Four Years – darrelplant.com

The flooding of New Orleans from levee failure in the aftermath of Hurricane Katrina nearly four years ago consumed my thoughts at the time, for weeks afterward, and from time to time ever since. In those first days I was incensed and I did an insane amount of reading, writing, and even research. In honor of the city and its people, as well as the others in the Gulf Coast and beyond who were affected by the storm and the morons in the Bush administration, I offer up most of the posts I wrote on the subject.

Memory of New Orleans: 31 Aug 2005. Going to New Orleans the year before Katrina.
The City That ~~Care~~ Bush Forgot: 31 Aug 2005. That damn photo.
FOXnews.com: Laziness or Something Else?: 01 Sep 2005. Research is soooo difficult.
Who Coulda Thunk?: 01 Sep 2005. It’s hard to deliver disaster relief in the middle of a disaster zone!
New Orleans Lockdown: 01 Sep 2005. One of the first reports from the bridge.
Over Here (Now On FX): 02 Sep 2005. Re-imagining a TV series from one hellhole to another.
Poor, Picked-On Pentagon: 02 Sep 2005. Whining from the Pentagon about their failure to move faster.
The Bad Bush Official/Bad Bush Strategy: 02 Sep 2005. Reconciling the “people should have left” story with the “nobody anticipated a disaster” narrative.
Who Coulda Thunk 2?: 02 Sep 2005. The weird coincidence of a hurricane and high water!
How Long Does It Take to Drive From Shreveport to New Orleans?: 03 Sep 2005. The odd disparity between “prepared” and prepared.
Disaster Fatigue: 03 Sep 2005. After spending three months chasing around Aruba for Natalee Holloway, it only took a week for the cable shows to start getting bored of New Orleans.
Continue to Think: 03 Sep 2005. Treating people like they’re idiots with bootstraps. Continue to think!
Why Did the Convention Center Relief Take So Long?: 04 Sep 2005. Not understanding how things were so bollixed up.
Who Coulda Thunk 3?: 04 Sep 2005. Nobody could have predicted a threat!
Half-Staff or Half-Assed?: 04 Sep 2005. For Immediate Release.
That Explains It: 05 Sep 2005. The connection to failure.
Fear of a Black New Orleans: 05 Sep 2005. The fear factor.
Photo from the Bayou: 06 Sep 2005. Me and a gator.
Nagin on Race and Class: 06 Sep 2005. For all his faults…Nagin on the way out of town.
The Hand That Feeds Jonah Goldberg: 07 Sep 2005. NPR’s timing at picking JG as commentator was near-perfect.
Did the Proclamation Have to Be Requested, Too?: 07 Sep 2005. Prying recognition out of Bush.
8 September 1935: 08 Sep 2005. A review of a Huey Long bio on the date Long was fatally shot.
Six Days Before the Presidential Proclamation: Why it Matters: 08 Sep 2005. Why’d it take six days to recognize the dead?
The Howler Pleasures Himself Daily: 09 Sep 2005. Bending backward to give Bush the benefit of the doubt when news reports going back a year say otherwise.
New Orleans: The No-Fault Disaster? Naaah.: 09 Sep 2005. Who knew what when.
Ignoblesse Unoblige: 11 Sep 2005. Barbara Bush and her beautiful mind.
Feedback Loop: 12 Sep 2005. Bad information will be free.
Bush vs. New Orleans: 12 Sep 2005. George Bush doesn’t like black people.
Las Cucarachas: 13 Sep 2005. aka “the residents of the city”.
The Plan Unfolds: 13 Sep 2005. Oregon’s ~~response~~.
Feedback Loop 2: 14 Sep 2005. How New Orleans dodged the bullet.
Natalee vs. Katrina: 21 Sep 2005. How much time MSNBC devoted to the “missing woman” story of the summer vs. New Orleans.
Letter to Dan Abrams, “The Abrams Report,” MSNBC: 21 Sep 2005. Natalaee Holloway vs. New Orleans.
Sing Along With Georgie: 22 Sep 2005. That other photo.
Ouroboros: 27 Sep 2005. Asking impertinent questions.
New Orleanians Want to Go Home: 08 Dec 2005. Rayh Broussard’s photos of his city..
Commemoration: 27 Aug 2006. The Hurricane Katrina commemorative bowl.
Half-Staff or Half-Assed Redux: 17 Apr 2007. The selective on-the-ballness of George W. Bush.
Postmark Katrina: 30 Aug 2007. Down the memory hole by two years out.
What’s Important to John McCain: 24 Apr 2008. John McCain on New Orleans. Or not.