About Pitbulls
When you refer to “lipstick” in the context of a canine, doesn’t it usually refer to the dog’s penis as it extends from the prepuce? I’m just saying that “Pitbull with lipstick” seems to me to mean “a dog with an erect wang.”
An observation
Sarah Palin puts the “L” in “pain”. Listening to her “debate” makes my skin crawl.
Katrina: survivor first-hand account from Charmaine Neville
Katrina: survivor first-hand account from Charmaine Neville
You might find it hard to watch this all. That’s a man of the cloth holding on to her.
Thanks to Boing Boing.
Okay Mister Smartypants, What’s Your Federal Emergency Plan Then?
Ignoring any levee building business, since I’m of the belief that any sized levee can still break. The blockquotes (in yellow and/or indented) are from this Guardian article and this timeline, and are things that actually happened.
Wednesday, Aug. 24:
- Tropical Depression 12 strengthens into Tropical Storm Katrina over the Central Bahamas; a hurricane warning is issued for the southeastern Florida coast.
With a tropical storm on the horizon, FEMA should coordinate with the department of homeland security to place the National Guard and reserves on alert. A percentage should be on call and ready to mobilize within two hours. (packed, dressed, napping on the couch waiting for the call)
Thursday, Aug. 25:
- Hurricane Katrina strikes Florida between Hallandale Beach and North Miami Beach as a Category 1 hurricane with 80 mph winds.
After landfall of a minor hurricane, FEMA should ensure that local law enforcement and rescue operations have the resources that they need. Were any police or fire stations compromised? Hospitals? Where is the hurricane headed?
Bush cancels his vacation and returns to Washington. Dick Cheney is revived from his daily sleep in the crypt and brought up to speed on the minor disaster and possible continuing action.
Friday, Aug. 26:
- Katrina weakens over land to a tropical storm before moving out over the Gulf of Mexico. It grows to a Category 2 hurricane with 100 mph winds, veering north and west toward Mississippi and Louisiana.
- 10,000 National Guard troops are dispatched across the Gulf Coast.
I do not believe that 10,000 troops were dispatched at this point. In my plan, on this day, everyone in the country is on alert now, since this is the big one.
FEMA flies emergency services (medics, engineers, radio operators, people to move sandbags) to Houston, Memphis, Atlanta, or whichever locations will be best for fast deployment of front-line rescue services. At minimum, several teams per hot spot with the ability to set up mobile command centers capable of dispatching an entire city’s worth of police (that’s a lot of powerful radio equipment) and several battalions of troops. A battalion may have up to a thousand soldiers.
Saturday, Aug. 27:
- Katrina becomes a Category 3 storm, with 115 mph winds; a hurricane warning is issued for Louisiana’s southeastern coast, including New Orleans and Lake Pontchartrain, and for the northern Gulf coast.
- New Orleans Mayor Ray Nagin declares a state of emergency and urges residents in low-lying areas to evacuate.
- Mississippi Gov. Haley Barbour declares a state of emergency. A mandatory evacuation is ordered for Hancock County.
- Coastal Gulf residents jam freeways and gas stations as they rush to evacuate.
President Bush, like the rest of America is glued to the television and other news sources. He contacts the state governers personally to find out the status of their aid requests. He coordinates with FEMA to determine effective coverage. He ensures that the military is at ready. The Coast Guard and Navy are as close as can be without risking loss of ship or life.
Sunday, Aug. 28:
- Katrina grows into a Category 5 storm with 160 mph winds and heads for the northern Gulf coast.
- Nagin orders a mandatory evacuation for New Orleans. But 10 shelters are also set up, including the Superdome, for those unable to leave.
- Evacuation orders are posted all along the Mississippi coast.
- Alabama Gov. Bob Riley declares a state of emergency.
Since a city of 500,000 people has been ordered to evacuate, FEMA determines the actual evacuation levels and to where those evacuees are fleeing. At this point the fate of New Orleans is unknown, so FEMA finds out how many people remain and plans for the eventualities of forcibly removing them and simply supplying them where they are. This storm is the big one, so all available National Guard members are expected to be ready. Most of those who had been “on call” are indeed called up, and plans to mobilize for relief and sandbagging duties are roughed out. The Mississippi floods, but we don’t normally get this much warning.
Monday, Aug. 29:
- Katrina, a Category 4 hurricane with 145 mph winds, makes landfall near Buras, La., at 6:10 a.m. CDT (7:10 a.m. EDT).
- Katrina rips two holes in the Superdome’s roof. Some 10,000 storm refugees are inside.
