Archives for Tuesday, 8/30/05

So much to blog on, so little time. Worthy subjects are flooding in like the rising water in the streets of New Orleans. So I thought I’d just quickly touch on a couple stories by pointing you towards what’s happening on some other, worthy blogs.

Major levee break inundates New Orleans
Much of my up to the minute meteorological and related disaster information on Hurricane Katrina has been coming from Steve Gregory’s amazingly informative blog on Weather Underground. And the latest reports are truly horrendous: 40,000 to 50,000 people have now sought refuge in the Superdome, where conditions are deteriorating as water rises around them.

80% of New Orleans is totally submerged now, and will likely become 100% submerged tonight. The depth of the water in the BIZ district is around 6-10 inches at this time.

This is a result of 2 MAJOR BREACHES OF THE LEVEE. The first one ,is about 400 feet long, and appears to have given way around 9PM last night. The Corp of Engineers have now said there is also a second breach as well. Within the hour the Pentagon will be taking over the coordination and manpower / machinery to assist in closing the 2 breaches.

Gregory describes the situation as “a ‘slow motion version’ of the worst case scenario.” Fires are burning throughout the city, looting is rampant, and the governor has ordered a total evacuation. Again, if you want to help, the American Red Cross is seeking cash donations.

Rebooting Creationism
On a lighter note, The General has posted a rather amusing letter to Bill and Melinda Gates, asking for the same kind of support in financing his unscientific research as they’ve given to the Discovery Institute’s “intelligent” design media campaign.

One of the biggest problems people have with Noah’s Ark is that even at 300 x 40 x 30 cubits in size, it would be too small to hold that many animals. That’s especially true when dinosaurs are included. My theory is that only a small portion of the animals were actually on the ark at any given time. The others swam, or in the case of non-buoyant animals like tortoises, they windsurfed until it was time for them to be rotated onto the boat.

In order to prove this theory, I’ll need an ark, every living species of animal, mockups of dinosaurs, and Cheetos. That’s going to take a lot of money, but I think you should be able to swing it.

I love The General. (In a manly, heterosexual way, of course.)

Conservative coffee cups
Darryl at Hominid Views has written a letter of his own, this one to Maureen Richardson of Concerned Women for America, a group that has complained to Starbucks of liberal bias in printing quotations on their coffee cups. Darryl suggests adding balance with a few quotes from God-fearing Christians, including these uplifting sentiments from the Rev. Jerry Falwell:

“I really believe that the pagans, and the abortionists, and the feminists, and the gays and the lesbians who are actively trying to make that an alternative lifestyle, the ACLU, People For the American Way, all of them who have tried to secularize America. I point the finger in their face and say “you helped [9-11] happen.'”

Share:

• Tweet
• Email
• Print

The Seattle chapter of Drinking Liberally meets tonight (and every Tuesday), 8PM at the Montlake Ale House, 2307 24th Avenue E.

I’ve promised friends I’d pick them up at the airport around 9 pm, so unless the flight comes in ahead of schedule (hah!) I’ll stop by early.

With the city largely emptied of people — and war-stressed National Guard units lacking the numbers to make a forceful presence — looting has started to hit the devastated streets of New Orleans.

At a Walgreen’s drug store in the French Quarter, people were running out with grocery baskets and coolers full of soft drinks, chips and diapers.

When police finally showed up, a young boy stood in the door screaming, ”86! 86!” — the radio code for police — and the crowd scattered.

Denise Bollinger, a tourist from Philadelphia, stood outside and snapped pictures in amazement.

”It’s downtown Baghdad,” the housewife said. ”It’s insane. I’ve wanted to come here for 10 years. I thought this was a sophisticated city. I guess not.”

Yes, the circumstances in New Orleans are somewhat similar to the looting that occurred in Baghdad in the wake of Bush’s poorly planned invasion. In both cases we failed to provide our military sufficient instructions to stop the looting… nor gave them the troop strength to do so.

Looters filled industrial-sized garbage cans with clothing and jewelry and floated them down the street on bits of plywood and insulation as National Guard lumbered by.

Mike Franklin stood on the trolley tracks and watched the spectacle unfold.

”To be honest with you, people who are oppressed all their lives, man, it’s an opportunity to get back at society,” he said.

Now before anyone berates this man for his anti-social statement, one should remember that he is merely echoing the sentiments of Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld in response to the “untidy” sacking of Baghdad. Rumsfeld explained that free people “make mistakes and commit crimes and do bad things.”

“And while no one condones looting, on the other hand one can understand the pent-up feelings that may result from decades of repression…”

So I guess we should celebrate the looting as evidence that we have finally succeeded in bringing freedom to the streets of New Orleans.

The Municipal League of King County has posted its 2005 Candidate Evaluations, a comprehensive citizen survey of county, port, city and school district races from throughout King County. Candidates are judged on four criteria — involvement, effectiveness, character and knowledge — and the evaluations have long been noted for being non-partisan and independent.

For example, in three of the five county council races, the Democrat received a lower rating than his or her opponent. However in the county executive race, Democrat Ron Sims was one of only a handful of candidates in the entire survey to receive an “outstanding”, the highest rating, while his Republican opponent David Irons was only rated “good”… the equivalent of a “C”.

It is curious to note that none of the candidates running for Seattle City Council was rated “outstanding”. And of particular interest to HA readers, our very own Richard Pope, running for Seattle Port Commission position #4, was rated “not qualified”, the lowest rating. Sorry Richard.

Speaking of Maria Cantwell… I know why I missed this tidbit — I was busy traveling that day — but I’m wondering why nobody in the MSM picked up on this Aug. 10 survey from Republican pollster Strategic Vision:

If the election for United States Senate were held today and the candidates were Maria Cantwell, the Democrat or Mike McGavick, the Republican, whom would you vote for?

Maria Cantwell [D]		46%
Mike McGavick [R]		38%
Undecided		16%

Yeah… yeah… I know, Cantwell is below the 50% mark, not exactly where an incumbent wants to be a year out from the election, but remember… this is a GOP pollster, and McGavick’s numbers barely rise above the hardcore Republican base that would blindly vote for anybody with an “R” next to their name on the ballot. (I call this the Will Baker Wing of the Republican Party.)

But perhaps the best indication that Republicans are more than a little uncomfortable about this poll is the fact that they’ve been so hush-hush about it. McGavick polls no higher than Jennifer Dunn, George Nethercutt or even Chris Vance did in a similar Strategic Vision matchup back in March. Hmmm. Perhaps the state GOP should take a closer look at Susan Hutchison?