By DANICA KIRKA, Associated Press Writer

VIENNA, Austria - As the enormity of Hurricane Katrina's aftermath sinks in, Europeans have been moved to help in ways great and small: from an Austrian university proposing to take in 500 students from New Orleans, to nations agreeing to tap into strategic oil reserves.

Amid the compassion, there was also surprise that America was so vulnerable and unprepared, and dismay the Bush administration plays down the global warming threat so many Europeans link to the force and frequency of such storms.

Across the continent, the media and governments focused on the tragedy, with newspapers running photos of victims wading chest-deep in water and television screens filled with fires.

The French daily Liberation described the scenes of devastation as a cruel spectacle for President Bush, "the champion of security." Criticizing the disorder in the evacuation of hospitals, the editorial called Hurricane Katrina a "natural disaster with political implications." Terror mastermind Osama bin Laden "must be dying of laughter," it said.

In Italy, several newspapers said mounting criticism of Bush's handling of the relief effort was damaging his credibility. And Germany's Die Tageszeitung said the world was "seeing scenes otherwise only known in African capitals. The forces of order are absent. Anarchy and chaos reign. Supermarkets are plundered, helicopters shot at."

Some said perceived U.S. indifference to global warming was coming home to roost.

"What's absent is a debate over the climate, over Kyoto, over the human-caused warming of the earth," said an editorial in the Sueddeutsche Zeitung, a Munich-based daily. "But the oil shortage caused by the disaster will hurt Bush more than gaps in climate policy will."

Concrete offers of help, though, were louder than the criticism. The governments of 26 countries agreed Friday to release the equivalent of 2 million barrels of oil per day from strategic fuel reserves to cope with the aftermath of Hurricane Katrina, the International Energy Agency said.

With offers from the four corners of the globe pouring in, Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice has decided "no offer that can help alleviate the suffering of the people in the afflicted area will be refused," State Department spokesman Sean McCormack said Thursday.

However, in Moscow, a Russian official said the U.S. Federal Emergency Management Agency had rejected a Russian offer to dispatch rescue teams and other aid.

Spurred by images of people huddled on curbs begging for clean water and chaotic rescue efforts from rooftops, Europe also offered brainpower — specialists in coordinating disaster relief, experts in rebuilding devastated communities and rescue workers familiar with risky maneuvers.

The U.N. created a special task force to dispatch disaster experts, while the European Union volunteered to send water supply specialists.

Italy offered two military transport planes loaded with pumps, generators, amphibious crafts and tents. Germany pledged medical supplies. France dispatched rescue workers to determine what it could offer. NATO pledged its help, too.

In the Balkans, where the U.S. military has been deployed to keep the peace following a decade of conflict, offers were steeped in gratitude. A Bosnian television station offered to raise money. In Kosovo, a civil emergency unit made up of former ethnic Albanian rebels offered to send a team to help rebuild.

Elsewhere, Asia-Pacific nations, including tsunami-battered Sri Lanka, pledged money and disaster relief experts.

"There should not be an assumption that because America is the wealthiest and most powerful country in the world, this isn't a major challenge and a major crisis," Australian Prime Minister John Howard told Australian Broadcasting Corp. radio.

El Salvador, the only Latin American country with troops still in Iraq, offered Thursday to send soldiers to the United States to help police zones flooded by Hurricane Katrina.

The French city of Orleans also rallied to help its hurricane-hit American namesake. The city south of Paris planned to donate money raised from ticket sales at local sports matches to help hurricane victims in New Orleans, a statement from City Hall said Friday. Orleans and its university also offered to take in 50 students from the University of New Orleans for the school year.

The proposal to take in 500 students from New Orleans at the University of Innsbruck in Austria for the winter semester was more personal. The two universities, both in cities that boast rich cultural histories, have spent decades building bonds of friendship and community.

The two universities have exchanged students in summer programs for three decades, placing hundreds of students per year, largely in business studies. Many of the program's alumni have offered to assist, Mathias Schennach, who heads the Austrian university's international relations office.

The offer came only days after the western province of Tyrol suffered severe flooding of its own.

"People here have cold winters and avalanches — so we are familiar with the dangers of nature," Schennach said. "There is an understanding that if someone is in need, you help."

I personally think the biggest slap in our government's ability to organize at a threat would be that in China, they evacuated 500,000 people from the coastlines when the typhoon hit. Only 5 people died. Our problem was that even though it was a mandatory evacuation, we didn't have the organization or abilty to evacuate everybody. Another issue is that we didn't even have a contigency plan in place that would keep this country from falling into a gas shortage. From what I've heard is that for decades it has been known that it would be quite possible for the levees to break in a powerful storm and completely destroy New Orleans, that for decades there was certainly a reason to fear a huricane coming into Louisiana. We were poorly prepared and as it came everything was poorly executed. Let's see if we can shape up in the repairs.

