Corps Fancy All-Female PR Firm, Atomic Opposite of Levees.org ~These "Ladies" are getting paid $5M in Flood Funding to misinform and misdirect the public view of the Perps who flooded our City on 8/29/05 and killed over 1500 American citizens. In response to ASCECORPS' immediate attempts to spin'filtrate that criminal negligence in the National Media, Levees.org formed as a grass-roots, non-partisan, multi-ethnic, multi-generational, multi-gender, socio-economical, and hence, omni-adaptable gumbo of Nolafugees to Inform the Public View ...as somewhat of an Antibody Politic... for nothing! Shit in one hand, diamonds in the other. Who'ya gonna call? ~In contrast, Levees.org has been laboring since December 2005 to reduce the number of negative stories about New Orleans - and been very effective - without any tax payer support of any kind, an entirely volunteer effort. Your hard-earned dollars, $5 million dollars, could instead have gone toward finding the truth about the Flooding in Greater New Orleans. AstroTurf or Real Grass? Guess we can see who dyes their roots?
~Janice Roper-Graham, founder and president of OPP, said: The information was removed from OPP's Web site after Rosenthal's email circulated because: "(we) didn't want to give the impression that OPP was 'signally responsible'(??) for the decrease in bad press." ~Editilla sayz Oooo'rilla?~New Phrase! New phrase! "SignallyResponsible"?WTF doesthat mean??? Oh this is rich, even if it might just be a typo or cross-cultural grammatical error! HA! Double HA! HA! I always wanted a girl in a Freudian Slip.
No wonder now why No One believes what the Corps is saying, even when we kinda understand what the Corps is maybe saying? Because this Communications Firm hired to Communicate the Corps to the Public is itself a pack of Horny-faced LyingMisComunicators, aka Public Relations Spin'filtraitors. From the puissant lips of the Succubus... OPP provides media support for print, broadcast and Internet media on local, national and international levels including outlets such as the Times-Picayune, WWL-TV CBS New Orleans, Associated Press, USA Today, The Weather Channel, The Today Show, French TV Channel 5, and Engineering News Record on issues such as Hurricane Gustav, “paper in the floodwalls” and other investigative responses, seepage, peer review and the state of the hurricane and storm damage risk reduction system. As part of this cause (?), OPP fosters strategic relationships with media outlets that result in more accurate and balanced stories. OPP focuses on the enhancement of internal and external communications between the various Corps districts,stakeholders, media and the general public. OPP has facilitated a myriad of interviews about the rebuilding of hurricane system levees and interim risk reduction structures. Our team members have facilitated in-depth interviews with producers and hosts of The History Channel and MTV. Oh'Snap! OPP's media support has been a fundamental part of the transition from typically negative news coverage to more neutral and positive news coverage. (Signally Responsible?)
Army Corps of Engineers in New Orleans: Buying Advice or Spin? ~Georgianne Nienaber, Huff ~Bit News Update! Fun's over Kiddi'rillas! Within minutes after the above Huff Post article, Corps PR Firm OPP shut down all web links to their Corps pages due to...??? Y'all go drop in some Word fo'da Corps! ~Editilla Specticulatas~We ain't saying we had anything to do wit'dis, buuuuttt, fortunately for Flood Survivors, all those pages had gone fairly Viral onto the internet before they started in with the ice pick or whateva these weirdos do to denude their nefarious content. Most of our links still work, some not, so please try them anyway. We toll'yaz, we can't make this stuff up! And, speaking of OPP as a virus from outer space... We The Antibody Politic... Thank Goddess for the pubic commons of neural nets! Our Pucelle d'Orléans does not suffer fools, but rather, prefers to have them served cold, with Oysters and a Bloody Mary. Editilla is exquisitely gratified by the rising tide of Nola bloggers commenting in the article above. It appears that breaching this story finally connects more than a few dots for Flood Survivors, particularly regarding continuous Corps Obfuscations, Cost Increases, Useless Public Meetings, Project Delays and general Skull'Buggery. We see this freakshow every day, while the rest of the country usually misses out on all da'fun circus sideshows. Rest assured, Gentle'rillas, we will see OPP giving the Exquisite Corps Head again, if they aren't hopefully fired and shipped out of New Orleans on a rendering barge, Then what will we see?
