Work Your Brain — 11/1/06

Tales of the Detainee Kind

• The Case Of Bilal Hussein — Justin Gardner @ Donklephant reports on Bilal Hussein, an AP war photographer, accused by the U.S. military of helping some insurgents kidnap a couple journalists. Only those journalists have been rescued and they say Hussein is a hero. The AP wants to know why he’s been detained since April with no charges having been filed against him while right-wing bloggers call for his head.
  

  Six months is more than enough time to get some facts together and make a case against Hussein. The military hasn’t done that, and they should…or else they should release Hussein without charge.

  As Gardner points out, Hussein isn’t the first journalist to be treated as such.

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  Tags: detainees, Bilal Hussein, Abdul Rahim Al Ginco, Afghanistan, Iraq, Guantanamo, al-Qaeda, Insurrection Act, FEMA, Lynne Cheney, Bill O'Reilly, liberals, rightwingers, patriotism, pragmatism, American soldiers, Republicans, Democrats, GOP, Georgia, Genital Cutting, abortion, pro-choice, pro-life, TSA, airport security, bomb-making materials, Christopher Soghoian, Center for Applied Cybersecurity Research, Indiana University, fake boarding passes, Ed Markey, FBI, Police State

  comments See also in Politics & Causes, In the News, Geekery, Blogging & Other Blogs, The World, 9-11 & Terrorism, Iraq & Afghanistan, Hurricane Katrina, Natural Disasters, Women's Rights, The Middle East

Work Your Brain — 09/02/06

First Some Fun

• Thursday Thirteen #3 — Baggage @ Baggage That Goes With Mine wrote thirteen reasons why the internet is better than real life. This is my favorite.
  

  11. On the internet, you can pop into a forum or a blog and tell a person that their beliefs are dumb, they should be breastfeeding, they should never co-sleep, they should divorce their husband, they should shave their legs, and they should stop wearing mom jeans. In real life, people would punch you in the face.

In Memory Of Katrina

• But you can keep them for the birds and bees — Mac @ PeskyApostrophe wonders about all of that Katrina aid money the U.S. asked for and got from other countries last year. She comes to the same conclusion I did.
  

  I’m appalled at a variety of things when it comes to the Katrina rebuilding effort and FEMA’s role in it all, but this is a whole new level of incompetence. As part of my new job, I am now involved in grant-writing. In a good portion of grants, the grantee expects a report as to how the money was used. While I’m sure these gifts did not come with any reporting requirements, if one of our grantees found out their money had been either wasted or didn’t got to the program for which it was intended that would pretty much guarantee they’d never give money to us again. And you have to wonder if, should another emergency situation arise, these countries would think twice about giving aid money to the U.S. if we’re not going to use it and use it wisely.

• First the Flood, Now the Fight — Spencer S. Hsu @ WashingtonPost.com wrote a special report on the butting of heads between FEMA and state and city officials in the rebuilding of the Gulf States and New Orleans after Hurricane Katrina. FEMA swears it’s not trying to be difficult but the process seems to be designed to wear down those requesting help until they just give up and either take what little they’ve been given, which isn’t much if anything.
  

  Through hundreds of such disputes large and small, the most costly disaster in U.S. history is fast becoming its most contentious, with appeals and disputes worth nearly a billion dollars bogging down repairs of critical public systems and delaying the return of residents.

  Current and former officials at all levels blame FEMA workers’ inexperience with eligibility rules, weaknesses in U.S. disaster laws and inconsistent treatment by Congress for much of the wrangling. The huge scale of the storm and honest disagreement over whether federal or local taxpayers should pay the tab add to the conflict.

  “Disasters should be difficult to declare. . . . But once you get them, FEMA should not worry about cutting costs,” said Daniel A. Craig, who stepped down in October as head of FEMA’s recovery division and is now consulting for New Orleans. “Public entities are eligible for everything they have lost due to the disaster. It is not up to FEMA to cut corners or makes sure money is saved.”

  Gil H. Jamieson, FEMA’s deputy director for Gulf Coast recovery, agreed that “we’re in this to rebuild the city” and added: “We are not in it to delay for the sake of delay. Are there folks who sometimes hose it up? Absolutely. But I think we’re doing a good job of helping it recover.”

