Houston’s Noble Experiment

I’ve done a lot of writing about Houston’s incredible effort on behalf of the Katrina evacuees. Beyond sheltering and comforting them in the aftermath of Katrina’s devastation, Houston is endeavoring to re-teach the entitlement-dependent, do-nothing former population of New Orleans the realities of personal responsibility.

The following excerpts are from an excellent article by Nicole Gelinas, of City Journal. I’ve grouped the excerpts under subject titles. There’s a lot of fascinating information, but you’ll need to read the original article to get the case studies and individual stories.

Houston’s Noble Experiment

Can good government uplift the New Orleans evacuees whom bad government harmed?

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No Good Deed Goes Unpunished

Back in September, when Houston was still laboring its collective ass off to assist, accomodate, and nurture the Katrina evacuees, Ranting Right Wing Howler was bold enough to ask the obvious: how long will the Mr. Nice Guy act last? Back then, while we Houstonians were still oblivious to our impending doom due to the sweat of hard labor blurring our vision, he clearly saw the obvious: Houston was inheriting the nastiest dregs of the most crime-ridden city in America.

[Read more]

NOLA’s New Chocolate Recipe

Mayor Nagin, so proud of wanting to keep his city “chocolate”, is now getting a little finicky about the types of chocolate that can be used is his recipe:

New Orleans doesn’t want its poorest residents back — unless they agree to work.

That was the message from three New Orleans City Council members who said government programs have “pampered” the city’s residents for too long.

The news that some New Orleans City Council members weren’t keen on the city’s poorest returning home added another layer of discomfort in Houston, where local residents and elected officials alike have stretched to meet the needs of thousands of Louisiana residents in the months after Hurricane Katrina.

Chief among the complaints: Houston didn’t discriminate when New Orleanians — from the poorest to the richest — filled this city’s homes, hotels, motels and shelters. And Houston didn’t flinch when nearly 100,000 evacuees needed subsidized housing for up to a year. So why, asked one Houston city councilman, are only the educated, healthy and employable welcome back in New Orleans?

Having kept tabs on what the Katrina evacuees have been up to (metaphorically speaking) while on their six month long all-expenses-paid vacation in Houston, the NOLA officials are getting even more specific about the chocolate they don’t want back:

“We don’t need soap opera watchers right now,” said New Orleans City Council President Oliver Thomas, during a housing committee meeting. “We’re going to target the people who are going to work. It’s not that I’m fed up, but that at some point there has to be a whole new level of motivation, and people have got to stop blaming the government for something they ought to do.”
[...]
…Thomas, who is black, reiterated that his remarks were intended for African-Americans.

“There’s just been a lot of pampering, and at some point you have to say, ‘No, no, no, no, no.’ … If our legs don’t hurt, you can walk somewhere,” he said. “I’m saying these things to motivate my people.”

Now, just wait a minute, says Houston:

“When this Katrina situation developed, we welcomed people with arms wide open,” [Councilman M.J. Khan, whose district has absorbed most of the city's evacuees] said.”We never scrutinized who should be coming into the city, we never turned anyone back. In the same way New Orleans cannot now say that everyone who is disabled, or cannot work, should have to stay in Houston.”

Shortly after Katrina struck New Orleans — and with Houston’s shelters and hotels full — Mayor Bill White and other local officials devised a plan to provide long-term housing for evacuees.

More than 80,000 evacuees signed up for the program, which provided one year of rent-free living in an apartment as well as free electricity and gas.

Houstonian Laurence says that Houston is the rug that New Orleans is apparently sweeping its trash under:

Houstonians, aren’t you glad that New Orleans wants to make your city the equivalent of a landfill site for New Orleans unemployable garbage? Gives me a warm feeling inside, like a hot poker jammed up the ass.

More Chocolate From Nagin

His ridiculous remarks about God wanting NOLA to be a chocolate city notwithstanding - you can’t make this stuff up, I swear - Nagin now gives us his CYA recipe for “chocolate”:

Political Teen has the video.

REPORTER: Let’s talk about the comments you made about it being a choclate city and how God wants it that way. Don’t you think that’s a bit uh…divisive on MLK day?

