They Are Not Coming (The most powerful Katrina story I have read ever)

[Phoebe Loosinhouse]

http://dailykos.com/storyonly/2006/8/2/104640/1838

PLease read. Unbelievably moving

[malaise]

1. This is way too sad

and yes they are not coming unless its for your resources or your rights. Fuck Bushco for the pain and suffering he and his goons have inflicted on humanity.

[Phoebe Loosinhouse]

2. And it is just one person's story

Incredibly written. But, just one among thousands and thousands. The title is so telling - They Are Not Coming - no help from an indifferent government. I will NEVER forget Katrina and her victims.

[malaise]

5. That's the hardest part

thousands had the same horrific experiences.

[The Backlash Cometh]

7. The fucking Republicans are nothing but predators.

[mtnester]

3. My husband and I are planning a trip there in the fall

we will go to help and to eat, and probably cry a lot too. We were there just before the storm, and loved it.

Everyone should plan a 3 - 4 day trip there in the next year...everyone...even if it is to flow dollars into their economy, or to help as well.

Everyone.

I wish I could recommend this thread more than once.

[Felinity]

4. K & R A must read! n/t

[elehhhhna]

6. Next chapter: Americans in Lebanon -- They Are Not Coming

[itzamirakul]

8. We needed to hear this story and we need to remember that it

is not George W. Bush who carries the title of President of the United States, but "Heckuvajob George."

[dogday]

9. Never thought it could happen in America?

Bush has totally fucked this country up..... That simple....

[rudy23]

10. This story is very common down here

Not to downplay it at all. It's sad that it's a story I've heard far too many times over the past year. If you haven't been, or talked to some of the natives, you have no idea how bad it was. No idea how difficult the stuggle has been afterwards. I don't really have an idea either, as I'm on the periphery of the real bad areas.

[rudy23]

11. Remember, this is all because * wants to be the anti-FDR

FDR was the first president who instilled the idea that the government should take care of its people in a crisis.

To blowhards like *, anything the government does to help people is "socialism".

All I've heard about for the last year is about how my relatives in N.O. just want handouts, and deserve to lose their homes for being too stupid to live in a city above sea level.

This is also a good example of why the Southern/rural prejudice needs to stop NOW, no matter which side it's coming from.

[Patiod]

12. But government taking care of big business, big agribusiness,

big oil, the defense contractors, the bloated insurance industry - that's not welfare! That's great!

[rubberducky]

13. What a powerful story!!

I was in tears before I even got to the part about the lady`s aunt. Had to take the time to read the comments. I`ll never figure out why NO-ONE has held bushco accountable for one damn thing. :cry: I wil never forget, until the day I die, how BAD these *years have been.

[Phoebe Loosinhouse]

14. The title really says it all for me.

When you saw footage of people on roofs and on the streets around the Convention Center and on highway overpasses and knew that some of these people were literally dying before your eyes, I (and probably you) were constantly asking - Where's the help, where's the aid?! I expected convoys of Red Cross and National Guard and FEMA and every other volunteer in the world to be there almost instantaneously. But they weren't. And then they still weren't. And then they still weren't. And then you had Geraldo pleading on TV - "Let them walk out!" when he too realized that They Are Not Coming! Bush ABANDONED the city of New Orleans. Never forget. The shame. The horror.

[tomreedtoon]

15. And it took those deaths - not Democratic leaders - to make people see.

I saw or heard nothing from the Democrats in the House and Senate during this catastrophe. I could be charitable and say they suffered the same paralysis that has affected them ever since September 11, that they really wanted to help but were blocked by the dark Jedi powers of Bush and Rove.

But in my heart of hearts, I suspect that they really didn't care either. If they did - if they pretended to the values they speak whenever they send letters asking for contributions and volunteers - they would have marched en masse to the White House and demanded action when they saw what was on their TV screens every night. Yes, even the censored, right-wing-controlled TV screens, which couldn't hold back all the horror happening.

