So, how are you doing?

[Rigorous Intuition]

Myself, I'm feeling very overwrought and helpless by all of this. Close to tears or screams much of the time.<br><br>No one I know is down there, in the thick of it. But all the people I don't know - it just tightens my gut. I have a dozen things that need attention, but I can't focus on anything else.<br> <p></p><i></i>

[DrDebugDU]

I feel the same way. Since yesterday I've been watching the news channels and reading some messageboards like DU and it's overwhelming in the sense that you can't do anything about it and the incredible feeling that the government isn't doing anything about it either.<br><br>It's surreal. Unlike the other disasters which we have seen like the Tsunami this one is even more surreal since the city of New Orleans should be filled with helicopters and boats and 100,000 soldiers and half the police force of the US trying to lend a help and all you say is people left in hell waiting for something which doesn't come.<br><br>I think it is the end of any decency left in the Bush administration... <p></p><i></i>

[Col Quisp]

Having lots of nightmares of people being herded....destitute.... I have some acquaintances who live in NO, and have heard that they are OK, except the fiance of one is still there and hasn't been heard from. <br><br>Another friend who decided to stay in the quarter reported that the looting wasn't as bad as depicted in the media. However, that was yesterday. It could be totally different now. He's on the 4th floor of an apartment in the quarter, says he has enough food and water for a few days. But others are trying to get him to safety. His reaction to the news of forced evacuation prior to the storm: "I'd rather face nature head on than be in the Superdome." After hearing the stories of that nightmare concentration camp, I'm sure he did the right thing. <br><br> <p></p><i></i>

[chiggerbit]

<!--EZCODE AUTOLINK START--><a href="http://www.hurricanehousing.org/?id=5945-537383-TKwiHIXpZxUtFfqP_6bY.w">www.hurricanehousing.org/...FfqP_6bY.w</a><!--EZCODE AUTOLINK END--> <p></p><i></i>

[Avalon]

Watch your breath. Get still. With your out breath visualize tension and stress going out with it. As you breathe in, take in courage, equanimity, and clarity. Connect with the sturdiness of the earth where you are.<br><br>Do this now, and at times throughout the day. It will be easier to help others who need your help if you can be grounded and centered.<br><br> <p></p><i></i>

[Camino Real]

over this. it's happening. the bush junta is sacrificing these people.... stunned, what is yet to come. thus begins mass conditioning to accept martial law ineptitude.<!--EZCODE EMOTICON START 8) --><img src=http://www.ezboard.com/images/emoticons/glasses.gif ALT="8)"><!--EZCODE EMOTICON END--> <p></p><i></i>

[heyjt]

I am feeling anger while I watch these people beg for assistance on CNN.<br> What the hell is the government waiting for? Where are the food drops? <br>Do the puppet masters want it to get real, real bad so some permanent state of emergency will exist?<br> I'm going down to our local fire department to donate money for the Red Cross today.<br> This is the start of the next great depression and New Orleans is the first "Hooverville"... <p></p><i></i>

[need a name]

It ranges from feelings of pissed off-ed-ness at the unbelieveable lack of competent, organized help that our people so desperatly need. To feelings of pure saddness at their plight! To disbelief at the destruction. It's impossible to feel normal. I feel like the mind set in this country is going to change for the better, after they have seen the complete FAILURE that their incompetent pres. is. And where is the Congress?????? What a fcking joke! They fed 500,000 people at woodstock.... you'd think they'd have their shit together at least as good as that!<br>This should have been an awesome rescue & evacuation effort BEFORE the storm. But you have to care in order to do that. And I think the public at large see's the complete lack of that. They have totally dug their own grave. <p></p><i></i>

[otherGeoff]

This is just incredible. People are being left to die, and nobody is yelling at the top of their lungs that it is wrong.<br><br>Foreign nations should be holding press conferences, publicly announcing their offers of help are being swatted aside.<br><br>Americans should be hectoring their representatives, lettting them know that the inaction is inhuman, and pure...I have to say it...evil.<br><br>Because almost all the faces I see are poor and black, they are being left to die.<br><br>The 'shooting at us' fictions no see to have shut ALL the relief operations down. Until order is restored...what's the sign of that - traffic signals awork again?...New Orleans is left to die. A poor, black water prison of death.<br><br>I'm embarassed, and as another Canadian, powerless.<br><br>The MMedia is an absolute joke now. We basically only have CNN right now (CBC is on lock-out, so no choice). CNN reporters should be permenantly broadcasting live from the Convention Centre, the Dome...and wherever else they can get...and show the horrors in an unblinking, hectoring diatribe. Even the lack of a Jennings (let alone an old school Morrow riffing) shows now. The power to do something refused with banal cliched segues.<br><br>If the demons are let loose, then maybe it's time to start demonizing those who are letting death to wander freely.<br><br>Oil profits out of all imagination all around for the wealthy...and the poor culled to boot.<br><br>I'm sorry, but like Jeff I feel the darkness gathering above NO.<br><br>GH <p></p><i></i>