US won't let Canada help Katrina victims

On tonight's news, CTV (Canadian TV) said that support was offered from Canada. Planes are ready to load with food and medical supplies and a system called "DART" which can provide fresh water and medical supplies is standing by. Department of Homeland Security as well as other U.S. agencies were contacted by the Canadian government requesting permission to provide help. Despite this contact, Canada has not been allowed to fly supplies and personnel to the areas hit by Katrina. So, everything here is grounded. Prime Minister Paul Martin is reportedly trying to speak to President Bush tonight or tomorrow to ask him why the U.S. federal government will not allow aid from Canada into Louisiana and Mississippi. That said, the Canadian Red Cross is reportedly allowed into the area.

Canadian agencies are saying that foreign aid is probably not being permitted into Louisiana and Mississippi because of "mass confusion" at the U.S. federal level in the wake of the storm.

http://storiesinamerica.dailykos.com/story/2005/8/31/235829/261

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Cowboy' Bush failed in Katrina evacuation - Chavez

"That government had no evacuation plan, it is incredible, the first power in the world that is so involved in
Iraq... and left its own population adrift," Chavez said in a cabinet meeting broadcast live on television.
.......
The Venezuelan president, applauded by supporters for his self-proclaimed socialist revolution to fight poverty, has offered to send cheap fuel, humanitarian aid and relief workers to the disaster area.

Venezuelan state oil firm PDVSA has offered $1 million from its U.S.-based refinery unit Citgo for relief efforts.
http://news.yahoo.com/s/nm/20050901/wl_nm/weather_katrina_chavez_dc_1;_ylt=Aoa4SALwWikRVMnri NnaQE_7NhkF;_ylu=X3oDMTA2ZGZwam4yBHNlYwNmYw--
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BTW -
As you're watching all this footage of people in Louisiana and Mississippi sleeping in overcrowded gymnasiums, their homes destroyed, loved ones missing, jobs lost… just remember that YOUR money is going to pay Gaza "settlers" $200,000 to $300,000 per family to relocate from their cushy housing projects along the Mediterranean. Think any of your fellow citizens will get a deal anywhere near that sweet?
http://www.antiwar.com/blog/index.php?id=P2334
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get a load of this asshole whos obviously detached from reality
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FEMA chief: Victims bear some responsibility
Brown pleased with effort: 'Things are going relatively well'

http://edition.cnn.com/2005/WEATHER/09/01/katrina.fema.brown/index.html
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Oh yeah and don't forget this one

http://www.boingboing.net/2005/08/31/_a_tale_of_two_photo.html
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Airboaters stalled by FEMA

The pilots stand ready to go help hurricane victims but have not been allowed to do so.

As a flooded New Orleans sinks further into despair, up to 500 Florida airboat pilots have volunteered to rescue Hurricane Katrina victims, transport relief workers and ferry supplies.

But they aren't being allowed in. And they're growing frustrated.

http://www.sun-sentinel.com/news/local/florida/orl-caneboats0205sep02,0,4766048.story?coll=sfla-news-florida
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Mayor to feds: 'Get off your asses'
Transcript of radio interview with New Orleans' Nagin

Friday, September 2, 2005; Posted: 2:59 p.m. EDT (18:59 GMT)

New Orleans Mayor Ray Nagin speaks Saturday, before Hurricane Katrina's devastation.

(CNN) -- New Orleans Mayor Ray Nagin blasted the slow pace of federal and state relief efforts in an expletive-laced interview with local radio station WWL-AM.

http://www.cnn.com/2005/US/09/02/nagin.transcript/index.html
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This looks like about the only thing the Feds are really doing...
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Troops told 'shoot to kill' in New Orleans
...
Three hundred of the Arkansas National Guard have landed in the city of New Orleans," Ms Blanco said.

"These troops are fresh back from Iraq, well trained, experienced, battle-tested and under my orders to restore order in the streets.

"They have M-16s and they are locked and loaded.

"These troops know how to shoot and kill and they are more than willing to do so if necessary and I expect they will."
...
http://www.abc.net.au/news/newsitems/200509/s1451906.htm
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Heres a livejournal about the situation

Three days ago, police and national guard troops told citizens to head toward the Crescent City Connection Bridge to await transportation out of the area. The citizens trekked over to the Convention Center and waited for the buses which they were told would take them to Houston or Alabama or somewhere else, out of this area.

It's been 3 days, and the buses have yet to appear.

Although obviously he has no exact count, he estimates more than 10,000 people are packed into and around and outside the convention center still waiting for the buses. They had no food, no water, and no medicine for the last three days, until today, when the National Guard drove over the bridge above them, and tossed out supplies over the side crashing down to the ground below. Much of the supplies were destroyed from the drop. Many people tried to catch the supplies to protect them before they hit the ground. Some offered to walk all the way around up the bridge and bring the supplies down, but any attempt to approach the police or national guard resulted in weapons being aimed at them.

