Here are some posts that caught my eye (and captured my thinking) out in the blogosphere this morning:
Eugene Volokh writes about a neighborhood publicly distancing itself from the views of a new family, and the comments to his post are thought-provoking. I’ve written about Prussian Blue before, and I’m not at all sorry to read that they’re having trouble finding “a fit”, philosophically.
Sideways Mencken (who has written a number of excellent posts recently imho), has some suggestions for our MidEast problems. Among other things, he proposes a “rip the band-aid off” timetable for Iraq:
Three months to make a deal. If they have a deal we stay and build their army. If they can’t reach a deal then they can’t be saved and we might as well bail out sooner rather than later.
Such an approach would likely distract Iran more than any amount of threats or sanctions. I once described it as door number 3…
Mark Folse links to the first video from the highly-hyped (and controversial) New Orleans Truth project, and notices something disturbing in the FEMA-contracted demolition patterns between the Ninth Ward and Lakeview:
At about minute 6:24 into the first video, an unidentified person takes the cameraman on a tour of a demolished home in the Ninth Ward and one in Lakeview, and points out an important difference: in Lakeview slabs are removed and utilities are pulled back to the street, and lots are filled and graded and ready to build.
Not so in the Ninth Ward, says the unidentified man on camera. Utilities are left in place and so are slabs, and the lots in the Ninth are not filled and graded. The Lakeview lot “is ready to build,” says the unidentified person speaking, implying those in the Ninth Ward are not. “That’s what happens when you have money.”
There are very serious implications to this.
And finally — Glenn Greenwald discovers a bit of myopic outrage. Goose and gander and all that.
Don’t don’t guess it would surprise anyone that I find the post by Sideways Mencken linked to above as arrogant, ignorant, and insulting.
Arrogant because this guy sitting at home in his comphy chair takes for granted he knows more about the situation in Iraq, and the goings on around it, than all the people whose job it is to know.
Ignorant because he assumes the battle in Iraq and the rest of this on-going war was meant to be a couple of years and out.
Insulting to the President of the United States and most all of Congress (check the voting record on who approved this action) for comparing them to arsonist. If they are “arsonist,” there’s is going to be a heck of a lot more fire starters, of all political persuasions in the next few years.
Friends, we are in just the beginning of a very long row to hoe.
Polimom says – There are very serious implications to this.
Are you thinking this implies the old Ninth Ward might not get rebuilt? You’re not alone. Listening to the business channels “what’s-his-name” that owns the Spurs and another Atlanta/ LasVegas group are buying up New Orleans property for pennys-on-the-dollar just like the Carpetbaggers years ago. The word is they plan to make for more gambling parlors and fancy hotels. The mayor said New Orleans was going to be “chocolate” again. What the Business Channels say is it will be a different shade, Green, as in money – but ALWAYS for the house.
Welcome to the New Big Easy, Sin City Central U.S.A.
(sad)
Yes, Laz — specifically, I do NOT like the idea that they (whoever *they* are) would set it up so that a particular neighborhood can’t rebuild because they’ve placed the cost barriers higher there.
Furthermore, those are (according to the video) FEMA contractors… which implies federal dollars being spent on that effort. That really freaks me out, frankly.
Updating to add: Some folks are looking into this question, and I’ll have to post a follow-up down the line, I think.
I don’t like it either. If someone can PROVE the real people behind it (and not make it a witch hunt) justice would not be prison but to give them a shovel and tell them to start making those folks lots as buildable as those other lots you mention.
One question I’d like answered, how many of those lots have ben sold and to who.