"Additional details previously posted about our (OPP) work with the Corps are currently under review. Appropriate additional information will be re-posted next week." ~H/T-Mat McBride
What sort of lobotomized market zombie could possibly top "Reducing Risk by Building Strong" with OPP? Bwhahahahahaha, like we said you just can't make this stuff up. Butt with the Exquisite Corps of Engineers, one thing fo'sho... OPP ain't the place to get caught...wit'cha pants down!
Wall of Emotion~Sandra Barbier ~The Wall That Heals, a half-size replica of the Vietnam Veterans Memorial will be on display through Sunday at Harry Hurst Middle School, at 170 Roadrunner Lane in Destrehan, LA. The exhibit, which is visiting the River Parishes for the first time, is open 24 hours a day, and on Sunday there will be a candlelight ceremony at 8 p.m.
Corps of Engineers/OPP report released on location for new pump stations in outfall canals ~Sheila Grissett The release, effective Monday, opens a 30-day period during which the public reviews and officially comments on the report known as Individual Environmental Report 5. The report, entitled "Outfall Canal Closure Structure, Orleans and Jefferson Parishes," evaluates the potential human and environmental impacts of the proposed locations for the new permanent pump stations and closure structures at or near the mouths of the 17th Street, Orleans Avenue and London Avenue canals. It will be discussed during a public meeting the corps has scheduled May 20, at St. Dominic's Church, 6363 Memphis St. Open house begins at 6:00 p.m, with presentation and discussion of this 300+ page behemoth report starting at 7:00 p.m. ~Editilla Com'postas~Kiss Ms Grissett. Despite dogged gumshoes on this Pump House Gang'bang story she can only report what they tell her, has no control over the efficacy of the message being presented and, frankly, is paid perhaps 1/10th what the copy writers of that media packet get from the Corps PR Contractor. While our Post-Disaster Economy may soon see the destruction of Ms Grissett's livelihood as a print journalist, her counterparts in the Public Relations Industry are dancing like flies on sherbert, lapping it up ...Marketing Risk.
Editilla, alas, marches to a different 2nd Line. We are Beotchwolf, the Corpsickled PR Spinfiltraitor's worst forking nightmare. Perhaps Ms Grissett will go online and start a blog with all the other soon to be out-sourced real journalists, where they can enjoy doing their jobs without having to share the page with paid professional marketing jackals. We would go there, following the Word like Humid Beings, and enjoy the flood of supportive advertisements that would follow as well. Hear that Gambit?
Is this an actual article, or a press packet placed by the Corps' Million Dollar/Year PR Contractor: Outreach Process Partners OPP? <-(we can't make this stuff up with the name) This meeting will be staged by OPP, as per their 4 year contract. How is any journalists, or the general public at these endless meetings, to know what the Exquisite Corps is putting in their Cool Aid, when it is served up in little Dixie Cups for the slick'heeled "cause" of can you say Other People's Professionals?
Senator 'Vitty-Cent' Vitter (R-Pamp) Posturing Over FEMA Head ~BBuzz ~Fugate held the same position in Florida, a state very much prone to hurricanes, under Republican Jeb Bush. According to The Hill, “Florida's two senators, Bill Nelson (D) and Mel Martinez (R), both told The St. Petersburg Times that they were trying to change Vitter's mind, but RepublicanMartinez went further, hinting that Vitter is grandstanding.” Photo courtesy of one broken-hearted clown.
New Orleans brewer sending beer to Fargo ~Mayor Dennis Walaker said during the city's flood fight this spring that he would buy everyone a beer after it was over. Representatives of the Dixie Brewing Co. in New Orleans heard about the flood and Walaker's comment and offered to help, by sending 1,000 cases of beer to Fargo for a post-flood party. ~Yeah You Right Where'Yat! Knockin'on da'door wit'da 504!
