People Won’t Evacuate If They Have Nowhere To Go

The following was in a recent New York Times article about the Israeli assault on Gaza— 

The Israeli Army also dropped thousands of leaflets into some residential districts warning inhabitants to evacuate their homes. Because of “the activity of terrorist groups,” the leaflets said in Arabic, the army “is obliged to respond quickly and work from inside your residential area.” Many residents of one apartment block in Gaza City said they had nowhere else to go and would stay in their homes.”

This made me think about all the people who did not evacuate New Orleans before Hurricane Katrina or Galveston before Hurricane Ike. It was clear from news reports that many who stayed behind were very poor. 

If folks don’t feel they have a better option but to stay and take their chances, they will quite possibly not evacuate when troubl is on the way. I think this is one of those cases where you have to be in the other person’s shoes to fully understand.

Though it is certainly easy, as I heard many times here in Houston after Hurricane Ike, to sit high and dry and criticize others. All I can say in reply is that if people are telling you that they are not going to get out of the way of bombs and hurricanes, I bet they have a good enough reason. At least in the context of their lives and their experiences in life, they have a good enough reason.

People Believe Wild Things Because Nothing’s So Horrible It Can’t Be True

Blogger’s Note—I’m on a Summer Solstice blogging holiday. I’m re-running some posts for the next few days. Thanks for reading Texas Liberal. I’ll be back to regular posting soon.)  

New York Times columnist Nicholas Kristof recently wrote about conspiracy theories many people believe.  

For example, 30% of black people believe it’s possible AIDS was deliberately manufactured to kill black folks.

This is held out as a crazy thing to think.

I don’t believe it myself.

But if you asked me if many white people and white politicians don’t care if poor urban black people live or die, I would say that’s correct.   

And plenty of black politicians don’t care either.  

In my own experience as a city council aide in Cincinnati, Ohio, I read the files of black cancer patients who had intentionally been given extra doses of radiation to see how they would react.

Get this—They suffered.  

Poor black people in cities, blacks and whites in rural areas, our colonized undocumented labor force, and poor people of all kinds, get inferior hospitals and inferior care.

When you ask black folks if AIDS was the work of government, maybe what you’re really asking if the government would do things that would kill people who look like you do.

“Yes” seems to be a logical reply.  

Mr. Kristoff says it is crazy that 36% of Americans believe that government orchestrated 9/11 or knew about it advance.  

Well—I’ve always thought that was a mistaken belief .

George W. Bush was intent on going to war in Iraq before 9/11. He did not need any provocation. 

What people know is that we lied about why we went to war, we did not give our troops the right equipment to save their lives, we sometimes kill innocent civilians, and that the troops sometimes get terrible care upon arriving back home.   

Did the government or President Bush know about 9/11 in advance? No. Is the government as led by President Bush capable of terrible acts that cause people to die? Sure–All the damned time.  

Mr. Kristoff mentions two other conspiracy theories in his column. 

One is that the levees in New Orleans were opened on purpose in the aftermath of Hurricane Katrina.

This is not so.

Yet it had been known for years that the levees might not hold during a bad hurricane and that much of New Orleans was vulnerable. Then, after it was clear the disaster response was poor, President Bush said his FEMA director was doing a “heckuva job.”    

So why not figure that levees were opened by design? Is that much worse than the truth of the matter? 

Another view held by many is that crack cocaine was deliberately introduced into poor neighborhoods.

Now that one is crazy. 

These communities were already so flooded with alcohol, cigarettes, overpriced grocery stores offering little or no produce, bad schools and a host of other urban afflictions, why would you have to introduce something new to harm people?  

The history books tell us that we won our land in good part by exterminating the native population, and that we built up the land with the frequent and longtime use of slave labor.  

Our own experiences in life show us that our cities are left to rot year after year. And the poor are getting more poor even as the rich get richer.

So when you ask if the people in charge of our country, or others in positions of power, are capable of barbaric or even genocidal acts, why would many give any other reply than “yes.”

People Believe Wild Things Because Nothing Is So Brutal Or Crazy That It Can’t Be True

New York Times columnist Nicholas Kristof recently wrote about conspiracy theories many people believe.  

For example, 30% of black people believe it’s possible AIDS was deliberately manufactured to kill black folks.

This is held out as a crazy thing to think.

I don’t believe it myself.

But if you asked me if many white people and white politicians don’t care if poor urban black people live or die, I would say that’s correct.   

And plenty of black politicians don’t care either.  

In my own experience as a city council aide in Cincinnati, Ohio, I read the files of black cancer patients who had intentionally been given extra doses of radiation to see how they would react.

Get this—They suffered.  

Poor black people in cities, blacks and whites in rural areas, our colonized undocumented labor force, and poor people of all kinds, get inferior hospitals and inferior care.

