Samedi~Soirée

This Is Change? 20 Hawks, Clintonites and Neocons to Watch for in Obama's White House~Jeremy Scahill
~Special thanks~ Kevin Gosztola: How Many Clinton Retreads Does It Take to Screw Up an Obama Administration?
~"Barack Obama campaigned on a pledge to bring change to Washington. "I don't want to just end the war," he said early this year. "I want to end the mindset that got us into war."
That is going to be very difficult if Obama employs a foreign policy team that was central to creating that mindset,
before and during the presidency of George W. Bush.
"Twenty-three senators and 133 House members who voted against the war -- and countless other notable individuals who spoke out against it and the dubious claims leading to war -- are apparently not even being considered for these crucial positions," observes
Sam Husseini of the Institute for Public Accuracy. This includes dozens of former military and intelligence officials who spoke out forcefully against the war and continue to oppose militaristic policy, as well as credible national security experts who have articulated their visions for a foreign policy based on justice."

Levees.org prepares Counter to Corps of Engineers’ PR campaign

Hairstylists leverage bonds with clients to recognize domestic abuse~Affrodite's Adventures in Nappy Hair

Po Boy Festival
~Squandered Heritage

NOLA RISING NYC!

New Orleans "Desire" car No. 952 crosses Golden Gate Bridge!

New Orleans' Basin Street Signs Jeremy Davenport
~all about Jazz

Samedi~Déjeuner

New Orleans to top crime rankings; St. Louis comes in at No. 4 ~Jeremy Kohler

Behind the Scenes: A mother's grief in New Orleans
~Soledad O'Brien

Hospital plans worry
New Orleans neighborhood

Blakely hints this budget may be his last~Paul Murphy, WWL

Debrisville Notes~ADRASTOS

Jindal begins Iowa trip with tour, speech~Michele Millhollen

Texas Governor Blasts FEMA, Creates Hurricane Recovery Commission

A Personal Perspective on the Power Game and the NFIP’s Katrina Expedited Claims Procedures ~slabbed

HUD OKs Port of Gulfport Funding ~Melissa Scallon

Customs seeks to keep unsafe, cheap shrimp out of U.S.
Jeremy Alford~Louisiana’s shrimp industry, along with those in other Southern states, has waged a long-fought battle to curb the illegal dumping of cheap foreign shrimp on the U.S. market. The shrimp is often sold below production costs.

State-supplied generators returned

Chertoff to hand over a changed guard~Carl Prine

'Blue roof' complaints investigated, Corps is asking Dept of Labor to probe Ike workers' claims~Matt Stiles
"We've heard a lot of those stories. It's unfortunate that these things happened."~Mike DeMasi, deputy director for project management in Corps's Galveston office.
~Editilla gotta Ax~
...because we knew there would be trouble'deep when the Corps of Engineers took over the Blue Roof program.
Much of this involves The Citizen signing over their"Right of Entry" in order to get into the program, to get a Blue Tarp. That is if they can find a pen amongst the debris of their damaged homes, with which to sign away their rights. Why? Why did the Corps of Engineers become involved in Roofing people's houses?
Why isn't the Corps taking care of flood control?
One of the main reasons I can see is this: the more money available to an organization, the more money available. Hence, the more "projects" that the Corps of Engineers can take on, then the more money they will have under their control, and therefore the more political power concentrated their way.
Many'a'rilla might ax themselves, "Oh but they are our own Government Engineers! Why would they do this?". The Answer is that the Corps of Engineers is NOT a "government" organization. Apparently they operate more to the benefit of Larger Corporations than the piddly needs of actual Citizen Tax-Payers.
Given their record in New Orleans and South Louisiana post Katrina and the Midwestern levee failures this past summer, it would appear that the Corps does NOT have the tax-paying citizenry's best interest in their "flood control" plans.
Maybe they are working for Big Energy, Titan Corp, KBR, ADM, Prudential Agri'biz, State Farm Insurance and other multi-national Non-Tax Paying, Land Granted Entities? Hell, the list goes on, but one thing is deadly obvious: the Corps of Engineers does not work for the American Tax Payers. Soooo, why would the Corps get into the Roofing Business...
--especially while their Levees already leak so badly?