MAYOR RAY NAGIN: Do you know anything about chocolate?

REPORTER: I’m asking you.

NAGIN: I’m asking you

NAGIN: Do you know anything chocolate? How do you make chocolate? You take dark chocolate, you mix it with white milk, and it becomes a uh…delicious drink. That’s the chocolate I’m talking about.

Awwwwwwwww… now I get it! You didn’t mean “chocolate” as in “negro”, you meant it as in “Ovaltine”!!

Oh, come ON now. What a pile of steaming crap. Just when you think this guy couldn’t get any sillier…

NAGIN: New Orleans was a chocolate city before Katrina, and it’ll be a chocolate city after Katrina. How is that divisive? It’s white and black working together, coming together, and making something special…

Kumbayah.

He Said WHAT?!

Nagin is full of it, and it ain’t CHOCOLATE!

More Louisiana Corruption

Jason Smith over at Generation Why has had top-notch coverage of Hurricane Katrina and its aftermath, and he pulls the rug out from under Governor Kathleen Blanco yet again with this post. Evidently, while thousands of people were homeless and trying to find family and loved ones, Blanco was renovating her offices.

The renovations were not, as you might think, related to repairs from the storm. Jason has the list, including “hookups and mounts for two flat screen televisions, Swedish granite countertops, walnut paneling and frosted laminated glass.” Swedish granite and frosted glass. Isn’t that nice?

Blanco’s Chief of Staff tried to put the whole thing in a different perspective for all of us who can add and have a concept of timing, by saying, “The floor had not been improved since the early 1980s and the space needed to be upgraded to meet safety codes.”

Oh really? Since when do flat screen televisions help with safety code compliance?

Perhaps the real kicker is this:

At the time of her decision [to renovate], Blanco also was hinting at deep budget cuts to state programs and the possibility of laying off 20 percent of the state workforce.

Isn’t that fantastic? [I mean that in an, "Oh my God there's a head rolling across the interstate and I can't stop looking at it" sort of way.]

So let’s recap. We have a completely clueless twit who points the finger at everyone else for not doing her job, and while she’s doing that she’s talking about cutting funding, PLUS she renovates her own offices in the wake of the single biggest natural disaster in this country. Amazing.

Mudvile Gazette has more.

Emporer Misha Tells Katrina “Victims” Where To Go

And he damn well means it! (Don’t click on Misha’s link if you can’t handle it - you know who you are!)

As a contributing citizen of the overly generous host city of Houston, who is a little miffed with the marked and notable increase in crime and instability since we opened our doors (80% of ALL crimes in the city are now committed by our unemployed and seemingly bored Katrina guests)…I have a few words to say to our unexpected leeches visitors:

Fish and company stink after three days four months. So…

GET LOST! GET OUT! GO ON. GET A JOB. GET GOING. GET A LIFE. GET OUTTA HERE! BYE.

Oh, yeahhhhh. I said it and I mean it, so bring it on, all you vapid little welfare-state apologists!

Statistics Prove Race WAS A Factor In Katrina Deaths

IF YOU WERE WHITE!!

All the “Bush hates black people”conspiracy theories can be officially retired already. Pack it up, Lefties!

During and after Katrina, Liberals were gleefully (and insanely) quick to accuse the Bush administration of deliberately delaying its response to the catastrophe because most of the victims were black. This silliness went on and on and on, despite clear evidence that the federal response to Katrina was faster than Hugo, Andrew, Iniki, Francine and Jeanne!

Damu Smith, founder of the National Black Environmental Justice Network, in September said that the federal government “ignored us, they forgot about us … because we look like we look.”

Nation of Islam leader Louis Farrakhan in October said that the Federal Emergency Management Agency wasn’t fit to help the storm’s victims because “there are not enough blacks high up in FEMA” and added that, “certainly the Red Cross is the same.”

Rapper Kanye West used his time on NBC’s telethon for the hurricane victims to charge that, “George Bush doesn’t care about hates black people.”

But the state’s demographic information suggests that whites in New Orleans died at a higher rate than minorities. According to the 2000 census, whites make up 28 percent of the city’s population, but the Louisiana Department of Health and Hospitals indicates that whites constitute 36.6 percent of the storm’s fatalities in the city.