When you ask black folks if AIDS was the work of government, maybe what you’re really asking if the government would do things that would kill people who look like you do.

“Yes” seems to be a logical reply.  

Mr. Kristoff says it is crazy that 36% of Americans believe that government orchestrated 9/11 or knew about it advance.  

Well—I’ve always thought that was a mistaken belief .

George W. Bush was intent on going to war in Iraq before 9/11. He did not need any provocation. 

What people know is that we lied about why we went to war, we did not give our troops the right equipment to save their lives, we sometimes kill innocent civilians, and that the troops sometimes get terrible care upon arriving back home.   

Did the government or President Bush know about 9/11 in advance? No. Is the government as led by President Bush capable of terrible acts that cause people to die? Sure–All the damned time.  

Mr. Kristoff mentions two other conspiracy theories in his column. 

One is that the levees in New Orleans were opened on purpose in the aftermath of Hurricane Katrina.

This is not so.

Yet it had been known for years that the levees might not hold during a bad hurricane and that much of New Orleans was vulnerable. Then, after it was clear the disaster response was poor, President Bush said his FEMA director was doing a “heckuva job.”    

So why not figure that levees were opened by design? Is that much worse than the truth of the matter? 

Another view held by many is that crack cocaine was deliberately introduced into poor neighborhoods.

Now that one is crazy. 

These communities were already so flooded with alcohol, cigarettes, overpriced grocery stores offering little or no produce, bad schools and a host of other urban afflictions, why would you have to introduce something new to harm people?  

The history books tell us that we won our land in good part by exterminating the native population, and that we built up the land with the frequent and longtime use of slave labor.  

Our own experiences in life show us that our cities are left to rot year after year. And the poor are getting more poor even as the rich get richer.

So when you ask if the people in charge of our country are capable of barbaric or even genocidal acts, why would many give any other reply than “yes.”

Louisiana Primary Is February 9—Facts, History & Links About Louisiana Politics & The Primary

The Louisiana primary will be held for both parties this upcoming Saturday, February 9.

Democrats will award 56 delegates and Republicans will have 20 delegates at stake. (Though some of these Republican delegates have already been spoken for in an earlier caucus.)

For Democrats in the South in 2008, Senator Barack Obama has so far won the Deep South states of South Carolina,( Here is a Texas Liberal history of the South Carolina primary.) Alabama and Georgia. Hillary Clinton has won Arkansas, where she lived for many years, and the border state of Tennessee.

Mrs. Clinton was the winner of the Florida poll, but due to a dispute over the date of the primary, a full campaign was not fought in Florida.  ( Here is a Texas Liberal history of the Florida primary.)

Senator Obama does well in states where much of the primary electorate is black.

For Republicans, Mike Huckabee has been the strongest candidate in the South. Though John McCain’s wins in South Carolina and Florida have been very important to his campaign.

( Satellite image of New Orleans.)

In November, Louisiana has gone Republican in the past two elections. Going back a bit further, after many years as a “Solid South” one-party Democratic state, Louisiana has mostly voted for Republicans for President beginning with Barry Goldwater in 1964. Southern Democrats Jimmy Carter in 1976 and Bill Clinton in 1992 and 1996 were able to carry the state.

Louisiana has not played a large role in the recent history of the presidential nominating process with one positive exception. In 1996 the forces of the far right-wing Texas Senator Phil Gramm  arranged for early caucuses in Louisiana to help the Gramm campaign. That was a bad move. Turnout was low and Pat Buchanan won the most delegates.

Louisiana did not hold its first Presidential primary until 1980. Ronald Reagan and Jimmy Carter were the winners.

Indicative of the strength of black voters within the Democratic Party there, Jesse Jackson was the Louisiana Democratic primary winner in both 1984 and 1988.

The Obama campaign must be aware of that fact.

( Photo below of Bald Cypress Swamp in Louisiana.)

Here is an excerpt from the Louisiana entry in the 2008 Almanac of American Politics—-

Louisiana often seems to America’s banana republic, with its charm and inefficiency, its communities interfaced by family ties and its public sector sometimes laced with corruption, with its own indigenous culture and its traditions of fine distinctions of class and caste. It is a state with an economy uncomfortably like that of an underdeveloped country, based on pumping minerals out of soggy ground and shipping grain produced in the vast hinterland drained by its great river, an economy increasingly dependent on businesses typical of picturesque Third World countries—tourism…. and gambling…..Louisiana has a hereditary rich class and a large low-wage working class. It has conservative cultural attitudes….but Louisiana also has a lazy tolerance of rule-breaking.

Louisiana has a lower population today than it did in 2000. This is because, of course, of Hurricane Katrina. The 2000 population was 4.468 million. The 2007 estimate was 4.293 million.

Here are some basic facts about Louisiana.

