First, I’ve heard secondhand complaints that the media aren’t covering the good news coming out of New Orleans. My friend Legomancer says there must be some puppies holding balloons that the everpresent cameras seem to have missed, but alas all I can offer you is “Cats in Sinks“.
Though usually bilious to a level that makes me roll my eyes, nihilistic kid has a good refutation for all the people questioning whether New Orleans needs to be rebuilt. Yesterday, he also wrote an eye-opening account of how stories get misreported (including the looters shooting at helicopters which apparently was just a rumor, thank God). He’s also posted a letter from Left Turn editor Jordan Flaherty, an eloquent firsthand account. CNN examines the disconnect between “official channels” and what journalists on the scene report. I guess this is what happens when our government is not part of the reality-based community. An interesting series of blog posts from author China Mieville on the Politics of Weather: part 1, part 2, part 3. His socialism is showing, but that doesn’t discredit his arguments. Particularly incisive is this bit from part 2: “Where do you even start? The lack of planning for/giving two shits about the poor? The wittering on about ‘looting’, ie the clear, unambiguous prioritising of property over human life?”
If I hadn’t already raged and spewed enough venom at the man who claims to lead my country yesterday, I could go on at length today about the incredibly facile and infuriating thing he said about Trent Lott’s beach house. Fortunately for me, others got there first, so I can just provide links: he’s clueless, he thinks a second home is the worst thing one has to face losing, he could have said something heart-warming if he had an ounce of empathy like Clinton did, he might have said one of these extrapolations if he’d been present at other calamities.
A common sense warning to the self-righteous finger pointers who insist everyone who lived in New Orleans deserves what they got because they’re stupid enough to live in a bowl below sea level. The loveliest line in the tirade : “Circumstance is chasing us all down, slowly but surely.” Indeed. “There but for the grace of God go I” has never been more eloquently phrased. Also, one last word on why someone who had no means to leave the path of a hurricane might not admit to it.
A list of New Orleans musicians who have been accounted for, and those who have not, from Looka! (via Making Light). Alex Chilton, another Ninth Ward resident, is still missing.
Morbid but funny, cobaltgreen brainstorms on what news would make the government stop dragging its feet and rescue the stranded. Also in the gallows humor category, this billboard (via Making Light) reminds us of the connection between small government and the lack of safety nets for our citizens:
My husband loaded a bunch of pictures into the photo database. Here’s a couple of my favorites from the summer:
I’ve noticed lately that Google News doesn’t have a feature I would like. It offers to sort things by date, assuming you want the most recent news, which is normally the case. However, several times in the past couple of weeks, I’ve been searching for the first instance of a quote or the first time something was mentioned in the news…this means that I’d want a reverse date sort, which it doesn’t have, and which would be really useful. Going to the last hit would accomplish a similar thing, except that you might get news that was too old, like years old instead of weeks old. So it would need to be a recent reverse sort, like seven days or two weeks.
Ok, so it wasn’t all negative, right? I tried for that vaunted balance I hear the media values so much.