[promoted by BooMan]
RAW STORY reported this through The Washington Times. I guess if the lawn jockey says it, it’s straight from his bosses’ lips:
Alphonso R. Jackson, secretary of housing and urban development, during a visit with hurricane victims in Houston, said New Orleans would not reach its pre-Katrina population of “500,000 people for a long time,” and “it’s not going to be as black as it was for a long time, if ever again.”
Rep. Danny K. Davis, Illinois Democrat and a member of the Congressional Black Caucus, quickly took issue.
“Anybody who can make that kind of projection with some degree of certainty or accuracy must have a crystal ball that I can’t see or maybe they are more prophetic than any of us can imagine,” he said.
Other members of the caucus said the comments by Mr. Jackson, who is black, could be misconstrued as a goal, particularly considering his position of responsibility in the administration.
Hell, they are COUNTING ON THAT GOAL.
And Nagin won’t have to worry about being turned out of office for his part in the Katrina debacle if he plays his cards right.
Furthermore, Jackson (no relation to Jesse) is a former housing developer with ties to the industry. He cannot be blind to the windfall to speculators and developers because of Katrina. No doubt, as a black Republican, he and Nagin are in cahoots.
Some of you might remember one of my diaries, one taken from a Salon article on DailyKos that showed the Reverend Jesse Jackson and Representative Maxine Waters trying to get evacuees to safety closer to home, preferably to nearby England Air Force Base in Alexandria. But that didn’t happen. Now,
Rep. Bobby L. Rush, Illinois Democrat, said Alphonso Jackson’s remarks and the prospects of real-estate speculators and developers in New Orleans are “foreboding.”
“Gentrification is a demon that is looming on the landscape, and we have to be aware of it and vigilant. … Right now, I don’t know if the resistance to it is strong enough,” Mr. Rush said.
He said a history of forced removal of blacks from their homes and property cannot be ignored as the reconstruction moves forward.
Two weeks after Katrina, the Congressional Black Caucus issued an eight-point action plan that calls for residents to get the first right of return to the area, that New Orleans residents get first choice of construction jobs and rebuilding contracts and that voting rights be protected.
Many evacuees from the Ninth Ward will likely never be able to return, Mr. Jackson said. He told Mayor C. Ray Nagin that it would be a mistake to rebuild that part of town, the lowest-lying section and prone to flooding.
Not with earthenwork, concrete and metal levees, you mean. Why not create a series of levees whereby people can live in relative safety as do the Dutch? But I guess, that is too expensive for black people who have traditionally voted Democrat.
Another option is to raise the City, as other cities have done over the past few centuries. (Sacramento, CA is one). With the numbers being thrown around it would be cost-competitive to reinforcing the levees and flood walls. OTOH, now would be a good time to deconstruct and move the entire City to safer ground.
As far as “normal” building goes the City government could begin condemnation proceedings and secure a good portion of the damaged areas to build affordable housing. ‘Course they could also institute a living wage requirement, including health insurance for all workers in the Parish, but what’re the odds?
It’ll all be modern and expensive and the po’ folk who can get the menial jobs in the city will have to live a long way away…. and then it’ll be destroyed by another hurricane in a few years, at which time — maybe — people will wake up and realize that the Mississippi must be somehow allowed to return to its natural state.
Now I’m even more depressed than I was after Judith Miller’s cheery press conference. I hope her dog bites her nose.
Um, what if they built a City and nobody came? They don’t even know it yet, but the displaced/dispossessed have a helluva lot of power now.
Bill Bennets remarks, The HuD chief.
White people are really feeling free to express their real feelings. If Black Babies were aborted for being black….uh wouldn’t that be a crime? Wouldn’t that result in millions of murders? Wouldn’t the murder rate go UP?
That never occurred to Bill Bennet because he didn’t consider that aborting black babies would be a crime. He see it as a social program.
Now, if you want to know whose inferior to who you can look at history and see very clearly that white people are the scourge of the planet Earth and have done nothing that elevates humanity to greater awareness. Rather, only to a bleak, self indulgent emptiness that wraps itself it mindless ritual.
A case can clearly be made that white people are inferior to all other people. It really can. I suggest Bill Bennet keep his mouth shut.
………..
All these people from New Orleans have been scattered all over the country and are being forgotten. Democracy Now! Diid a piece on some of these people or perhaps Bennet would call them “things”
Which day on DN!? I’ve missed the last couple … well, I can look myself. No matter.
Boy oh boy… you’ve got a realist’s view of the world, Stu. And on Judy too.
DN It’s today. I just saw it near the end. Theire’s not enough though.
I think this is an interesting subject. On race. Which in this case is really culture. There are different kinds of intelligence. And their are different kinds of beings. Some are more predatory than others.
The whole idea of superiority is very interesting, because I think the answers would be unexpected. The problem is we humans don’t know what we are.
i always enjoy your diaries, Susan
Thank you.
Wasn’t Nagin a Republican and switched to Democrat so he could get more votes? I wonder what he’ll do if Alphonso is right and there aren’t enough Democrats left to elect him.
This whole thing stinks. It actually makes me physically ill to realize what the Republicans are about to do to New Orleans.
I saw somewhere about how the real estate wolves are already sniffing around. Could it be that some of this talk could be aimed at those black people who do own homes but are not well off and were wiped out? All this talk of not rebuilding the most ravaged districts could push devastated land owners to sell for a fraction of what the land itself is really worth. These people need good representation and advice. This is disgusting.
Blacks account for one-third of the voting power in Louisiana and are one-half of New Orleans voters. The Katrina Diaspora has effectively torn away a good part of these voters to the point that Dems like Charlie Melancon are targeted.
Said columnist Earl Ofari Hutchinson at AlterNet recently,
And Jefferson is CBC. Hutchinson went on to say:
Huh? The republicans are afraid of ‘redistricting’ in order to preserve the right to vote for thousands of Americans, but BugMan DeLay could redistrict Texas and buy elections with illegal corporate money. You seem to be all over this, Blksista. I am so glad you are here to keep us informed. I love reading your diaries and comments. Keep ’em coming.