DADvocate

About the only way I keep up with NOLA is via Patrick at Hurricane Radio. Although he claims to be a liberal, he seems to have a level head. He's definitely not a radical left winger.

He reports disturbing news, lots of murders and Nagin still says stupid things. There have been 118 murders as of Aug.9 of this year. Cincinnati, currently a much larger city with outraged citizens, had 86 murders for the 12 months of 2006. How do the city officials of New Orleans react to this crisis?

Your Right Hand Thief gives a synopsis. Quoting The Times-Picayune

"Do I worry about it? Somewhat. It's not good for us, but it also keeps the New Orleans brand out there, and it keeps people thinking about our needs and what we need to bring this community back. So it is kind of a two-edged sword. Sure it hurts, but we have to keep working everyday to make the city better," Nagin said, according to a transcript of provided by FOX 8.

I wonder if Mayor Mallory of Cincinnati will pick up of this strategy to promote Cincinnati. "Hey, we're killing each other. Help us rebuild our city!" More from YRHT:

In sum: we are told to be comforted by random murders, and we are told that the upside to our high murder rate is more exposure for "the New Orleans brand".

The mayor of Newark goes for days without sleep when violent murders occur in his city. He promises that the killers will be found and that the multiple murders will stop.

OUR MAYOR, on the other hand, is only "somewhat" bothered by the violence, and sees a marketing opportunity for our stricken city. As all the helpful Couhig Conservatives and other Nagin-enablers will tell you, OUR MAYOR "understands business". Unlike, say, Mitch Landrieu, Nagin understands that being the murder capital of the U.S. keeps "the New Orleans brand" out there. The mayor claims that murders are thought provoking. Indeed, "they keep people thinking" about New Orleans' many needs.

Read the entire post and follow the links. Amazing stuff.

Another great quote reached via Hurricane Radio/YRHT/forgotston.com:

Recently, after a murder of a 52-year old engineer who was returning from work to his home New Orleans, NOPD spokesman Sgt. Joe Narcisse said “I think people can take some comfort in knowing that it was a random act of violence….”

As if random acts of violence are more acceptable than a pattern of violent acts. Nothing about acts of violence should make anyone comfortable.

Yep, I always find random acts of violence, especially murder, comforting.

Adding to all this, Patrick at points out that the district attorney is not prosecuting murders. Maybe he's afraid of being the target of a random attack.

National Geographic ran a story, New Orleans - A Perilous Future, in the August, 2007 issue. Reading this story (I subscribe to the paper edition), I got the feeling that New Orleans is doomed.

But among engineers and experts, that resolve is giving way to a growing awareness that another such disaster is inevitable, and nothing short of a massive and endless national commitment can prevent it.

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The long odds led Robert Giegengack, a geologist at the University of Pennsylvania, to tell policymakers a few months after the storm that the wealthiest, most technologically advanced nation on the globe was helpless to prevent another Katrina: "We simply lack the capacity to protect New Orleans." He recommended selling the French Quarter to Disney, moving the port 150 miles (240 kilometers) upstream, and abandoning one of the most historic and culturally significant cities in the nation.

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Instead of rebuilding smarter or surrendering, New Orleans is doing what it has always done after such disasters: bumping up the levees just a little higher, rebuilding the same flood-prone houses back in the same low spots, and praying that hurricanes hit elsewhere. Some former New Orleanians may have had enough. More than a third of the city's pre-Katrina population has yet to return.

Maybe it is time to hang it up for New Orleans or turn it over to Disney. The city government has shown itself time and again to possess legendary incompetence. Geographically the city is indefensible from nature. The levees protecting New Orleans destroy wetlands and prevent natural depositing of silt in the delta. Unfortunately many cities die, maybe we need to perform a requiem for NOLA.

I will always remember New Orleans as the place where I first legally drank beer. But what a mess.