There are many infants and elderly people among them, as well as many people who were injured jumping out of windows to escape flood water and the like -- all of them in dire straights.

Any attempt to flag down police results in being told to get away at gunpoint. Hour after hour they watch buses pass by filled with people from other areas. Tensions are very high, and there has been at least one murder and several fights. 8 or 9 dead people have been stored in a freezer in the area, and 2 of these dead people are kids.

The people are so desperate that they're doing anything they can think of to impress the authorities enough to bring some buses. These things include standing in single file lines with the eldery in front, women and children next; sweeping up the area and cleaning the windows and anything else that would show the people are not barbarians.

The buses never stop.

Before the supplies were pitched off the bridge today, people had to break into buildings in the area to try to find food and water for their families. There was not enough. This spurred many families to break into cars to try to escape the city. There was no police response to the auto thefts until the mob reached the rich area -- Saulet Condos -- once they tried to get cars from there... well then the whole swat teams began showing up with rifles pointed. Snipers got on the roof and told people to get back.

He reports that the conditions are horrendous. Heat, mosquitoes and utter misery. The smell, he says, is "horrific."

He says it's the slowest mandatory evacuation ever, and he wants to know why they were told to go to the Convention Center area in the first place; furthermore, he reports that many of them with cell phones have contacts willing to come rescue them, but people are not being allowed through to pick them up.

http://www.livejournal.com/users/interdictor/42309.html
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And heres some crazy before and after photos:
http://alt.ngs.noaa.gov/katrina/089I30C_KATRINA.HTM

http://www.globalsecurity.org/military/facility/new-orleans-imagery.htm

Some kid takes an abandoned bus and gets over 100 people out of New Orleans before FEMA lifts a finger and now the cops say he may be in big trouble. What bunch of fucking assholes...

http://www.newschannel5.tv/2005/9/1/4255/Taking-refuge-in-the-Astrodome
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FEMA head should have been fired in Jan.


Fire Michael Brown as FEMA head,
Rep. Wexler urges President Bush
http://www.jewishsightseeing.com/dhh_weblog/2005-blog/2005-01-blog/2005-01-26-wexler-fema.htm

Oh and one more point of insanity...

FEMA Directing Donations To Rev.
Pat Robertson

http://www.sploid.com/news/2005/09/01/fema-directing-donations-to-rev-pat-robertson-123509.php

edit- Oops I lied... heres another

Halliburton hired for storm cleanup
The Navy has hired Houston-based Halliburton Co. to restore electric power, repair roofs and remove debris at three naval facilities in Mississippi damaged by Hurricane Katrina.
http://www.chron.com/cs/CDA/ssistory.mpl/business/3335685

At least someone in power is outraged...

Senators call hurricane response "immense failure"

WASHINGTON (Reuters) - Two key U.S. senators said on Friday they will open a bipartisan investigation into what they described as an "immense failure" of the government response to the victims of Hurricane Katrina.

http://news.yahoo.com/s/nm/20050902/pl_nm/weather_katrina_senate_dc

Originally posted by Blibblob
I personally think the biggest slap in our government's ability to organize at a threat would be that in China, they evacuated 500,000 people from the coastlines when the typhoon hit. Only 5 people died. Our problem was that even though it was a mandatory evacuation, we didn't have the organization or abilty to evacuate everybody.

Of course in China when the government says mandatory, it has a somewhat different meaning.

Originally posted by Blibblob
From what I've heard is that for decades it has been known that it would be quite possible for the levees to break in a powerful storm and completely destroy New Orleans, that for decades there was certainly a reason to fear a huricane coming into Louisiana.

Yeah, apparently they've been trying to shore up the levees since the 90s. An article in the paper today contrasted the struggle they've had trying to get funding to protects hundreds of thousands of people with Alaska's ability to get $241 million to fund a bridge to an uninhabited island. The difference? The Alaska delagation are Republicans in a Republican Congress and Ted Stevens heads the appropriations committee. I hope he's pleased with himself. I hate pork.

Echo,

Why is it that I'm unsurprised that YOU find the news stories about foreign countries offering aid to the U.S. and criticism of President Bush? If you put the same energy you have in bashing Bush into something more constructive, you'd still be blaming Bush.

Dammit.

Lots of great pic of the horrible disaster

http://www.nola.com/hurricane/photos/

Just to give you a sense of just how badly FEMA has f*cked up.

This is beyond my comprehension and after spending two frustrating days trying to just get someone to let us help we've FINNALLY been told we can conduct "renegade" boat rescues via the just concluded press conference that Gov. Blanco just held.