Marathon Oil Corporation Donates $1.5 Million to American Red Cross for Hurricanes

News Alert: Big Oil pays taxes!
~Your Right Hand Thief

ACT Appeal Cuba: Hurricane Gustav and Hurricane Ike emergency assistance

Island Rd.*
no leaves on the trees,
only bare bark cascading like a brown river
outstretched on limbs formed in yearning arcs and tangles,
their dark silhouettes
haunting the still blue sky

they hover statuesque above tall grass
like old brittle veins
that once knew the warmth of a body
and the way to gather for making love
~please read further

Seems like old times
~Randy Rosetta

Coming up in this week’s Gambit: The Baby, It’s Cold Outside Edition

Farewell To Storyville
~Citizen K

K, W and N:
Four-letter stories
~Talmadge Gleck

New Orleans jazz from Claude Luter ~Jazzarific

Vendredi

Waiting for the Go
~Molly Day, Gambit Weekly
~Louisiana is poised to become a leader in environmental restoration — so why aren't the state and federal governments coming up with policies and money to make it happen?

~Editilla bat'schillas~Gentle'rillas...
please go check out the new Gambit Weekly site!
Bookmark it and sign up for their little thingy.
Goodness Gracious Great Googly Mooglies! Damn this is great,
as I am an idiot and find this site extremely accommodating.
Here, for once, the news finds me, rather than having to dig for it by jumping though labyrinths of Advertising Shame.
Now, this is the way to run a print media down the internet supa'forkin highway. Many I have spoken to have worried how Gambit might do this, follow their loyal readers to the immediate surroundings high above the turgid flood waters, on that Great Ladder in da'Sky. (Because, let's face it, if the TP is any indication then newsprint media will be nothing but Corps of Engineers Floodwall Filler before the next decade is out.)
Wet paper jus'soooo sucks when the levees break, eh?
But rest easy, Gentle'rillas. The Pony Expresso has arrived.

Big Oil hurt coast, so why doesn’t it pay for repairs?
~Dennis Woltering

Oilfield canals crisscross the marshes of southern Terrebonne Parish.

~Engineer reports what waterways were like more than 100 years ago

New Orleans: the City that Civil Engineers Forgot~S. Rosenthal
~"I can count on one hand the number of civil engineers who have come forward to publicly rebuke and berate the Corps of Engineers for its well documented gross negligence."

:A CE
Americans for Civilizing Engineers ~This website was created by concerned engineers from New Orleans and south Louisiana as a struggle against the intimidation of civil engineers
by the US Army Corps of Engineers and the ASCE.
Editilla call'em: ASCECORPS for short.

New Hope for the Gulf Coast?
~Sue Sturgis, Facing South
~"It means a chance for a do-over," says James Perry, executive director of Americans for Gulf Coast Recovery, a citizens' lobby created in 2006. "Katrina fatigue had become the norm, but this new administration has said Gulf Coast reconstruction is a priority. We're already getting calls from people close to the administration asking about what they need to go back and correct."

The Scheme: Oh, lord I want to be in that number - the power game (Chapter 5 qui tam) ~slabbed
trav’ling’ in the footsteps of those who’ve gone before
…we’ll all be reunited on a new and sunlit shore
Katrina, the hurricane, was a trumpet, not a saint.
When the trumpet sounds its call
the powerful go marching in.

Chertoff on the Government's Role in Managing Risk ~Knowledge@Wharton
~Looking back at the 9/11 attacks and various natural disasters during his soon-to-conclude tenure, "or even the current financial crisis, it becomes very clear that we have not always handled risk properly," Chertoff acknowledged.

Getting to the end game
~Humid City

New Orleans Po-Boy Preservation Festival
~Ian McNulty
~New this year are sample-size sandwiches, priced $2 to $3, to aid comparison of the many varieties around the festival.
Expect everything from traditional roast beef to banh mi, the crunchy, spicy Vietnamese sandwich. Free admission.

Three-Legged Pony Makes Unusual Recovery~WDSU

It's Tender Footing
~Our New Orleans Saints

Inside, Outside New Orleans:
They Still Love Us
~Aimee Thibodeaux, BBuzz

Street- car and bus rides could cost more ~WWL


Jindal sets hiring freeze
~Michlelle Millhollon

Finances pinched at N.O. hospitals~Allan Johnson Jr.