[Starman]

Jeez -- Thanks for asking Jeff -- I'm sure a lot of folks, like me too, feel a need to express their feelings. <br><br>I feel --semi-numb and outraged, horrified, incredibly sad, and amazed -- and frustrated, watching news reports of the most appalling incompetance or outright criminal indifference or calculated negligence, I don't know how to describe what I'm seeing and hearing. Now I don't see any evidence that any thought had been put into how a possible fire in NO would be extinguished -- clearly, they needed some heavy-lift helicopters, a fucking FLEET of heavy-lift helicopters for levee repair and air-drops and to drop water on fires and to assist in air-evacs. The lack of planning for staging to make efficient use of resources --<br><br>I imagine some of the most desperate, horrible suffering and anguished deaths while America watches, like me, helpless to do anything. I'm so disturbed by what I've seen watching what passes for 'news' I can't take much solace in my own secure circumstances. I wish I could do something to HELP. My own thoughts about what should be done seem much more capable than much of what I've seen. <br><br>And then I see this Immaculate Idiot like Chertoff who is a fucking delusional disaster himself, talking about the necessity of 'saving lives' and sustaining lives and ... He's saying that ongoing evacuation is happening while people are STILL wandering aimlessly on the downtown bridge and NOTHING happening at the catastrophe at the Convention Center. He's SO clueless ... It should be a crime. Apparently Chertoff doesn't know about boats or helicopters. Every hour that goes by there is a HUGE public health crisis bubbling even worse. Where ARE the fleets and armadas of rescue personnel? Why aren't National Guard trucks moving people out?<br><br>It's very hard being a concerned, compassionate, aware person about now. My heart goes out to everyone hurting and especially those suffering.<br>Starman <p></p><i></i>

[thrulookingglass]

There just aren't words for what most of us are going through. The outrage of events such as alleged persons shooting at rescue helicopters?! TheOriginalCyn in commentary said <br><!--EZCODE ITALIC START--><em>"People who are waiting to get rescued DO NOT SHOOT at their rescuers."</em><!--EZCODE ITALIC END--><br>and I have to agree with that. Perhaps their are moles or what have you amongst the survivors seeking to further the mayhem that exists. I know this, if I owned a boat and was in New Orleans you would have to shoot me to stop me from trying to rescue people. Perhaps this unraveling needs to begin. I think we (here) can see the beginings of martial law spreading throughout the country. I think you are right Jeff when you speak of the <!--EZCODE ITALIC START--><em>sacrifice of so many souls to further the work of Satan</em><!--EZCODE ITALIC END-->. I'm still consider myself an atheist, but I cannot deny the accession of evil in these times. This is what happens when power is usurped for so long. I fear for all of us. The media keeps hiding the evil face of this catastrophe from the masses, which only drives us deeper into the night. Many of us come here to gain understanding of the forces that drive humanity to such dire and dangerous consequences, hoping that greater knowledge will lead to elucidation. It's not about resolve or understanding anymore, it's about surviving. These matters will devolve, I can only hope that its true that it is darkest before the dawn. <p></p><i></i>

[Peachtree Pam]

Hi Starman,<br><br>I just posted on the other thread about how all of this is intentional. It is passive culling. Do you think Bush gives a GD how many poor, black people die in La and Miss?<br><br>What would have happened if it had been in Orange county, California? I think you know the answer. <br><br>Just saw Chertoff. I can't post anymore, too angry and disgusted.<br><br>Pam <p></p><i></i>

[vondardenelle]

i was going to post this in the other thread in response to something "fearless" wrote about feeling the same way after 9/11. this is kind of how I feel now, but it's worse than it was on 9/11.<br><br>it feels like the world is ending, but i drove into work today and everyone is happy though bothered about the $3+ gas. on top of all this i ordered an ipod last week which arrived last night. i was opening it as i was watching cnn and i just about lost it. an ipod has gotta be one of the most superflous things around now, and i get to play with one as i watch the world end for new orleans (and didn't 1000 people get stampeded to death in iraq yesterday?) [edit-- to clarify, my near "losing it" was more due to the realization that i am just as detached from reality as many of those i woudl criticize]<br><br>"human"'s post on the other thread with the links to the white and black people "finding" and "looting", respectively. how can people take this???<br><br>i know things have been surreal since at least 2000, but i don't know, i really don't know what to think of this shit anymore.<br> <p></p><i>Edited by: <A HREF=http://p216.ezboard.com/brigorousintuition.showUserPublicProfile?gid=vondardenelle>vondardenelle</A> at: 9/1/05 1:09 pm<br></i>