Why is this JUST NOW being allowed? Well let's start from the very beginning.

On Wednesday morning a group of approximately 1,000 citizens pulling 500 boats left the Acadiana Mall in Lafayette in the early morning and headed to New Orleans with a police escort from the Jefferson Parish Sheriff's Department. The flotillia of trucks pulling boats stretched over FIVE miles. This citizen rescue group was organized by La. State Senator, Nick Gautreaux from Vermilion Parish. The group was comprised of experienced boaters, licensed fishermen and hunters, people who have spent their entire adult life and teenage years on the waterways of Louisiana.
...
http://securingamerica.com/ccn/node/357#comment-6515
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Evacuees at Cajundome wait for first lady, and for lunch

As the first lady toured the Red Cross shelter at the Cajundome this morning, a line of evacuees waiting to eat their lunch trickled out the door of the Dome.

First lady Laura Bush arrived about midday to tour the shelter and meet evacuees.

By 12:50 p.m., the trays of food were still covered and hungry evacuees stood in line, holding empty plates. Rice, beans and jambalaya were on the menu. About that time, volunteers began rolling the carts of food into position to serve.
http://www.acadiananow.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20050902/NEWS05/50902009/1075
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Army times calls victims insurgents...

http://www.armytimes.com/story.php?f=1-292925-1077495.php

50 countries offer US aid after Katrina

AP - In an accelerating drive, more than 50 countries have pledged money or other aid to help Americans recover from Hurricane Katrina.

The pledges blur political lines. Cuba and Venezuela have offered help despite differences with Washington. Oil giant Saudi Arabia and tiny countries like Dominica are among nations making pledges.

"I hope that will remind Americans that we are all part of the same community," Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice said Friday as offers kept pouring in.

http://news.ninemsn.com.au/article.aspx?id=59898
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A list of screw-ups
http://www.katrinamistakelist.com/
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WTF these guys couldn't come home 2 weeks early to do the job they actually signed up for?

Eight Long Days
Nearing the end of their tour in Iraq, National Guard troops from Louisiana face an uncertain homecoming.
http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/9131097/site/newsweek
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Bush fakes photo ops and stalls releif efforts

fake food distro
http://www.warandpiece.com/blogdirs/002485.html

Bush faked levee repair for photo op yesterday
http://americablog.blogspot.com/2005/09/bush-faked-levee-repair-for-photo-op.html

Bush visit halts food delivery
http://www.nola.com/weblogs/print.ssf?/mtlogs/nola_Times-Picayune/archives/print076556.html

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FEMA Outsourced N.O. Disaster Plans To Politcal Cronies/Donors

The award was announced on June 3, 2004 on the firm's web site but was taken down just as Hurricane Katrina's winds and waves first started pounding New Orleans. It would now appear that the hurricane plan IEM and its team developed wasn't worth a damned thing.
http://rense.com/general67/fema.htm
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The Two Americas

Last September, a Category 5 hurricane battered the small island of Cuba with 160-mile-per-hour winds. More than 1.5 million Cubans were evacuated to higher ground ahead of the storm. Although the hurricane destroyed 20,000 houses, no one died.

http://www.truthout.org/docs_2005/090305Y.shtml
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Aaron Broussard, president of Jefferson Parish, New Orleans, announces on Meet the Press that FEMA blocked life-saving aid to Jefferson Parish. FEMA prevented the delivery of three trailer trucks of water donated by Wal-Mart, forbade the Coast Guard from donating 1000 gallons of diesel fuel that happened to be on a Coast Guard vessel docked in Jefferson Parish, and cut all emergency communication lines out of the parish. The communication lines were repaired and put under armed guard. Mr. Broussard then broke down as he described how the mother of the head of emergency management in the parish was trapped in a nursing home and phoned her son every day asking when help would come. The son tried to reassure her that help was coming, but the woman died Friday evening (after President Bush's flyby) when she drowned to death.

http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/9179790/

i live in alabama im glad it didnt hit us that bad

clearly cuba is better then the US and bush should be jailed for life. God, I am sick of everything having to revolve around bush and how he can be implicated in EVERYTHING. get a fucking life losers

Originally posted by Travh20
clearly cuba is better then the US and bush should be jailed for life. God, I am sick of everything having to revolve around bush and how he can be implicated in EVERYTHING. get a fucking life losers

Sound familiar to anyone? Just insert Clinton for bush and it is exactly what we all heard for the previous 8 years befor bush took over.

"clearly cuba is better then the US and Clinton should be jailed for life. God, I am sick of everything having to revolve around Clinton and how he can be implicated in EVERYTHING. get a fucking life losers"

Couldn't have said it better myself.

ya, clinton is relevant now :rolleyes: not only do you attack bush 24/7 but you defend clinton who no one gives a shit about anymore the rest of the time.