New Orleans commission approves hotel financing

Gov. Perry: Feds are slighting Texas in Ike aid~Mike Snyder

Phil Bryant considers run for governor of MS
~Michael Newsom

Coal industry, utilities ponder future under Obama
~Jim Suhr

New Corps Plans for Repatriation, Reburial
of Native Remains


Spiders get their space legs
— all eight of them!
~After tangled false start, two weave amazing new webs in zero gravity

Saturday Farmers' Market

Medeski, Martin and Wood still going their own way
~Chris Barton

The Iguanas take the Blue Moon Saloon stage~Cody Daigle

HAPPY BIRTHDAY DOCTOR!

Dr. John

Jeudi

Star-Spangled Banner Days
~Robert M. Poole

Few Crime Cameras Repaired After Gustav
~The city purchased 213 crime cameras, but nearly half of them are out of order. Some neighborhoods have few working cameras at all. Last May, someone was shot and killed right underneath one of those cameras.

Meanwhile, Crime Is Fought
~We Could Be Famous

"There's little to show for the
$7 million taxpayers have plunged down this rabbit hole."
~Your Right Hand Thief

Bye, Bye, White Girl
~Andrea Boll

Blind racist learns Obama isn't Irish~Cha Cha Pitchoulas

A President Who Asks for Help
~techPresident

Honore: Cultural shift key to storm preparedness

"Give Me Some Exuberance!"
~Garland Robinette

These cranes only point down
~Library Chronicles

Give thanks to New Orleans cooking teachers for their best holiday tips and recipes
~Judy Walker
~Editilla wanna toll'yaz~
This will be perhaps the only TP article on da'Ladda today.
Please see yesterday's Tilla'Rant top lede.
We have begun a partial boycott of the Times Picayune because we never know when they will display Flash Adverts for the Corps of Engineers in order to Taint the Jury Pool before the MRGO lawsuit due in 181 days. Seeing these expensive PR Lies absolutely turns my stomach --which brings me to Judy Walker, who has always made my stomach feel at home.
It is about Soul Food, Our Food.
This also brings me to Keith Spera, Mark Schleifstein, Sheila Grissett, James Gill, Sheila Stroup, Eric Elie --just to name only a few of my regular favorites. We will follow our heroes, albeit reluctantly and with the greatest trepidation.
Chris Rose is now a book promoter who disgusts Editilla almost as much as any scurrilous Corps Spokesperson.

I suggest everyone give up on the TP for at least a week.
Seek out other news. When you see a TP headline online, go look for the story somewhere else. Don't look at the ads, and by all means do not click on the Corps Adverts because you will then be spending even more Tax Payer Flood Funds with each click.
Or, you can follow Editilla's lead and correspond with these other advertisers about the TP's Conflict of Interest.
Try to see what news there is elsewhere in New Orleans. See how damn shameful it is that the TP has been bought-off by the Corps.

What I'm getting at is we are done here with Weakest Links in our Flood Safety. The Corps of Engineers has Compromised our only major daily Press in New Orleans. Perhaps that is their intent in spending Tax Payer Flood Funds to Advertise in the TP.
Maybe they want the public to give up on expecting any kind of aggressive investigative journalism out of the TP.
It worked for me. I'm having a bad time with such a concept.
The statements in the Adverts are Patently False.
The Corps of Engineers is Increasing Risk by Spinning Hard --with that excruciatingly Bad Marketing Grammar To Boot...
like "Kwik Check" or "Bellyfeel Newspeak".
Is the TP working to become "Victory News"?

While the Mayor has obviously seriously screwed the City and Corruptly demolished homes at will the TP sat on its Ass.
While the Corps does whatever it wants post Federal Flood, the TP places ads for them, treats them like conquering Kings.
This is unmitigated bullshit because if/when those levees fail again, all the great journalists in the world are not going to protect us from the mayhem. Too much trouble is going down in town for the TP to simply play Nice.

The Corps of Engineers must be dealt with before any meaningful future can be even imagined in New Orleans. We need a local media outlet that is on the side of the City --not on the side of her Rapists. It is bad enough that this newspaper fails to inform the public about threats to their safety but I will be goddamned if they will be allowed to Promote the Perps.
So, until the TP comes off of it, they are on the side of the Murdering Rapists. Should Gentle'rillas think I'm smelling a bit strong here, just tell me first if you were in the the city when the levees failed and/or speak to me of the past 3 years of "recovery".
And this is only the beginning! HA!
Next (soon) we'll try to tell you what other media outlets have Flood on their Hands!
And before anyone axs, their new, concerned and extremely forthcoming Editor in Chief assures me Gambit is solid. Not that Editilla had any doubts about anyone who would carry their servers with them before a hurricane, it is so gratifying to be taken seriously about this, and reassuring that we won't have to render them into budan like like a Tiny Peccary.

