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Tuesday, September 13, 2005

A HARROWING ACCOUNT OF LIFE IN THE NEW ORLEANS CONVENTION CENTER AFTER HURRICANE KATRINA

This is a first-person account of life in the New Orleans Convention Center after Hurricane Katrina by a Denise Moore. I received this via email....read it and weep.

"Denise said she thought she was in hell. they were at the convention center for 2 days, with no water, no food. no shelter. Denise, her mother (63 years old), her niece (21 years old), and 2-year-old grandniece. When they arrived, there were already thousands of people there.

They were told that buses were coming. Police drove by, windows rolled up, thumbs up signs.

National Guard trucks rolled by, completely empty, soldiers with guns cocked and aimed at them.

Nobody stopped to drop off water.

A helicopter dropped a load of water, but all the bottles exploded on impact due to the height of the helicopter.

The first day (Wednesday) 4 people died next to her. the second day (Thursday) 6 people died next to her.

Denise told me the people around her
all thought they had been sent there to die.
Again, nobody stopped.

The only buses that came were full; they dropped off more and more people, but nobody was being picked up and taken away. they found out that those being dropped off had been rescued from rooftops and attics; they got off the buses delirious from lack of water and food. completely dehydrated.

The crowd tried to keep them all in one area; Denise said the new arrivals had mostly lost their minds. they had gone crazy.

Inside the Convention Center, the place was one huge bathroom.
In order to shit, you had to stand in other people’s shit.
The floors were black and slick with shit.

Most people stayed outside because the smell was so bad. but outside wasn’t much better: between the heat, the humidity, the lack of water, the old and very young dying from dehydration… and there was no place to lay down, not even room on the sidewalk. They slept outside Wednesday night, under an overpass.

Denise said yes, there were young men with guns there.but they organized the crowd. They went to Canal Street and “looted,” and brought back food and water for the old people and the babies, because nobody had eaten in days.

When the police rolled down windows and yelled out “the buses are coming,” the young men with guns organized the crowd in order: old people in front, women and children next, men in the back. just so that when the buses came, there would be priorities of who got out first.

Denise said the fights she saw between the young men with guns were fist fights. she saw them put their guns down and fight rather than shoot up the crowd. but she said that there were a handful of people shot in the convention center; their bodies were left inside, along with other dead babies and old people.

Cops passing by, speeding off.

National Guard rolling by with guns aimed at them. and yes, a few men shot at the police, because at a certain point all the people thought the cops were coming to hurt them, to kill them all.

She saw a young man who had stolen a car speed past, cops in pursuit; he crashed the car, got out and ran, and the cops shot him in the back in front of the whole crowd.

She saw many groups of people decide that they were going to walk across the bridge to the west bank, and those same groups would return, saying that they were met at the top of the bridge by armed police ordering them to turn around, that they weren’t allowed to leave.

So they all believed they were sent there to die.

Denise’s niece found a pay phone, and kept trying to call her mother’s boyfriend in Baton Rouge, and finally got through and told him where they were. The boyfriend, and Denise’s brother, drove down from Baton Rouge and came and got them.

They had to bribe a few cops, and talk a few into letting them into the city (”come on, man, my 2-year-old niece is at the Convention Center!”), then they took back roads to get to them.

After arriving at my other cousin’s apartment in Baton Rouge, they saw the images on TV, and couldn’t believe how the media was portraying the people of New Orleans. She kept repeating to me on the phone last night:

"Make sure you tell everybody that they left us there to die.
Nobody came."
Those young men with guns were protecting us. If it wasn’t for them, we wouldn’t have had the little water and food they had found."

That’s Denise Moore’s story."


BUSH IS ASKED SOME SERIOUS QUESTIONS ABOUT THE ROLE HE AND HIS GOVERNMENT FAILED TO PLAY IN THE WAKE OF HURRICANE KATRINA

These questions were given to the President by Senator Minority Leader Harry Reid (D)NV...

Administration inaction to warnings of catastrophic flooding in New Orleans.
President Bush, Secretary Chertoff, and other top Administration officials have repeatedly stated that no one "anticipated the breach of the levees." Yet, public studies and analyses made available to the Administration have long warned that a major storm was inevitable and would lead to the breaching of New Orleans' levees with catastrophic results. Why, then, was the Administration so unprepared to deal with the breaching of the levees?

