Friday, September 02, 2005
It's Not About Money
It’s not about money. I am not a political person, I have said that before. I am a supporter of George W., even though I realize he is human and he too has let me down. But I don’t really understand our country’s response to what is happening in New Orleans. I just wonder if the tragedy had been caused by a terrorist attack if our response would have been faster. Would we have allowed the suffering and the waiting that is going on? I have held out hope that the Calvary was going to rush in at any moment…but this morning when I read Larry James blog, I became angry, hurt and disillusioned. (I can’t read Larry James everyday because he either makes me feel guilty, helpless or depressed, that of course has nothing to do with him and everything to do with me.)
David and I have watched news nightly and wondered why we are not bringing in more military support and military expertise to rescue, to communicate and to bring food and water to these people. We have amphibious troop movers; we have helicopters that are people movers. Yes, there are some truly bad people, there will always be bad people and they seem to get all the press, but we have failed this city. No not the average American, we have all wanted to help to do our part, to offer a hand or whatever we could. But we are helpless as individuals to do the things that have to be done to reach these people. However, we have the military capability to handle this. We are the strongest nation in the world and we have other countries shaking their heads wondering why we don't have this situation under control. I wonder too. I don’t believe in second guessing or placing blame but I am sad that we have allowed ourselves to fail this city.
It is not about money. Let’s pray for our leadership to mobilize and provide the people of New Orleans the rescue that they are waiting for.
David and I have watched news nightly and wondered why we are not bringing in more military support and military expertise to rescue, to communicate and to bring food and water to these people. We have amphibious troop movers; we have helicopters that are people movers. Yes, there are some truly bad people, there will always be bad people and they seem to get all the press, but we have failed this city. No not the average American, we have all wanted to help to do our part, to offer a hand or whatever we could. But we are helpless as individuals to do the things that have to be done to reach these people. However, we have the military capability to handle this. We are the strongest nation in the world and we have other countries shaking their heads wondering why we don't have this situation under control. I wonder too. I don’t believe in second guessing or placing blame but I am sad that we have allowed ourselves to fail this city.
It is not about money. Let’s pray for our leadership to mobilize and provide the people of New Orleans the rescue that they are waiting for.
Comments:
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Slightly off topic - sometimes I think it's a shame that our chosen leadership (of any stripe) represents the intents of the nation so poorly. Whatever is or isn't going on surely doesn't represent the hearts of most of us.
My brother in the Air Force replied to my post via e-mai. He made some good points so I wanted to share.
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Donna,
It is frustrating, but to respond to an emergency like this one, first you have to "imagine" it to execute a response. Who would have imagine the city staying under water after the wave of water, who would imagine all of those people choosing not to evaucate after so many warnings. We have military in every state but none of them were sitting poised to run to their trucks and take off. These movements (if they are to be effective) take planning and time, positioning of resources. If you think back to the sunomia our response was slow and only small at first it wasn't till a week maybe two before we got real supplies on the ground there. Why? because the response had to be assigned and the supplies had to be gathered. We had tons of supplies in warehouses in Louisiana but they are gone.
We americans are famous for our independent mind set we don't want help (most of us)Why did the mayor not ask for help to evacuate before (or the govenor) before the disaster? Because that would admite weakness, but now that the disaster has come why is it (Fed Gov)someone elses fault?
I am sad we haven't planned this out so that we could respond quickly and conciesely but many of the state and local workers who would have played critical roles in cordinating the effort evacuated like everyone else that could did. This is not an answer but it is typical of americans to play the we are the "greatest nation" card when their military doesn't respond. Yet we forget "their" military is deployed in every continent on this planet being drawn down at the same time and we are heavly engaged and being shot at in 3 of those continents. Prayer and patience is the answer, once the machine starts rolling it will be effective it will be more effective if we ask God to guide its efforts. I share your frustrations but encourage you to think about what planning you have done if you lost you home and Cullman was flooded for a week and power stayed off for two weeks? No one expected the water to stay, look what happened in Mississippi it came it left. It was destructive and over 100 lost their lives but they are in the clean up phase. That's what we plan for in hurricans.
God will help us through. Thanks for the web site I will send it to my brethren here for donations.
God help us.
Love BT
***********************
Donna,
It is frustrating, but to respond to an emergency like this one, first you have to "imagine" it to execute a response. Who would have imagine the city staying under water after the wave of water, who would imagine all of those people choosing not to evaucate after so many warnings. We have military in every state but none of them were sitting poised to run to their trucks and take off. These movements (if they are to be effective) take planning and time, positioning of resources. If you think back to the sunomia our response was slow and only small at first it wasn't till a week maybe two before we got real supplies on the ground there. Why? because the response had to be assigned and the supplies had to be gathered. We had tons of supplies in warehouses in Louisiana but they are gone.
We americans are famous for our independent mind set we don't want help (most of us)Why did the mayor not ask for help to evacuate before (or the govenor) before the disaster? Because that would admite weakness, but now that the disaster has come why is it (Fed Gov)someone elses fault?
I am sad we haven't planned this out so that we could respond quickly and conciesely but many of the state and local workers who would have played critical roles in cordinating the effort evacuated like everyone else that could did. This is not an answer but it is typical of americans to play the we are the "greatest nation" card when their military doesn't respond. Yet we forget "their" military is deployed in every continent on this planet being drawn down at the same time and we are heavly engaged and being shot at in 3 of those continents. Prayer and patience is the answer, once the machine starts rolling it will be effective it will be more effective if we ask God to guide its efforts. I share your frustrations but encourage you to think about what planning you have done if you lost you home and Cullman was flooded for a week and power stayed off for two weeks? No one expected the water to stay, look what happened in Mississippi it came it left. It was destructive and over 100 lost their lives but they are in the clean up phase. That's what we plan for in hurricans.
God will help us through. Thanks for the web site I will send it to my brethren here for donations.
God help us.
Love BT
Donna,
I know that Larry is a great guy with a great heart, and is frustrated. But it is difficult to mobilize that much stuff and people at a moments notice. They just don't stand on ready. Today should be a much better day. with the number of troups rolling in. I have not seen any news today and just got back from trying to find some gas cans and pick up some other supplies at Wal-mart in order to head south. We are still up in the air if we are going with fema, red cross, or the baptist releif effort. Too bad that we church of christers (I like that term because it offends) don't have mobile soup kitchens and needed structure to do this. But I bought my wife and I a couple of camel back backpacks (with water bladders in them) and we are hopeing to be somewhere this weekend. keep blogging because people are reading and our neighbors need all the help they can get.
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I know that Larry is a great guy with a great heart, and is frustrated. But it is difficult to mobilize that much stuff and people at a moments notice. They just don't stand on ready. Today should be a much better day. with the number of troups rolling in. I have not seen any news today and just got back from trying to find some gas cans and pick up some other supplies at Wal-mart in order to head south. We are still up in the air if we are going with fema, red cross, or the baptist releif effort. Too bad that we church of christers (I like that term because it offends) don't have mobile soup kitchens and needed structure to do this. But I bought my wife and I a couple of camel back backpacks (with water bladders in them) and we are hopeing to be somewhere this weekend. keep blogging because people are reading and our neighbors need all the help they can get.
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