There's a lot specific that we need to do ( Hurricane Katrina)

[Swagman]

There's a lot specific that we need to do
Alan Ramsey
July 19, 2008

Pat Troy lives in Canberra's oldest suburb. Almost four decades ago, when another new Labor government arrived full of our hope and its promise, Troy went to work in its bowels in Tom Uren's spanking new department of urban and regional development. Three years later the government was dead, so was the hope and promise and so was DURD. Troy returned to academia. These days he is an emeritus professor at the Australian National University and he's just edited a new book, Troubled Waters, dealing with accelerating climate change and our bad water habits.

In the opening chapter of his latest book, American Journeys, published earlier this year, the historian and former Keating speechwriter Don Watson approaches the issue of troubled waters from a very different perspective.
Watson tells of an incident concerning government indolence and indifference at its worst in the immediate aftermath of Hurricane Katrina, the monster storm which struck the United States three years ago, drowning the city of New Orleans, leaving nearly 2000 dead, "hundreds of thousands" homeless, and causing $US80 billion worth of destruction, "more damage than in any other storm" in recorded US history.

Katrina hit the Gulf Coast on the night of August 29, 2005. Watson arrived by train in New Orleans five weeks later. A doctor volunteer, the friend of a friend, had agreed to show him the government relief effort "from the inside". It seemed, at the very least, wrote Watson, "a good way to see what Americans meant to other Americans". For many, as it turned out, not a lot.

You might remember Mike Brown, however vaguely. He was the oafish Republican crony George Bush appointed head of his federal emergency management agency early in his presidency. After Katrina struck, it took Bush five days to get off his bum and go to devastated New Orleans from his ranch in neighbouring Texas, and when he did "he made a point of telling his old buddy he was doing 'one heck of a job"'. Five weeks later, when Watson arrived, he learnt differently.

Watson would write: "There were police cars on every block. Army vehicles were lined up in Canal Street. Soldiers stalked up and down in full battle dress … Doubtless there were good reasons for so quickly sending in the troops. New Orleans was notorious for crime and violence and the hurricane had hardly passed when scenes of looting appeared on TV screens. But the soldiers brought with them other meanings: signs of the old fear of a black uprising; signs of social failure. As evidence grew of government ineptitude and indifference to suffering, the troops became a symbol of that as well. And the evidence came in ways and from places that could not be ignored."

One of the uglier pieces of this evidence involved "old buddy Brown's" senior man on the ground in New Orleans, Marty Bahamonde, who publicly labelled Washington's slothful, corrupt response "systemic failure at all levels of government". Writes Watson: "Bahamonde knew better than most. Two nights after Katrina hit, while he was sheltering in the Superdome, Bahamonde read an email from Mike Brown's press secretary . It said: 'It is very important that time is allowed for Mr Brown to eat dinner. Given Baton Rouge is back to normal, restaurants are getting busy. He needs much more than 20 or 30 minutes. We now have traffic to encounter to get to and from a location of his choise (sic), followed by wait service from the restaurant staff, eating etc. Thank you.'

"Bahamonde emailed his deputy: 'Tell I just ate a and crapped in the hallway of the Superdome, along with 30,000 other close friends, so I understand her concerns about busy restaurants.' As people drowned or waited to be rescued from their roofs and attics, Bahamonde sent emails on his BlackBerry telling Brown they were running out of food and water, that many would not survive the night, that the situation was 'past critical'. Brown replied: 'Thanks for the update. Anything specific I need to do or tweak?"'

Brown resigned 12 days later.

http://www.smh.com.au/news/alan-ramsey/theres-a-lot-specific-that-we-need-to-do/2008/07/18/1216163153164.html