  The disputes come as the costliest part of the recovery begins: restoring water, power, roads, bridges, schools and other public facilities along the Gulf Coast. Agency veterans said the spending will have more impact on the physical rebuilding of the Gulf area than anything else FEMA does over the next decade, possibly eclipsing its role in aiding individual victims of the storm.

  The Sewerage and Water Board of New Orleans, for instance, sustained $446 million in storm losses, said Executive Director Marcia St. Martin. But FEMA has committed just $113 million so far.

  FEMA notes that New Orleans promised U.S. environmental regulators $640 million in repairs before Katrina, and that the antiquated system is too big for the Crescent City’s reduced population.

  “That’s what makes a city — if you don’t have water, sewer and drainage, you don’t have a city,” lamented Robert Jackson, spokesman for the sewer board. “The money so far only scratches the surface of the devastation.

  Hat Tip: Susie @ Suburban Guerrilla

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Tags: Thursday Thirteen, Internet, Hurricane Katrina, FEMA, aid money, Gil H. Jamieson, Daniel A. Craig, Gulf Coast recovery, New Orleans, Islamofascism, George W. Bush, Muslims, women in the media, Support the Troops, defense appropriation bill, Defense and Veterans Brain Injury Center, Iraq, Afghanistan, Congress, Pentagon, Lower 9th Ward, National Hurricane Canter, 9/11, Max Mayfield, Osama bin Laden, Hezbollah, terrorism, Ann Jones, Taliban, NATO, Christians, American Dream, Martin Niemoller, Germany, Nazis, Rocky Anderson, Utah, Salt Lake Tribune, patriotism, lie, Walter Jones, Colonel Lawrence Wilkerson, Colin Powell, Dick Cheney, Caddam Hussein, Donald Rumsfeld

Discombobulated Thoughts - 09/01/06

• Pugly loves that credit theft commercial where the woman voice-over sings “Unbreak My Heart” really badly.  He stops whatever he’s doing every single time to watch it.
• I have been avoiding the Katrina anniversary coverage because emotionally I don’t think I could handle it this week.
• I could use a raise.
• I still haven’t found a maid.
• I really need an assistant too.  I’ve become really bad at remembering to do things again.
• I just ate an orange.  I’m sure it was delicious, but I have no tastebuds.
• No more Puppy Playgroup for Pugly; he turns 6 months today and now he’s too old.  We’ll both
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  Tags: Pug, the puppy, maid, discombobulated, Hurricane Katrina

  6 comments See also in My Life, Discombobulated, The World, Hurricane Katrina, Natural Disasters, The Puppy

Recommended Reading - 08/28/06

• Moral relativity and the “war on terrorism” — Kevin @ Preemptive Karma wrote an excellent post about the double standard of the this administration and the expectations of the Right that expect Rep. Cynthia McKinney to apologize to the police officer she had an altercation with earlier this year but accepts the fact that the U.S. has imprisoned and tortured innocent people in Gitmo and elsewhere without apology or explanation and that is just fine.
  

  Apparently in the twisted world of rightwing freaks slapping someone requires an apology but busting out the teeth of a perfectly innocent Lebanese or torturing an innocent Turk, not to mention their imprisonment, is something that those particular victims ought to just suck it up over, be glad that they eventually regained their freedom and to hell with apologizing to them.

• Republicans: Making the world safe for bigots and racists — Jill @ Brilliant at Breakfast writes about recent incidents in the South where black children have been segregated to the back of the school bus and a church has voted not to accept black members and she wonders what has made this sort of thing acceptable as we approach the one year anniversary of Hurricane Katrina, “leaving tens of thousands of black New Orleans residents stranded or dying, while the President of the United States was yukking it up with 2008 Presidential hopeful John McCain over birthday cake.”
  

  You can trot Condoleeza Rice out there till the cows come home, it doesn’t change the fact that when it comes to black Americans who do not serve the Republican party, as far as that party is concerned, they might as well drown.

