"Happy Dog" wrote in message
...
As others here have pointed out, many did not have the means to evacuate.

Many, many did. Disagree with that or quit wasting time.

And even if some *do* have themselves to blame, that does not argue
against the rescue coordinators *also* being to blame.

Did I say that? No, I didn't.

I didn't say you said that. I was just adding balance. (I think we've
entered a miscommunication loop.)

this has happened throughout the world and throughout human history, so
it should take no one by surprise. Nor should it be misrepresented as
unusually characteristic of impoverished people or welfare recipients;
sadly, it is universal.

Well, we can disagree then and wait for the facts to reveal themselves.
I haven't enough faith in newspaper reports to use them as solid
evidence. But, FWIW, from the reports so far, you're losing badly.

In what way? For me to be "losing" so far, you'd have to be able to show
quantitatively, from the reports so far, that the extent of the violence
in New Orleans is greater than has broken out during collapses of civil
authority in other times and places throughout the world,

Did I say that? No. I didn't.

Then perhaps we're misunderstanding each other here too. My point was that
to plausibly attribute the violence in N.O. to welfare assistance, you'd
have to show, at a minimum, that there is more violence in N.O. than in
otherwise-comparable circumstances where welfare assistance is absent.
Nothing in "the reports so far" even *attempts* to make that comparison.
(Nor has anyone shown--though you and others have flatly asserted--that the
perpetrators of the violence or looting were recipients of welfare
assistance. If, as it appears, the most serious violence is coming from gang
members, then it is at least as plausible to speculate that they support
themselves by drug dealing instead. If the Prohibition-era Mafia had been
thriving in New Orleans when the hurricane struck, don't you suppose *their*
gangs would have taken over too when the police department collapsed?)

--Gary