Corps of Engineers to host youth deer hunt

Gustav may cost BR $14 million
~Scott Dyer

Recovery dollars for businesses could vanish~Jeremy Alford

NOAA Announces Up to $47 Million for Hurricane Damage to Fisheries

New Bankruptcy Law Restrictions Lifted for Scores of Hurricane Victims
~John Campbell

Armed with bat, man takes cat back from shelter before it's put down ~Debbie Denmon

Should the oil industry pay to fix coastal damage?
~Dennis Woltering

Cameron Diaz in New Orleans, Talks Green Architecture ~ecorazzi

Katrina Film: Attorney Jalene Mack Tackles Big Screen

Musicians Bringing Musicians Home IV Benefit Announced
~Plug in Music

New orchestra seeks to demystify classical music
~Frank Daugherty

A singer and his city
~Stacey Plaisance

Mercredi

Times Picayune Supports Corps Supports Times Picayune Supports Corps Supports...


~Editilla Kicks AssBuff~
We do not advertise for the Corps of Engineers. These trademarked images are posted as evidence of skulduggery and unethical collusion between the Times Picayune and the Corps.
Building Strong. Reducing Risk. This is the absolute opposite of what the Corps has (not) been doing in Terrebone Parish.
This is the rational opposite of what they had every intention of Not Doing with the Pumps had it not been for Matt McBride calling them out on rusted pipes. This is not in congroovience with using the Times Picayune News Paper as levee filler.
These are Buzz Words from Advertising. Spin'filtration. Pablum.
This is Glaring Conflict of Interests (GSI) by the Times Picayune.
The lede above links to my rant of September regarding this,
so I linked it here to show Gentle'rillas what is still going down behind your backs. We pay to pay more.

This Flash Advert above appears today on the story about "N.O. firm questioned in probe". Note: It may not be there when you go look as they seem to rotate on different pages. Slick bastards.
The Corps of Engineers will be in a Jury Trial in 182 Days.
They should not be legally allowed to Spend Tax Payers' Funding to engage in Public Relations before their Trial by Jury for definitely flooding the city of New Orleans August 29, 2005
BY INCREASING OUR RISKS BY NOT BUILDING STRONG.
The Corps is Lying through its Goddamned Teeth
with Tax Funded Advertising. Who paid the Sales Tax here TP?
Can we see the name of whoever signed-off on this expense?
Did the Times Picayune get a tax write-off?
The Corps isn't exactly a for-profit corporation, yet... right?
I say it is Wrong to Taint the Jury Pool with Public Relations.
What we have here is a failure to communicate!
What we have here is Shock Doctrine Disaster Capitalism.
What we have here is Fluff Flash Ads in the Newspaper read by the Demographic that will Seat the Corps' Jury in 182 days...
--about the start of next year's hurricane season.
That is what keeps me up about all of this shifty horse'doings:
the Corps is Not Reducing Risk
because they are Not Building Strong(er).
They are juggling books and waiting for us all to die off.
We were providentially lucky with Gustav,
--not protected by their sorry asses-- and Every Body Knows It.
Folks may not admit that, but we almost bought it again.
I can't do this again. Floods creep me out.

Back in September, I called Editor Peter Kovacs about this. He, glibly, argued that this practice is no different than taking money from a Candidate during election without supporting their View.
The Times Picayune needs to fire that Dumb Ass.
Editilla retorted that this practice is more akin to Advertising for a Murderer in the weeks before their trial for flooding New Orleans with MRGO. I hung up the phone feeling used, scammed.
Did anyone see a single Ad for William Jefferson in the TP? Jus'axin.
VP of Advertising Kelly Rose did not return my phone call seeking clarification on the TP's Ethics Policy.
Hey, y'all' I tried.
This Media Company has no published Company Ethics Policy, such as the NYT or 90% of the American Media Industry that I surveyed via telephone and email over a two week period after the last time the TP shoveled this shit into the streets.
They do not have one in either Print or Online editions, as recommended by 5 out of the 5 Journalism professors I asked.
Here are their emails.
Please ask them yourselves. Toll'em I sent you.
Ashton Phelps, publisher: aphelps@aol.com
James Amoss, Editor: jamoss@timespicayune.com
Peter Kovacs, managing editor-news: pkovacs@timespicayune.com
Kelly Rose, Vice-president advertising: krose@timespicayune.com

