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2005-09-04 Home Front: Economy

New Orleans cops disintegrated - 2/3 of the police missing post-Katrina!

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Posted by Dan Darling 2005-09-04 03:42|| || Front Page|| [1 views since 2007-05-07] Top

#1 I don't remember this happening in NYC when 911 happened. Must be a cultural thing?

Posted by BrerRabbit 2005-09-04 07:37|| 2005-09-04 07:37|| Front Page Top

#2 "Now the chief of the New Orleans police, an organization so famously corrupt that it actually had to be put under Federal control, having watched 200 troopers simply walk off the job, is sitting around criticizing the National Guard for being late for doing the job he was supposed to be doing." - Jason von Steewyk

Anyone know what he's talking about?

And BrerRabbit, something in me suggests that the "anything goes" culture (yes, the one tied to Mardi Gras and that "national treasure" the Dems so badly want back)

Posted by Edward Yee 2005-09-04 09:00|| http://edwardyee.fanworks.net]">[http://edwardyee.fanworks.net] 2005-09-04 09:00|| Front Page Top

#3 He may be referring to the period when the Feds were busting the NOPD for corruption not too long back. They may have been subjected to Federal oversight for a period of time by DOJ.

Posted by Angerong Uninelet1441 2005-09-04 09:17|| 2005-09-04 09:17|| Front Page Top

#4 The NO police department is famous for corruption, drug-dealing, and even murder. One policewoman murdered her partner when she and her boyfriend robbed the restaurant he was moonlighting at. Another policeman murdered a citizen who had filed a brutality complaint upon him. Drug investigations were leaked to the suspects, and corruption investigations were leaked to the policemen involved. Think of it as a more sinister version of the movie The Big Easy.

Brer, in NYC the policemen and firemen were almost inconceivably brave. Some of the NO policemen are almost inconceivably vile. We don't hear about the good ones, of course. And, although the destruction at the WTC was complete, it was also local. The rest of NYC was affected by smoke and debris, but there was no breakdown of order. The affected area in NO is much larger than the affected area of NYC. Sadly, the WTC attack left few people wounded. Thousands of people lined up to donate blood, but little of their donations were ever used.

Posted by Eric Jablow">Eric Jablow 2005-09-04 10:27|| 2005-09-04 10:27|| Front Page Top

#5 A better analogy is the 1997 flood centered on Grand Forks, ND.

There was a dike breech. There was sudden major flooding. There were people stranded. There even was some minor looting. However, the local police and State troopers put down the minor looting quickly.

In the New Orleans case, the Mayor wasn't able to acknowledge that the police force would be unable to handle the emergency and the State wouldn't do so because they would be called 'racist'. Similarly if the Feds had said, "well we are coming in with force because we expect the police force to disintegrate", the Feds would have been condemned by the PC press, the Democrats, etc.

Posted by mhw 2005-09-04 10:39|| 2005-09-04 10:39|| Front Page Top

#6 On top of which NO is drastically under-manned in the PD anyway. On a per capita basis NYC has 5 times the cops.

Posted by AlanC">AlanC 2005-09-04 10:52|| 2005-09-04 10:52|| Front Page Top

#7 From LGF -- CNN reported major from the Hyatt this morning. "The first thing on his agenda this morning was to get hotel rooms in a place like Las Vegas for his police and firefighters? He wants them to get counseling?"

Remember all the places NYC finest were sent? This guy thinks he's Rudy!!!!

Posted by Sherry 2005-09-04 17:06|| 2005-09-04 17:06|| Front Page Top

#8 NO French colony, like Haiti; NY Dutch/English colony. These influences are very persistent. Yeah, it's cultural.

Posted by Mrs. Davis 2005-09-04 17:20|| 2005-09-04 17:20|| Front Page Top

#9 So much of this is due to leadership. People key on the leader. When the leaders are running around, blaming everyone else, breaking down on camera, and making paranoid accusations*, then it should come as no surprise when everything falls apart. Contrast this vile New Orleans bunch with Pataki and Guiliani on 9/11. If Rudy and Pataki had panicked on 9/11, there would have been a similar breakdown in NYC.

