Sonic 'Lasers' to be Deployed in Hurricane Region 619
MacDork writes "Wired News is running an article about high powered acoustic technology to be deployed in the hurricane Katrina disaster recovery. Apparently, the technology will allow authorities to communicate with others up to a mile away along with providing a non-lethal means of crowd control. No word on additional busses and shelters..."
Trades (Score:2, Interesting)
Re:What a horrible mess... (Score:3, Interesting)
"In mid-90's morning heat at Edwards Air Force
Base, HPV Technologies and American Technology demonstrated prototypes of non-lethal sonic devices for a group of military and law enforcement guests, including representatives of the U.K. Home Office.
Representatives of both companies say that within days, they will ship some units of their respective products to areas hit by Hurricane Katrina, so authorities can use the tools for crowd control, aid distribution and rescue operations."
So it's a publicity stunt for corporations. They are sending them to Marine MP and hope they will get some free press when one of the thousands of reporters in the area gets the scoop of Marines using some scifi crowd control.
I read nowhere any government official asking or endorsing this specifically for New Orleans. Maybe I missed it. It does mention the LAPD is looking at it and that the Navy already uses similar devices in Iraq. Never having been on the receiving end of crowd control techniques, I can't say this weapon is any better than things like tear gas. I would damn well like to know that before any member of any force uses it on anyone. Especially in an area with martial law.
Of course, if there is a riot and the government does nothing, everyone will watch it on CNN and complain the government is not doing their job. So either the military ship thousands of individuals to handle upset people (vs. rescuing - or we could trail off about Iraq here too) or they use a allegedly non-lethal weapon. I'd prefer to pass judgement after we know all the details of what leaders and people alike are dealing with down there.
Re:Why not just machine gun the refugees? (Score:1, Interesting)
Emergency response plans and disaster relief are planned at the local, county, and state level. FEMA bases their response and help on the existing state and local plans, and on the information given to them when they are asked to come in. The feds do not plan evacuations, they plan response techniques and strategies then apply those, they do not release aid until asked for by the local/state authority. Each Governor is responsible for that state's national guard.
People are making claims about what FEMA and the fed. gov. should have done when it is not their responsibility. False claims are also being made about why relief didn't come immediately, as some relief was there prior to this disaster. The levys were being assessed to be repaired immediatly after the storm has passed.
I love how people are also ignoring the fact that response teams were sent to other cities as well, as New Orleans wasn't the only place to need aid.
The reason that helicopters were not used to drop supplies. Available helicopters were being used to transport isolated people much more in need of rescuing than those in a group large enough to help each other.
No, boats are not effective rescuing somone from certain locations, such as unstable buildings, though small boats are being used. Take a look at the logistics of getting busses into the locations you are talking about, you cannot drive a bus thru 20' of water. A convoy of busses would also have to travel some distance (thru other areas also devastated by the hurricane).
Re:Bus Report (Score:5, Interesting)
And why not move in the food and water before the storm hit, and have it already there for those who will need it. I guess foresight and planning ahead no longer applies, even with all the models and predictions concerning hurricane disasters in that area.
Then, too, there will always be some people who will say, "I'm not leaving. I'll just take my chances." Then these same people yell the loudest about not being helped out of the situation they got themselves into. (Note: I am not referring to those too ill or feeble to move, or who just can't for some reason, nor to those who may be too poor to be able to find the means to leave.)
Because People Don't Matter (Score:3, Interesting)
http://service.spiegel.de/cache/international/0,1
Re:Why not just machine gun the refugees? (Score:5, Interesting)
You're right -- helicopters are 100 times more expensive, which is why the feds are not usually in charge of disaster recovery. The country is too damn big to have disaster plans for every region, which is why it's the responsibility of local and state governments to have plans. Why the hell didn't the mayor of New Orleans have a plan to get HIS OWN CITIZENS out?? The guy is being a total a-hole blaiming the feds for his own failure, as well as the failure of the governor of Louisiana.