• Have Some Foil — chicago dyke @ CorrenteWire has a nice piece up about two whistleblowers, who uncovered secret wiretapping in cell phones around the world. They’ve been murdered, of course. Read the rest of this entry »

  Tags: terrorism, Cynthia McKinney, Guantanamo Bay, torture, detainees, rightwingers, Republicans, racism, George W. Bush, Condi Rice, John McCain, Hurricane Katrina, whistleblowers, wiretapping, American Society of Civil Engineers, JonBenet Ramsey, pedophiles, relationships

  1 comments See also in Politics & Causes, In the News, Geekery, Blogging & Other Blogs, The World, 9-11 & Terrorism, Hurricane Katrina, Conspiracy Theories, Natural Disasters, Women's Rights

Recommended Reading - 08/25/06

• ‘Liquid Bombers’ - The Impossible Bomb — A lot of websites have been linking to this explanation as to why the most recent terror plot from the UK could not have worked and why all of the fearmongering and passenger harrassment by the UK and American governments in the airports is unnecessary. I say, read it for yourself and decide for yourself.
• Homeland insecurity 2.0 — Pam @ Pam’s House Blend wrote one of the best reports of what travelling immediately after the latest terrorist plot scare was like that I’ve read.
  

  Again, the PA came on, this time it was for another flight — on Continental — that was boarding. This announcer, I’m not kidding you, went on for about 2-3 minutes warning people about taking on liquids and gels (”liquid” chapstick is a no-no, solid is OK), no coffee or soda will make it on board. Random checks at the gate would be performed. If they find contraband on you, you will be asked to give it up. If you don’t give it up, you’ll not be able to board, he boomed, and you would have to go on a later flight. “Not later today,” he warned, “maybe not even this week…maybe not for a couple of weeks.” OK, at this point, people are laughing, including the two of us. This is ludicrous.

  Our flight is finally called and we board. The plane is about to close up and a couple of late arrivals get on. This time we have a woman taking her sweet time, coming down the aisle with a steaming hot cup of Cinnabon coffee, which she proceeds to balance on an armrest as she casually loads her bag in the overhead bin, blocking the aisle as a couple of people wait behind her.

  Clearly, my friends, US Airways has let on the Cinnabomber.

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Tags: liquid bombers, airport security, Continental, U.S. Airways, crime rate, terrorism, morning-after pill, women soldiers, American soldiers, pharmacists, JonBenet Ramsey, Abeer al-Janabi, Jessica Lynch, Jim Bensman, Army Corps of Engineers, FBI, Duarris Perez, Guantanamo Bay, Gitmo, Cuba, Homeland Security, Bosnia, Algeria, Afghanistan, Iraq, Hamas, al-Qaeda, Hurricane Katrina, pink food coloring, food industry

1 comments See also in Politics & Causes, In the News, Geekery, Blogging & Other Blogs, The World, Featured, 9-11 & Terrorism, Iraq & Afghanistan, Hurricane Katrina, Natural Disasters, The Middle East

Recommended Reading — Hurricane Katrina Edition

• Photographer for ‘Times-Pic’ Arrested As He Begs Cops to Kill Him — @ Editor&Publisher
  

  NEW YORK A photographer for the Times-Picayune of New Orleans who has undergone severe personal trauma since Hurricana Katrina hit was arrested Tuesday after trying to get police to shoot him to death. Police said he claimed he was depressed after he found out he didn’t have enough insurance money to rebuild his Katrina-damaged home.
  
  They said he was seeking “suicide-by-cop,” but police who found him tasered him instead.

• Formaldehyde in FEMA travel trailers making people
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  Tags: Hurricane Katrina, politics, Times-Picayune, FEMA, Republicans

  comments See also in The World, Featured, Hurricane Katrina, Natural Disasters

Patients Euthenized In Katrina

It’s very, very difficult to be the kind of paranoid truth-seeker I am and actually know something really, really big and not tell anyone for almost a year. The most I did was say “I know something I’m not supposed to know and I can’t say what it is.”

The truth is that I promised a very good friend when he told me not to print it here on this website or any website, for that matter, until it was a matter of public record. In fact, I still know more facts than have been in the news so
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Tags: murder, euthanasia, Hurricane Katrina, Memorial Hospital, Times-Picayune

Where In The World Is Iraq?

