Samedi

Mardi Gras Parades Today
~Parades, Buffets, Grandstands
Spanish Town krewe celebrates 30th anniversary as new Krewe of Poseidon joins BR Carnival

Of Muses, Maddox and the Goodbye Girl
~Karen Dalton-Beninato

Zero to none~American Zombie

City running months behind in paying architects~Ariella Cohen

Katrina Myth passes 100,000 ~Levees.org

More important than the Super Bowl~FoodMusicJustice.com
*I mean, if you want fun then go over to Schleifstein's article on this and get a load of the commentary.

The Daily Reveille sounds the bugle on LSU’s silence on the van Heerden lawsuit. Brings up an important public policy point we’ve tackled on Slabbed

Tsunamis, Floods, Earthquakes And Systems Scientists
~Maitris Vatul Blog

Katrina-related changes make Rapides Parish levees substandard ~Bret McCormick

Report: No crime wave among Hurricane Katrina evacuees
~Dan Vergano ~H/T~Levees.org

Sierra Club, New Orleans Group presents a two-part program entitled: "Protection of our Coastal Cypress Forests"

New DEQ chief has enforcement background

Legislature hires storm recovery advisor

Jindal scales state budget back to $24 million~Jeremy Alford

Spare me
~Your Right Hand Thief

Gov. Bobby Jindal's state budget proposal increases privatization, outsourcing~R.T. Scott

Lawrence O'Donnell slams Marc Thiessen for his hypocrisy, but Scarborough shuts him down
~David Neiwert

Quoth Editilla!

"All this happened,
more or less." ~Or, the Children's Crusade,
A Duty-Dance with Death

Magazine fiction's golden age can never be repeated
~Matt Fullerty

Timothy McSweeney has died
~Fresh Ink

NOLA Art House Tree House
~New Orleans Slate

Hitchiking to Portland and Sleeping Under a Waxing Crescent Moon
~Suzanne Kingsbury
~My very favorite writing reminds me what it was like to be 16 and wild and free and completely invincible. Can you imagine my happiness when I got a guest blog post submission that made me feel like that? Today, Darrelyn Saloom, a kick-ass writer and a very gorgeous lady from New Orleans, writes all about how her grandma’s ghost kept her safe as she hitchhiked hither and yon with her best friend, Susie.

Louis Moholo At Zeitgeist 9pm
~Jeff Albert

WWOZ: Thirty Years of "Bringing New Orleans Music to the Universe"~Wade Luquet

Vendredi

Our View: University’s silence on Van Heerden is unacceptable
~Daily Reveille

Commentary rages over Firing of Dr. Ivor van Heerden

New Orleans Workshop on Implementing Innovative, Sustainable Flood Mitigation Solutions for the Gulf Coast

NOLA Tree House: Treme Civic Association’s Side of the Story
~The Fire Department’s Side
~Alejandro de los Rios

Mayor-elect Mitch Landrieu names transition team leaders
~Michelle Krupa

Delay Deny Defend: Why insurance companies don’t pay claims and what you can do about it. ~slabbed

Billy Tauzin to leave job as Junkident of drug industry trade group ~Jonathan Tilove

The Legacy of Billy Tauzin:
The White House-PhRMA Deal

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Yes! Chris Rose joins Gambit! ~Kevin Allman

Updates for Rained-out Parades
~Watch Live Parade Cam
Divine Protectors of Endangered Pleasures or DIVA
French Quarter 1:30 p.m.
Knights of Hermes
Uptown 6 p.m.
Le Krewe d'Etat
Uptown 6 p.m.
Krewe of Morpheus
Uptown 7 p.m.
Krewe of Muses
Uptown 8 p.m.
Krewe of Centurions
Metairie 7 p.m.
Krewe of Selene
Slidell 6:30 p.m.
The Original Krewe of Orpheus
Mandeville 7 p.m.
Krewe of Aphrodite
Houma 6:30 p.m. ~~~Skull Art by Leveeland Creations

New Orleans Craft Mafia
Mardi Gras Market

Southern states most at risk from 2010 Census undercount
~Chris Kromm, Facing South

My Cuba Videography
~American Zombie

Baquet discusses photography, history and culture on Feb. 24

Black Rock hosts New Orleans benefit

New Orleans Mardi Gras marching bands are incubators for more than music~Sarah Carr

Live music in New Orleans during Mardi Gras~Keith Spera

Williams was inspiration for Carnival song~John Wirt

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Jeudi

Faulkner Link to Plantation Diary Discovered~Patricia Cohen
~Editilla breaks the yoke of love and grief~
This is just Great! We are big Faulkner fans, having grown up there with family such'n'such. Jus'soz ya'knowz...