Then I spoke with TP Journalist Mark Schleifstein about this.
He literally wrote the book on this Path of Destruction with John McQuaid, also someone who I've found to be seriously straight-up. I will continue to trust this journalist, will seek him out regardless of how this shakes out with his paper...
--and this will shake out I promise.
He assured me that these ads are part of Nola.com and not part of the Paper Proper. I believed him and laid off of always placing a disclaimer beneath any TP article regarding the Corps and backing off of this Rant. How foolish was that, eh? Silly'tilla me!
Now...Editilla believes that a difference that makes no difference is no difference. If we can't trust journalists who can we trust?
I say this sounds like Bourgeois Naivity. I say the result of this view (the continuous positive advertising above for the Corps at Tax Payer Expense) is obviously ambiguous at best and at its worst is Shit in One Hand / Half-a-Dozen in The Other!
I say the result of this view is Soft Treatment of the Corps before they face the Largest Product Liability Lawsuit in History: MRGO.

I say it is wrong for the Corps of Engineers to use My Tax Money to make themselves shine before Trial. Indeed the Corps of Engineers needs to come up off of how much Flood Control Funding it is spending in Advertising and Public Relations overall. I suspect the amount would stun even those jaded by the current financial bailout. Who designs their slick website to which these ads lead the unsuspecting reader? How much of the Our Flood Control Funding is being used for these Advertisements? I will not allow the Corps of Engineers to spend our Flood Control Funding to tell us how glad we should be that they flooded our city and killed 1000s of our fellow citizens.

I say I say I say... because that seems to be all I can do. I certainly do not have the Funding for Advertising with the Times Picayune. Who has that kind of money? Levees.org does not have that kind of money. Neither does Pump to the River, or MRGO MUST GO!
We The People cannot compete with the Perps who Flooded Us.
We can't seem to Stop the Corps from continuing to Spinfiltrate their Responsibility for Bad Engineering. Indeed we reward it!

Editilla tried to call these people the nice way. Nothing but more Conflicts in Advertising. I have walked a long and troubled path since standing in the middle of that crime. Now we take the back hand path. This Shit Must Not Stand. Please contact the TP Editors and ask them yourselves. Maybe Editilla is wrong here.

I emailed all those listed above and we hope Gentle'rillas will too.
For every headline the TP posts we will try diligently to find another source. I cannot in good conscience support this paper when it supports the people who flooded our city and continue to run from the truth of that crime.
In fact, I see anyone who would stand on that side of the Levee with the Corps as standing apart from and against We The People Who Hold Truth To Be Self Evident...and who must always face the tragic results of such jailhouse punk'ass liaisons.
This is most disappointing due to my own admiration for most of the "journalists" who write for the TP --particularly Schleifstein, who seems to be getting his editor's finger in his ass while they pee down his leg and tell us it is only raining. And let this be a lesson to all Safe Flood Control Advocacy groups all across the country: Divided We Drown!

Priorities of the corps need reform~Maura Wood

Group sues Army Corps to get sand tested~Donna Weaver

Ethics cases delayed
~Marsha Shuler

State asks feds to OK funds for N.O. hospital
~Allen Johnson Jr.

Honoré speaks of readiness
~Robert Scott

SDT employee says company dumped raw sewage in City Park ~Lee Zurik

Black leaders start meeting today in New Orleans to discuss change ~Becky Bohrer

Mardi ~Fire Mayor Ray Nagin! ~Recall Ray!

Live Piracy Map 2008

$5 billion in federal hurricane aid to La. unspent
~Elinda DesLatte

Army Corps of Engineers connected to banned firms getting new U.S. building contracts in Iraq ~Matt Kelley
~A firm suspended from U.S. government contracts for allegedly bribing Army officers was awarded a new contract in Iraq two days after the suspension was imposed, government investigators found. The Pentagon paid the suspended company more than $1 million under the new contract.

Corruption May Have Helped Undermine City Levees
~November 3, 2005 LA Times.
~Editilla Can't Get No Satisfaction~
We would like to remind everyone of the Corps of Engineers' culture of corruption, and 3 people I think they would like to see discredited, in the run-up to the MRGO Lawsuit:
1) Dr. Raymond Seed~“These levees should have been expected to perform adequately if they had been designed and constructed properly,”
2) Robert G. Bea, a civil engineering professor at Berkeley, expert witness and a member of Seed’s investigating team.
3) Ivor van Heerden, a Louisiana State University geologist headed a third inquiry, for the state of Louisiana.

