BigEasy way out...

When you fly into New Orleans, landing flights go straight ahead one second, and make an immediate bank, turn left or right and dive in – so suddenly that you feel you must be – about to die! This is due to the highways, overpasses and heavily populated areas, being immediately next to the landing field.

Horrified looking at the Hurricane Katrina’s aerial radar shots prior to landfall I was scared for all those along the coastline, already so ravaged by previous storms. It appeared to me that this was going to hit New Orleans – it seemed a certainty. The thought passed through my mind that special evacuation plans needed to be in place because I knew there was a huge population living at the poverty line and below in this area.

Heady evenings with friends around a table of spicy steamy crawfish: days at the fairgrounds moving tent to tent immersed in music! The ancient southern homes, the Spanish moss hanging everywhere – TipiTina’s – the Neville Brothers….up all night. Drinking Hurricane’s on the veranda at O’Brien’s. Life is good. Friends all around.

Bad planning? Hmn. Photos on TV today showed two different still shots of people who had been “shopping” in the storm. The black couple – they labeled “looters”….the white “finding bread and water”. Today it looks like Louisiana native and a 3-star general, is finally in-charge! Golly, thank you.

In life, it is always how you treat those beneath you on the social ladder, that is a true indication of who you are in a moral sense. One of the finest meals I had in New Orleans (with a group of eight friends) was on advice from a black cabbie – Chez Louise. Outside town – broken down place – and we were the only white faces there.

You can’t patronize the working class. We recognize our lot in life and while many of us strive to break free of it, few of us ever succeed. The key thing is – in the end – the only thing that really matters is people, and your health. We have killed many of our own citizens in this disaster, through inaction and laziness. From not providing vehicles to evacuate the poor, to selling contracts for levees to lowest bidders, to passing a transportation bill packed to the gills with “pork barrel” projects. I could go on…

For quite some time I have felt ashamed of the citizenry here by and large, on so many levels. Greed/avarice – but also, no ethics or morality or integrity. If this tragedy does not make us all, reassess our actions? Otherwise there is, no way out.