Fire and Water, Black and White, California and New Orleans

"I can only imagine what the Superdome would have been like with massage therapy, big-screen TVs and live rock bands, not to mention food, water and perhaps port-a-potties to suppress that lingering moldy urine smell." Shawn Brown

David Seaton's News Links
The American memory is notoriously short, but the Southern California disaster coming so soon after Katrina makes comparison inevitable.

It's would be an easy, a cheap shot, if it weren't so tragic, so obviously unjust... so unjust as to bring tears of impotent rage to the eyes of anyone raised to believe that, as an old slave owner once wrote, "All Men are Created Equal".

A musician, Shawn Brown has written the best comparison of the two disasters that I've read so far: a little masterpiece.

Shawn's are words that had to be written and they are words that should be read. DS

Shawn Brown: Katrina vs. The Witch - Los Angeles Times
Abstract: I know it shouldn't surprise me very much to learn that the Federal Emergency Management Agency, as well as state and local government agencies, have reacted in a slightly different manner to the recent fire disaster in Southern California than their counterparts did after Hurricane Katrina. After all, in the current election-year political climate, when you compare the relative economic clout of the Southern California communities affected by the fires with that of the Louisiana, Alabama and Mississippi Gulf coasts, it really isn't a shocker to find out that the evacuees in California come out ahead. We are talking about the difference between a population heavy with Caucasian millionaires, with houses valued at more than $750,000, and people of "the Chocolate City" and surrounding areas, where most of the residents lived below the poverty line. I was also not surprised to hear insurance companies in Southern California talking about settlements forthcoming within the next two weeks to a month, and homeowners planning to rebuild as quickly as possible. I also would expect that lessons have been learned by the ongoing, painfully slow and ineffectual response that the government and private sector eventually ... somewhat implemented for Katrina victims. In Southern California, the National Guard was deployed within 24 hours in key positions to protect "structures" from looting; massive cattle ranches, horse stables and many multimillion-dollar summer homes were spared because of to their government's timely diligence.(...) I also admit that television images of a specially equipped DC-10 DC-10 flying over, dropping 30,000 gallons of fire retardant between the firestorm and my good friends in Malibu gave my soul a gentle, warm, almost fuzzy feeling. Also, the cockles of my heart were warmed in the blink of an embattled politician's eye when I was told that the air conditioning was working quite well at Qualcomm Stadium, which was among several shelters that had been opened up to evacuees. It made me proud to be a registered voter, albeit in Southwestern Florida, where some folks are still living in FEMA trailers as a result of 2004's Hurricane Charlie.(...) I can only imagine what the Superdome would have been like with massage therapy, big-screen TVs and live rock bands, not to mention food, water and perhaps port-a-potties to suppress that lingering moldy urine smell. READ IT ALL