Let Them Eat Stake! ~Corps of Engineers spends Our Tax Dollars to this Public Relations firm to have their corps message cleaned up and painted --with a better shade of Lipstick! Sound like yet another case of Pig Flew? Wit'nass how and where the Exquisite Corps Plants Its Flag. ~Stakeholders are an integral part of a project. They are the end-users or clients, the people from whom requirements will be drawn, the people who will influence the design and, ultimately, the people who will reap the benefits of your completed project. Executive stakeholders are the guys who pay the bills.
Riversideis an in-house monthly, full- color, glossy print magazine publication of the USACE New Orleans District. While the magazine is written for an internal audience, it contains useful information on a wide variety of topics and Corps activities. {And Cost a Forkin'Bundle of Flood Funding to Publish!}
We The People, Who Pay Every Dimeof this PR Firm's Contract, are considered "general public", and as such, are not considered "Stakeholders" or "End Users" or even particularly important components to OPP's Million Dollar/Year Strategic "Relationship" with the Corps of Engineers. Over 1500 of us died after the last Corps Failure on August 29th, 2005, but OPP's job is to convince everyone that the Corps is Reducing Risk by Building Strong. Indeed, it could be easily argued from the Corps ongoing exploits of Delay that We The People are quite expendable, and (in the gunsites of this PR Firm) in the wayof their message spin.
And BTW~BARRY JOHN M---$1,500??? On this same list of Federal Spending, where we found OPP at the $1M level, our own John Barry turned up at the $1500 level? For What did the Exquisite Corps pay $1500 to John Barry, a member of our esteemed new Levee Board:S.L.F.P.A.-East? It certainly isn't the money, but the question... and the surprise. Whiskey Tango Foxtrot?
And Humid City,alwaysquickonthe draw, opens up a Ho'nutter can of misdirection, with a pan of dead fish on the women of OPP.
{^^^Caution! Strong Language!^^^} ~Editilla Goz't'Hella~Remember all these cute "public input meetings" the Corps expensively advertises? ASCECORPS is spending Millions Mo'Dollars of Our Flood Protection Funding to hire this Public Relations Firm to have lots of public meetings where the effected public can come Talk At The Corps. This is the very type of firm you would have wanted to do the invitations for Hitler's Bat Mitsvah. These are the very people who have been hired to Spin'filtrate the Corps Message of Risk, keep us all distracted by pretty ads and flags while the Corps moves along with the same engineering methodology that Flooded New Orleans on 8/29 and de-swamped South Louisiana in the first place. These are the very people who have enable the Corps to get away with delaying our Flood Safety Studies. Whenever the Corps has wanted to screw us in the ass, these are the people who tell us how good it feels to be Punk'd. This firm believes People want to feel like they have a stake in the work yad nauseum. Let'em Talk, Hell, talk is cheaper than bullets! Yet the whole time, No matter what anyone says to the Corps of Engineers, ASCECORPS has had every intention of installing their own design of defective engineering so they can come back later and reinstall more defective designs so they can come back later and reinstall more defective designs so they can come back later and...have marketing groups run their meetings and risk message.
And just think, if OPP is successful in knocking us all dead here, then imagine the possibilities for making a killing marketing Risk to the rest of the country. Oh the Horror Cha'Ching! That is the final judgment here, the actual Grapes of Wrath of this Public Relations "cause", to wit: by our deaths from the next catastrophic engineering failure, we will have proved this PR Company successful, as the Corps Reduces Risk, Builds Strong.