Please, let’s not forget these dimmest of bulbs:

Larisa Alexandrovna at Huffington Post accused the ever-evil American military of “ethnic cleansing” in New Orleans: “They lock them in, starve them, let them rot in death and sewage, and then on day six - they destroy them completely.”

Whaaa…?! Yes, the idiot actually said that - can you believe it?

How ’bout this from David Billings of The People’s Institute, a 25-year-old New Orleans-based organization focused on ending racism: “I do think the nation would be responding differently if they were white elderly and white babies actually dying on the street and being covered with newspapers and shrouds and being left there.”

Ummmm…guess what genius - it was. If we’re going to end racism anytime soon, it’s not going to be with blinkered racists like David Billings leading the way!

Of course, the Photo-op Whore Of The Universe, Jesse Jackson, added his worthless rhetoric to the stinking heap when he compared the condition of evacuees to “Africans in the hull of a slave ship”.

And let’s not leave out this absolute gem from Randall Robinson, another ‘tard in the collection of rejects comprising The Huffington Post universe: “It is reported that black hurricane victims in New Orleans have begun eating corpses to survive. Four days after the storm, thousands of blacks in New Orleans are dying like dogs. No-one has come to help them.”

*sigh* Does anyone want to speculate if there will be any retractions forthcoming? Any apologies for being a supreme idiot in public? Any mea culpas for willfully imposing their egregious fallacies and lies on the rest of us?

I, personally predict that there will be NONE. In fact, there will be more accusations of Rovian meddling in the statistics. It is my personal belief that these people endanger public safety, just by walking their idiot asses around on the streets. How on earth do they function without hurting themselves or others? With people like that attemting to use their defective brains, sooner or later, somebody is bound to get hurt! People exhibiting such an immeasurable level of stupidity need to be quarantined, placed in special communes for the mentally deranged, and above all, highly encouraged NOT TO REPRODUCE. Please. Stop the cruelty.

Katrina Rebuilding - Are Illegals “Doing Jobs AMERICANS Won’t Do”?

I don’t think New Orleans should be rebuilt. At least NOT where it was before. That would be really, really stupid. (But then again, look at who’s in charge of New Orleans, so the likelihood of of stupidity reigning is unfortunately very, very high.) However, the work in Louisiana, Mississippi, and Alabama needs to be done by three groups of citizens:

1) the able-bodied residents that want to return to live there.

2) Americans from other states that want to help or take short-term contractual jobs.

3) the really, really yucky clean-up work needs to be done by lazy-ass criminals instead of them sittin’ on their asses in air-conditioned prisons watching cable. Right now, our military is doing a lot of the clean-up. That is plain wrong.

I don’t think these people should clean up or rebuild the area:

1) the American military or National Guard.

2) illegal aliens.

From The Immigration Blog:

Just recently, the Wall Street Journal reported on an immigration raid of a Red Cross shelter in Long Beach, MS. It includes this:

undocumented workers are likely to be a major part of the massive cleanup and rebuilding, competing for jobs against some non-Hispanics thrown out of work by the hurricanes

And, a CS Monitor article contains this:

At a time when Latino immigrants are expected to form a big part of the Gulf Coast reconstruction labor pool, the Department of Homeland Security has temporarily suspended sanctioning employers who hire workers unable to prove their citizenship, essentially allowing contractors to hire undocumented workers.

Perhaps most worrisome of all, Customs and Border Protection seems to have established a new policy to allow in relief workers from other countries.

*sigh* The Immigration Blog has all the rest.

A Canadian Journalist’s Take On The Blame Game

This ended up in my inbox this morning (thanks, Gary!) and is too damn interesting to keep to myself:

Origins: The article cited below was indeed penned by Canadian journalist David Warren and published in the Ottawa Citizen on 11 September 2005. Warren’s column appears in that newspaper every Sunday, Wednesday, and Saturday.

