HBO : When the Levees Broke

[spurschick]

Is anyone else going to watch this? I've been tearing up during the trailers for it, so I can't imagine what's going to happen while watching the entire thing.

[Johnny_Blaze_47]

When is it? I hadn't heard of it.

[PakiDan]

When is it on? Let me know... I'll watch it.

[spurschick]

Go to hbo.com

The first two parts are on tomorrow night and it finishes on Tuesday night

[Jelly]

It's supposed to be absolutely riveting with harrowing scenes we've never seen before. Spike Lee always produces top quality films. Wish I had HBO.

[CharlieMac]

It looks pretty good from the trailers I've seen.

[Sonia_TX]

Haven't see the trailers but I will watch the show...thanks for letting us know.

[KEDA]

Ill see it


thanks for the heads up

[mookie2001]

when the levee breaks we'll have no place stay

[ShoogarBear]

I might have a very difficult time watching it.

[MannyIsGod]

I'm watching the first 2 parts right now on HBO InDemand.

Fuck.

[MannyIsGod]

Everytime I hear that the government didn't know it pisses me off.

http://spurstalk.com/forums/showpost.php?p=457449&postcount=14
http://spurstalk.com/forums/showpost.php?p=458023&postcount=35

Read the last sentence in this post. Fuck, just read the whole thread.

http://spurstalk.com/forums/showpost.php?p=458135&postcount=46

[boutons_]

December 18, 2006

Op-Ed Columnist

Out of Sight

By BOB HERBERT

Baker, La.

There are hundreds of children in the trailer camp that is run by FEMA and known as Renaissance Village, but they won’t be having much of a Christmas. They’re trapped here in a demoralizing, overcrowded environment with adults who are mostly broke, jobless and at the end of their emotional tethers. Many of the kids aren’t even going to school.

“This is a terrible environment for children,” said Anita Gentris, who lost everything in the flood that followed Hurricane Katrina and is living in one of the 200-square-foot travel trailers with her 10-year-old daughter and 5-year-old son. “My daughter is having bad dreams. And my son, he’s a very angry child right now. He cries. He throws things.

“I’m desperately trying to find permanent housing.”

The television cameras are mostly gone now, and the many thousands of people from the Gulf Coast whose lives were wrecked by Katrina in the summer of 2005 have slipped from the national consciousness. But like the city of New Orleans itself, most of them have yet to recover.

The enormity of the continuing tragedy is breathtaking. Thousands upon thousands of people are still suffering. And yet the way the poorest and most vulnerable victims have been treated so far by government officials at every level has been disgraceful.

More than a third of the 1,200 people in this sprawling camp are children. Only about half of the school-age youngsters are even registered for school; of those, roughly half actually go to school on any given day. The authorities can’t account for the rest.

A number of officials who asked not to be identified told me they are concerned that large numbers of children are remaining isolated at Renaissance Village, holed up in the trailers day in and day out, falling further and further behind educationally, and deteriorating emotionally.

Leah Baptiste, a caseworker from a local affiliate of Catholic Charities, said: “These trailers are small. They were only meant for traveling. And you’ve got families with three and four children cooped up in there seven days a week, 24 hours a day, with no privacy, no babysitter, no job, no money — there’s a lot of help they need. Some people have learned to adapt, but a lot are depressed.”

The most critical needs for the trailer camp population are housing and employment. Many of the adults at Renaissance Village were working before the storm but have been unable to find work since. Even the lowest-wage jobs in the Baton Rouge area are scarce, and without cars (in some cases, without money even for bus fare) it’s extremely difficult for Renaissance Village residents to get to them.

Beyond that, many of the residents have severe personal problems. “They are afraid,” said a woman who works closely with the population and asked not to be identified. “They’re embarrassed by their situation, humiliated. They don’t know what to do. Some cannot read or write, so when the government drops off these bureaucratic forms for them to fill out, it’s a waste of time.”

Nearly all of the residents are carrying scars from their initial ordeal. Many lost close relatives, and many came frighteningly close to dying themselves.

Candice Victor was about to give birth immediately after the storm and needed a Caesarean section. A stranger with a butcher knife offered to do it. “She was going to sterilize the knife by pouring lighter fluid on it and setting it on fire,” Ms. Victor said. Wiser heads prevailed, and the baby, a girl, was later successfully delivered.