[Qutb]

I'm crying, which doesn't happen frequently.<br><br><!--EZCODE QUOTE START--><blockquote><strong><em>Quote:</em></strong><hr>NEW ORLEANS, Louisiana (CNN) -- Thousands of people forced from their homes by Hurricane Katrina have crammed into the New Orleans convention center, where they've had no food, no water and no word on when help would come.<br><br>And people are dying.<br><br>CNN's Chris Lawrence described "many, many" bodies, inside and outside the facility on New Orleans' Riverwalk. (Watch report on the desperate conditions at the convention center -- 2:54 ) <br><br>"There are multiple people dying at the convention center," he said. "There was an old woman, dead in a wheelchair with a blanket draped over her, pushed up against a wall. Horrible, horrible conditions.<br><br>"We saw a man who went into a seizure, literally dying right in front of us."<br><br>People were "being forced to lived like animals," Lawrence said -- surrounded by piles of trash and feces.<br><br><!--EZCODE BOLD START--><strong>He said while he has seen police SWAT teams drive by in armored vehicles, no one has stopped to talk with the refugees.<br><br>"People are asking, 'Where are the buses? Where is the plan? Where is the help?" he said</strong><!--EZCODE BOLD END-->.<hr></blockquote><!--EZCODE QUOTE END--><br>The buses don't exist, and the help isn't coming. That's the plan.<br><br>Wonder why Bush looked so content on Tuesday?<br><!--EZCODE IMAGE START--><img src="http://us.news3.yimg.com/us.i2.yimg.com/p/ap/20050830/capt.capm10108301730.bush_capm101.jpg" style="border:0;"/><!--EZCODE IMAGE END--><br><br>As others have pointed out, Bush has PR people and lots of them. So is it a coincidence that the day the hurricane hits, he's being photographed with a guitar (fiddling while Rome burns) and eating cake (let them eat cake)? <p><!--EZCODE FONT START--><span style="color:black;font-family:century gothic;font-size:x-small;"><!--EZCODE BOLD START--><strong>Qutb means "axis," "pole," "the center," which contains the periphery or is present in it. The qutb is a spiritual being, or function, which can reside in a human being or several human beings or a moment. It is the elusive mystery of how the divine gets delegated into the manifest world and obviously cannot be defined.</strong><!--EZCODE BOLD END--></span><!--EZCODE FONT END--><br><br></p><i></i>

[heath7]

You've covered it well my friend. I'm not proud that I've allowed my daily doings to become as dusty as the attic space so many survivors call home in NOLA. I <!--EZCODE ITALIC START--><em>try</em><!--EZCODE ITALIC END--> to play video games and exercise to distract myself, but I can't hold onto the game controller for more than 10 minutes, and I watch the news while I ride my exercise bike (always have).<br><br>I can't say its depressing me that much. Its more like an omni-present mild anxiety, wondering what its all going to lead to. <br><br>I feel sorry for all those 'refugees' (isn't it weird to hear the talking heads refer to Americans as refugees?), and I worry that the 1-2 million of them are not going to be recieved well where ever they make it to. The communities that will absorb them don't fully understand how taxing their presence will be, and will grow to resent their presence (fish and visitors begin to smell in three days). As an added bonus, the media has made sure that those communities will view the 'refugees' as looters. The fact that these homeless will be flat broke will compound this confrontation.<br><br>And I'm bothered by how closely this all resembles the movie 'Oil Storm'. Gas and oil has been badly compromised, which means all of America has been badly compromised. The talking heads are happy to speculate about four dollar gas without putting any focus whatsoever on the energy companies' accountabilities and responsibilities. This will inevitably lead to foot dragging on the part of energy companies who look to profit handsomely from this <!--EZCODE ITALIC START--><em>very real</em><!--EZCODE ITALIC END--> storm.<br><br>And make no mistake about it; experiments in martial law are being refined as we speak. The mayor's 'whatever it takes' attitude seems extremely insensitive to me, and dubya himself says there should be 'zero tolerance' when it comes to the looters. Even the people who need food and water, George? Armed people with little or no hope, going up against cops who will have no oversight, and in the backdrop is the largest United States internment camp in history. <br><br>With all this happening, my daily doings feel mighty trivial, and I feel like, since I can, I should monitor this situation very closely. In general, we're all waiting for some ill-defined trigger moment to motivate us in a particular direction, and this storm has me on the edge of my seat waiting for just such a catalyst. I'm in a major American city, and watching just how easy it is for the authorities to sacrifice a <!--EZCODE BOLD START--><strong>major</strong><!--EZCODE BOLD END--> city, I'm wondering if tomorrow I will need to seek 'higher ground'. <p></p><i></i>