Hearing scheduled on levee tie-in~Matt Scallan

Liprap's Lament - The Line
~On the one hand, I want to yell my ever-ready mantra at Peter Schjeldahl concerning his opining on Prospect .1:
"We don't care how they do it in New York!!!!"
However, he does raise some valid points about how the atmosphere of New Orleans circa 8-29 and three years afterwards has affected the participating artists

New Orleans East
and the Master Plan
~We Could Be Famous

Starting to think I voted for the wrong guy ~Library Chronicles

Insurance costs keep Miss. Habitat houses locked
~Shelia Byrd

Obama Enlists Supporters in Wildfire Relief~Matthew Delong

Ticket requests swamp Landrieu
~With the inauguration of President-elect Barack Obama coming up on Jan. 20, U.S. Sen. Mary Landrieu is being asked to watch it with 12,000 of her closest friends.

Could be 2009 before panel hears Klan death case
~Kevin McGill

Carville the class clown to get serious at Tulane~John Pope

Pennsylvania grand jury looking at how GOP used New Orleans demographer's work
~David Hammer

California bent on rebuilding despite wildfire risk
~Mary Milliken

Professor gets grant for
New Orleans restoration
~Richard Oxley

Registration Begins for 2009 WebEOC User Conference
~Emergency Managers Nationwide Convening in San Diego Show "The Power of Community"

Two more booked in alligator thefts

Mixed year for La citrus growers

1851 Magnetic Society of New Orleans~Green Lantern Press

Indian Hurricane Katrina Relief Workers Were Treated Like Slaves ~Barry Seward

Five Reasons to Go Native

American Indian Pow-Wow offers food, dance and heritage in Gonzales, La. ~Jon Donely

Po'Boy Preservation Festival This Weekend in New Orleans ~Serious Eats

A Beautiful Moon
in New Orleans~Asparagus Thin

Houston artist's sculpture hops over to New Orleans

gentrification
~Red Star Perspective
~"I’m in New Orleans for a meeting of non-profit recovery advocates. Yesterday, I spent about 45 minutes talking to a local photographer, Christopher Porche-West, about the changes in the city since Hurricane Katrina and his particular challenges rebuilding his life."

Radio documentary about Jonathan Freilich is as wide-ranging as guitarist's career ~Dave Walker

The Radiators
~Music for Humans

Lundi~Recall Ray Nagin! Nagin Must Go! ~Raaayyycaalllaaa!~Raaayyycaalllaaa!~

Slaves Votes Heavily In Obama’s Favor ~Wonkette

New Louisiana:
KKK vs. Black Panthers?
~Jeff Crouere
~James Brown say Get Down!
Editilla say Get Back Up Again!

Recall petition forming for Terrebonne Parish president

~Recall of New Orleans Mayor Ray Nagin?
~Editilla gotta holla~
Certain nola bloggers may coitainly consider me Quixotic, but it ain't my butt Nagin has his thumbs up. I say Pie da'Bastad->
He needs to leave office sooner than later --but wheneva and whereva he goes it should be with the Blackest Eyes of any mayor in the history of this city.
Otherwise, we will see him again and again just like the Morials.
Jus'sayin, at the very least Nagin should be getting pie in his face wheneva and wheneva he show it.

Malik Rahim 2008 Thomas Merton award recipient

Eve Ensler creates new play:
'Swimming Upstream' for the Katrina Warriors~Molly Reid
~The play premiered in April at the V-Day 10th anniversary celebration in New Orleans, and returns Tuesday for the first local repeat performance since its debut.

I Lost an Idol Today…
~Gentilly Girl~"I lost a beloved hero today...
--Gore Vidal. In an interview with Andrew Gumbel who asked him about Obama as president, Vidal replied:
“Slaves have a hard time making poetry,” he said, relishing the shock factor, “unless it’s got a beat.”
Now Vidal makes pithy statements all of the time. It’s one reason I liked him. He has a wonderful mind and the ability to see through the B/S that befuddle others, but this time he showed his fucking soul- he’s an aristocratic, Racist fuckmook."