The soldiers are at base and getting ancy as the footage of the storm damage rolls in. They are informed that they will be deploying as soon as the weather permits them to land in the Gulf Coast. The military flies data collection passes over the area hourly to survey the storm and damage.
As soon as the skies are clear enough to land a helicopter, the advance teams rush in, setting up communications for the affected cities. After landfall of a major hurricane, FEMA should ensure that local law enforcement and rescue operations have the resources that they need. Were any police or fire stations compromised? Hospitals? Where are the people who did not evacuate?
Every Greyhound in the neighboring six states is requested for evacuation assistance.
The Coast Guard and Navy are at full steam towards the Gulf Coast. Any troops that can be in the air are in the air. Troops at staging area are mobilized for multi-hour drives to affected states.
In a disaster involving flooding of populated areas, many boats will be needed to do house-to-house searches. These should be ready for any areas that had a danger of flooding or storm surges.
Tuesday, Aug. 30:
- Two levees break in New Orleans and water pours in, covering 80 percent of the city and rising to 20 feet deep in some areas. Many people climb onto roofs to escape.
- Louisiana Gov. Kathleen Blanco says everyone still in New Orleans - an estimated 50,000 to 100,000 people - must be evacuated. Crowds swell at the Superdome and the New Orleans convention center.
- Rescuers in helicopters and boats pick up hundreds of stranded people in New Orleans. Reports of looting emerge.
- About 40,000 people are in American Red Cross shelters, not including New Orleans.
UAVs (Predators. Unmanned flying things with cameras that we used all over the place in Iraq) fly non-stop to spot persons in need. Helicopters with infrared cameras are dispatched en masse.
Troops begin arriving. Emergency hospitals are built in mere hours, just like the commercials on television. Some food and water is air dropped under the supervision of coordinated police and military efforts. More supplies are ordered to be dropped. Troops continue to arrive. Heavy equipment is deployed to clear the path for evacuees.
The president is on the phone with every governor finding homes for people. Those greyhounds are swiftly dispatched. So are school buses from every state for a thousand miles.
Wednesday, Aug.31:
- Nagin offers a startling estimate of New Orleans’ death toll: “Minimum, hundreds. Most likely, thousands,'’ he says.
- “At first light, the devastation is greater than our worst fears,'’ says Blanco, Louisiana’s governor.
- Health and Human Services Secretary Mike Leavitt declares a federal health emergency throughout the Gulf Coast, sends in medical supplies and workers.
- Army Corps of Engineers estimates it will be at least 30 days or more before New Orleans will be pumped out.
- An estimated 52,000 people are in Red Cross shelters. An additional 25,000 are in the Superdome, where conditions are worsening by the hour.
- An exodus from the Superdome begins, with the first buses leaving for Houston’s Astrodome, 350 miles away.
- Pentagon mounts one of largest search-and-rescue operations in U.S. history, sending four Navy ships with emergency supplies.
- Water levels stop rising in New Orleans. Engineers work to close a 500-foot gap in a failed floodwall.
Residents are instructed to amass in particular locations like the Superdome and Convention Center, where troops and buses are already standing by. Emergency hospitals and food centers are being built at those locations.
Well, at this point things are a little sketchy. I’m not sure what to do with the thousands of troops flowing in to New Orleans and the forced evacuation of the remaining folks. I imagine that it will be just like what didn’t happen in reality until Friday, September 2nd, or more realistically, Saturday and Sunday, when suddenly the Superdome and convention center just magically emptied. My plan might not save that many lives, but it would make us all look a lot less like colossal douchebags.
Thursday, Sept. 1:
- Outside the New Orleans Convention Center, the sidewalks are packed with people without food, water or medical care, waiting for buses that do not come. Tempers flare.
- Nagin, the New Orleans mayor, calls the situation critical and issues “a desperate SOS'’ for more buses.
- Crowds at the Superdome swell to 30,000 with another 25,000 at the convention center. The first refugee buses arrive at the Houston Astrodome. Elsewhere, 76,000 people are Red Cross shelters.
Friday, Sept 2:
- Thousands of National Guardsmen arrive in New Orleans in truck convoys carrying food, water and weapons.
Yes, I have the benefit of hindsight, but I wrote this in an hour in my underpants, for free. It wasn’t my job to be prepared for disaster or lead us through it.
Whose job was it to be prepared and lead us through it?
Carolyn Cheeks Kilpatrick for President
Representative Carolyn Cheeks Kilpatrick, Michigan’s 13th District
I have a secret love for CSPAN. While obsessively looking for Katrina news, we here at the Keathly household came across the Congressional Black Caucus on Response to Hurricane Katrina. Now that was some presidential speaking.
