Need some help responding to these idiots: Iowa floods vs NOLA

[liberal N proud]

I get this email from my right wing brother-in-law who is just forwarding this crap from someone else.

The text of the message is below and the email is interlaced with pictures of Cedar Rapids flooding from last year. I didn't include pictures because I would have had to post them somewhere but you can get the message they are trying to convey here.

Thanks for any feedback I can use to blast this bull out of the water.

I don't even know what to say to this idiot this time:

WOW!!!!!

"" Iowa ""
MAKES YOU THINK

WHAT'S THE DIFFERENCE BETWEEN IOWA (THE HEARTLAND OF AMERICA ) AND

NEW ORLEANS?

NEW ORLEANS KNEW THAT A HURRICANE WAS COMING AND CHOSE TO DO LITTLE ,

THEN EXPECT THE GOVERNMENT AND THE TAXPAYERS TO REBUILD THE CITY AND

THEIR HOMES BETTER THAN THEY WERE PRIOR TO THE HURRICANE.

IOWA JUST WATCHED IT RAIN AND DEALT WITH IT.



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?



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?






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 George Bush hates white, rural people? My God, where are Angelina Jolie and Brad Pitt, Oprah, and Ray Coniff Jr?



How come in another two weeks, you will never hear about the Iowa flooding ever again? Where are the government bailout 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 people of Louisiana .
Pass this unedited, undoctored, factual information forward..... to get Americans thinking.

Let's float this one around for a while in contrast to all of the hullabaloo that New Orleans received.
________________________________________

[wryter2000]

1. I'm not too familiar with the floods in Iowa

First thing, check snopes. www.snopes.com

I'd be willing to bet that Fema did their job in that flood. Can you research that?

[liberal N proud]

3. I couldn't find anything in Snopes

Usually pretty good about nailing them. Search Snopes, reply all and copy and past link, send.

[wryter2000]

10. Actually, I did

Remember the earlier viral e-mail comparing Katrina to terrible snow storms in the Dakotas? According to snopes, this is a rewrite of that letter.

[liberal N proud]

22. Great

Thanks

[gratuitous]

2. The short, simple answer

Fuck you.

Jon Stewart used it in response to Stanford's chuckling over how great it feels to be a billionaire. It would seem to fit with this scenario, as well.

[Terran]

4. Well, one difference is:

the federal government, as well as the city of New Orleans, has had a huge stake for many decades in making sure New Orleans *didn't* get flooded--which is why the levees wre built by the Army Corp of Engineers. One reason for this is that New Orleans is a major seaport and commercial center connected with shipping and OIL. If Des Moines was basically destroyed by a flood, the federal government wouldn't have a compelling strategic reason to rebuild it; it would just be the right thing to do--and I'm sure millions in federal funds have been spent to do so. But the US cannot afford to have New Orleans disappear...period.

Note that tt was the *federal* government, as well as that of the State of Louisiana and the City of New Orleans, who failed to act adequately to protect the city from Katrina's storm surge, so the feds kind of 'owe it' to new Orleans to rebuild.

Does this idiot think no federal money went to assist Des Moines? Perhaps the fuss over New Orleans is not just the severity of what happened to it (far worse than Des Moines) but the simple fact that people just like New Orleans better than they do Des Moines.

[cynatnite]

5. Didn't Katrina happen BEFORE the Iowa floods...

so as to avoid a second clusterfuck, they were actually on the job in Iowa and didn't have Heckuva Job Brownie running FEMA?

[wryter2000]

11. That's my guess

I'll bet you'll find that the federal government and FEMA were in there. No one would have had to complain about them if they were doing their jobs.

[SharonAnn]

6. Hmmm, it was much smaller scale, people weren't trapped, buildings weren't destroyed,

They didn't have the core of their city wiped out, such as hospitals, police stations, fire stations, etc.

Far fewer people.

People could get away, they weren't trapped.

Etc., etc., etc.

Totally inappropriate comparison.

In NOLA, the Feds let them down in many ways ( starting with the Bush budget for the Army Corps of Engineers and the priorities of the Corps).

[EmilyAnne]

7. If the faces of those trapped on roofs in New Orleans that the MSM chose to show were WHITE, I

suspect this person would have a completely different opinion.

