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Thank you for reading!
Jane, good to have you on board!
twodog, that does tend to muck things up around here, doesn't it?
Offbeats, see comment concerning Scoop's comment/
Scoop, you get a B+ for homework. Thanks for sharing those citations, but you can go a lot further back than that, since this has been a problem for decades. President Bush was clearly mistaken in that remark; I can only surmise that he made the same mistake we all make in our refusal to think that the very worst could actually happen. (Another classic example - not thinking anyone would acutally fly airliners into buildings.) But once again - this goes back decades before Bush, and every president and every administration deserves scorn for not addressing this - as do those who would oppose the necessary construction to make it so.
(Incidentally, I heard that National Geographic ran an article last fall that predicted these events fairly accurately; when you stop and think about it, the sequence of events is not that hard to predict and follows a path of clear but unfortunate logic.)
posted by
WriterofLight
on September 6, 2005 at 7:51 PM
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Writeroflight here is the same comment I left Twodog
On the September 1st in an interview on "Good Morning America," President Bush said, "I don't think anyone anticipated the breach of the levees." He added, "Now we're having to deal with it, and will."
But Media Matters did Nexis search and found these gems;
- ABC's Nightline, 9/15/04:
"If it sounds overly dramatic, it is not. This city is surrounded by water on three sides. Lake Pontchartrain to the north and the Mississippi below. A major hurricane hitting right here would breach the levees. Water would cascade in, submerging the city. And because of the levees, it would have no way of escaping." - Associated Press, 5/16/04:
"Officials have warned that if a major hurricane hits New Orleans, thousands of people could be killed and the city could be flooded for weeks as flood waters breach the levees ringing the city, which has the topography of a saucer that dips several feet below sea level in many places." - The Advocate
, Baton Rouge, Louisiana, 9/19/03: "... the Hurricane Center has developed an 'extremely detailed' map of New Orleans because the city, which sits about 6-feet below sea level and is surrounded by levees, is a 'worst-case scenario' for a major storm to hit. Knowing how far and how fast the water in the inlets will rise, evacuations and cleanups can be better planned, [LSU Hurricane Center director Ivor] van Heerden said. In the case of south Louisiana, a breach of the levees would trap the flood water on the wrong side of the bank once the bayous and rivers receded, van Heerden said." - Richmond Times-Dispatch
, 8/6/02: "New Orleans, with more than 460,000 residents, lies entirely below sea level and depends on a system of levees to hold back the Gulf of Mexico. Some researchers say a Category 3 hurricane could breach the levees and kill thousands of people."
And Bush still cut funding, why?
posted by
scoop
on September 6, 2005 at 11:17 AM
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Writer
Excellent..but do not look for the bashers to read, it is after all, much easier to blame than to take responsibility! I saw a piece this last week about an article written in the 90's, from a New Orleans paper, regarding the levee's, it stated then what the effects of a Cat. 5 could have on the city and the delta. Obviously no one paid attention back then, but that's easy when you live in the great STATE OF DENIAL!!
posted by
Offy
on September 6, 2005 at 11:11 AM
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WriterofLight
Now you've done it, throwing all those facts out there. How unpoliticaly correct. Good post, good information, thanks.
posted by
twodog
on September 5, 2005 at 9:33 PM
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Thanks for including the link to Malkin's blog.
Excellent!
posted by
JanesOpinion
on September 5, 2005 at 7:07 PM
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