From the puissant lips of the Succubus... OPP provides media support for print, broadcast and Internet media on local, national and international levels including outlets such as the Times-Picayune, WWL-TV CBS New Orleans, Associated Press, USA Today, The Weather Channel, The Today Show, French TV Channel 5, and Engineering News Record on issues such as Hurricane Gustav, “paper in the floodwalls” and other investigative responses, seepage, peer review and the state of the hurricane and storm damage risk reduction system. As part of this cause?, OPP fosters strategic relationships with media outlets that result in more accurate and balanced stories. OPP focuses on the enhancement of internal and external communications between the various Corps districts, stakeholders (??), media and the general public (us?). OPP has facilitated a myriad of interviews about the rebuilding of hurricane system levees and interim risk reduction structures. Our team members have facilitated in-depth interviews with producers and hosts of The History Channel and MTV. (Oh'Snap!) OPP's media support has been a fundamental part of the transition from typically negative news coverage to more neutral and positive news coverage. (Spin'Filtration) ~Editilla Notellas~ Everything composted above: aforementioned, linked, referred to, parodied, smeared, slabbed, slammed, copied, pasted and condemned whatnot'whateva rests solidly and legally on the subject's public availability as News Evidence of where our Tax Dollars are going, and as such is inviolate of copyrights. More to point, we paid for this ass'wipe. We have paid OPP 2 Million Dollars to date for this ass'wipe. And, lest anyone sense even a drop of blood profit on this blog... show me a reason and I'll walk the fire. ~More from yesterday's lengthy post.
{Caution! Strong Language!} ~Editilla Goz't'Hella~Remember all these cute "public input meetings" the Corps expensively advertises? ASCECORPS is spending Millions Mo'Dollars of Our Flood Protection Funding to hire this Public Relations Firm to have lots of public meetings where the effected public can come Talk At The Corps. This is the very type of firm you would have wanted to do the invitations for Hitler's Bat Mitsvah. These are the very people who have been hired to Spin'filtrate the Corps Message of Risk, keep us all distracted by pretty ads and flags while the Corps moves along with the same engineering methodology that Flooded New Orleans on 8/29 and de-swamped South Louisiana in the first place. These are the very people who have enable the Corps to get away with delaying our Flood Safety Studies. Whenever the Corps has wanted to screw us in the ass, these are the people who tell us how good it feels to be Punk'd. This firm believes People want to feel like they have a stake in the work yad nauseum. Let'em Talk, Hell, talk is cheaper than bullets! Yet the whole time, No matter what anyone says to the Corps of Engineers, ASCECORPS has had every intention of installing their own design of defective engineering so they can come back later and reinstall more defective designs so they can come back later and reinstall more defective designs so they can come back later and...have marketing groups run their meetings and risk message.
And just think, if OPP is successful in knocking us all dead here, then imagine the possibilities for making a killing marketing Risk to the rest of the country. Oh the Horror Cha'Ching! That is the final judgment here, the actual Grapes of Wrath of this Public Relations "cause", to wit: by our deaths from the next catastrophic engineering failure, we will have proved this PR Company successful, as the Corps Reduces Risk, Builds Strong.
From the puissant lips of the Succubus... OPP provides media support for print, broadcast and Internet media on local, national and international levels including outlets such as the Times-Picayune, WWL-TV CBS New Orleans, Associated Press, USA Today, The Weather Channel, The Today Show, French TV Channel 5, and Engineering News Record on issues such as Hurricane Gustav, “paper in the floodwalls” and other investigative responses, seepage, peer review and the state of the hurricane and storm damage risk reduction system. As part of this cause, OPP fosters strategic relationships with media outlets that result in more accurate and balanced stories. OPP focuses on the enhancement of internal and external communications between the various Corps districts, stakeholders (??), media and the general public (us?). OPP has facilitated a myriad of interviews about the rebuilding of hurricane system levees and interim risk reduction structures. Our team members have facilitated in-depth interviews with producers and hosts of The History Channel and MTV. (Oh Snap'whee!) OPP's media support has been a fundamental part of the transition from typically negative news coverage to more neutral and positive news coverage. (Spin'Filtration)
