your drop of serotoninrain...
I am already playing in my head with how to start this conversation with my students.
I strongly suggest you follow Eric's trackback to this post. He's in a different place than I am on this particular issue (that's right, he's in Texas and I'm in Pennsyvlania but that's not what I meant), and it's worth reading what he has to say. Furthermore, despite his denigration of his own math skills, his number crunching can't be faulted. 
My own feeling is that this isn't about numbers and having our facts straight. At some point feelings need to be as valid as facts. I was so angry last night reading what some people had written, and seeing the images on my TV screen of children walking around on astroturf that oozed human waste (!!!) that it made me want to do something. I want to fly down there, or even walk, and do something to make it stop and let the healing start. (That was all before I heard about Kanye West's comments. Ugh! I still feel the same way, but my gosh... chill buddy!)
I think part of the healing I mentioned above must take the form of serious, inclusive discussions on the socioeconomic issues brought out by this catastrophe. I know it sounds absurd, but this is an opportunity we may not have again for many years to do some much needed reconciliation between black and white, rich and poor, looters and finders, you and me.
Please let's not pass it by, even if our numbers don't add up.
Jim, I respectfully disagree with your contention that we ought to ignore numbers and not worry about having our facts straight. "Feelings" can't substitute for facts, because feelings can always be manipulated; that's what Jesse Jackson and Kanye West and, yes, even some on the "other side" rely on to make their overheated rhetoric work.
But, I know what you're saying (I think). At some point, we have to react to the reality of what has happened and get beyond how it came to be, until a more appropriate time when that discussion can be channeled into constructive areas of making sure this doesn't happen again. But, amigo, don't hold your breath. It's all going to get worse (not the physical conditions...those will be addressed; I'm talking about the finger-pointing).
My point with the number-crunching was not to dismiss all concerns about who the victims are and how they came to be in the condition they're in. I definitely don't want the focus to shift away from helping them. I was simply trying to move the discussion beyond the agenda-driven rhetoric that causes backs to bow up and walls to go up and communications to cease. I probably didn't do a very good job in that regard, but perhaps you'll trust my heart even if my words are clumsy.
Don't get the impression that I was sitting here waiting for your comment, cause I was.
I think I know where you're heart's at (that sounds presumptuous I know, but I mean it in a complimentary way, not as a slam). I wasn't unhappy with your words and I didn't think them clumsy, either. You usually do a pretty good job saying what you want to say.
You're right: we don't agree on the numbers thing but, eh; agreement is overrated. (I apologize for giving the impression that I think we should ignore numbers and facts, by the way. Not hardly. I did graduate with a Math and Statistics degree, you know. I like numbers. I like facts too).
Finally, you won't catch me holding my breath. But neither will I stop calling out and working for reconciliation. I think I'm just wired that way. God and I have had some discussions about it; I won't share them here as it would just make me look selfish.
So at the end of the day, I think I'll just resort to my favorite prayer. "Lord Jesus Christ, Son of God, have mercy on me a sinner."
Math and Statistics degree,
I should have known. The guitar thing was a dead giveaway. 
I like your favorite prayer; it's one I use every day.
But I like this one, too. Actually, it's two prayers, one for the morning and one for the evening. Anne Lamott, my favorite lefty Christian, brought them to my attention, and I'm sure you know them as well.
In the morning: "Whatever."
In the evening: "Oh well."
[Notice how artfully I've directed the conversation to more edifying fields?]
It is amazing, the interrelationship between mathematical and musical minds.
And yes, artful redirection is essential to civil discourse (it helps in a marriage too, every so often).
Commenting by HaloScan
