On the topic of al-Cajun

Right around September 11th, I had a lot of things to say about the government (all bad) that kept me well topped up on Rants of the Infrequent for a long time. Then I stopped paying attention to politics because, basically, I don't have health insurance and can't afford a heart attack right now. Once Bush was re-elected the deathknell, as far as I was concerned, for America had been tolled. It's not even that I disagree with his politics, though I do, it's that he has the evident intelligence of a mouldy sock. He has, evidently, charisma and interpersonal intelligence, but I like good old fashioned book larnin.

Katrina and its aftermath has given me another opportunity to say lots of bad things about the government, and I've said some of them. I think a lot more of them. So it interests me to realise that the topic I have the most to say on isn't, um, formally speaking the government.

Well, not technically. Not in the political-talking-heads sense.

It is, instead, The Army Times.

That's right, it's the insurgency article. Go read it; I'll wait.

There really is far more to pick apart here than I'm going to focus on, though I do think the first paragraph is deserving of a special nod for being "scariest paragraph ever written about civilians". The paragraph, in its entirety, says "Combat operations are underway on the streets 'to take this city back' in the aftermath of Hurricane Katrina."

Let the phrase 'combat operations' roll gently off your tongue. While you do that, ponder the location of New Orleans, the city in question. It is in the United States (whatever Michael Brown thinks, it's also a city) and as such is friendly territory. This is neither Kabul nor Compton of which we speak. It is, instead, New Orleans.

In consequence, the statement in the next paragraph, a direct quote from the enlightened Brigadier General Gary Jones, is even more shocking than it might otherwise be. What does he say will be the state of New Orleans after these combat operations roll out? 'This place is going to look like Little Somalia.' I'm not entirely sure if that means that it's going to be full of starving black people and the sound of fighter jets overhead as we bomb it back to the stone age, or if there's some other characteristic of (Big?) Somalia that I'm missing. But given the reports on the checkpoints and the progress in and out of the city, I'm leaning towards the former.

But all of that is introductory material. The real reason I am even bothering to write about this - I could write until my hands fell off and not get halfway through the things I think and feel about the government - is the usage of the term "insurgency" to describe the armed looters and snipers in the city. Or, to quote directly from the article, "While some fight the insurgency in the city, other carry on with rescue and evacuation operations."

Now. Let's discuss this.

While I am opposed to the situation of anarchy that existed (and may still exist) in NO, I'm also not entirely convinced that as many people as the Army Times claims were shot were shot. There's a good article on the Guardian; I've also seen an article (somewhere, if you know where tell me) that discusses the incident of the helicopter that was fired on. Or rather, the incidents of the other helicopters that weren't fired on.

We have two problems here. One of them, The Guardian acknowledges. Essentially, the media never sold a paper or got a click-through pushed by finding two moderates, let's say, in the Palestinian/Israeli debate and asking their opinions on the situation. They go looking for the hotheads and present that as utter fact - and we buy it. In this case, the media is gleefully reporting that children have been raped and murdered, adults have been raped, murders have been committed in the Superdome and later in the shelters. No one has, thus far, either come forward with a tale of rape or has turned up the body of someone raped and murdered. Doesn't mean it hasn't happened - but it does mean that the reporters are, at the moment, wrong. They are reporting news that does not exist and cannot be substantiated. In a similar vein, the media was full of reports of mass violence in a refugee camp in Baton Rouge - when the reality was that shelter workers confiscated one knife from one refugee.

It's the power of rumour on the scale that got the Runaway Bride handed a bill for the investigation into her disappearance. It's, in fact, simply the power of rumour at a time when most people on the scene had little way to verify what was true and what was not. Ever play Telephone? Yeah.

The other problem, though, is the idea that American citizens are in some sort of state of declared insurgency. While any actions (such as the shootout at the OK Corral the bridge) of verified sniping and gunfire is absolutely unforgiveable to me, that doesn't mean that there's some sort of actual insurgency occuring.

Maybe my assumption is naive and the people who are shooting are not people who are in fear, possibly in great medical need (one of the issues faced is the number of people, disproportionately attracted to NO, who use drugs) and generally stressed out. But when my dogs are stressed out, I don't say they're involved in an insurgency.

On the other hand, though, what do you expect when you allow a population to arm itself? It's great to know that there are people out there prepared to defend "their" territory from their fellow citizens (notice that I did not specify New Orleans there). I certainly sleep safer in my bed at night, knowing that people who feel that the risks of gun ownership are far outweighed by the thought of being able to shoot the robber who breaks in at two am to steal all their Wal-Mart crap are living in my community. I certainly feel safer on the streets knowing that there are people carrying guns for reasons of their own and one of those reasons is that other people have guns.