We call this style of Marketing: Pile-Driving with a Shotgun. Rest uneasy with the reality that We The People are Not the aforementioned "Stakeholders" in this paid infomercial narrative. No wonder we still cannot get valid answers from the Corps for what went wrong with the Corps Engineering on August 29th, '05! Can't talk to'da Corps... gotta get'wit da'OPP! Yeah, you know me! But, who are these lugubrious "Stakeholders"? In who's invisible hand may we find their Hammer? We already know into who's heart the next blow will go...driven. Who stands to benefit from this re-branding of the Crucifixion of an entire American City? As we follow that money trail from atop this Ladder, Gentle'rillas may well wretch at the lengths and depths to which the Corps of Engineers has gone (and yet will go) to Keep Truth From Getting Plainly Told. Still we will persevere no matter the stench...git'cha git'cha... We started on these faux meetings PR back when they started advertising them around September. Now, when it gets down to nut cutting the actual steel and concrete, we realize that ASCECORPS was simply blowing smoke up our asses, stringing us along the whole time. Yes, we came to these meetings, we got bored with the same old story and came less and less. Fine with the Corps, as our fatigue of bullshit is exactly why they instituted these meet'n'greets. All year long, we get to hear about how the Corps is Reducing Risk, like the medicated whisper of a drug commercial --when the important stuff, the engineering, especially "independent" engineering analysis, always gets put off for "Further Study" HA! Did you say OPP? ~Editilla Notellas~ Everything composted above: aforementioned, linked, referred to, parodied, smeared, slabbed, slammed, copied, pasted and condemned whatnot'whateva rests solidly and legally on the subject's public availability as News Evidence of where our Tax Dollars are going, and as such is inviolate of copyrights. More to point, we paid for this ass'wipe. We have paid OPP 2 Million Dollars to date for this ass'wipe. And, lest anyone sense even a drop of blood profit on this blog... show me a reason and I'll walk the fire. ~And we would Additilla~ the activities decried above are performed by Other People Professionals, and We Do Not recommend anyone try this at home, or say, in their local media. Such PRofiteering, though in the same slit vein, should Not to be confused with the recent surge of spin'filtered bullshit mis- direction from local astro'turf bloggers and Corps engineers who fuck red herrings for sport, or the heartbreaking betrayal of our Flood Safety from our darling local so'called "alt" news media: Gambit <--et tu'dat-- stabbed us in the back before the blood had even dried on the firing of herollero hurricane expert Dr. Ivor van Heerden by LSU, the spay- neutering of the the Hurricane Center and its Director's Resignation in Protest. Bad Gambit!No Soup For You! And No Soup For Your Advertisers Either! And if you don't come clean on this frat'trash'talkin spin'flit then we will be forced to ask your advertisers the next logical question: Got Any Soup For Gambit?
MRGO Lawsuit Update~slabbed ~Only slabbed could out-tilla Editilla... hahahahaha... Conflict of interest is a subject we know well in Mississippi. Although often overlooked, our State’s population is so small that without conflicting interest, we would have no interest at all. Louisiana is relatively larger; but, with the largely homegrown population of both states, relatively takes on its literal meaning... --most of us are kin to the rest of us.
Floodwall builders can't be sued for Katrina failure on 17th Street Canal~Mark Schleifstein ~Editilla Notellas~ We have hung this article on through today, chiefly due to the 160 plus comments so far left rollicking in the wake of Schleifstein's Ace Beat. We applaud such Editillero Gumshoe Vigilance. It appears that he has struck a Nerve, regarding our Flood Safety, in the Body Politic of still raw-wounded yet alive New Orleans. Another reason we carried forth this article post is because now, with their ass'ramming pumps above, we see the fruits of the Corps use of Alternative Public Relations Media to distract and misdirect the Public View from the actual engineering to the Marketing of Risk as well as simply muck-up whatever public discourse in the commons of our internets. They deployed this strategy the day after their flood walls failed and flooded New Orleans. Remember? Remember how adamantly the ASCECORPS said "the flood walls were over-topped"? Remember when those flood walls in fact failed at the half-way level due to their own corrupt engineering? Remember? Well, Witness How They Do It.
Schleifstein cuts through the recent surge of spin'filtered bullshit misdirection from local astro'turf bloggers and Corps engineers who fuck red herrings for sport, as well as heartbreaking betrayal of our Flood Safety from our darling local so'called "alt" news media: Gambit <--et tu'dat-- before the blood had even dried on the firing of herollero hurricane expert Dr. Ivor van Heerden by LSU, the deconstruction of the the Hurricane Center and its Director's Resignation in Protest. Bad Gambit!No Soup For You! We gave you 2 more issues to issue an apology for farting in the face of our flood safety. We tried nice. Now, no more nice. You Suck, Gambit, like an empty Oyster, Nothing But Shell! {Not You, our fav blog'0'friendo:Big Molluski!} Editilla understands the pursuit of happiness in New Orleans, but beneath all of that, every Jazz Fest, every rotted instrument from the Corps of Destruction, every songless child floating over the river Styx, all of it everything and the Raven's NEVERMORE rests or rests not the Soul of Our Saints behind the Actuality of Safety. Having read Gambit for nearly 30 years, our heart brakes like hard rock candy on a sea of bloody tears no lie.
