muckefuck | Looterville

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Looterville

If you're looking for a little schadenfreude this morning in the wake of disaster, the crazy woman who decided to remain in New Orleans because her cats weren't worried has been forced to evacuate.

I have to confess some frustration with people who defy a mandatory evacuation order and then turn around and scream for rescue when things get worse than they expected. On the one hand, a state's power to force people from their homes should certainly be limited. Moreover, people should be allowed to make bad decisions without being required to pay the ultimate price for them. But demanding to be left alone and then suddenly changing your mind just makes matters worse for everybody.

For instance, if all citizens had evacuated their homes in the beginning, then law enforcement could basically assume that anyone on the streets who wasn't a rescue worker was a looter and take appropriate action. Of course, a lot of people who stayed behind did so to protect their property since they expected that the police wouldn't do much to prevent widespread theft--and they're being proven right. The first-hand accounts of conditions in the city today are nothing less than harrowing. What I want to know is: What the hell are the looters doing with all this crap? After all, 80% of the city is flooded and passage in and out is drastically curtailed. Are they taking it all back to their flooded homes where it will simply be destroyed? The idiocy of it all pisses me off.

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What the hell are the looters doing with all this crap? After all, 80% of the city is flooded and passage in and out is drastically curtailed. Are they taking it all back to their flooded homes where it will simply be destroyed? The idiocy of it all pisses me off.

THANK YOU! I'm glad I'm not the only one who was wondering this! Seriously, it's not like you can plug in that TV you just swiped anywhere, and it's simply transformed into prolonged vandalism. Why the police just let this happen in a number of cases is beyond me ...

The idiocy of it all pisses me off.

Me too. I cannot imagine the sort of mind that would think, "The city's being destroyed! Wahoo! Flat-screen TV!"

I read today that they can't declare martial law down there because the Louisiana state constitution has no provision for it. (!)

I also heard, back on Monday morning, that the people who really got the hell OUT of town were the ones who (a) could afford plane tickets, or (b) owned a car and could afford gas money. I imagine being one of the people who has neither of those options, but doesn't want to abandon the little property I had, which is little enough but worth a lot to me. People who have very little are not so economically resilient as to just abandon "stuff"...even stuff they have no immediate use for. (...)

In other news, of course you heard about the Glencoe family who took their son down to start at Tulane, but then turned right around on Saturday to get out of town. The rented a LIMOUSINE to bring them back here, with son and luggage and all. It was available, the limousine, you see. Must be nice to be able to seize one's options. (!)/(...)

http://www.livejournal.com/users/wicked_wish/582898.html

For instance, if all citizens had evacuated their homes in the beginning, then law enforcement could basically assume that anyone on the streets who wasn't a rescue worker was a looter and take appropriate action.

What would the appropriate action be in that case?

I don't feel like getting into a flame war over on

wicked_wish's livejournal, but I find it hard to believe that if money hadn't been spent on Iraq, New Orleans would have been fine and dandy. Flood control is such a long-term project that three years of insufficient funds doesn't cause the whole thing to fail. No, that takes decades of erosion, mismanagement and removal of marshland. It also helps to have a system (levees) which is fundamentally flawed.

I sometimes speculate on what good can come out of this, and I hope a radical rethink on flood policy is one of them. The levee system is a bad system, particularly in an area like Louisiana where they are constantly sinking. On CNN the other night Aaron Brown asked the mayor of New Orleans if he had anything he wanted to say. The mayor made a plea for the federal government to do something about erosion and the removal of marshland.

http://www.livejournal.com/users/wicked_wish/582898.html

Just her thoughts.

I have to confess some frustration with people who defy a mandatory evacuation order and then turn around and scream for rescue when things get worse than they expected.

Trying to be charitable here... have you looked, at all, into why people might not have left? Things like not having any goddamned car? Or no place to go? Or no money to stay somewhere for the next three months? Or an elderly relative to take care of?

These sort of explanations have been in the top stories on CNN for a week, so I absolutely don't understand why you want to attribute the harrowing predicament of these dirt-poor people to willful defiance.

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