Questions… Surprise…

I am appalled by what is happening in the South, but I am also surprised. I have always believed that states do well during emergencies. Day-to-day, they maintain an order based on injustice and exclusion, but during urgent crises, I assume they act to restore that order. I also assumed that an empire has difficulty bringing its brand of order to colonies because it is difficult when the population is against you, but at home, where there is legitimacy, such efforts are easier.


I am appalled by what is happening in the South, but I am also surprised. I have always believed that states do well during emergencies. Day-to-day, they maintain an order based on injustice and exclusion, but during urgent crises, I assume they act to restore that order. I also assumed that an empire has difficulty bringing its brand of order to colonies because it is difficult when the population is against you, but at home, where there is legitimacy, such efforts are easier.

I admit that I don’t know why there seems to be so much neglect and incompetence. It could be that the scale of the problem is so huge, or that they are prioritizing the wealthy and powerful, or that they were unprepared, or that they are incompetent. But the resources are there, more so than any other society on the planet, by a large margin. So is the organization. I don’t understand why even basic relief efforts are so problematic.

Is it that the black people of New Orleans, or the poor throughout the area, aren’t seen as part of ‘the homeland’? Is it just that neoliberalism has advanced so far that the state can’t even manage to do what states are supposed to be able to do, at minimum? Or is it just an intractable problem to reach 100,000 people in a metropolis that is below sea level after the dikes burst?

The cameras are there, and I hope they stay there, and are sympathetic, for the same reasons I wish there were more cameras in Africa, and Haiti, and Palestine. Only attention and the potential for anger will ensure that what can be done, will be.

If they fix the levees and pump out the water, they will find many dead. Will the toll be greater than the thousand who died in Iraq by mortar and stampede? So many connections between those deaths. I remember a poem from 3 years ago, the first anniversary of 9/11, by Martin Espada. He connected two different groups of the dead with his poem. Alabanza.

Author: Justin Podur

Author of Siegebreakers. Ecology. Environmental Science. Political Science. Anti-imperialism. Political fiction. Teach at York U's FES. Author. Writer at ZNet, TeleSUR, AlterNet, Ricochet, and the Independent Media Institute.

One thought on “Questions… Surprise…”

  1. From the washington
    From the washington monthly.

    CHRONOLOGY….Here’s a timeline that outlines the fate of both FEMA and flood control projects in New Orleans under the Bush administration. Read it and weep:

    * January 2001: Bush appoints Joe Allbaugh, a crony from Texas, as head of FEMA. Allbaugh has no previous experience in disaster management.

    * April 2001: Budget Director Mitch Daniels announces the Bush administration’s goal of privatizing much of FEMA’s work. In May, Allbaugh confirms that FEMA will be downsized: “Many are concerned that federal disaster assistance may have evolved into both an oversized entitlement program….” he said. “Expectations of when the federal government should be involved and the degree of involvement may have ballooned beyond what is an appropriate level.”

    * 2001: FEMA designates a major hurricane hitting New Orleans as one of the three “likeliest, most catastrophic disasters facing this country.”

    * December 2002: After less than two years at FEMA, Allbaugh announces he is leaving to start up a consulting firm that advises companies seeking to do business in Iraq. He is succeeded by his deputy, Michael Brown, who, like Allbaugh, has no previous experience in disaster management.

    * March 2003: FEMA is downgraded from a cabinet level position and folded into the Department of Homeland Security. Its mission is refocused on fighting acts of terrorism.

    * 2003: Under its new organization chart within DHS, FEMA’s preparation and planning functions are reassigned to a new Office of Preparedness and Response. FEMA will henceforth focus only on response and recovery.

    * Summer 2004: FEMA denies Louisiana’s pre-disaster mitigation funding requests. Says Jefferson Parish flood zone manager Tom Rodrigue: “You would think we would get maximum consideration….This is what the grant program called for. We were more than qualified for it.”

    * June 2004: The Army Corps of Engineers budget for levee construction in New Orleans is slashed. Jefferson Parish emergency management chiefs Walter Maestri comments: “It appears that the money has been moved in the president’s budget to handle homeland security and the war in Iraq, and I suppose that’s the price we pay.”

    * June 2005: Funding for the New Orleans district of the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers is cut by a record $71.2 million. One of the hardest-hit areas is the Southeast Louisiana Urban Flood Control Project, which was created after the May 1995 flood to improve drainage in Jefferson, Orleans and St. Tammany parishes.

    * August 2005: While New Orleans is undergoing a slow motion catastrophe, Bush mugs for the cameras, cuts a cake for John McCain, plays the guitar for Mark Wills, delivers an address about V-J day, and continues with his vacation. When he finally gets around to acknowledging the scope of the unfolding disaster, he delivers only a photo op on Air Force One and a flat, defensive, laundry list speech in the Rose Garden.

    So: A crony with no relevant experience was installed as head of FEMA. Mitigation budgets for New Orleans were slashed even though it was known to be one of the top three risks in the country. FEMA was deliberately downsized as part of the Bush administration’s conservative agenda to reduce the role of government. After DHS was created, FEMA’s preparation and planning functions were taken away.

    Actions have consequences. No one could predict that a hurricane the size of Katrina would hit this year, but the slow federal response when it did happen was no accident. It was the result of four years of deliberate Republican policy and budget choices that favor ideology and partisan loyalty at the expense of operational competence. It’s the Bush administration in a nutshell.

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