Is it just me, or do the folks in the traditional media (aka "MSM") act as if an entire American city was NOT destroyed one year ago this weekend? Right now, it's JonBenet 24/7, with a dash of "Bush got a bounce in the polls."
Yet at the same time, I feel as if we are about to be force-fed non-stop 9/11 coverage because of the event's 5th year anniversary. Now, both events were horrible tragedies, and for better or worse, 9/11 has had more of an impact on the country as a whole, but that doesn't mean that Katrina can be ignored.
The devastation of New Orleans was unprecedented, in that it flooded almost an entire city! Katrina also showed how weak our government is in responding to disasters. If we can't count on FEMA to help the people of the Lower 9th Ward out, how can we expect FEMA to help victims of future terror attacks? And I mean MASSIVE ones, like a dirty bomb or a chemical attack?
I feel as if the traditional media only wants us to remember 9/11, because if we remember the victims who died in the Twin Towers, Pentagon, or those planes, then we will vaguely remember George W. Bush standing at Ground Zero with that bullhorn, and
not George W. Bush playing guitar while NOLA was flooded and people were crowding in the Superdome.
Will CNN Presents do a Katrina special on how the government is STILL unprepared or how NOLA STILL hasn't been cleaned up? WIll the History Channel do a "Countdown to Katrina" special? So far, only Spike Lee and a few other celebrities has been talking about the anniversary and raising continued awareness of it. I wish that Anderson Cooper, who I admire for his coverage of NOLA during Katrina (he's a good reporter if given the chance) would spend more time covering the anniversary, and less time covering what John Mark Carr ate on a freakin' plane!
I guess Time Warner and GE and News Corp don't want us to remember that there is still a city that needs to be rebuilt, and that there is still an incompetent President in office who failed the people of that city.