Gustav

[MTK]

Originally Posted by jdlea

I think that's the most important thing. The problem in NOLA isn't universal. It's a rich vs. poor situation. New Orleans, like most cities has a pretty visible class system. And the people who are still without help are the ones who do not have a lot of money. Most of the rich people live either on the outskirts like uptown or in the more touristy version of the city. Each of which are better protected that places like the 9th ward.

That said, I have a friend from Slidell (a district of NO that was hit hard). He told me that they are back in their home. He didn't say when, but he gutted what needed to be gutted with a couple of his friends and they rebuilt what needed rebuilding. He didn't say whether he had trouble, but I know many people had issues getting their power turned on in their homes. Many of the electric companies tried to charge citizens for the time that they were out of power, that's flat out wrong.

I am personally considering moving to New Orleans because I've never to be any place like it in my entire life. The French Quarter, uptown, Garden District, all of that is amazing. You just can't move that to some other location. I would be heart broken if they just decide to abandon the city of New Orleans. The levees are federally built, and they're only built to stand up to a Cat 3. The federal government needs to do a better job. There are federally built levees all across the country and I don't hear anyone suggest that because some of middle America has levees around their homes, that they should move.

As for the suggestion that people who are hit by multiple natural disasters should abandon their homes...that's just retarded. That would constitute the majority of the United States. The majority of the southern U.S. is hit by Hurricanes or threatened by tornadoes, California is always experiencing earthquakes, hell we face hurricanes and tornadoes where we live. It's naive to think that we should all just move to somewhere where nothing can possibly happen. It's not naive however, to assume that when the government institutes a system to protect you, you should hold them to their word. I'm not saying that the government should rebuild homes, but they should make strong levees.

I agree and that's basically what I was trying to say here. NO is the way it is because of an inadequate levee system, which can be directly attributable to the Fed. Providing a strong levee system in a high risk area shouldn't be too much to expect.