Assessing the Benefits of Levees: An Economic Assessment of U.S. Counties with Levees ~InfrastructureUSA.org

Preservation group sues to halt N.O. hospital plan
~Michael Kunzelman, AP
~The Washington-based group said about 25 square blocks in Mid-City would be bulldozed and about 600 residents and several dozen businesses would be evicted to make room for a new Veterans Affairs hospital and a teaching and research hospital to replace storm-damaged Charity Hospital, which hasn’t reopened since Hurricane Katrina.
~Editilla Notellas~ The bold italics represent the Katrina Shorthand Jive that the AP seems intent on continuing to use to Misstate the Facts of New Orleans' Flood 8/29/05.
We have decided to boycott the AP whenever they Tell This Lie.
Our campaign includes much more than simply not publishing the AP, however, since Charity is so near and dear to our hearts we will publish this piece. We just ask that this reporter do some fact checking about Charity Hospital.
At least ask Russell Honore how he had his men Pump Out The Flood Water in record time and had Charity ready to go.
My point is, it was not Storm Damage from Katrina. It was Flood Damage from the Corps of Engineers flood wall failures.
~"It took ten days to pump all the water out of the basement, while most of the workers, including me, were cleaning and decontaminating the first three floors, removing biodegradables from the first 14 floors, boarding windows and weatherproofing the building in a preliminary way. Specifically I recollect that the Navy Seabees boarded up every broken window in the building. - The cleanup was essentially complete by September 21.
I observed at that time that the first three floors were spotless. Electric power had been restored, and the air conditioning was functioning..." ~testimony of Dr. James Moises.
~"Between September 7 and September 19, 2005, I personally witnessed and participated in the complete restoration of the first and second and parts of the third floor of Charity Hospital. - The 82d Airborne worked around the clock, in shifts, to clean Charity Hospital and make it ready to reopen. Almost immediately, over a three-day period, they pumped all the water out of the basement... The 82d then sent in their decontamination teams to clean up and test, to determine if the basement and first three floors were decontaminated. The team did this over several days, and on September 19 declared the tested floors ready for human habitation. It was at this time I and others got word that LSU wanted us out of the building in order to shut the building down." ~Sworn affidavit, Staff Seargent James A. Johnson

Let's call them The Feints!
More commentary in the ongoing Astro'turf battle raging around Dr. Ivor van Heerden's lawsuit against LSU
~Editilla Rotellas~ The above lede is to the newer article published last night. I think the T-P does this with Corps articles so as to split the hot commentary developing. For example here is the original bad article we hung yesterday, with 81 comments so far.

Chaos Cancels; Babylon, Muses Postpone Parades ~WDSU

Distracted or disillusioned?
~Eli Ackerman, The Lens

Jim Brown on the challenges facing NOLA mayor elect Mitch Landrieu ~slabbed

US Labor Department secures $1 million in overtime back wages for 154 Hurricane Katrina recovery workers

Trashman Talking

Creative bakers reconfigure the king cake~Ian McNulty

Top 4 Mardi Gras King Cakes Online~Sharon Keating

Mercredi

LSU professor Ivor van Heerden sues university, says free speech rights violated in his firing, UPDATE~Mark Schleifstein
~Dr. van Heerden's Lawsuit as filed here (pdf)
~Editilla Stunnerellas~ We are absolutely shocked by Mark Schleifstein's omissions in this article, which amount to censorship of what actually happened at this press conference.
Not only did he not link to the actual lawsuit (linked above) but there is no mention of the formidable group of supporters who spoke on Dr. van Heerden's behalf, much less what they said.
I will withhold blaming Big Schleif for this abject censorship, as my source tells me they have cut so much staff that they had Schleif covering the Saints Parade. Jeez Louie! Who'dat that he is, he is actually a Pulitzer Winning Wetlands Reporter. Despite that, I really enjoyed Scheif's piece on the Saints' Parade.
This from Sandy Rosenthal, director of levees.org, who also spoke: "There were many speakers and supporters in the room including John Barry, Oliver Houck, Harry Shearer, Marc Levitan, Dr. Mtangulizi Sanyika, and Jed Horne.
What they contributed to Ivor’s story ranged from amazing to eye popping to tear jerking."
~Fortunately WWL was there so here is better real coverage where they actually spoke to the people at this event.

