Comments for “Whatever It Is, I'm Against It” -- whateveritisimagainstit.blogspot.com
Where do you get the inner strength, the resources, the cojones, to read this stuff every day? Really.
And what are we to make of the fact that they (handlers, writers, etc.) don't seem to care that he sounds like a dolt and we all know it? Is it because they think if we're laughing at him we're for a moment, at least, forgetting about the destruction he's levying around the world?
I live in Pass Christian, MS. My Mother lives in Pass Christian, MS. My brother lives in Bay St. Louis, MS. My home was completely destroyed (along with my business and most of the town). My mother's and my brother's homes were severely damaged and remain uninhabitable.
The Feds "wrote a check" to HUD for billions. HUD developed CDBG (Community Development Block Grants) programs to be administered by MS Republican Gov. (and former RNC head) Haley Barbour. MS Phase I Katrina Housing Grants have been applied for by (reportedly) 17,000 families. Approximately 65,000 homes in MS were either destroyed or severely damaged by Katrina. Of the 17,000 Phase I applicants, less than 50 have seen a dime of Phase I money. Less than 50.
Phase I only covered homes with insurance outside the designated FEMA flood zones. As you can see, only about one-quarter of the homes destroyed or severely damaged by Katrina in MS even qualified for Phase I money and less than 50 have so far received any money at all.
My brother qualified for Phase I. He has yet to receive a dime. My mother and I did not qualify for Phase I. We applied for Phase II, but Phase II is vapor-there isn't any plan for Phase II yet, just an empty promise.
Homeowner's Insurance has turned out to be a cruel and expensive joke (or a racket run against policyholders). If a drop of floodwater can be documented in one's neighborhood, one is denied any coverage by one's homeowner's insurance carrier.
The reality down here is unless a Katrina damaged MS homeowner had the maximum amount of federal flood insurance (which very few did), then their chances of having any reconstruction or repair underway depends almost entirely upon their being able to self-finance (again very, very few can manage that) or getting lucky (akin to being struck by lightning) and having a volunteer group build or repair their home (a few have been that lucky), they are living in a 8' x 28' FEMA travel trailer which rocks and rolls in every strong breeze.
Can anyone on this blog suggest a way of getting Aaron's story a little wider circulation?
bobw: If you can enthuse the site owner to include AA's comment in a post, a Google bomb might be possible.
I dont know what a Google bomb is, but it sounds good!
Related item: Democracy Now today (Monday) played a Greg Palast "documentary" in which he claimed that a company called Innovative Emergency Management got a $500,000 contract to write a plan for evacuation, and never wrote the plan. Further, after the hurricane, they got another contract to study the failure of the government's response.
bobw: A Google bomb is a technique for manipulating search enginge results.
e.g. put the words "miserable failure" into Google and hit the "I feel lucky" button.
(You need the "lucky" button as the first few results in Google are paid for.)
I added a reference to it in the post. Simpler than a Google bomb, I would think, is linking to it elsewhere. I see that someone has mentioned it in comments at Lenin's Tomb. First-Draft would also be a good place to do that.
Aaron Adams, you're perturbed (to put it mildly). I hope things get better for you and your family, but I doubt it. What a horrible, hypocritical creature Bush&Co. is.
So what is the deal with the alleged news media in Mississippi? From what Aaron says, it would seem that if they were doing their job at all, the Gov and his corporate buddies would be the center of a scandal by now. Are they just not doing their job down there, or does the whole state only get its ``news'' from Faux News.
BTW, I bet one house that has been rebuilt already is that of Sen. Lott....
Commenting by HaloScan
