Dagmar wrote:

Assuming they actually manage to rebuild New Orleans, that is.

I don't think they should. When I first learned about the geography of New Orleans in middle school, I thought to myself, "What happens if a hurricane hits it?"

We're seeing the answer now. Sometimes common sense isn't so common. Generation after generation just kept building more stuff there. No one remembered the lesson of Galveston, TX in 1900 it seems.

I feel sorry for everyone in New Orleans who died because of or is suffering from this hurricane, but the land is not a practical place to have a city. I'm reminded of Monty Python and the Holy Grail:

"When I first came here, this was all swamp. Everyone said I was daft to build a castle on a swamp, but I built in all the same, just to show them. It sank into the swamp. So I built a second one. That sank into the swamp. So I built a third. That burned down, fell over, then sank into the swamp. But the fourth one stayed up. And that's what you're going to get, Lad, the strongest castle in all of England."

Hijexx wrote:

Dagmar wrote:

Assuming they actually manage to rebuild New Orleans, that is.

I don't think they should. When I first learned about the geography of New Orleans in middle school, I thought to myself, "What happens if a hurricane hits it?"

We're seeing the answer now. Sometimes common sense isn't so common. Generation after generation just kept building more stuff there. No one remembered the lesson of Galveston, TX in 1900 it seems.

I feel sorry for everyone in New Orleans who died because of or is suffering from this hurricane, but the land is not a practical place to have a city. I'm reminded of Monty Python and the Holy Grail:

"When I first came here, this was all swamp. Everyone said I was daft to build a castle on a swamp, but I built in all the same, just to show them. It sank into the swamp. So I built a second one. That sank into the swamp. So I built a third. That burned down, fell over, then sank into the swamp. But the fourth one stayed up. And that's what you're going to get, Lad, the strongest castle in all of England."

Excellent! If you've ever been to NO, you soon realize that despite it being beautiful and entrancing, it is perhaps one of the stupidest civil engineering mistakes ever. Okay, maybe Pompei.

flynn23 wrote:

Hijexx wrote:

Dagmar wrote:

Assuming they actually manage to rebuild New Orleans, that is.

I don't think they should. When I first learned about the geography of New Orleans in middle school, I thought to myself, "What happens if a hurricane hits it?"

We're seeing the answer now. Sometimes common sense isn't so common. Generation after generation just kept building more stuff there. No one remembered the lesson of Galveston, TX in 1900 it seems.

I feel sorry for everyone in New Orleans who died because of or is suffering from this hurricane, but the land is not a practical place to have a city. I'm reminded of Monty Python and the Holy Grail:

"When I first came here, this was all swamp. Everyone said I was daft to build a castle on a swamp, but I built in all the same, just to show them. It sank into the swamp. So I built a second one. That sank into the swamp. So I built a third. That burned down, fell over, then sank into the swamp. But the fourth one stayed up. And that's what you're going to get, Lad, the strongest castle in all of England."

Excellent! If you've ever been to NO, you soon realize that despite it being beautiful and entrancing, it is perhaps one of the stupidest civil engineering mistakes ever. Okay, maybe Pompei.

What's the problem here? People taste good.

Hijexx wrote:

I don't think they should. When I first learned about the geography of New Orleans in middle school, I thought to myself, "What happens if a hurricane hits it?"

It's an odd behavior but something inexplicably natural. Home is home no matter what happens. While on a trip to India a colleague, who happened to live in Southern Miss at the time, said that he was astonished how many times flooding and disease had hit various areas ~every~ summer and the people kept coming back and rebuilding.

Animals do it, we do it, and we'll continue to do it. Besides, now a whole new group of Civil Engineers have something to prove.

I wish them all well but I sure do with FEMA would stop providing so generously for any repeat events/claims. Just don't stop providing now. :-/ -Pk

Dagmar wrote:
First there came Karina.

Now there's looting, fires, no electricity, homeless ants outnumbering people about a thousand to one, poisonous snakes, and flood-demolished homes with markers meaning "Body In Attic", lack of food, and a general untidyness about the place. The news vultures have never had a more nutritious diet of human misery to gorge themselves on.

They're pretty busy down there. At this point I think that if any of them survive the next few weeks without having to resort to cannibalism, I doubt there will ever be any problems getting people to evacuate New Orleans again.

Assuming they actually manage to rebuild New Orleans, that is.

I wish people would quit griping about petty looting. All of that merchandise is lost anyway...may as well let all those poor people who've lost everything get a change of clothes and some perishables to lessen the hell of living in the Superdome and Convention centers.

On that note, is there any really good reason why conditions are so bad there? Beyond the obvious hurrican damage, are we so taken aback by it that 250 years of government planning and programs can't handle it? All I've heard is "look how much money so-and-so company is donating" and "x number of National Guards have been mobilized" but nothing about why its taking so long to evacuate people or what the hell is standing in the way of getting all those thousands of people the fuck out of dodge. Didn't this kind of situtation (i.e. mass evacuations following a tragedy) ever occur to us? Is it because all the army men with the bad attitudes are stuck in Iraq instead of kicking ass and taking names in LA and MS? I of course realize that "returning to normal" requires a ton of money and manpower and all that loss of life is a terrible shock, but I just can't imagine why the United States, a country of 300 million people and an annual GDP of $11 trillion, is incapacitated by the task of helping 100,000 people trapped by floodwaters. Sheer numbers? Nature/type of disaster? Lack of planning cohesion?

-janelane, compassionately