The big story in the immediate aftermath of Katrina was the way the government failed to rush to the aid of people who were obviously in desperate trouble. What we’re witnessing now is an extended slow-motion replay of that initial failed response. Thousands of people remain in trouble, but instead of clinging to roofs and waving signs at TV cameras in helicopters flying overhead, they are suffering in silence, out of the sight of most Americans.

The government could have come up with a crash program to build housing and find or create jobs for the victims of Katrina. It could have ensured that all those hurt by the storm received whatever social services they needed, including mental health counseling and treatment. It could have begun to address the long-festering problems of race and poverty in this country.

The government could have done so much. But it didn’t.

http://select.nytimes.com/2006/12/18/opinion/18herbert.html?n=Top%2fOpinion%2fEditorials%20and% 20Op%2dEd%2fOp%2dEd%2fColumnists%2fBob%20Herbert

=========

The Katrina victims need to get their shit together and start contributing $Ms to the Repugs, and register as Repugs. The Repugs only "govern" when paid to do so with $$$ or with votes.

[CosmicCowboy]

How is it that they can't get jobs when I know of dozens of guys that traveled from Texas to work cleanup after the hurricane...contractors were begging for help and paying top dollar...

And how is it the govenments responsibility to make these kids go to school? Last time I checked it was the parents responsibility...It's the governments responsibility to have schools for them to go to and it looks like they fulfilled that responsibility adequately...

i throw the bulllshit flag on that one...

[Kori Ellis]

And how is it the govenments responsibility to make these kids go to school? Last time I checked it was the parents responsibility...It's the governments responsibility to have schools for them to go to and it looks like they fulfilled that responsibility adequately...

i throw the bulllshit flag on that one...

Are their school buses from Renaissance Village to the schools?

[CosmicCowboy]

Kori...I can't imagine that they would not have schoolbuses...have you ever seen any place that didn't? Baton Rouge wasn't hit hard like New Orleans...

[Sacramental]

this show is old i saw it months ago.

[King]

this show is old i saw it months ago.

Hence the August date on the first post.

[Fillmoe]

Kori...I can't imagine that they would not have schoolbuses...have you ever seen any place that didn't? Baton Rouge wasn't hit hard like New Orleans...


wow at the ignorance in this sentence..... "cant imagine"..... should have stopped right there.......

[Cant_Be_Faded]

Houston is still getting chode bloaded by supporting all those evacuees with no government support, isnt it?

[Aggie Hoopsfan]

It's supposed to be absolutely riveting with harrowing scenes we've never seen before. Spike Lee always produces top quality films. Wish I had HBO.

Spike Lee sucks. I'm sure the summary of it will be that it was all the fault of the white man.

[Aggie Hoopsfan]

How is it that they can't get jobs when I know of dozens of guys that traveled from Texas to work cleanup after the hurricane...contractors were begging for help and paying top dollar...

And how is it the govenments responsibility to make these kids go to school? Last time I checked it was the parents responsibility...It's the governments responsibility to have schools for them to go to and it looks like they fulfilled that responsibility adequately...

i throw the bulllshit flag on that one...

They're too busy blowing all their government stipends at the casinos. Why work when you can take a government hand out and head to the blackjack tables?

[T Park]

Great post Aggie, Im sure thought the bleeding hearts will flame away at you on that though.

[CosmicCowboy]

wow at the ignorance in this sentence..... "cant imagine"..... should have stopped right there.......

Someone as dumb as you are should be careful about throwing around the word "ignorant". You are obviously too stupid to recognize that the writer of this article made no attempt at being evenhanded and neutral and clearly had a political agenda. If the kids weren't able to go to school because the local school district refused to supply transportation there is no way that gem wouldn't have been included in this smear article.

The bottom line is that it is not the "governments" job to replace basic parental responsibilities.

[1369]

They're too busy blowing all their government stipends at the casinos. Why work when you can take a government hand out and head to the blackjack tables?

When I was driving back from Florida in June, I stopped for the night in MS and in trying to find a motel that was open/had a vacancy, each one had a sign on the door that basically said the same thing: "Do not come in here asking for a job, due to the fact that after Katrina and we were trying to rebuild/reopen you were content to live off the gov't and too lazy to work. We filled our needed positions and you can go piss up a rope."

[Extra Stout]

The issue at Renaissance Village is truancy, not lack of bussing.

It is the government's fault that parents won't send their children to school, you see. Maybe if these parents got another handout, they'd be more motivated.

[MannyIsGod]

Spike Lee sucks. I'm sure the summary of it will be that it was all the fault of the white man.Perhaps you should watch it before being critical. I didn't get that from it at all, but I've only seen the first 2 hours.