The piece has received wide circulation in e-mail because the human tragedy wrought by Hurricane Katrina and the subsequent flooding of New Orleans has resulted in a flurry of finger-pointing. While some heap blame on President George W. Bush, Louisiana governor Kathleen Blanco, New Orleans mayor Ray Nagin, FEMA, or some combination of those four, others assert the
victims themselves were the ones at fault for not having evacuated in time. Opinions have polarized on whose failure led to additional lives being lost, with adherents of each position determined to win over others who have arrived at differing conclusions.

In such an emotionally charged environment, an article from a foreign publication that supports one theory of culpability and dismisses another is heady stuff. Because news pieces hailing from outside the U.S. are often perceived (rightly or wrongly) as being uninfluenced by U.S. partisan politics, David Warren’s discourse on where blame belongs has been frequently forwarded as an unbiased assessment of the situation by those who agree with the Canadian newsman’s take on things.

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Charitable Relief is NOT The Province of the Government

Smoke Signals has an excellent history lesson for us - one that we as Americans have forgotten, to our everlasting detriment. In light of the recent Katrina and Rita disasters, and other disasters beyond our borders such as last years’ tsunami and this week’s Pakistani earthquake, the following historical story of Davy Crockett bears relearning:

“Several years ago, I was one evening standing on the steps of the Capitol with some members of Congress when our attention was attracted by a great light over in Georgetown. It was evidently a large fire. In spite of all that could be done, many houses were burned and many families made houseless. . . . The weather was very cold, and when I saw so many children suffering, I felt that something ought to be done. A bill was introduced appropriating $20,000 for their relief. We rushed it through.

“The next summer, when riding one day in a part of my district. I saw a man in a field plowing. I spoke to the man. He replied
politely, but rather coldly.

” ‘You are Colonel Crockett. I shall not vote for you again.’ ”

“I begged him tell me what was the matter.”

“‘Well Colonel, you gave a vote last winter which shows that either you have not capacity to understand the Constitution or
that you are wanting in the honesty and firmness to be guided by it. You voted for a bill to appropriate $20,000 to some sufferers by fire in Georgetown.

” ‘Certainly nobody will complain that a great and rich country like ours should give $20,000 to relieve its suffering women and
children, particularly with a full and overflowing treasury,’ I replied.”

“‘It is not the amount, Colonel, it is the principle. The power of collecting and disbursing money at pleasure is the most dangerous power that can be entrusted to man. . . . You will very easily perceive what a wide door this would open for fraud and corruption and favoritism, on the one hand, and for robbing the people on the other. The people have delegated to Congress, by the Constitution, the power to do certain things. To do these, it is authorized to collect and pay moneys, and for nothing else. Everything beyond this is usurpation, and a violation of the Constitution. You have violated the Constitution in what I consider a vital point. It is a precedent fraught with danger to the country, for when Congress once begins to stretch its power beyond the limits of the Constitution, there is no limit to it, and no security for the people.’

This is only an excerpt, and there is more to the story concerning Crockett’s subsequent challenge under a different crises that the Congress give some of their own money, instead of misappropriating the taxpayers’. I’ll bet you can guess how that idea went over in Congress - much like it would today, no doubt! Go read the rest.

Illegals Deserve Katrina Aid, Too?

Wha…? No. This is just wrong. Plain and simple.

Hillary Clinton is urging the Department of Homeland Security to assure illegal immigrants that they will get their fair share of Hurricane Katrina relief aid without fear of being deported. In a statement posted to her official Senate web site on Wednesday, Clinton said that the DHS should “issue a formal statement reassuring immigrant victims of Hurricane Rita and Katrina that they can seek help from relief agencies without fear of deportation or being turned over to immigration authorities.”

Fair share? What’s their “fair share”?!

Let me ask a quick question of everyone out there who gave money, food, clothing, or anything to the Katrina relief fund: would you rather your donation aid Americans or illegals? Further, would it be OK with you if the Americans were gypped a little so that the illegals get their FAIR SHARE?!

I know what my answer is. I’m a big old hard-hearted meany, but I’d rather ALL (and only) the Americans get what they need to live, and the illegals go back to their own country and apply for “evacuee status” to receive aid. Let Mexico have a fund-raiser or two of their own (yeah, that’ll be the day!). In fact, all that free money must be drawing those illegals like flies, so I’d just as soon round ‘em up in the FEMA and Red Cross lines and deport their butts over the border. There - how’s that for ‘mean’?!

