This is from Andrea Garland, who is from New Orleans:
There are supplies sitting in Baton Rouge for the folks in New Orleans,
but the National Guard has the city surrounded and is not letting
anyone in or out. They are turning away people with supplies, claiming
it is too dangerous. If we have planes that can drop bombs on people in
Iraq, certainly we can air drop supplies into the city. Our goverment
is KILLING the people of New Orleans. This is the message I am now
sending to all major media sources, national and worldwide, as well as
posting to email lists, blogs, etc. The story is getting out that the
people there are not getting supplies, but the truth of WHY is not.
Please help spread the word, we must get this story out. Please so not
let any more of my friends die.
I can be reached at 254.640.8441 – feel free to call me or give my
number to any media that needs a contact person to talk to.
Here is my message:
I am a resident of the Bywater in New Orleans (9th Ward). I am one of
the lucky ones that was able to evacuate before the storm.
I have recently managed to speak to some friends stranded in New
Orleans. They are starving and dehydrating and there is no news of when
they will be receiving food and water. I have spoken to relief efforts
and understand that there are plenty of supplies waiting for these
people, BUT THEY ARE NOT BEING ALLOWED INTO THE CITY.
The National Guard has the city surrounded and is not letting anyone in
or out, except the buses being evacuated. The excuse that they can not
bring supplies into New Orleans because of the looting and gun fire is
not a valid excuse – if they are too afraid to enter the streets of New
Orleans, they need to be air dropping supplies into the city. If the
United States is capable of sending planes that can withstand enemy
fire to drop bombs in Iraq, certainly they are capable of air dropping
supplies into a city where the worst of the gunfire they could encouter
would be from semi-automatics.
Our government is killing the people of New Orleans. By witholding
supplies, they are ensuring more deaths, and I hold them complicit.
Please bring this matter to the attention of the people of the United
States. They need to know that New Orleans is deliberatly being denied
food and water. Perhaps if the people there had food and water, they
might not be shooting off guns.
Please feel free to call me for further information or with any
questions. I appreciate your attention to this most serious matter.
I fear for my friends.
Sincerely,
Andrea Garland
Get Your Act On! (getyouracton.com)
If they have “plenty of troops” then why the hell can’t some of them escort the people with supplies — I hear tell they’ve been doing it for the medical people.
duranta, I am with you — I will try to forward this where I can tomorrow.
Is it human lives vs insurance industry? Or what?
This is racism. That’s all it is. Nobody cares about these people. It’s not a plot. They just don’t care.
Isn’t the National Guard fighting in Iraq? The National Guard normally is used for domestic application but they are fighting in Iraq.
Why when they are being used properly, are they afraid of teenagers shooting hand guns? Whose telling them to back down because of roving teenagers with a couple of guns? This is backwards ins’t it. Bush is a very disturbed, perverse man.
You know the commentators are starting to yelp a little. But they should be screaming at the top of their lungs that George Bush and his federal government are killing Americans in New Orleans through neglect.
They are creating an insurgency in this country. I’m afraid it’s getting to late. They better get those troops out of Iraq soon because they will need them to kill Americans soon!
How I wish there were some hint of any other agenda but to ripen the opportunity for an iron fist.
crackdown:
US troops, armed with a shoot-to-kill policy, are being sent to New Orleans to quell growing lawlessness, four days after Hurricane Katrina hit.
…
Announcing the deployment of 300 “battle-tested” National Guardsmen to New Orleans from Iraq, Louisiana Governor Kathleen Blanco said the men were carrying deadly weapons and were ready to use them.
Battle tested? What battle? The Battle of Perpetual Disorder in Bagdad? The Battle of Urban Pulverization in Fallujah?
What do they expect a too-small force of traumatized, hairtrigger veterans to do?
Cut to Be ruthless with looters, police and National Guard told
Haley Barbour, the Governor of Mississippi, said: “I have instructed the Highway Patrol and the National Guard to treat looters ruthlessly. Looting will not be tolerated and rules of engagement will be as aggressive as the law allows.”
Ruthless? As in, let rip your darkest impulses to harm?
These are provocations, not pacifications.
Only partially right. The public warning serves notice on the looters, but also lets everyone else know help is coming – stability. They should have called the military in earlier, but that’s life.
They are better at delivering supplies/food, and relief efforts than civlilians. They have the equipment, unified chain of command, and they don’t use f*king cell phones.
Your information to my local media. Keep posting the truth, if you can. I know I may sound kooky, but I don’t think it is beyond our government to be in a situation, where it knows how awful this is, and it will be happy to have many of the eye witnesses disappear. Who will be able to say weeks from now, how many died in the storm and initial flood, and how many died because of the completely lacking response to this disaster.
My son and I talked about this last night. He said the government will use the “lawlessness” meme to allow these poor people to die. What has this country come too? When will we all rise up and say enough is enough? I fear for the worst and the possible civil war that will besiege this country. What can we do?
leezy, see my post above. Be glad that a well-trained, disciplined force with a clear chain of command and RESOURCES is going in. Civilians have no business attempting something this big.
Once command is transferred everyone is literally on the same frequency.
And when will the National Guard start shooting the journalists there?
My God the looting and violence makes it even more imperative that the guard get in there to help and protect these poor people. This is so twisted. People don’t want to see their daughters raped and killed. Their babies shot on top of everything else. Quit making excuses and get in there and help. Quit blaming the victims. Go and stop poor refugees from being killed by the looters before they fucking die of thirst and disease. We are not helping because we here gunfire that shit wouldn’t fly in Beverly Hills!