Seriously, imagine a a family that looks like John McCain, his wife and his blonde daughter on one of those roofs pleading for rescue.
People like the author of this email would be out of their head.
Then, imagine that Bill Clinton was president at the time.

The lack of sympathy for New Orleans is mostly racist, in my humble opinion. These people think that New Orleans was full of a "bunch of black people."
I only started believing this recently and it makes me sick.

[tangent90]

8. That's just a poorly rewritten version of the story that began with South Dakota

IIRC...a few years ago. Same crap about how the tough self-sufficient heartlanders repaired all their problems without any help from anybody 'cept Jebus. A pack of lies to be sure, but then what else would we expect?

[wryter2000]

12. Exactly

That's what snopes said.

[uppityperson]

16. Was that the (pick a midwest state) snowstorm email?

I recall seeing one along that line, with the same stuff.

[Caliman73]

21. Why is it that these people always say that rural and midwest people..

don't rely on government. Anyone ever hear of farm and crop subsidies.Perhaps if those were withdrawn, you know since they don't need any handouts and handle everything on their own. Kind of like Joe the Plumber decrying welfare when he used food stamps.

[Tashca]

9. I'm from CR

Comparing these two event is comparing apples and oranges.

Our record high water level before the flood was between 20'-21'. This flood hit a new high of 33'. Yes it was an amazing disaster.

But to compare this to the devastation of N.O.???......that is just ignorance.

The water rose with warning and we had plenty of time to move out......the problem here was more that the level was so much higher than had ever been seen or considered ....we were not fighting hurricane force winds or a hurricane for that matter. No levy breach that matters when the water level was 12 feet higher than ever recoded before.

N.O. is a major port city......CR....in much smaller city and the damage was mostly contained in the lower area's I don't want to do it again, but would rather go through what we did than ever go through what N.O. went through.

BTW.....we aren't even close to recovered either....

[wryter2000]

14. Ding, ding, ding

We have a winner. :applause:

[ddeclue]

18. It's more like comparing Apples and PUMPKINS...

:eyes:

[wryter2000]

13. What you could say

Where were the thousands of people trapped in a stadium in Iowa in suffocating heat with no plumbing, no food, no health care for days and days and days without anyone doing anything to help them?

[Belial]

15. There were none.. they chose to get the hell out of dodge..

most people dont remember.. but the biggest impact was on farms and livestock.. I dont know about the email.. never seen it.. but it does have a point in one tiny aspect. People in metropolitan areas are more dependent on the Govt.. etc. This is not an insult.. just what people get used to.

[ddeclue]

17. How about HEY JACKASS..Hurricane Katrina was 10x the size of the entire state of Iowa

and orders of magnitude more destructive.

This is just more pointy hatted eyeholes in mom's white tablecloth race baiting by idiots who've never been through a hurricane, much less an Andrew, Hugo, or Katrina.



Doug D.
Orlando, FL
Survivior Hurricanes Opel, Charley, Frances, and Jeanne

[noiretextatique]

19. racist tripe

really not worthy or a response.

[suede1]

20. It's a wonder how these people don't disgust themselves. Do they ever look in the mirror and say

"boy, am I a disgusting bigot, or what?"

[robdogbucky]

23. I can add this info

Unfortunately, my good friend John, who was battling cancer when he wrote this to me a week before last November's election, did not survive past Thanksgiving. My step-daughter had received this RW email crap at work and wanted to know what we thought of it. I then forwarded it to my friend John, who was in Iowa City. This was my part of a long email that was my last communication with him. I am happy to share his first hand opinion of that email and the comparisons between Katrina and the Iowa floods of '08.


"...Cedar Rapids was hit the hardest by the floods. Something on the order of 18,000 people and 7,000+ properties were affected (see http://www.corridorrecovery.org/stats.asp). Iowa City and, to a lesser extent, Waterloo/Cedar Falls, were affected. Damage estimates for the U of Iowa alone top $200 million. Many people are still not back in their homes.

For us, this is huge. However, I'd say we're not in the same league as Katrina country. Further, if we get less press it may also be that Iowan's are a stoic lot that tends to band together to take care of things in a quiet way. I don't think you'd get agreement here that less press = conspiracy to cover up.>>"


May you rest in peace, John.


robdogbucky