Administration insistence on harmful budget cuts.
In the face of these warnings about the risks involved of a catastrophic hurricane, why did the Administration reject urgent and repeated requests from local and state officials and the Army Corps of Engineers for programs that could have budget cuts for programs such as levee repairs/maintenance, emergency planning grants, wetlands restoration, and other related items have on the damage caused by Katrina?

Slow Administration response to Hurricane Katrina warnings.
Max Mayfield, director of the National Hurricane Center, has stated that both DHS Secretary Chertoff and FEMA Director Brown listened to NHC briefings days before Katrina's landfall that discussed the strength of the storm and its potential impact. Given these warnings, why did FEMA and DHS fail to adequately prepare for the consequences? Who else received these briefings? Did Secretary Chertoff or Director Brown communicate these warnings to President Bush, Secretary Rumsfeld, Leavitt, Mineta or other key Cabinet officials? If so, what specific actions did each cabinet official take?

FEMA rejection of assistance.
Is it true that FEMA turned away offers of assistance from states, nonprofit agencies, and the private sector - including offers for generators, water, fuel, food aid, transportation, and fire control? If so, why?

Absence from Washington of the President and key officials.
How much time did the President spend dealing with this emerging crisis while he was on vacation? Did the fact that he was outside of Washington, D.C. have any effect on the federal government's response? When it became apparent a major hurricane was days away from striking the Gulf Coast, why didn't President Bush immediately return to Washington from his vacation and why didn’t he recall key officials and staff members back from their vacations? Would the presence of key officials in Washington have improved the response?

Failure to implement National Response Plan.
The Bush Administration published a National Response Plan for responding to catastrophic incidents, including natural disasters, in December 2004. The plan explicitly states that the federal government can override notification and request for assistance regulations in order to expedite assistance, and that "the coordination process must not delay or impede the rapid deployment and use of critical resources." Why did the Bush Administration fail to act according to the National Response Plan?

Failure to cut through red tape.
Numerous reports indicate that bureaucratic red tape impeded the rapid delivery of assistance for critical needs, such as shelter, transportation, and food. Did Administration officials have the authority to cut through this red tape and, if so, why didn't they exercise this authority?

Failure to send sufficient number of troops immediately.
Why did it take several days for National Guard and active military units to reach positions in New Orleans and around the Gulf Coast? Why did the Secretary of Defense wait until Saturday - five days after the hurricane struck - to deploy soldiers from the nearest Army base, Fort Polk, LA? What effect have extended overseas deployments of National Guard and Reserve forces had on these forces’ abilities to respond to emergencies on U.S. soil?

Lack of interoperable communications.
The Wall Street Journal reports that the response effort has been plagued by "a total breakdown of communications systems, an echo of the problems that faced New York officials dealing with the 2001 terrorist attacks and a system the government has been trying to fix for four years," specifically citing "incompatible radio systems." Why has the Administration failed to solve this problem? Would the adoption of congressional amendments to increase funds for this equipment helped to mitigate this problem?

Failure to respond to state and local officials.
State and local officials indicate that they were asking for immediate and massive federal assistance from the outset, but that the federal government failed to mobilize for several days, dragging its feet and failing to appreciate the impact of the storm. Did this Administration work as closely in this case with state and local officials as did previous Administrations or during previous disasters?

Administration efforts to shift blame from its own failures.
Shortly after it became apparent that the government’s response was grossly inadequate, comments attributed to unidentified Administration officials suggested that the primary blame for the chaotic response rested with state and local officials. Is there any evidence that Administration officials decided to intentionally mislead the public?

Effects of organizational changes at FEMA.
It appears that FEMA suffered from serious systemic failures in virtually every aspect of its' response to Katrina. Did these failures stem directly from the decision to strip FEMA of its cabinet level status and include it in a department where countering terrorist attacks is the primary focus? There have also been reports that many of FEMA's most experienced and capable personnel have left the agency recently. It is essential that your committee speak with current and former FEMA officials, especially those who have worked at the agency before and since the transition.

Preparation for future disasters.
What do experts predict about the frequency and intensity of hurricanes and other natural disasters striking the U.S. in the immediate future? What actions should the Administration and Congress take immediately to address the lessons you draw from the U.S. government's response to Hurricane Katrina so that we will be better able to respond to future emergencies including major terrorist attacks?

It is now time to begin the 'Blame Game' (whether the Republicans like it or not) and get to the bottom of who is responsible for this travesty against citizens of the United States (and President Bush's so-called investigatory commission is a joke- it's like letting the inmates hold their own kangaroo court in prison).

When will we get honest answers to these questions? We WANT answers.

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