What has happened Here?

This week I am truely confused. At first I heart on the German news that the hurricane Katrina has struck New Orleans, but the damage was less the expected. I felt relieved and was sure it was another natural disaster which happens unfortunately every year somewhere in the USA. Certainly we would see some of it in the news for the day and maybe the next day. Yes, lives would be hurt and property distroyed, but as in most instances the warning system we have and the infrastructure allow quickly to get the situation under control. Relief funds would kick in and life would return to as close to normal as possible.

I could not have been more wrong! In a nation that has the best equipped military and one of the highest living standards in the worl, an economy power that amounts to numbers other countries haven't dreamed of, we are still dealing with people trapped, starving and officials blaiming one another not sure why things went wrong.

Articles of respectful scientists and reporters re-appear that show that in 2001 besides the number one thread to this nation, a terrorist attack in New York, the third worse thing that could face our country would be a hurricane reaching New Orleans.

If this was known, there were tests and simulations of this scenario as recent as last year, why did it take so long to get the needed help down there? How come it was Friday, the hurricane hit Tuesday, the leeves breached Wednesday, before the there was federal intervention? How come we hear about hotels getting prefered recuing and people sitting at lunch critizising starving people who feel abandond and left behind looting necessities to get by, because they still hadn't gotten any help Thursday in the shelters they were instructed to seak out.

Next, money was cut to give back as tax cuts, and to fund a war in Iraq, money that was used to realise a plan to protect New Orleans from another disasterous hurricane.

I am deeply ashamed that we could not do anything better than that. It seems like people got quicker help after the tsunami in less developed countries with little or no infrastructure. It seems that priority was placed on other issues more than on following experts advise. I don't want to imagine what would happen if the second worst thing would happen, an earthquake in San Francisco.

Now where is the accountability our president wants, or does it really matter who is at fault here? Don't we owe the victims of this storm an explanation and a promise we really will make sure next time will be handle quicker and better? Afterall, this wasn't the last hurricane!