I'm curious to know what the purpose of the guns in NO is. Anyone shot an alligator? Water moccasin? Enraged camel?

Didn't think so.

So what happened to make people form packs of armed citizens and go out and defend "their" territory? And why does the Army Times refer to them as an insurgency?

Cause, forgive me if I'm wrong, but to be an insurgency, you have to rebel. There was no indication that was being done; therefore, there is no insurgency. What there was was a group of citizens running around with guns. Which, as mentioned above, 'solve' too many problems in this society as it is.

My theory is this. After a year and a half of combat in Iraq, the military establishment is pretty used to seeing problems in the nail sense. And all they've got is hammers.

Not that that makes this right. While the violence is not excusable, calling this an insurgency isn't either. But, as with so many of the results of Katrina, we'd rather not deal with the problems.

Rather than taking a serious look at the political appointee/patronage system in Washington, Michael Brown will either resign under pressure or be fired.

Rather than re-evaluating whether we need a Department of Sieg Heil Homeland Security when obviously they have the capability of a wet kitty of keeping the Homeland, you know, Secure, Michael Chertoff will dodge the political bullet, but there will be grumbling.

Rather than spending money appropriately to ensure that this sort of thing doesn't happen again, or is at least minimised when it does, Congress will porkbarrel every single project that comes out of the areas hit by Katrina, even if it's a vital exhibit on the history of lint.

Rather than electing a president with any sort of leadership ability, we will stare at Bush for a few more media minutes. The midterms will go Democrat, Lott will hold his seat, and the presidential will be...interesting. Katrina ain't going to be a player for the Dems when it comes down to the presidential. Interestingly, I'm calling Katrina as a player for the Reps in that election.

Rather than not fighting a stupid, unjust war that we're not prepared to fight properly, we'll fund that and FEMA and all the porkbarrel shit. There will be tax cuts in there somewhere. For the rich.

Rather than realising exactly how close that knife is to our throat in the oil/America relationship, we will continue to exploit fossil fuels.

Rather than admitting that perhaps global warming has something to do with why we're up to N for storm names and it's not even half way through the season - oh, and by the time you read this, we might be up to O because a Tropical Depression (don't ask, channonyarrow, don't...fucking...ask...) might be Tropical Storm Ophelia - we'll continue to accept that it doesn't - because that's easier than dealing with the problem, which will take years and money and effort and work to fix.

Rather than having reasonable gun-control laws in this country, we'll continue to have an "insurgency." Said insurgency will require combat operations to control.

What happened to being your brother's keeper? I'm not only asking that of the Army Times - I'm asking that of the looters. What happened to it? When did it turn into "shoot on sight"?

Apparently, it turned into that the moment the National Guard was deployed to do what it should be doing, rather than getting blown up in Iraq. Apparently, we've all forgotten anything we ever learned about how to behave, and how to be human.

This whole thing is shameful. Trying to pick out someone's misuse of militarily-hostile terms like 'combat operations' and 'insurgency' and say why they're specifically wrong isn't saying that there are things here that are right. Because I'm not finding anything that the leaders we elected and the leaders we allowed to steal the country are doing that is right. Barbara Bush thinks that the people in the Astrodome will be better off for it; Bush is hugging everyone in sight; the Cabinet as a whole raced to the South over the weekend; Michael Brown is hiding from cameras. And we're not doing anything to discuss their accountability. It's not the time for that yet - now is the time to stop this from getting worse than it already will be.

Five people have been confirmed dead from cholera by the CDC. Overstretched states across the nation are fitting people into their infrastructure; people are giving generously. Now is the time for that.

But later will be the time when questions need to be asked, and they need to be asked by us. Whether or not Nancy Pelosi calls for the resignation of Brown doesn't matter - it's votes. It's politics as usual, and you latch on to the most likely suspect (until the debacle with the convention centre, I had Rice pegged as the one to take the hit) and you bring them down to keep yourself alive. But we, I think, have the obligation to know why this was allowed to happen, from Nagin's level up through Blanco's and ultimately to Bush's. And we have the right and the duty to act according to what we find out. We have the right and the duty to decide if this is the sort of thing we want to support or if it is a wedge for change. We have the right and the duty to do that.

Read the Declaration of Independence; I'll wait.

And the reason for all this? Apparently, our government is at war with us. The Army Times' considered opinion of the United States insurgency notwithstanding, what of the official response makes you think that Homeland Security and FEMA and the Executive Branch aren't opposed to us?

Yeah. I didn't see anything either.