

Last week, Katrina tore across south Florida as a Category 1, proving that even the relatively lighter winds and rain could yet wreak havoc on a dense population center like the Greater Miami area. Last weekend, over the very warm waters of the Gulf of Mexico Katrina exploded from a Category 1 storm to a Category 5 storm and just as was predicted it had turned to the northwest and was taking aim on the New Orleans Gulfport, Biloxi and Mobile areas. It did not deviate much from the original projection. The forecasting on this one was very accurate. In fact, the past few storms have been predicted pretty close even several days out. The exceptions are Charley and Jeanne of last year, both of those storms took strange turns.

So as early as last Friday there was a pretty good chance that this storm was going to hit right where it did. Voluntary evacuations were posted as early as Saturday Morning and by Saturday afternoon it was clear enough where the storm was hitting that Mandatory evacuations began.


If you care to leaf back through this blog there are comments on last years storms that hit Florida, the three that I experienced directly were Charley (largely a non-event for most of Brevard County), Frances and Jeanne. I evacuated my family for Frances which was a Cat 4 storm at the time and seemed to be bearing down on Melbourne, which is about ten miles south of where I live. I was not able to evacuate for Jeanne due to obligations to the store and the desire to keep the store open for a long as possible. Jeanne as you will recall was sneaky and did a loop-ta-loop around the Bahamas and approached as a weakening Cat 4, and a smaller and faster moving storm than Francis.

Riding out Jeanne was perhaps one of the top five scariest things I have ever done and perhaps the most stupid of all as my three kids weathered the storm with me. I will not ride another one out. The winds when Jeanne hit around here was about 105MPH with gusts to 130MPH. The garage door on the house where I live was bowing in 6 inches from the direct assault of the wind and rain. The roof sounded like it was on the verge of tearing off. The doors and windows rattled as sheets of rain pushed against them. I could not see the neighbor’s fence from the sliding glass door in the back of my house. The neighbor’s fence is maybe ten feet away. The power went off half way through the experience. Imagine enduring a storm in the dark, not knowing whether there was a tornado coming, which was very possible as we were on the northern side of the storm.

Anyway watching the coverage of the storm on Sunday and Monday brought back memories of some seriously scary times. There really is nothing good about experiencing a major storm. I mean that in the most sincere way. I rode one out and by the grace of God my family and I survived it. I say again, I will not ride another out. If one is coming; I am going.

ANYONE that has the ability, time and opportunity to evacuate and decides not to is a fool. Those that have done it repeatedly are plain stupid. Such behavior is tantamount to playing Russian roulette. You will eventually kill yourself. Such human behavior speaks volumes about the survival of the fittest. With animals it is all about strength and speed. With humans it is about intelligence. From where I sit anyone that rides out a storm and then decides to do it again does not deserve to reproduce. There are some faulty genes in there somewhere and the human race can do without proliferating those tendencies.

Okay, okay I hear ya. I am not condemning any of people in New Orleans that could not evacuate for reasons of economics (no car and no public transportation for evacuation was offered as far as I can determine) and of course the invalids and the very sick. My heart goes out to all of them. I know how much stress and pain the storms put my family through. I cannot imagine enduring the agony in New Orleans.

Mississippi Alabama are no better off except that the floods receded there. The land looks like it is a war zone. Katrina invaded out shores and we lost the battle. That much is clear. Mother Nature 1; US 0. Generally speaking Mother Nature is undefeated in every contest so far.

There is a lot of talk on the 24/7/365 news channels about who is to blame for this or that failure in our governments to respond to the need or act to prevent this catastrophe. I won't get into my own personal favorites but I will suggest that in the future we might learn from this horrendous tragedy and have some plan to use public transportation resources for mandatory evacuations so that the poor and the infirmed are not left behind with no recourse but to suffer and hopefully not die in the process.

I do not understand what is going on now with the seemingly random instances of shooting, rape, and looting. I am not there. I know that there nut cases everywhere and where ever they are the nut cases make life miserable for everyone around them. The nut cases with the guns that are shooting at helicopters are the one's that natural selection sometimes passes over for whatever reason. Maybe it is to serve as an example to others of just how bad the dark side of human behavior can be.

There is one thing that I was critical of last year as well. It has only gotten even worse and I am beginning to think that it is actually contributing to the bravado of dumb-assed dip-shits that say, "Oh I am riding this one out." Or bravely boast, “This is my land, I am protecting it.” What the hell is the news media thinking? Why don’t you lash yourself to a mast and see if you can withstand the forces of nature while you allow a storm to rip your face right off the head that you have never, ever used to its fullest capacity anyway?

I have to ask CNN, FNN, MSNBC and to a lesser extent the broadcast networks: Why do I need an on scene reporter dressed in an rain suit and goggles standing outside of a hotel getting blown around, lashed by the wind-driven rain and nearly whacked-up the side of the head by falling and blowing debris. What in the hell is wrong with you people? Anyone stupid enough to do this sort of thing more than once (allegedly for the sake of journalism in the public interest) does not deserve to reproduce. I do not want those defective attributes swimming around the same human gene pool that my children and their children will use to select their mates.

I am embarrassed to say that I once aspired to be a journalist. It used to be a noble profession and at times it still can be. Brave correspondents went into war to report on stories. That is probably stupid to but I think it is different. There was at least a conscious reasoning process involved. Standing out in a storm is asinine and unjustifiable. Yet in the days of 24/7 news channels we receive one-upped over-sensationalized rehashes of last hours breaking news until there is another disaster that is a good opportunity for some yellow journalism to rear its ugly but apparently attention-getting head. Then there comes a natural disaster; events like major storms, earthquakes and tidal waves attract cable news reporters like flies to a fresh meadow muffin.

Turn off the cameras. No more displays of the anguish, suffering and mourning. I get it. I got it last dozen times. I gave whatever I could spare to the cause of getting people back on their feet not because the media made me feel guilty but because I have been through something like it on a smaller scale and but for the grace of God I might be standing beside them or people very much like them up to my knees in contaminated water, not even daring to ask if it could get any worse for fear that it will.

Nature has a very profound way of letting people know that we are all born butt-assed naked and we leave the world the same way. In between that is whatever we do to ourselves and one another. The money and the materialistic pleasures in life are a distraction, all part of the illusion to lead minds away from the reason that you and I came here, to live and experience life, love and learn what it is to be a part of the sentient world.

Please, news media back off! Let those poor people endure their tragic times with some dignity. Tell us where to send the contribution and what those people need. Report on how to prevent human suffering in the future by pointing out what went wrong. I am okay with that; that is journalism. That is the humane way to proceed.

E

posted by Unknown @ 9:03 PM