Did you know that it was BUSH who personally called the mayor to order a mandatory evacuation? From this [nola.com]...
"Gov. Kathleen Blanco, standing beside the mayor at a news conference, said President Bush called and personally appealed for a mandatory evacuation for the low-lying city, which is prone to flooding."
In other words, Bush saved thousand, if not tens of thousands of lives. The deaths can be put squarely on the government of Louisiana and New Orleans.
Not that things couldn't have been done faster -- they could have. But Bush is getting way too much of the blame here. The feds are not designed to move fast, combined with the fact that it was an incredible mess, and it doesn't help when people are shooting at the rescuers.
Re:What a horrible mess... (Score:1, Interesting)
http://www.ndtv.com/morenews/showmorestory.asp?sl
Re:What a horrible mess... (Score:2, Interesting)
And I -will- be political here. As politics are just as god damned important to this situation as anything else. Because -politicians- are calling the shots here.
I just damn well hope that the delay in accepting aid from Koffi Annan is due to the flawed system rather then any kind of face saving or those responsible should be punished greatly.
And -speaking- of politics. Cuba and Venezuela have both offered assistance. The Red Cross accepted Venezuela's help I think. But the USA has not accepted Cuba's. If -THAT- ain't political, I don't f***ing know what is.
FEMA head fired from last job (Score:3, Interesting)
Link [bostonherald.com]
Re:Buses? (Score:5, Interesting)
Here's why the mayor of New Orleans didn't use the buses: He doesn't run the school district, which has been a complete organizational disaster for some time. Cities and school districts are not the same thing.
For a taste of just how bad the school district has become:
http://www.cnn.com/2005/EDUCATION/08/18/new.orlea
The person you label as an "idiot democrat mayor" didn't make the mess. He is a relative political outsider, [wikipedia.org] a former Cox cable executive, who was a Republican until he decided to run for mayor of a traditionally Democrat city.
He has been on a campaign to clean up the extremely corrupt New Orleans government, working actively with the FBI.
Maybe you should read something other than right-wing hate blogs.
Re:What a horrible mess... (Score:3, Interesting)
Notice the two words "provide" and "promote"? There is good reason why "provide" isn't used twice.
In those days, the government didn't have the power to impose an income tax. Most government monies were raised through bonds that were paid back with interest (your modern day T-Bills).
The names for our modern day "welfare" systems were chosen very craftily by the politicians, and should be added to the weasel word list IMO.
Bush, fuck you... (aka- Karma Burn) (Score:3, Interesting)
Re:Local Government (Score:2, Interesting)
The National Guards belong to the States until they are Federalized, the NG units in the War on Terror outside the US are Federalized, but the NG units used for guarding airports or disaster ops are State run.
FEMA exists to superceed the US Constitution as to what the Federal Government can do, but FEMA has never used all of it's power.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fema [wikipedia.org]
Louisiana also is different governmentally than other States.
Louisiana is the only state whose legal system is based on Roman, Spanish, and French civil law as opposed to English common law. Technically, it is known as "Civil Law," or the "Civilian System."
Byzantine structure of New Orleans politics requires separate governing boards for each levee that is built. The boards get to approve or deny Army Corps of Engineers plans, new levees require new boards and new elections, every election has a system of run-off elections and has to have funding approved.
Mayor Nagin rails against the government for their slow response. Yet, if there is fingerpointing to be done, it has to rest with the local government. If they wanted people out, they should have provided ways for them to get out. They are aware of the tens of thousands of indigents that live in their city. They knew that many live pay check to pay check, having no transportation and immense extended families.
They have only a 1200-1400 police in New Orleans. The Los Angeles Police Department (usually known as the LAPD) is the police department of the City of Los Angeles, California. It is one of the largest law enforcement agencies in the world with over 9,000 officers and 3,000 civilian staff, covering an area of 467 sq miles with a population of around 3.4 million with another 7,000 or so in the LA County Sheriff. New Orleans is 180 sq miles, 1.337 million in the metro area, 500,000 in the city proper. Many men will not serve in the police department due to the rampant corruption which continued inspite of reforms in the late 1990s.
