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BACK SOON

Apologies for lack of posts; much work, very busy, etc. For US charity information following Hurricane Katrina, go here. For news and views on the Baghdad disaster that may have left 1,000 or more dead, try here, here, and here.

Posted by Tim B. on 08/31/2005 at 09:34 PM
  1. Speaking of Katrina, Our ABC (at least, Newsradio) has adopted a bastardised pronunciation of ‘New Orleans’.  ‘New’ retains standard Australian pronunciation (added ‘y’ consonant) but ‘Orleans’ becomes ‘Orluns’. Silly.

    Posted by walterplinge on 2005 08 31 at 11:23 PM • permalink

  2. Our ABC also ensured, in their coverage of the Baghdad bridge disaster, that their single representative soundbite was an Iraqi saying:
    It is all America’s fault

    At least, that’s what the translator/voiceover said he said.

    Posted by cuckoo on 2005 08 31 at 11:37 PM • permalink

  3. Can we call them terrorists now, rather then “insurgents” or “freedom fighters”? This is the true effect of it afterall, not the attacks so much as what they create.

    Posted by Aging Gamer on 2005 08 31 at 11:58 PM • permalink

  4. Oh, and ABC Radio this morning also made sure we understood that Katrina is all about…Iraq.  Their Washington correspondent editorialized that Bush would be judged on how well he responded to a domestic crisis, when he was so willing to spend resources on -quote- “foreign adventures” -unquote.

    Posted by cuckoo on 2005 09 01 at 12:31 AM • permalink

  5. Walter,

    That’s how you pronounce New Orleans. Or one way, at least. It’s not “New Or-LEENs”, it’s “N’awlins”. Or, if you haven’t actually lived in Leeziana for a decade, “New Orlins”.

    Kinda like how I had to learn how to pronounce Melbin and Brisbin when I moved to Sydney. :)

    Cheers!

    Posted by dnewlander on 2005 09 01 at 12:37 AM • permalink

  6. Of course the bridge disaster is the fault of the US.  If they hadn’t deposed Saddam, the Shites wouldn’t be having their religious festivals!!

    Bastards!!!

    Posted by Razor on 2005 09 01 at 12:51 AM • permalink

  7. The Americans had a roadblock, it’s all their fault.

    Or was it two roadblocks.

    Not the fault of the opposing muslim sect which started the suicide bomber rumour.

    Posted by kae on 2005 09 01 at 01:00 AM • permalink

  8. Cuckoo.  At least they didn’t drone on and on about the fact the one third of the LA National Guard is currently deployed in Iraq.
    It’s the current mantra here.

    Posted by yojimbo on 2005 09 01 at 01:27 AM • permalink

  9. Just going by what I could see on tv today this relief effort is a joke.  It must be run by the Mickey Mouse Club or something.  I’m not talking about the restoration of power.  They need to get the Army in there yesterday and get those people out of there now.  The Army is very good with quick setups of temporary camps and this is what they need in a hurry.  You have many people in there starving and going without water for days while people walking around with their thumbs in their respective butts.  It’s pathetic.  Somebody should hang that Mayor and Governor now.  Rant concluded.

    Posted by yojimbo on 2005 09 01 at 01:39 AM • permalink

  10. About those people looting the stores, you have to make a distinction. 

    I saw a woman coming out of a store with 3 bags of diapers.  I’m not going to condemn that woman, at all.  She obviously has a baby somewhere, she’s run out of diapers, and there is absolutely nowhere in New Orleans where she could buy them, even if she wanted to.  No, taking food and diapers and the basic nessecities of life is not to be comdemned.

    As to the cement-heads stealing TV’s, guess what idiots, there’s no electricity, you won’t be able to watch it anyway.  And since the TV thieves look like your typical ghetto-rats, that means they live in a ghetto.  Guess what TV-thieving ghetto-rats, some other ghetto-rat is going to steal your TV while you are forcibly ejected from the city.

    Of course, six months or a year from now, all those ghetto dwellers will be whining and crying about not having jobs.  They won’t be bright enough to connect the fact that they looted, and ruined, hundreds and hundreds of businesses.  Businesses that provided these things called jobs.

    Posted by David Crawford on 2005 09 01 at 03:04 AM • permalink

  11. #8, Actually, our people have caught onto this particular meme.  As you know, we have nothing like the National Guard here in Oz, and our liberal media would consider them to be sadistic ‘Kent State’ killbots - but suddenly, when there’s heavy lifting to do, it’s ‘Where oh where are the National Guard?’

    Posted by cuckoo on 2005 09 01 at 03:11 AM • permalink

  12. What is wrong with the posters on this website? First Tim Blair says he’ll be back soon. And then he isn’t back soon at all. Selective quoting. Got it? So let me keep it simple for all of you. He said he’d be back soon. He wasn’t. And why does no-one else take Tim to task for this? He still isn’t back. I don’t know his reasoning. Tim, where are you?

    Skeptic

    Posted by Hanyu on 2005 09 01 at 03:38 AM • permalink

  13. While the commentariat of the west get themselves into gear for another venomous attack on Americans it was very warming to read an Iranian blogger from Iran pushing donations to American Red Cross

    “My way of saying, it is only natural that all of us come to need a bit of help sometimes. Please give as generously as you can”

    http://broodingpersian.blogspot.com/

    Posted by Ros on 2005 09 01 at 03:59 AM • permalink

  14. Interesting reading the pundits response to Katrina, some say it is not Americas Tsunami, others blame Katrina on the beligerence of the US policy on GW.

