Survival of New Orleans blog

Sunday before landfall I was showing New Orleans to my oldest son Nick (via maps.google.com).
This morning I looked though the photos I had snapped during Siggraph 2000, at the convention center and the Royal Sonesta hotel on Bourbon Street where we stayed while working with Caligari. The pics aren’t much to share, mostly our crew. I have one looking out the back door of the center under the bridge. The same convention center now filled with persons who didn’t escape in time, some now dead or dying.
I remember the drive from the convention center to our hotel on Bourbon Street, and have retraced it on the maps a few times, wondering what’s taking place now, as my eyes travel the digital terrain.
I am angry and outraged. Our National Guard isn’t available, can’t be deployed in time (can you guess why?), FEMA isn’t geared up for acts of god because all planning is geared towards “terror”.
Long before the 2004 election I wrote that dubya should be impeached for his “handling” of the war on terror, if not for his various corporate collusions. This disaster is yet another example of how our national security has been squandered. Accountablility no longer exists in the USA, and most of the population is too damn lazy to care. How else could we have devolved into this sad state of “government”.
And yet, somehow, I still have faith that we’ll turn it around.