[lbo-talk] Blaming Katrina's victims for not being rich

[Carl Remick]

I thnk it's worth citing in this thread a genuine rarity: an interesting 
David Brooks column.  In "The Storm After the Storm" today, Brooks writes:

"Floods wash away the surface of society, the settled way things have been 
done. They expose the underlying power structures, the injustices, the 
patterns of corruption and the unacknowledged inequalities. When you look 
back over the meteorological turbulence in this nation's history, it's 
striking how often political turbulence followed. ...

"[For example,] ... in 1927, the great Mississippi flood rumbled down upon 
New Orleans. As Barry writes in his account, 'Rising Tide,' the disaster 
ripped the veil off the genteel, feudal relations between whites and blacks, 
and revealed the festering iniquities. Blacks were rounded up into work 
camps and held by armed guards. They were prevented from leaving as the 
waters rose. A steamer, the Capitol, played 'Bye Bye Blackbird' as it sailed 
away. The racist violence that followed the floods helped persuade many 
blacks to move north.

"Civic leaders intentionally flooded poor and middle-class areas to ease the 
water's pressure on the city, and then reneged on promises to compensate 
those whose homes were destroyed. That helped fuel the populist anger that 
led to Huey Long's success. Across the country people demanded that the 
federal government get involved in disaster relief, helping to set the stage 
for the New Deal. The local civic elite turned insular and reactionary, and 
New Orleans never really recovered its preflood vibrancy. ...

"Civic arrangements work or they fail. Leaders are found worthy or wanting. 
What's happening in New Orleans and Mississippi today is a human tragedy. 
But take a close look at the people you see wandering, devastated, around 
New Orleans: they are predominantly black and poor. The political 
disturbances are still to come."

<http://www.nytimes.com/2005/09/01/opinion/01brooks.html>

Carl