Dr. Ivor van Heerden to Sue LSU over Wrongful Dismissal!
~The news conference will be held at 11:00 a.m.
at the Westin Canal Place, Magnolia Room (3rd Floor),
100 Rue Iberville, NOLA.
~Dr. Ivor van Heerden, his attorneys and several supporters will appear in a news conference this morning to discuss the allegations against the university of harassment and the wrongful termination of this well-known professor and hurricane expert for his outspoken criticisms of the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers for levee failures after Hurricane Katrina.
Among supporters speaking are Sandy Rosenthal, Harry Shearer, Jed Horne, Marc Levitan, John Barry, Oliver Houck.
~This from the NYTimes

Parade Schedules Today!
~Wednesday Feb 10th
Mystic Krewe of Druids ~Uptown 6:30 p.m.
Krewe of Thor ~Metairie 7 p.m.

Today's Mardi Gras parades begin seven day run of revelry

Legal challenge to plans for new teaching hospital to be heard in federal court~Bill Barrow

New Orleans enjoys fairy-tale endings ~James Gill

Saints coach Sean Payton took his older sister along for a magical Super Bowl ride
~They are the moments the cameras don't see, couldn't even if they were there, like when time was ticking down, a Saints victory imminent, and Patrice looked at Sean's 9-year-old son, Connor, and saw her brother. "He's brilliant about football and he was talking with his mom about different plays, and it was amazing," she said. "He's the spitting image of Sean at that age. And I looked over at him and thought, 'Oh my God, it's uncanny. It's Sean.'"
She remembered her brother and their father, Thomas, who did not live to see his son as an NFL coach, using silverware to diagram plays when the helmet was bigger than Sean and, later, sitting in the stands with her dad at Eastern Illinois and watching Sean at quarterback.

Super Bowl Is $7 Million Win for Nevada Sports Book~Bloomberg
~Nevada’s sports book operations won almost $6.9 million on wagers of $82.7 million on the Super Bowl when the underdog New Orleans Saints beat the Indianapolis Colts. The state’s 182 sports books had “a win percentage of 8.3 percent,” after the Saints’ 31-17 upset, said Dennis Neilander, chairman of the Nevada Gaming Control Board. The Colts were five-point favorites in the National Football League championship game, according to Las Vegas oddsmakers.

Matters of Great Importance: Legalize the Tree House!
~Alejandro de los Rios

Insurance Commissioner Jim Donelon rejects 19 percent statewide rate increase request by State Farm
~Rebecca Mowbray

Slabbed Hump Day

Sorry, Melissa Harris-Lacewell,
but There Is No Crying In Politics --James Perry Not Next Obama!

Disaster contractors eye Haiti for new deals~Sue Sturgis

Cookbook Showcase: Cajun sweets~Jolene McHugh

Tennessee Williams/New Orleans Literary Festival Announces Fiction Contest Finalists

Gil Scott-Heron: I’m New Here
~Alex Wilson

Happy Birthday Tuba Phil!
~Red Cotton, Gambit

Mardi~Happy Lombardi Gras!!!!

Saints Super Bowl parade includes signature floats of several krewes
~Mark Schleifstein
~Parade will begin at 5 p.m. on Poydras Street in front of the Superdome. Members of the Saints organization and players will ride a group of floats donated from various Mardi Gras krewes.
More than 250 Saints players, coaches and staff members will be throwing beads from a dozen of the area’s premiere Mardi Gras floats “I think that this is the first time that you’ll ever see all these floats together at one time, and very well could be the last time you ever see all these floats together,” said Barry Kern, president of Blaine Kern Studios, which is overseeing the event.
Included will be the signature floats of Endymion, Bacchus, Rex, Zulu, Alla, Caesar, Tucks, Muses, Orpheus and Babylon, he said.
“There was a school of thought that you go on a traditional route, but the reality is that the Saints don’t want this to be a Mardi Gras parade,” he said. “This is a parade about the Saints.”