I would also accept Jesse Jackson Jr., or probably most of the rest of the speakers. He said some smart, smart things.
Really, I just want a president who can communicate and inspire. I have yet to be inspired by thing one that comes out of Bush’s twisty mouth.
Gratuitous and Mean-Spirited
I don’t know politics, but I know what I like!
A doctor, a lawyer, and an accountant all die and go to heaven on the same day. When they get to the Pearly Gates, they are greeted by St. Peter. St. Peter says, “Scott McClellan is a lying sack of shit and I’d tell him so myself if he weren’t going straight to hell when he dies.”
Feelin’ Hot Hot Hot
This is a little scary, I got all crazy hot in class today and stopped sweating again, despite drinking another two liters of water. How much am I paying to slowly roast in a classroom with no air conditioning?
I wrote another post, but it’s embarrassingly lurid. I might have to run it through a few revisions. I dunno. I just want to go lie down on the couch and drink lemonade until the next guy comes to see the red car. Then, after he leaves I will call up Paul #2 and tell him to bring a trailer and a fat check. Paul #2 drives a 2005 Subaru WRX STi with all wheel drive and 300hp. He let me drive it yesterday and it was deliriously awesome, yet I knew right off that I didn’t want a car like that for myself. It was just way too fast.
Speaking of cars, it’s really easy for me to say things like “we should go ethanol” or “hybrids are getting there, but I think that they could have a lot more to offer than they currently do” or “fuel cells just displace the extraction of energy from fuel from individual vehicles to centralized power plants.” Walking away from ease and convenience of hopping in the car? Not so easy. I still think that all new homes and businesses in sunburnt parts of the country should be required to have solar panels in direct proportion to their square footage. Power companies should be required to accept excess power back into the grid and pay or credit users for it. Extra juice could be harnessed to do things like generate hydrogen for fuel cells, which would be a way that power companies could stockpile energy.
I don’t know where that came from. I’m gonna go lie down for a while.
Pantslessness
I think that the heat is starting to break. That is the only explanation that I can come up with for my unprovoked lawn mowing and bike tuneup-ing. Tuning up. One of the spokes is broken, but I got a bunch of gunk out of the chain, straightened out the mounting of the rear wheel, and put air in the tires. I rode in circles a little bit, but I was too lazy to go in and get my helmet so I could ride around the neighborhood.
Read 754 more words, see 3 more images, and read 2 comments...
Re: FW: Photos That will NEVER Make the News, unless they were released by major news organizations in the first place
————– Forwarded Message: ————–
Subject: FW: Photos That will NEVER Make the News
Date: Wed, 10 Nov 2004 14:11:57 +0000—–Original Message—–
Subject: FW: Photos That will NEVER Make the News—–Original Message—–
Subject: Photos That will NEVER Make the NewsPlease pass the pictures on. Sometimes in our everyday lives we tend to forget what’s going on elsewhere in the world and that the brave men and women of the service are just like you and I. They have family and friends back home who love them very much and are praying for their safe return.
PLEASE KEEP THIS GOING EVEN IF YOU HAVE PASSED IT ON BEFORE
When you receive this, please stop for a moment and say a prayer for our troops and the people in Afghanistan, Kuwait, Iraq, and all around the world. There is nothing attached……. This can be very powerful……Just send this to people in your address book. Do not stop the wheel, please….
Of all the gifts you could give to support peace, Prayer is the very best one…..
Not to be a wiseass, but did you notice “AP”, “Reuters” and “AFP” at the bottom of all but one of the photos? I suppose that the tiny text would be easy to miss, but it’s there, and it indicates that the photos all come from news agencies, so by definition they all made the news - they all had to be released by the news agencies at one point or another.
http://www.reuters.com/
http://www.ap.org/
http://www.afp.com/english/home/
If you would like to argue about the media, perhaps we could argue that the media isn’t showing enough images like these:
http://gallery.colofinder.net/casualties
http://gallery.colofinder.net/iraqwar2003-fisk
I have a strong stomach. Even though I believe strongly that the reasons that we went to Iraq were at best hasty and at worst outright lies, I understand that we are killing people for a reason.
When we deposed Saddam Hussein we removed a murderous, evil madman. Unfortunately for us, he did not have ties to Al Qaeda. He also didn’t have any weapons of mass destruction. Iraq had nothing to do with 9/11. Iraq had little to do with Islamic terrorists. Iraq was a secular state. Muslims did not like Iraq’s leadership because they were not religious.
Now we have unleashed upon the world a country friendly to muslim extremists. Oh yeah, the top brass didn’t make “securing munitions” a high priority so now the extremists are armed. Thanks a lot.
Okay, maybe I was being a wiseass.