* I'm probably being too kind by characterizing them as paranoid. They are political opportunists of the worst sort. This is probably the game they've been playing all of their lives. Sit back, let things happen as they will, then shift the blame onto someone else when things go wrong. Only now, the stakes are much higher and the attention of the world is focused on them, so they sound shriller and more accusatory than they normally would. This is not about saving their city. It's about saving their sociopathic asses. They could give a rat's ass about the dead and dying.

Posted by 11A5S 2005-09-04 18:17|| 2005-09-04 18:17|| Front Page Top

#10 amen 115AS

Posted by Frank G">Frank G 2005-09-04 18:33|| 2005-09-04 18:33|| Front Page Top

#11 1 I don't remember this happening in NYC when 911 happened. Must be a cultural thing?
I am cautiously going to offer up that comparasonsons to 9/11 are more dis similar. NYC had a flood of "manpower" at the willing and ready to move any mountain. NO seems to have suffered from a lack of manpower, dispursed at farther distances. It is almost as if all the first responders to 9/11 had to coordinate in PA, you would not have seen the same response...
Just thinking out loud and I could be off base here.

Posted by Capsu 78 2005-09-04 18:47|| 2005-09-04 18:47|| Front Page Top

#12 9/11 was localized. The subway system was 99% undamaged. The roads were passable, with the exception of about a few building blocks around WTC. LA will see less people killed but more infrastructure damage than 9/11. I suspect $20B is a low estimate for the Federal aid to the regions affected.

New Orleans is also one of the most crime-ridden cities in the country. NYC's murder rate in 2004 was 6.25 per 100,000 population. New Orleans's murder rate was 54 per 100,000 population. That's a whole lot of murders.

Posted by Zhang Fei 2005-09-04 19:04|| http://timurileng.blogspot.com]">[http://timurileng.blogspot.com] 2005-09-04 19:04|| Front Page Top

#13 Iraq's murder rate was, I think, 65 per 100,000.

Posted by Glenmore">Glenmore 2005-09-04 19:15|| 2005-09-04 19:15|| Front Page Top

#14 OTOH, NYC had no advance notice and NO had five days. NYC suffered a paramilitary attack that could have been repeated or supplemented with additional attacks, NO suffered a hurricane like plenty of others it has endured except for its location and intensity.

Argue all you want about the crisis comparisons, but the fact is both sets of leaders were under unbelievable pressure in real time. NYC did the job, all the way up and down the chain of organization. NOLA buckled at every rung. It's cultural. Hopefully that can be excluded out in the rebuild.

Posted by Mrs. Davis 2005-09-04 19:17|| 2005-09-04 19:17|| Front Page Top

#15 Comparing apples to apples,there has been no similar collapse in Mississipi where several small towns and cities were hit even harder.(THe NO mess came after levees breached.)

Complete lack of leadership. NO own hurricane plan states that city can EXPECT NO OUTSIDE HELP FOR AT LEAST 72 HOURS!

Posted by Stephen 2005-09-04 20:29|| 2005-09-04 20:29|| Front Page Top

#16 Mississippi also has a toxic waste problem... Gulfport, a port of entry of all things animal, chemical, etc. Ships and semi's (with cargo still aboard) have been destroyed and contents carried across the city.

Mississippi got the Marines!

Posted by Sherry 2005-09-04 20:37|| 2005-09-04 20:37|| Front Page Top

#17 g: Iraq's murder rate was, I think, 65 per 100,000.

That is an amazing (and true) statistic. Don't think of New Orleans as just another American city. Think of it as Fallujah-lite. At least the enemy in this instance doesn't have RPG's or large caches of stockpiled ordnance for IED's - or the skills to use either.

Posted by Zhang Fei 2005-09-04 20:43|| http://timurileng.blogspot.com]">[http://timurileng.blogspot.com] 2005-09-04 20:43|| Front Page Top

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