*Happy Lombardi Gras!~NOLAPC

The Saints Have Won the Superbowl and I'm Moving Home~Karen Dalton-Beninato

Merriment on the Mississippi
~John Hollinger

Taste of Indiana to New Orleans
~Indianapolis Star
~Tenderloins, barbecue, shrimp, cookies and candies as officials in the state make good on various Super Bowl bets.

Wetland Watchers Park pavilion financing approved by St. Charles Parish Council

Effort to block Houma storm surge expected to advance
~Nikki Buskey

Courthouse calling! Show your support for Lower Mid-City!
~SaveCharityHospital.com

Politics Of The Moment Part One ....I Told You So~Cliff's Crib

Landrieus’ Washington hot line
~Gerard Shields

How you gonna keep'em down... on da'Snake Farm?~slabbed

Recipes for Celebrating Mardi Gras ~Lauren Salkeld

Home of the Groove

Lundi

Its like waiting 43yrs to hear somebody say ‘I Love You’ back.
The Spirit of New Orleans
~Wynton Marsalis
Editilla believes that the world subconsciously thinks the soul of America has disappeared into the heart of New Orleans...
hiding there in what is left of our nation's individuality.
I find it all together fitting that beyond New Orleans' Super Bowl victory last night the 2nd most watched TV show in history was the final episode of M.A.S.H.

New Orleans Saints arrive at airport to shrieking crowds

Parades, Monday Feb 8th
2.2 Social Aid & Pleasure Marching Club ~Uptown 7:30

Dimanche~Bless Our Boys!

Glory Saints Win Super Bowl!

*Wha'dat Talking King Cake Baby Say Again?

Barkus to roll Game Day 1PM!
~New Orleans Pet Care
~Barkus Goes Tailgaiting: "The Dogs Go Barking In"
Because of Super Bowl XLIV and its importance to the citizens of New Orleans, Barkus Parade will roll one hour earlier!
The 2010 Parade starts at Orleans & N. Rampart promptly at 1pm and proceeds on the new 15-block route through the Vieux Carré, stopping at the VIP Reviewing Stand at Good Friends Bar, corner Dauphine and St. Ann, where VIPs
(and those who desire to be VIPs) will toast the Royal Court. The Pawty (before, during & after parade) at Orleans & N. Rampart is open to all at no charge to hear the music and see the sights! Edibles and potables available.
Orleans & N. Rampart opens to all at 10:30am and is the staging area for the parade participants.
~Mardi Gras parades for Super Bowl Sunday
Krewe of Carrollton~Uptown 11:00 a.m.
Krewe of King Arthur~Uptown 12:15 p.m.
Mystic Krewe of Barkus~French Quarter 1:00 p.m.**
Krewe of Dionysus~Slidell 12:30 p.m.
Krewe of Hyacinthians~Houma 11:00 a.m.
Krewe of Titans~Houma, follows Hyacinthians

Parades Away~Daily Iberian

Anxious East Jeff. residents watch leaking levee as river rises, Corps says Seep Jeep!
~Corps of Engineers (again) calls it Levee Seep. Residents across the street (again) call it Levee Leak.
And, again, Sheila Grissett,
the Times-Picayune's own in-house Hack Of Optimal Process Partners (HOOPP), calls it whatever the Corps wants it called as long as the story gets buried in the Sunday edition on Saints Game Day.
With paper like the Times-Picayune, who needs Levee Filler, eh?

Mitch Landrieu Wins Mayor of New Orleans in a landslide!

How we voted, precinct/precinct ~Kevin Allman
~Wit'some Lagniappe from da'Mystic Oyacle!

Thanks to the American Zombie

Ethics in the Louisiana Legislature? That's a laugh
~James Gill

Ethics revamp effects mixed
~Marsha Shuler

La. transportation secretary resigns unexpectedly

BASF committed to its biggest U.S. complex ~Gary Perilloux

1st Festival of the Rising Sun
~NewOrleans.com

The Stooges Brass Band giving Goody’s to New Orleans
~Red Cotton
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