But Gambit's Feint Editorial Appeasement Pales beside the words of an actual NAE Study Committee member now publicly pining da'Corps'Meme of Marketing Risk (CoMoMR). Dr. Moruea presents us with a weirdly familiar Fantasy Island where everyone thinks only of Risk. All the fey inhabitants play at contemplating Risk. Indeed, that is why they idly paid so much to come to The Island of Dr. Moreau! They spend all day looking towards Risk and the Future of Risk --instead of the Crumbling Engineering at the foot of the disappearing coastlines of their own damn'nation.
With Every Word of the Exquisite Corps, they Market Risk. Every single tax'paid public relations statement: Risk. Never Safe Engineering. Never the word Safety, or Flood Safety, but always the word Risk. Pay no attention to all of this Broken Engineering. Think about Risk, amorphous, turism, proving the negative of odds-making with booky'numbers public relations.
This Dr. Moreau is an engineer himself, who happens to have also worked for the Corps of Engineers. ~"For 80 billion bucks you could do a lot of other things that might be a lot more beneficial than rebuilding levees or making them higher. You might be able to relocate people. You might be able to create jobs in areas that are substantially at less risk. It requires some additional analysis that has not yet been publicly released. It requires some additional analysis that has not yet been publicly released.It requires some additional analysis that has not yet been publicly released.It requires some additional analysis that has not yet been publicly released.It requires some additional analysis that has not yet been publicly released." I thought this New NAE Study was supposed to move beyond exactly that type of conflict of interest? Perhaps Dr. Moreau's Mole Role in the NAE Study was more to represent, or shepherd a competing school of Hurricane Surge Modeling? It is unfortunate that such valuable toolery can be dragged into Mud Wrestling Funding Politics. Now, with their firing of Dr. Ivor van Heerden and the Denuded Hurricane Center, it would appear that poor little backwater LSU has indeed Buckled under the heavyweights of conflicting academic interests. Geaux Tiger... meow.
Thank you, Mr. Schleifstein for keeping our Focus on the Levees and Those Who Would Build Them Red Castles Made of Sand. This one is for you, Mark Schleifstein. Sinn Féin Where the Body of da'Goddess lays bare our vulnerabilities... the Goddamned Exquisite Corps lies like a dog. No wonder they are always Ass'Quacking about Risk! It was the Corps of Engineers who built this ho'house of cards, a "Hurricane Protection System In Name Only". Can somebody do a cheap bumper sticker please: IT'S THE LEVEES, STUPID! ~and/or~ DON'T FLOOD ME, C.O.E.
The battle for Alligator Bayou ~Amy Wold~While the conflict suggests the two sides have vastly different ideas about managing the Spanish Lake Basin, their overall goals seem remarkably similar. Both say they want to restore the original cycle of wet and dry seasons, which would lead to better tree growth. Both talk about improving water flow in the area through dredging and other methods. And both want to run at least part of their property as for-profit “mitigation banks,” which developers use to compensate for wetlands damaged elsewhere by their projects. Cypress trees stand along the water's edge in the Spanish Lake Basin. ~Photo: Bill Feig/Advocate Input sought on Federal City master plan~NO City Business
Debate about 'Ike Dike' ~Leigh Jones ~“Ike Dike” has become the recovery buzzword for islanders already getting anxious about the start of this year’s hurricane season. But skeptics said the $2 billion system is just an expensive way to avoid making unpopular changes to the way people live along the Gulf Coast.
From the puissant lips 
OPP focuses on the enhancement of internal and external communications between the various Corps districts, stakeholders, media and the general public.