Maybe the reason that Americans think we’re so superior is because we don’t take time to realize we’re not actually alone and that there are actually whole other countries and cultures beyond our borders. Then again, we aren’t all that good with figuring out what’s in our own borders, are we? I recall my mother telling me that some friends of hers were on one of those game shows like The Price Is Right and it took them a year to get their prizes shipped to them because they lived in New Mexico and the show wouldn’t ship
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Tags: Iraq, education, Hurricane Katrina, New Orleans, Gulf Coast, National Geographics, CNN

FEMA’s Double Standard

BATON ROUGE, La. (AP) — Secretary of State Al Ater wants to know why the federal government agreed to pay for New York City’s municipal elections after Sept. 11, 2001, but refuses to pay for New Orleans’ elections after Hurricane Katrina.

FEMA recently turned down Louisiana’s request for the extra $3-4 million it will take to hold the April 22 New Orleans municipal elections, rescheduled in the wake of Hurricane Katrina.

But the agency shelled out $7.9 million after the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks delayed New York City’s elections.

Ater said it’s a double standard.

“After the election, I’m going to dedicate my life
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Tags: vote, FEMA, Hurricane Katrina, New Orleans

comments See also in Politics & Causes, The World, Featured, Hurricane Katrina, Natural Disasters

FEMA Deems Condemned Homes “Habitable”, Denies Assistance

The incompentance is just never ending. Thank God, for Houston’s Mayor Bill White!

A New Orleans house flattened but for a concrete staircase on a crumbling facade was among many storm-ravaged structures that federal officials deemed fit for occupancy by Katrina victims now living in Houston, Mayor Bill White said Friday.

The Federal Emergency Management Agency has notified about 8,900 heads of households in Houston, representing more than 20,000 Katrina evacuees, that they will be ineligible for the cash assistance intended to replace a massive city voucher program that has paid their rent.

A common reason was that the evacuees’ former homes
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Tags: FEMA, Hurricane Katrina, Houston, New Orleans, Bill White

comments See also in In the News, The World, Featured, Hurricane Katrina, Natural Disasters

The Bridesmaid’s Dress Is Ordered — Check

Well, the bridesmaid’s dress is ordered and I sent an email off to PW to assure her it is so. Perhaps now she can relax. I did ask her if I need flats or heels. I’m hoping flats as she’s told me that the day’s activities will last 13 hours.

Now I have to find a suitable magic bra to hold everything in place for 13 hours — yeah right! At her last wedding, between dances, I kept having to run to the bathroom to pull up my strapless
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Tags: wedding, Alfred Angelo, strapless bra

Save New Orleans

“This is enormously frustrating to me,” said Sen. David Vitter, R-La. “I’ve been telling them since last November that they’ve sought way too little money for essential levee work.”[“L.A. Wants More Levee Money — And Quick (NOLA.com)]

Last week the Army Corps of Engineers announced new estimates of an additional $6 billion would be needed to raise and repair the levees to protect the New Orleans area from a major hurricane. According to this article in the Times-Picayune, while the east bank of Orleans Parish has financing for levees that would meet the necessary certification by
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Tags: Hurricane Katrina, David Vitter, New Orleans, Plaquenines, Louisiana, FEMA, Army Corps of Engineers, Times-Picayune, George W. Bush

13,000 Words About Katrina

You never really get the full picture until someone shows you a real picture. Here’s 13 pictures of the apartment PW and El lived in near the 17th Street Canal. These were taken six to eight weeks after the hurricane, if I remember correctly, which was the first they could get into the area.

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Tags: Hurricane Katrina, photo

New Orleans Public Library Needs Books

New books will be used to replace those that were damaged; used books will be distributed to families in need or sold for library fundraising. Please send books to:

Rica A. Trigs, Public Relations
New Orleans Public Library
219 Loyola Avenue
New Orleans, LA 70112

If you tell the post office that they are for the library in New Orleans, they will give you the library rate which is slightly less than the book rate.

You can also click here to contribute to the New Orleans Public Library Foundation Rebuilding Campaign.