    The German environment minister didnt hold back and condemned the US for causing Katrina

    Nowhere is the UN to be seen, if the US has a disaster its their fault and they can fix it themselves, if there is a disaster elsewhere it is the US fault for not responding fast enough.

    Cowardly politics.

    Posted by rog2 on 2005 09 01 at 04:13 AM • permalink

  15. Hanyu - perhaps what Tim meant to say was that he was just stepping out for a bit, and might be gone for quite sometime.

    Waiting for Timmy.  Hhmmm.

    Posted by Ck on 2005 09 01 at 04:25 AM • permalink

  16. Hanyu you have to stretch that out to eleven posts and nothing less.

    Posted by yojimbo on 2005 09 01 at 04:27 AM • permalink

  17. David I’m not even talking about the rioters at present.  You have massive amounts of people waandering around in the downtown areas with no food or water and a growing disease problem of massive proportion.  I have not heard of one evacuation plan stated as of yet.  They want to get the people out of there where the Red Cross etc.,etc. can help them.  They are sending in buses to get the people out of the Superdome and into Houston.  Fort Polk(an Army urban warfare training site) is no more than 5 hours away.
    Fort Hood, with transport capability up the wazoo, is 12 to 14 hours away.  If they can get the freaking buses in then they can get military transport in to get massive amounts of people out of there in a short period of time.

    Posted by yojimbo on 2005 09 01 at 04:43 AM • permalink

  18. Re #14 - That’s about what you’d expect from a former journalist, a greenie, and unreconstructed Lefty: He’s a prat.

    Link

    Posted by walterplinge on 2005 09 01 at 05:19 AM • permalink

  19. Hanyu, you need to define “soon”.  I’m a little unclear on what you mean.

    :-P

    Posted by The_Real_JeffS on 2005 09 01 at 07:37 AM • permalink

  20. #14 and #18: As the Medienkritik post also alludes to, Trittin is pretty much the poster child for the term “watermelon”. He’s a Green since the 80s, but his rhetoric hasn’t changed much, if at all, since his younger days as a Communist.

    Posted by PW on 2005 09 01 at 03:11 PM • permalink

  21. New Orleans has become Escape from New York, but it’s a nightmarish reality.

    Story: There are 7 people trapped in the Gallary Row apartments at 448 Julia Street (corner of Julia and Magazine). They were attacked by armed gang who hijacked their truck and drove it through a locked gate in the parking garage. They are unable to leave the building due to the heavy presence of large, well-organized armed looters. They expect the building to be attacked at any moment.

    Story: My coworker’s brother is one of seven doctors who have been left behind at Charity Hospital. His name is Vinroot, I’m sorry, I don’t know the first name. He is in a panic—the doctors have barricaded themselves on the seventh floor because armed gunmen are outside threatening them and demanding access to the roof so they can be rescued first.

    story: University hospital has apparently slipped through the system and has yet to receive assistance as rescue efforts have been directed elsewhere. The hospital is absolutely non-functional and patients are dying at an alarming rate. My father in law (Dr. Oscar Ballester a treating physician at this hospital who is in need of food, water, and insulin) is stable, but we are unaware how long this will hold, possibly less than 48 hours.

    here

    Posted by 13times on 2005 09 01 at 07:03 PM • permalink

  22. WHAT IS AUSTRALIA DOING TO HELP OUR OVERWHELMED AMERICAN FRIENDS IN THE WAKE OF KATRINA!?
    WHERE IS THE INTERNATIONAL COMMUNITY, SO OFTEN THE BENEFICIARY OF AMERICAN AID, WHEN AMERICA SO OBVIOUSLY REQUIRES ASSISTANCE!?

    Posted by Brian on 2005 09 01 at 07:31 PM • permalink

  23. Brian, Brian, it’s okay. Calm down now.

    Posted by Andrea Harris, Administrator on 2005 09 01 at 07:45 PM • permalink

  24. Not to throw a wet blanket on you, but really, to what extent can the rest of the world do something besides donate money? The only country with sufficient capacity to move equipment and goods across the ocean (pick one of ‘em, depending on your location) is, well, the United States. I don’t advocate sitting on one’s hands (and at least in the West, I doubt that’s happening anywhere - the German government has offered whatever assistance is needed, for one), but it’s an unfortunate fact that the rest of the world has vastly smaller hands than the US, so to speak.

    Posted by PW on 2005 09 01 at 07:52 PM • permalink

  25. Ah, Andrea beat me to it. Obviously not busy enough adding bold tags!

    Posted by PW on 2005 09 01 at 07:53 PM • permalink

  26. Ah! That’s a bit better!
    I’ve been asking that question, “where’s the help?” for two days now. If you ask me, the offers took a long time in coming, or at least being made known. I wasn’t actually thinking money, I was thinking boots on the ground kind of stuff to restore order and facilitate aid and rescue. Surely countries like Australia and New Zealand could send a thousand troops or SES workers???
    I just heard we’re sending the grand total of 20! Things are only going to get worse there. It’s like watching someone bleed to death.
    Thanks for the link Andrea ;-)

    Posted by Brian on 2005 09 01 at 11:43 PM • permalink

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