New Orleans cemeteries reviving from neglect ~Mary Foster
AP Photo/Bill Haber

Hurricane Katrina: Invisible to the Tourist Eye~Janet Morrison
~Everything is not fine.
Something about that seems terribly wrong.
The scars because of our terrible mistake are, unfortunately, hidden--except to those who continue to be affected.

The New Orleans Biennial beckons~The New Yorker

The New Orleans Biennial
Crescent City Connections
~2 from Ariella Cohen

The Scheme: What’s the first case on the docket - the blame game (Chapter 4 qui tam) ~slabbed
~It seems strange to me for the insurance industry to be one the nation’s leading players of blame the lawyer. Insurers employee so many that you’d think they liked lawyers a lot.

The Difference Between
Show Business and Business
~Harry Shearer

FEMA launches recovery Web site; information differs from City of New Orleans site
~Bruce Nolan

FEMA’s plans to clean waterway debris from 2005 hurricanes, but not from the 2008 hurricanes, leave many baffled ~Facing South

FEMA/EMI’s New "Principles of Emergency Management" ~SEMP

Army Corps projects quietly fuel Alaska economy

New standards force major facelift for Tanana River levee
~Without that work, the FEMA could wind up labeling much of Fairbanks, Alaska as officially flood-prone -- a change that could leave the community paying millions more, collectively, for individual flood insurance plans in the future.

TerraGo Technologies Congratulates Ray Caputo, Army Corps of Engineers, for USGIF Geospatial Intelligence Achievement Award Win

Doubts swirl about effectiveness of no-flush urinals
~The influential U.S. Green Building Council promotes no-flush urinals as a way to win its prized Leadership in Energy and Environmental Design endorsements. The U.S. Army Corps of Engineers specifies them for the service's future construction. Nobel laureate and former Vice President Al Gore is a board member of Falcon Waterfree Technologies of Grand Rapids, Mich., the leading no-flush urinal maker.
Still, an inconvenient truth hovers over the no-flush urinal industry. It's that many buyers and one-time fans say that the urinals are icky, tricky and costly to maintain.
(By process of elimination, Editilla just couldn't pass this one up!;)

RC helicopter used after Hurricane Katrina

Fred Cain Landscape Rake

Analysis of Disaster Response Plans and the Aftermath of Hurricane Katrina:
Lessons Learned From a Level I Trauma Center

City Park's front door is getting $2 Million makeover
~Frank Donze

Does Your Grocery Store Have You Crying Tears of Joy? ~Serious Eats

Businesses finding home in offbeat Marigny area
~Emilie Bahr

Copeland's Social City Launch Set for Nov. 21

White Beans and Andouille Sausage ~Cajun Cooking TV

Chuck Carbo: Good Things Come To Those Who Wait
~Home of the Groove

Dimanche ~Recall Mayor Ray Nagin

Editilla just watched the '60 Minutes' interview with Barrack Obama and I got one final impression.
We will have a Basket Ball player in the White House, who happens to think in paragraphs and speak in complete sentences. "Mom in Chief" (her words)
is a Harvard Educated Lawyer. Jus'sayin... whoa!
I think that is a great thing.

Comment by Keith Olbermann on Prop 8 ~Hrrmph!

Fag'less Mormon Underwear->
"I keep hearing this term "re-defining" marriage.
If this country hadn't re-defined marriage, black people still couldn't marry white people.
Sixteen states had laws on the books which made that illegal... in 1967. 1967.
The parents of the President-Elect of the United States couldn't have married in nearly one third of the states of the country their son grew up to lead. But it's worse than that. If this country had not "re-defined" marriage, some black people still couldn't marry...black people."