UPDATE: If you live in the Portland, ME area and have books to donate but cannot afford shipping, please contact me and we’ll work something out. Thanks!
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Tags: New Orleans, Public Library, Hurricane Katrina, relief

What The President Knew & When He Knew It

“If a picture is worth a thousand words, a video must be worth a million,” [Rep. Bennie Thompson] said. “Six months after Hurricane Katrina destroyed the homes and livelihoods of millions along the Gulf Coast, the truth about what the president knew and when he knew it has come to light.”[“Democrats Want Independent Katrina Probe” (Yahoo!News)]

The blogsphere is all-a-buzz with the news of the video aquired by Associated Press, which you can view at Crooks and Liars, that reveals that Bush was well-briefed on the potential devestation of Hurricane Katrina, including the kind of flooding that actually occurred because of those breached levees — exactly as Michael Brown claimed in his recent testimony to Congress.

I’ve said before that I’m a fan of Republican and former Bush-employee Louisiana Senator David Vitter. I particularly like what he had to say in response — that the video “makes it perfectly clear once again that this disaster was not out of the blue or unforeseeable. It was not only predictable, it was actually predicted. That’s what made the failures in response — at the local, state and federal level — all the more outrageous.” [“Democrats Want Independent Katrina Probe” (Yahoo!News)]

I’m sure that the right-winger loyalists who simply refuse to believe that President Bush could do wrong will find some flimsy excuse, but then I’ve maintained all along that it’s easier to deny the truth than accept you’ve put your faith in the wrong person. Anyway, Senate Democratic Leader Harry Reid charges this is another sign that Bush administration officials have “systematically misled the American people.”

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Tags: Hurricane Katrina, Associated Press, Crooks & Liars, David Vitter, George W. Bush, politics

Post-Katrina Photos

My mother sent me these photos. I believe she took some of them during her trip there late last fall. As they are of places I am intimately familiar with, I thought I’d share them.

This is the House I grew up in. It’s located near Boulard in New Orleans East. Note the damage to the shutters and the water line on the garage door. You can’t tell from the picture but the tree that was in the backyard is gone and the fence between the house and the property behind is gone too. I did expect it to be worse from my mom’s description. She did say no one was living in it.

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Tags: Hurricane Katrina, photo

Forgotten New Orleans

Gulf Coast Reconstruction Watch has put together a document analyzing how much progress the city of New Orleans with the promised State and Federal help has made since Hurricane Katrina struck in 2005. Known as The Mardi Gras Index and released yesterday, February 28th, it looks at over 235 indicators in 11 categories. The statistical outlook suggests that President Bush’s promise that the country “would do what it takes” to make New Orleans whole again has been forgotten a mere six months later and that very little progress has been made.

Here are just some of the statistics
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Tags: Hurricane Katrina, New Orleans

Supply & Demand - The Curse of Hurricane Katrina

One of the most frustrating things I’ve heard and read a lot recently is the complaint that Katrina Evacuees are mooching off the system when they should just get on with their lives and get jobs.

People like to point out that there are a lot of jobs in New Orleans right now. Why just about every business has a sign out that they are hiring. Anyone who claims they can’t find work must be moochers.
Meanwhile, people who are working in the city are getting kicked out of their hotels because FEMA won’t pay anymore. FEMA is handing
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Tags: Hurricane Katrina, New Orleans, politics, FEMA

What’s The Etiquette On Re-Gifting MREs?

Gosh, it seems like ages but less than a month ago articles started appearing in the paper and news-related websites about how the U.S. had received tons of food donations (MREs) from other countries for Hurricane Katrina but they ended up in Little Rock awaiting possible incineration because of laws prohibiting certain foods from outside the country.

Now another article has appeared indicating that the State Department asked its embassies to ask countries worldwide for donations when there was a need for 500k readily packaged meals for hurricane victims. Get that? We asked them to give us
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Tags: Hurricane Katrina, MREs

Mostly Grim News From New Orleans

I spoke with PW last night. She’s currently in New Orleans preparing what’s left of her personal possessions for the trip to England. She said that she has about six changes of clothes at this point and from her descriptions, it sounds like everything she rescued can fit into four suitcases, carefully packed to not be more than 50lbs each.

She said that New Orleans is very much a cash-based economy at the moment. There aren’t a lot of working phone lines for those credit card machines. Plus, she also verified that most stores as well as
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Tags: Hurricane Katrina, New Orleans