In a letter written directly to Homeland Security Chief Michael Chertoff, Clinton and other Senate Democrats complained that they first asked for Katrina amnesty for illegals more than two weeks ago, but have not received a response.

“In fact,” they said, “we were surprised and troubled to learn that DHS has placed some individuals in deportation proceedings after these individuals sought assistance, despite the fact that the government had previously encouraged all storm victims to come forward to seek help.

You haven’t received a response, you political hack, because they’re really, really BUSY! (And if they weren’t busy, you’d have their asses thrown in front of a Senate commission, wouldn’t you?!)

Of course, those illegals are bound and determined to get a little more American “free” money. Who is DHS to actually enforce the laws and do their job (for once) - how dare they?!!!

Mrs. Clinton urged Chertoff to “terminate removal proceedings against those [illegal immigrants] who were placed in proceedings after they sought assistance.”

Other Senate Democrats who signed onto Mrs. Clinton bid to obtain Katrina aid for illegal immigrants include Harry Reid, Dick Durbin, Maria Cantwell, Barack Obama, Russ Feingold, Daniel Akaka, Frank Lautenberg, Joe Lieberman, Carl Levin, John F. Kerry, Chris Dodd, Pat Leahy and Jon Corzine.

This is a brazen attempt to get a law enforcement agency to NOT DO THEIR JOB. What is this?! Obstruction of justice! I demand that these politicians stop meddling in law enforcement issues. They are attempting to coerce and intimidate law enforcement officers to release known law-breakers, and block them from apprehending any more! C’mon - there’s something really wrong about that.

I need a lawyer.

A Black’s Perspective on NOLA Looting

I came across this completely politically incorrect commentary on the blacks that looted New Orleans. My jaw dropped as I read this perspective. I offer you the link with no editorial asides whatsoever. The author speaks loud and clear on the subject - and needs no clarification.

What’s Good For The Gander Ain’t Good For The Goose…Apparently

You know I really hate when a woman demands a double-standard for herself that is in no way applied to her male peers. Governor Blanco, whom you all know I abhor, gets a free pass on her stupefyingly abysmal response to the Katrina disaster. She asked for it, and she got it. Stupid, pansy-ass senators - probably terrified that a tough question or two would make her weep and they’d be crucified in the press for “being big meanies and making a girl cry.” G-d, she makes me sick!

So while swooning Lady Blanco was being handled with white gloves by the Senate Finance Committee, Mike Brown, former head of FEMA, was taking it up the a** from members of both political parties. They probably weren’t so afraid he’d collapse in tears if they pounded on him as if he were a criminal - and so they did.

I credit Blanco with setting women back at least a generation or two. She has fulfilled all the fallacious, time-worn arguments against women in positions of true power and leadership. I mean, she single-handedly reinforced ancient stereotypes of women folding under pressure, collapsing in befuddled tears, and being unable to make a decision. After watching her pathetic, emotionally crippled performance why would anyone want to take that chance with another woman? The frustration of it is killing me!

H/T: The Therapist

Government As Big Shepherd

During our Rita evacuation, my husband and I came to the realization that neither of us makes good sheep. Never have, never will. There are some people that expect and want the government to take care of them. They feel helpless to do for themselves what they believe the government should be doing for them. Such a mentality makes me want to scream! And it’s dangerously insidious:

“If you think of yourselves as helpless and ineffectual, it is certain that you will create a despotic government to be your master. The wise despot, therefore, maintains among his subjects a popular sense that they are helpless and ineffectual.”

-Frank Herbert

Some people may disagree with our determination to not follow the herd during an oncoming catastrophe. Some will argue that this just creates more problems in the long run for the masses, that it somehow adds to the chaos. I disagree wholeheartedly, because I feel that more people taking care of themselves and their own business is what this country NEEDS - not less. I don’t trust the government and I certainly don’t need it. There’s no way that the government can take care of me and mine better than we can ourselves. And in fact, as evidenced in Texas, being caught in the herd can be deadly!