I Can’t Marry Someone I Love? ~Gentilly Girl

Mayor Hasn't Learned His Lesson~Jarvis DeBerry

New Orleans Mayor Disappears Amid Corruption, Crime, Scandal~Details Details

The Klan violently reappears
~Times Picayune
<--Klancuffs on the floor of the "ritural" tent (blown up from the article's slide-show photo -- not mentioned by the TP journalists) The mayor of Bogalusa, James "Mack" McGehee, said he "probably hadn't heard the word (KKK) for 20 years." "It gives your community a black eye, " said McGehee, 48. "My generation has never experienced anything like that, and it goes to show that these types of people can live right next to you and you'd never know it."
~Editilla's gotta Hammer~
We would like to point out that this man is a goddamn fool,
(or an Imperial Liar himself) whose "generation" experienced Exactly This in Jena two years ago, and this last year.
The biggest mistake people make when considering the social networking capabilities of Racially Inferior People (RIPs) is to forget that any dain'bramaged redneck can use Hand Cuffs.
"Just goes to show'ya.." is the same thing we always hear survivors say, as with German Concentration Camps, the Mass Graves around Sarajevo, and the Pedophiles of the Catholic Church, Mormon Child Marriages and Ballot Homotropia.
Well, I'll be Goddamned! Who'da thunk'it, eh?
Just a few miles away, a few states over the line.
Whoooo would have expected big-time authority figures like the US Army Corps of Engineers would build such Gruesomely, Criminally Fallible Flood Control Structures
--and kill 1000s and continue try to lie about it?
Who'da thought? But I guess that really isn't the same thing, eh?
Literally Right In Our Own Back Yards!
Just goes to show'ya... the Dead Can't Complain!
Nazis, Stupid Ass White People, Deviant Priests, Bad Presidents, ASCECORPS... who can complain? Who'ya gonna call?
Jus'sayin... just goes ta'show'ya...
--They Have Already Gone and Shown Us.

Corps of Engineers
Still Maintains Federal Flood
of New Orleans Was Katrina!

For a successful technology, reality must take precedence over public relations,
for Nature cannot be fooled.
~Richard P. Feynman

~Paul Mlakar will pose the question "New Orleans and Hurricane Katrina: What happened and why?" Katrina, one of the strongest storms to hit the U.S. coast in the past century, produced a magnitude of destruction that brought extensive damage to the hurricane protection system and catastrophic failure to a number of structures, raising significant questions about the integrity of the system prior to the storm and its capacity to provide future protection, even after repairs.
As a senior research scientist for weapons effects and structural dynamics at the U.S. Army Engineer Research and Development Center in Vicksburg, Miss., Mlakar has spent his career studying these phenomena and will offer his seasoned perspective about the country's preparedness. He has looked at catastrophic, human-caused events such as the Oklahoma City Murrah Building bombing and the Pentagon terrorist attack and at natural events like Katrina. <-Dr. Raymond Seed begs to differ with this fakir's assesments.
~Editilla gotta warn'yaz~
This man, Bull Mlakar, and others like him have been touring the country speaking to Engineering Schools, telling this tale, framing this story. We believe that by spinning This Shit, with alarming frequency of press, the Corps Public Relations Contractors are attempting to slant the view of the MRGO lawsuit due in 185 Days.
This will be a trial by Jury. And, we are paying to taint it?
Don't get stuck on Stupid. These articles are "placed".
The Corps thinks it can simply keep telling people that it was Katrina, or local management, or natural sinking --when it was their own Bad Engineering that flooded New Orleans on 8/29.
We really need Executive Intervention here. We need the new President Barrack Obama, Commander in Chief, to address this issue of his subordinates' (US Army Corps of Engineers) insubordination. We really really need the 8/29 Investigation.
Why? Because we cannot forget...NEVERMORE!
Because Insanity requires this of us...
...the telling of this story over and over and over and...

A 30-mile levee sprint
~"This is an aggressive project," Interim Executive Director Bill Edgar told agency directors earlier this week in Yuba City.
"We're not standing around twiddling our thumbs."
While the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers has been pursuing what some local officials say is an off-again, on-again study of Sutter County flood protection, the agency wants to move ahead with state and local funded repairs before the Army Corps study makes its recommendations for flood-safety improvements in 2010.

Thousands of parked FEMA units destined to be sold for scrap ~Greg Garland
FEMA is paying $80,000 a month to lease a 447-acre site in Lottie in Pointe Coupee Parish to store 25,000 trailers once used for Hurricane Katrina victims. FEMA officials say most of the trailers will be sold for scrap. Photo: Bill Feig -The Advocate

FEMA pays to clean waterways of debris from Hurricane Katrina but not Gustav ~Chris Kirkham

Bayou residents to gain cover during Thanksgiving blitz ~Laura McKnight

Bush Political Lackey Marc Racicot Curbed by American Insurance Association ~slabbed

The GOP: Architects of Another 'Great Depression'
~The Existential Cowboy

Endowed foundations in the
New Orleans area are seeing their investments erode


It's about...
~Our New Orleans Saints

R&B music legend Fats Domino documentary has special meaning to local filmmakers

Obama should bring jazz back to the White House

Voodoo Experience 2008
(The Hidden Voodoo)
~all abut Jazz