It will be the deaths from Katrina, and the survivors who remember how those deaths occurred, that will turn things around. But it will entirely be the shame of the Republicans. There are no Democratic heroes here - although I'm sure they will retroactively "claim" to have tried to help.

[rudy23]

16. Once again, Repukes were allowed to frame the issue, and "swiftboat" N.O.

So now, Americans think of all New Orleanians as looters, welfare recipients, gangbangers, and complainers who were so stupid and backwards that they built a city below sea level and elected incompetent people who were really the ones that were supposed to save them.

Now, I'm afraid it doesn't poll well enough to help the people of New Orleans, to have anybody in power say "enough is enough".

I'm surprised Hillary Clinton hasn't come forward to brag about how Congress isn't going to give New Orleanians a free ride.

There are families of law abiding, hard-working, taxpaying citizens living in tin boxes in their front yards while no one comes for the mountains of garbage and debris that surround them for miles. This is from a natural disaster that hit the city that surrounds the biggest port in America. Where is the outrage from our "leaders"?

[tomreedtoon]

17. Precisely. Where were the Big Three nominees?

Where were Clinton, Gore and Kerry? Did any of them even try to get to New Orleans? Did any of them try to use their authority to bring food and water to the Superdome? Did any of them ride along in a truck with ice and water, and when a National Guardsmen under Bush command stopped them, did they step out, holding out their Congressional identity card, and tell the Guardsman to stand down?

That would have won them the hearts and minds of Americans, and call it grandstanding or not, it would have shown how Bush and his team had betrayed America.

But, of course, I don't think they were even aware of it. They were too busy writing e-mails to send to all the people who supported them in the past, asking for their financial support for 2008. And they're still asking for it.

Why aren't people like Kucinich and Feingold pointing this out, and trying to clear their own way to the nomination?

[misanthrope]

20. This is the most brutally honest post...

...in this thread and, as a result, it's bound to earn you intense contempt from some on DU. I, however, salute the probity within it.

Thank you.

[bluedonkey]

22. Al Gore airlifted patients out of Charity Hospital

He was here,he didn't just send a plane.HE CAME!

Now I don't know where other Dems were but Al Gore helped.

<img src=>

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[tomreedtoon]

24. Thank you! Now where were Kerry and Clinton?

This is something else nobody knew, and that Gore didn't mention. This is - dare I say it - a campaign point.

Of course, the entire Democratic Party will be on pause until Tuesday, when Lieberman will either be defeated or will have stolen the nomination with the help of the Republicans. But if one of the Pink Tutu Democrats is defeated, this may be a way for Gore to be nominated - and this would be a reason for people not to feel guilty about voting for him.

Kerry and Clinton supporters, the ball is in your courts (lousy metaphor, but you know what I mean). What did your American idols do during Katrina?

[Generic Other]

18. Sad story

Has much changed in a year?

[Balderdash]

19. I just want to cry

I was there and it was terrible and in some ways wonderful too.
No they weren't coming but the southern fucktards were amazing.
If someone had something extra, they gave it away. There was no
hording of anything, it was amazing, if you needed it it was yours.
BushCo was absent but the humans that live here were amazing and the
volunteers from everywhere were amazing. Katrina was the worse thing
I've ever been through but the people of Louisiana are truly heroic
people. And I had friends that I only know through the internet that
held me and mine together until we could do it ourselves. I wish I were
a better writer because there are some things that need saying but I get
overwhelmed with emotion thinking about those days and the days yet to
come because we're not back yet but we will be.

[me b zola]

21. KatrinaBush

For almost a year now I have struggled to know how to call the disaster that occurred in the Gulf states. Sure enough, the storm Katrina devistated portions of the Gulf and took many lives. But Katrina is only a portion of the story. The man-made disaster that followed Katrina was/is arguably more devistating than the storm itself.

So I have settled on calling the entire catastrophic event KatrinaBush.

[Nikki Stone 1]

23. Very powerful and frightening

The globalized forces of our government don't care about the citizenry.

[earth mom]

25. Thanks for posting...will read later tonight. eom