I definitely subscribe to the theory that less is better when it comes to government roles and actions. And yes, that includes disaster management. I still believe in personal accountability.

“That government is best which governs the least, because its people discipline themselves.”

-Thomas Jefferson

And so, my one unique foray into the unwashed masses of media-induced hysteria and panic will never be repeated. Ever. We will do for ourselves and for others - and let the government take care of those less able and willing to care for themselves.

“I am certainly not one of those who need to be prodded. In fact, if anything, I am the prod.”

-Sir Winston Churchill

Along these lines, I found a wonderful essay at The Anchoress by Peggy Noonan on the important differences between government authority and responsibility. There’s a warning in there for ALL of us:

The day before hurricane Rita hit Texas, last Friday, I saw on TV something that disturbed me. It was not the usual scene of crashing waves and hardy reporters being blown sideways by wind gusts. It was a fat Texas guy swimming in the waves off Galveston. He’d apparently decided the high surf was a good thing to jump into, so he went for a prehurricane swim. Two cops saw him, waded into the surf and arrested him. When I saw it the guy was standing there in orange trunks being astonished as the cops put handcuffs on him and hauled him away.

…I thought: Oh no, this is isn’t good. This is authority, not responsibility.

You’d have to be crazy, in my judgment, to decide you were going to go swim in the ocean as a hurricane comes. But in the America where I grew up, you were allowed to be crazy. You had the right. Sometimes you were crazy and survived whatever you did. Sometimes you didn’t, and afterwards everyone said, “He was crazy.”

Last week I quoted Gerald Ford: “The government big enough to give you everything you want is big enough to take away everything you have.” I was talking about money. But it applies also to personal freedom, to the rights of the individual, including his right to do something stupid as long as it’s legal, like swimming.

Government has real duties in disaster. Maintaining the peace is a primary one. But if we demand that our government protect us from all the weather all the time, if we demand that it protect us from rain and hail, if we make government and politicians pay a terrible price for not getting us out of every flood zone and rescuing us from every wave, we’re going to lose a lot more than we gain. If we give government all authority then we are giving them all power.

And we will not only lose the right to be crazy, we’ll lose the right to be sane. A few weeks ago when, for a few days, some level of government, it isn’t completely clear, decided no one should be allowed to live in New Orleans after the flood, law-enforcement officers went to the home of a man who had a dry house, a month’s supply of food and water, and a gun to protect himself. The police demanded that he leave. Why? He was fine. He had everything he needed. The man was enraged: It was his decision, he said, and he was staying.

It is the government’s job to warn and inform. That’s what we have the National Weather Service for. It is not government’s job to command and control and make microdecisions about the lives of people who want to do it their own way.

This sort of thing of course has been going on for a long time. In Katrina and Rita it just became more dramatically obvious as each incident played out on TV.

I’m glad I’m not alone in my distrust of an ever-increasing government role. I really, really wish that the hurricane catastrophes had highlighted the strongest and best of America - the Gray Tribe - instead of the weakest and whiniest. Don’t get me wrong, the Grays were out in full force, doing what they do with excellence and perseverence. But their own self-preservation and self-government is exactly what keeps them out of the spotlight. It’s just that the Pinks got all the attention. Case in point: compare the effective responses of Mississippi and Alabama to the freakish chaos of New Orleans. Who got the attention, and the money? Another case in point: Nederland, a small town between Port Arthur and Beaumont, TX was squished by Rita. Yet, unlike both Port Arthur and Beaumont, it’s a 99% white blue-collar community and 99% on it’s own. No federal or state help - only local. No problem - you won’t see them bitchin’ on the news either - they’re too busy trying to salvage their community.

I’m afraid that the ever-increasing neediness of the Pink Tribe will justify a greater and more sweeping role for government. After all, what politican wants to be witch-hunted by the media for “failing” to do for millions of people what most of them should be able to do for themselves? None. So amendments, actions, proposals, and what-not will start to fly in the ensuing months as the government grabs more power and seeks to CYA for future disasters.

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Linked to Lunch at Basil’s and Cao’s Blog. Also X-posted at Blogger News Network and Blogcritics.