Re:Bus Report (Score:1, Interesting)
Probably because they would want it somewhere safe that would survive the hurricane. The nearest guarranteed safe point (high enough to be sure that it wouldn't be flooded) from New Orleans is about 80 miles away.
The Red Cross has always refused to build shelters in the area of New Orleans since they didn't want to build a shelter that would likely be demolished.
true nature of America w/ regards to poor blacks (Score:1, Interesting)
That is nothing but lies and a big misunderstanding of the large picture. For decades - even centuries - the majority of black people in America have created for themselves a "I'm a victim" mentality. This does not engender motivation to make one's life better. Witness all of the other foreigners who have come to America - some literally "off the boat" at Ellis Island in N.Y. - and became successful.
What we are seeing in N.O. is the result of socialism in America. I can't count the number of times on T.V. I've seen the poor black people complaining about "what is the government going to do", "where is the government to take care of us", "why has the government let us down." Instead of taking personal responsibility for their actions, they have been conditioned by receiving welfare checks and other government handouts, mainly from the Democratic Party, to not think for themselves.
I think that "leaders" like Jesse Jackson actually do more have than good for the black people of America by perpetuating the "I'm a victim" mentality.
Thus, the true nature of America that your foreigners are seeing today is the disgust we have with the failures of socialism and the continueing concept amongst blacks that they are "victims" of something that happened centuries ago. Any person, any group, any race, any religion, any civilization has been a "victim" or a descenent of "victim" of some event many years / decades / centuries in the past. You get over it and move on.
I would really like to see my fellow Americans get over and move beyond this "I'm a victim" mentality. Only then will we all be productive and work together to make America great again. If that cannot happen, then America - the republic and now the empire - will collapse into a 3rd world dictatorship under martial law like so many other African and South American countries have.
And so as not to be totally off-topic, I am quite concerned about this increase of weapons for controlling larger and larger crowds. What is our government thinking? Why the need to control many large amounts of people unless they see something awful coming...
Re:What a horrible mess... (Score:5, Interesting)
Hardly unique to the US. I'm an American, but living in London. People are mugged and stabbed right in front of others in the UK... no one does anything.
I know a lady who was with her two small children and was shoved down in a fast food resturant full of customers and employees so some guy could steal her purse. No one lifted a finger.
Don't think indifference to the pain of others is unique to the US.
In fact (and this is far off topic), I've been to a couple dozen countries and most US states, and the only place in the world I've seen people defend each other, including strangers, is the central part of the US. Try to push over a lady and mug her in a McD's in Iowa... you'll find, at best, your ass kicked, and, at worst, some customer shooting you. You may think it's harsh, but at least people are looking out for each other.
Re:true nature of America w/ regards to poor black (Score:4, Interesting)
" continueing concept amongst blacks that they are "victims" of something that happened centuries ago."
Perhaps you are not aware that until the voting rights act of 1965, black were largely disenfranchised and segregated. Hardly centuries ago.
"What we are seeing in N.O. is the result of socialism in America. I can't count the number of times on T.V. I've seen the poor black people complaining about "what is the government going to do", "where is the government to take care of us", "why has the government let us down." Instead of taking personal responsibility for their actions, they have been conditioned by receiving welfare checks and other government handouts, mainly from the Democratic Party, to not think for themselves."
A vast and very child like generalization. Many of these people are working poor who pay taxes. Many of them don't own vehicles. By call them "welfare recipients" you simply reveal your ignorance. What data is this based on? Knowing what I know about the difficulty of receiving welfare after the welfare reform act I doubt that many of them are welfare recipients.
Take a look at the reponse the government had in regards to Hurricane Andrew - it was much better.
As far as your immigrant success stories - yeah sure people come here and are successful. Usually because they have a great deal of money to begin with. Your quote
some literally "off the boat" at Ellis Island in N.Y.
is quite telling. Ellis Island hasn't been used as an immigration facility for 51 years.
