As much outrage as
I personally have for the
the funneling of Army Corps of Engineering money to Iraq, watching the unfolding disaster response is far, far worse.
One of the things that floored me, watching television coverage last night with footage of FEMA, FedEx, and other semis parked in a line, was a reporter in coastal Mississippi saying that some of these devastated areas will not be getting food or water from FEMA for four or five more days, because the aid first has to be organized in other states, then shipped to the affected states, then distributed out to the areas that need it, then distributed to the people currently without food or homes.
Floored me, because the described convoy-and-redistribution system is great, just great, if you're restocking a K-Mart. But these people can't wait four or five days to get water. These people need food and water NOW, or a great many more will die. The government plan is well and good, except that those people can't wait for distribution centers and tractor trailers full of food. They need a way to stay alive and healthy before those things arrive, and they're not getting them.
Look, the rest of this post is pure, rant. And not snarky rant, just the old fashioned kind.
I am very, very sympathetic to the staggering logistics of efforts such as this -- but dammit, this isn't rocket science. It's taken this long for the federal government to apparently
figure out that this really is a disaster. And even then, it is being executed as a organized and plodding convoy, and not as a panicked attempt to save lives.
Where was the necessary government sense of panic, these last days? If you can't get your supplies into the farthest community, then for the love of god why didn't we, and why aren't we, airlifting water and MRE's into these communities? Drop them by parachute. Drop the damn MRE's without parachute -- just get them on the ground somehow, in boxes or piles or scattered across wide areas. I don't care if a water crate smashes an already-damaged rooftop or two. For the first few days, you shovel as much food, water, and security at the problem as you can to stop the sense of panic and keep people alive until better disaster relief efforts can reach them. You don't leave them abandoned until you can clear enough roads to let the trucks through. And then you send troops to keep the peace, prevent hoarding, or do any of the other "police action" tasks so utterly dismissed by George Bush until he actually became president.
The French Quarter, as the only moderately dry place of the city, should not be a free-for-all of people seeking food and clothing while other much less sympathetic characters stock up on whatever electronics or jewelry they can lay their hands on. It should be a safe zone for those N.O. residents who can't get to any other dry location. Can't get properly equipped national guardsmen in to secure 'safe' areas? Then for the love of god, at least send paratroopers to establish basic perimeters where people can be safe to come get airlifted supplies without it becoming a riot.
This is not a drill. This isn't a FedExable problem. When people are actively dying, you don't organize in warehouses. For the first few days, you do it the bad way, until you can organize the good way. You commandeer every truck and helicopter, you mobilize every troop you can muster, and you start throwing food and water at the problem, wherever you can, even if it only a helicoptered crate at a time, even if there's no plan, even if some people get more than others, if you don't know where you have and haven't dropped it before. You give them food and water, so that they will know more food and water are on the way, and so they know they aren't being left to scrounge or die.
You can can focus on longer-term, convoyed, more effective aid WHILE you are shoveling as much food, water, and security at the situation as you possibly can muster.
I honestly am beginning to wonder if the officials organizing this effort have any disaster relief experience. And I am honestly long-past-beginning to wonder whether or not our Iraqi adventure has left our domestic protection so utterly barren as to be useless when a disaster like this occurred. Are there cargo planes, for airdrops? Where are the helicopters -- not by fours and fives, but in waves?
Where the hell have the troops been?