SoylentFoo

This slideshow (via AWholeLottaNothing, via MeFi) is absolutely amazing: a 1st person account of riding out the storm in New Orleans. Matt describes better than anyone else what these pictures capture:

”...calm followed by surprise and confusion and later untold devistation.”

As someone who’s only visited NOLA once, this really put it in perspective. Jackson Square, Pat O’Brian’s, The Hyatt, The Superdome, Canal Street: all of the major landmarks photographed by a regular guy that ends up stealing a car to flee to Houston. What a story…

This is absolutely insane:

Why is the Red Cross not in New Orleans?

“Access to New Orleans is controlled by the National Guard and local authorities and while we are in constant contact with them, we simply cannot enter New Orleans against their orders.”

“The state Homeland Security Department had requested – and continues to request – that the American Red Cross not come back into New Orleans following the hurricane. Our presence would keep people from evacuating and encourage others to come into the city.”

I don’t even know what to say.

Chief Justice William Rehnquist died last night, at the age of 80.

From MSNBC:

“The death leaves President Bush with his second court opening within four months and sets up what’s expected to be an even more bruising Senate confirmation battle than that of John Roberts.”

From the Metafilter thread discussing this issue:

“This is a terrible movie and I want my money back. Even odds on a California earthquake within the week.” – posted by Armitage Shanks

It’s sad to see Rehnquist go (I hope you’re happy, Justice Sunday) in more ways than one: this is really, really bad news for the Supreme Court. President Bush receiving the priviledge of nominating another Supreme Court Justice in the middle of both domestic and foreign quagmires for which he is (directly or indirectly) responsible absolutely infuriates me.

I don’t know about you, but I’m suddenly a bigger Kanye West fan than I was 10 minutes ago. During NBC’s live Katrina benefit concert tonight, he ignored the teleprompter and spoke emotionally about the governments neglect for the poor, mostly black refugees in New Orleans while a flabbergasted Mike Myers looked on. Mike recovered and continued from the prompter for a minute, after which Kanye dropped the bomb:

“George Bush doesn’t care about black people”

Wow. I don’t know what to say, other than to tell you to watch this video right now.

Big props to Kanye for having the guts to speak the truth, even when it’s not what (the government wants) people want to hear.

UPDATE: Sure enough, NBC censored Kanye’s remarks on the time-delayed showing of the event shown on the west coast.

A developing story in the South today is the gas shortage that is taking place due to some major pipelines being down. The AJC has this:

“The two pipelines that bring gasoline and jet fuel to the region are down â€â€? powerless to pump as Hurricane Katrina wreaked havoc on electrical infrastructure.

The metro Atlanta region generally has about a 10-day supply of gasoline in inventory, said BP spokesman Michael Kumpf. The pipelines have been down for two days.”

Gas is $2.99 per gallon for regular at the station right outside my apartment. My boss just got off of the phone with his Mom who lives in rural Georgia – drivers from smaller towns surrounding where she lives are coming to her town to get gas because the smaller town stations are out.

Anyone have a moped they want to sell? :-/ Hope that when the power is restored to those pipelines prices go back down, but CNN doesn’t think that will happen. This doesn’t look good.

I’m jnewland@gmail.com. Check out Google Talk

UPDATE: It’s Live

Consumer Reports calls air purifier ‘unhealthy’

HA! I’ve been telling people this forever. Sharper Image should be ashamed, trying to sue Consumer Reports and all. I mean, really, who sues Consumer Reports?

“Those who would give up Essential Liberty to purchase a little Temporary Safety, deserve neither Liberty nor Safety.”

The liberty/security scale has just been tipped by the 1000 gorilla that is the NYPD. There will be random searches of subway passenger’s bags starting friday.

In New Security Move, New York Police to Search Commuters’ Bags – from the NYTimes.

What does Mayor Bloomberg have to say about all of this?

“We live in a world where sadly these types of security measures are necessary. Are they intrusive? Yes, a little bit. But we’re trying to find the right balance.”

Mr. Mayor, please take a lesson from Dr. Franklin. This is rediculous.

This is why having old white men in charge is a horrible idea. They say stupid things and embarass the whole country. The spoekesperson for Rep. Tancredo (FL) said he was ”...speaking hypothetically…” when he said the following on a radio show Friday:

“Well, what if you said something like—if this happens in the United States, and we determine that it is the result of extremist, fundamentalist Muslims, you know, you could take out their holy sites,” Tancredo answered.

“You’re talking about bombing Mecca,” Campbell said.

“Yeah,” Tancredo responded.

Incredible. I have nothing further to say.