Re:What a horrible mess... (Score:3, Interesting)
The best one in the world, obviously.
people's natural instincts are to help one another, not steal things from stores, or beat and rape each other.
This is a "dog eat dog" society, with traditions of Wild West obviously fresh in many minds.
Is the USA really in such a state that law and order are maintained only by the presence of police?
In many places - yes; in some smaller places, no. Large cities rate very poorly on friendship and mutual assistance scale.
And if something happens to disrupt the power of the police, that the first things that come to people's minds is to break into the neighborhood shops and take the TV's?
Of course; it's profitable.
Is your country filled with people who are so ready to backstab their neighbors?
It would be nice to know a country which bred humans with better behavior. Generally, one must be completely and totally fulfilled in every aspect in order not to desire something that someone else has. Or one must have nerves of steel to combat such desires. Many people, in any country, will steal when they have a chance. Some will steal small things from a store; other steal big things, like national currency, from a nation. But humans always steal.
If this is true, it seems like a really, really sick (and scary!) society.
You are not the first to comment on that.
The following dosen't have to be the epitaph. (Score:1, Interesting)
In the refugee camp I just left, on the I-10 freeway near Causeway, thousands of people (at least 90% black and poor) stood and squatted in mud and trash behind metal barricades, under an unforgiving sun, with heavily armed soldiers standing guard over them. When a bus would come through, it would stop at a random spot, state police would open a gap in one of the barricades, and people would rush for the bus, with no information given about where the bus was going. Once inside (we were told) evacuees would be told where the bus was taking them - Baton Rouge, Houston, Arkansas, Dallas, or other locations.
I was told that if you boarded a bus bound for Arkansas (for example), even people with family and a place to stay in Baton Rouge would not be allowed to get out of the bus as it passed through Baton Rouge. You had no choice but to go to the shelter in Arkansas. If you had people willing to come to New Orleans to pick you up, they could not come within 17 miles of the camp.
I traveled throughout the camp and spoke to Red Cross workers, Salvation Army workers, National Guard, and state police, and although they were friendly, no one could give me any details on when buses would arrive, how many, where they would go to, or any other information. I spoke to the several teams of journalists nearby, and asked if any of them had been able to get any information from any federal or state officials on any of these questions, and all of them, from Australian tv to local Fox affiliates complained of an unorganized, non-communicative, mess. One cameraman told me "as someone who's been here in this camp for two days, the only information I can give you is this: get out by nightfall. You don't want to be here at night."
There was also no visible attempt by any of those running the camp to set up any sort of transparent and consistent system, for instance a line to get on buses, a way to register contact information or find family members, special needs services for children and infirm, phone services, treatment for possible disease exposure, nor even a single trash can.
To understand this tragedy, its important to look at New Orleans itself. For those who have not lived in New Orleans, you have missed a incredible, glorious, vital, city. A place with a culture and energy unlike anywhere else in the world. A 70% African-American city where resistance to white supremecy has supported a generous, subversive and unique culture of vivid beauty. From jazz, blues and hiphop, to secondlines, Mardi Gras Indians, Parades, Beads, Jazz Funerals, and red beans and rice on Monday nights, New Orleans is a place of art and music and dance and sexuality and liberation unlike anywhere else in the world.
It is a city of kindness and hospitality, where walking down the block can take two hours because you stop and talk to someone on every porch, and where a community pulls together when someone is in need. It is a city of extended families and social networks filling the gaps left by city, state and federal goverments that have abdicated their responsibilty for the public welfare. It is a city where someone you walk past on the street not only asks how you are, they wait for an answer.
It is also a city of exploitation and segregation and fear. The city of New Orleans has a population of just over 500,000 and was expecting 300 murders this year, most of them centered on just a few, overwhelmingly black, neighborhoods. Police have been quoted as saying that they don't need to search out the perpetrators, because usually a few days after a shooting, the attacker is shot in revenge.
