As Hurricane Dean Passes Over Cuba…
...check out what Hog On Ice has to say about castro's vaunted civil defense system that so draws the drooly praise of assorted United Nations inspectors here. The difference between ours and theirs is personal freedom. The UN is clueless about this little detail. But this piece knows the deal. Killer reading.
Oink!
I'm pretty sure the poor of New Orleans wouldn't have minded being pulled at gunpoint onto trucks and buses before the onslaught of Katrina.
Nope, all they were offered was "shelter" at the Superdome and guns pointed at them when they tried to get out of the city. The military and Blackwater were protecting the more affluent neighborhoods, some of which were the only areas dry enough to get out of the city on foot after the storm.
Did the City/State/Federal government even offer ways for the poor to get out of the city? We all remember the pictures of those flooded buses.
Let me finish by quoting a Republican:
"We look upon authority too often and focus over and over again, for 30 or 40 or 50 years, as if there is something wrong with authority. We see only the oppressive side of authority. Maybe it comes out of our history and our background. What we don't see is that freedom is not a concept in which people can do anything they want, be anything they can be. Freedom is about authority. Freedom is about the willingness of every single human being to cede to lawful authority a great deal of discretion about what you do." -Rudy Giuliani (source: http://query.nytimes.com/gst/fullpage.html?res=9A01E2D9173CF933A15750C0A962958260 )
The liberal media has taken this quote and decided to flay Mr. Giuliani with it. While I personally am very anti-authoritarian, sometimes the authority of our government must protect the weak. Helping to evacuate people from a dangerous area where authority does not overstep it's own bounds.
"I'm pretty sure the poor of New Orleans wouldn't have minded being pulled at gunpoint onto trucks and buses before the onslaught of Katrina."
Strange, then, that thousands who had a choice and were fully informed stayed where they were. Many stayed even after the city flooded, while rescuers begged them to leave. Some were dumb and lazy, some just wanted to protect their property, some wanted their entitlement money, and others were enjoying the looting.
Surely none of them, fully understanding the facts of life in Cuba, would trade places with Castro's safe little sheep. Life on welfare in America, even in the overcrowded Superdome, is better than starving under the eye of a tyrant. In fact, I remember a time when Cubans thronged to America on unsafe boats and gladly took up temporary residence on cots at the Orange Bowl. Which doesn't even have a dome. And that was in subtropical Miami, in the unbearable June and July heat. After that, they ended up in tents under the expressway, the concrete over their heads shuddering and roaring twenty-four hours a day. And they were thrilled to be there, and Cubans in Cuba envied them.
I guess I shouldn't mention the fact that they distinguished themselves from Louisiana's displaced poor in that they did not have to be forceably evicted, and the vast bulk of them got jobs as soon as possible and started contributing to the economy. To mention those things would be to raise the disturbing issue of personal responsibility.
It would be wonderful if Kathleen Blanco and Ray Nagin had made a responsible effort to plan ahead, and if Nagin had implemented such plans as he had, instead of holing up in a hotel, which is what he did. He's the guy that drowned the buses you mention. And it would be great if FEMA had done a better job, and if Kathleen Blanco had allowed the feds in immediately, instead of refusing them permission (funny how the BDS-crazed media minimized that startling bit of news). There is plenty of room for improvement. However we are never going to have Cuban-style civil defense, for the simple reason that the Cuban system is the product of a totalitarian state, and its nature is such that only another totalitarian state--with no federalism or Bill of Rights issues--can replicate it.
Americans won't support a draft, even in time of war, to support vital national interests. Imagine how we would rise up if the government started dragging our kids away, Castro-style, to do civil defense work, under the direct control of the Pentagon.
Maybe we should competently execute the policies we already have in place, before rushing to emulate a vicious dictator. We're not faced with a choice between nothing and the unworkable Castro system. If we simply did what we're supposed to, it would make a tremendous difference.
Safety can always be bought at the price of liberty. Historically, Americans have refused to pay that price.
Gosh, I sound like a fringe-nut leftist, bitching about taking off his shoes at the airport.
I guess I should mention that I was here during Andrew as well as the 2005 hurricanes, and I've spent over a month without electricity, while a devastated city reeled around me. So while I have never been forced to live in a shelter, I know a little bit about what happens before, during, and after hurricanes.