The population of Louisiana is around 30% black. The Hispanic population is much smaller. If it has gone up since Katrina, it is unlikely that many of the Hispanics involved in rebuilding New Orleans are registered to vote. Hispanic voters have been supporting Hillary Clinton so far in the Democratic race.

It was not just New Orleans proper that lost population after Katrina. Strongly Republican Jefferson Parrish in the New Orleans suburbs has also lost people and this fact may offset at least some of the black population decline.

Here is the Louisiana progressive blogger Moldy City.

Here is the Louisiana progressive blogger CenLamar.

Here is the Louisiana progressive blogger Library Chronicles.

Here is the New Orleans Times-Picayune newspaper.

Here is the Louisiana Democratic Party.

Here is the Green Party of Louisiana.

Here is the Louisiana Republican Party.

(Texas Liberal is leading the way in political history blogging in 2008. )

(Does this unique Louisiana cuisine make up for years of poverty and racism?)

Black Voters In New Orleans Keep Messing Up

Congressman William Jefferson from New Orleans has been reelected despite an ongoing investigation into his conduct and despite the fact $ 90,000 was found in his freezer.

Though his Democratic opponent in the run-off election was also black, Mr. Jefferson won along racial lines. Black voters strongly supported Mr. Jefferson. Part of Mr. Jefferson’s campaign pitch was that the investigation of him is racially motivated.

It is not surprising Mr. Jefferson won. Earlier this year black voters in New Orleans, with the support of white conservatives who thought Mayor Ray Nagin’s white opponent too liberal, made the bone-headed decision to reelect the incompetent Mayor Nagin.

Reluctance by blacks to elect a white mayor in what had been a majority-black city before Katrina is understandable. However, it is clear that Mayor Nagin is not the man to get things done.

Conservative whites in New Orleans are pretty much irredeemable as voters. Liberal whites are hard to find. It is up to blacks to get it right. Black folks in New Orleans have got make a choice.

They can vote based mostly on race or they can elect the right people of whatever color to help fix New Orleans. If New Orleans blacks mess up they will get screwed time and time again. Conservatives see a “New” New Orleans with as many poor people and black people gone as possible.

So far, black voters in New Orleans are getting it wrong every time. 

Katrina Evacuees Win A Round

A federal judge has ordered the payment of owed housing benefits to evacuees of Hurricane Katrina. Many eligible for this money live here in Houston.  

FEMA promised these payments, but has not delivered. The judge said FEMA has offered no good reason why the benefits had been curtailed.

I once read a book called Regulating The Poor by Frances Fox Piven and Richard Cloward. The book is a history of poor assistance and government benefits to the needy. It is a long-term story of government not publicizing available payments and of people denied resources they were eligible to receive.

Hurricane Katrina evacuees are mostly powerless. As such, they are easy to cheat. It is good to know that at least this small victory has been won. 

Katrina victims, while bearing responsibility for their future, are survivors of both a horrible storm and of a horrible city. Their plight must be at the top of the national agenda.  

Time To Stop Saying Nasty Things About Hurricane Katrina Evacuees Living In Houston

A disturbing consequence of Hurricane Katrina is the demonization of former New Orleans residents now living here in Houston, Texas. I thought about this again last week while driving behind a lady with Louisiana plates on her car. She had a bumper sticker on the car announcing that her child was an honor student at the local Labay Middle School.

Much of the anger and fear the Katrina people have generated comes from local talk radio and the predominately right-wing audience these shows attract. These are the very same folks that do nothing about chronic poverty in America’s cities. We live in a society that is, to a degree, of our own making.

It is true the murder rate has gone up in Houston since Katrina. These crimes can be blamed on both those who committed the murders and on the barbaric conditions of third-world poverty which prevailed in much of New Orleans before Katrina.

Houstonians who see their safety jeopardized by the newcomers have a right to express their concerns and to demand action. Houston Mayor Bill White has attended public meetings on this topic. To his credit, the Mayor has insisted that Katrina victims be treated well.

Former New Orleans residents now in Houston are mostly decent people who need some help. I know this is an attitude I share with Houstonians of all political views— Including many who see themselves on the right.

Those forced to leave New Orleans because of the storm are going to be here for a long time. Many will stay for good. It’s important that these people be treated as individuals trying to make the best out of life.

Many Hurricane Katrina Victims Plan To Stay In Houston.

The Houston Chronicle reports that a majority of the poorest Hurricane Katrina evacuees from New Orleans plan to stay in Houston.  Some Houston residents are upset with the increased crime displaced Katrina people have brought. You can’t blame them for being upset.  

Yet it is also true that both Louisiana and Texas have long been indifferent to the poor.  Maybe what both states should do, in addition to telling hurricane victims that at some point they must get to work, is to raise the tax revenue required to treat all residents decently. It is time for Texas and Louisiana to finally become modern first-world societies.