There is an atmosphere of intense hostility and distrust between much of Black New Orleans and the N.O. Po
Re:What a horrible mess... (Score:3, Interesting)
Consider that it is mainly the poor neighborhoods inhabited by blacks and Mexicans where law and order are maintained only by the presence of police. Generally speaking, the middle and upper class live outside US cities in comfortable suburbs.
This is America's dirty little secret, and Mother Nature has washed the whole thing out in the open for the rest of the world to see. Almost 30% of New Orleans residents live below the poverty line. Almost all of them are black. The truth is, we have a *huge* number of people in this country who live beneath the poverty line. Many of them canot afford even basic health care or food for their families, so they turn to drug dealing and prostitution to make more money. There are practially NO jobs and nothing for these people to do so they suck off the nipple of the government and sit around idle, getting into all sorts of mischief. Look what's happened to Detroit [yahoo.com] to get a small taste for what this urban decay looks like.
I'm embarrassed to say also that the most powerful country in the world has no national health care system! Most of the "working poor" in this country such as the Wal-Mart employees have no access to even basic health care for their families. Even Costa Rica has a basic health care plan for all its citizens!
We have already received thousands of refugees here in San Antonio, Texas. I've been listening to the police scanner the last couple of days and it's a complete mess. The last part I heard today, someone was asking where to deliver some insulin, and the reply was that nobody was available to answer the question, because most of the gov't office supervisors were OUT OF TOWN for the 3 day weekend!
These days I am embarassed to be an American, which has become something completely different than what the founding fathers [whitehouse.gov] envisioned.
Everything ShortChanged (Score:4, Interesting)
Clinton has been gone for years. I know Bush people don't know how to run a country, just how to make fun of an expresident who retired more popular than practically any president has ever been. I know Bush people don't know how to run a country, just blame Clinton for everything. Because they call facts that show their incompetence, written by anyone, "biased". Well, the facts are clearly biased against the Bush administration (to paraphrase the Daily Show). Whatever resistance Clinton might have had on that one day (nevermind what subsequently was done, like perhaps fully funding it) 10 years ago, before the past 5 years of Bush's rule, Bush certainly did not reverse that cut. He cut it as much as he could. He cut it, even after he's coasted on the coattails of one day in September 2001, when - after the smoke cleared - he climbed on top of a pile of rubble in NYC, and declared with a bullhorn that "everything changed".
The #1 predicted national disaster, terrorist attack on NYC, had come horribly true - though Bush had not prepared for it. In fact, he deprioritized terrorist attacks during that first year of his administration, while looking for an excuse to invade Iraq from day 1. Four years later (minus only two weeks), National Disaster #2, hurricane devastation in New Orleans, has come true. And Bush stayed on vacation in his Texas estate, then made some BS speeches about Iraq in California, then skimmed back to DC giving just a flyover blink to "Lake George" where New Orleans once stood. While his Secretary of State took in Spamalot on Broadway, then shopped for thousand-dollar shoes on 5th Avenue.
I know it's tough to admit that Bush is a miserable failure. That he's created catastrophe everywhere he's worked, in his whole career, but especially in the US and Iraq. I know it's tough to admit you're complicit in his catastrophes, because you voted for him and defended him. But its time to stop the BS apologies for the Master of Disaster. That old "it's Clinton's fault" BS only worked on a small percentage for a while, back around the turn of the century. It's useless now. Cut your losses and hang the blame on the Commander in Chimp now. Help us replace him with someone who can run the country some other way than into the ground. Or watch as Disaster #3, California Earthquake, kills thousands, millions more, cripples more of our ports and energy, all while we're still bogged down in Iraqmire, the Gulf Swamp, and across the nation that has been wallowing in stagnation and distrust since Bush was installed by the Supreme Court in 2000.
Because who knows - the next disaster could be the one that your local government has been sucking Homeland Security dollars away from New York, New Orleans and San Francisco for. And you'll find yourself screaming in the streets for Bush's head, when they stole the money like the New Orleans disaster plan funds, and abandon you the same way. While some other Bush apologist posts lies, blaming Clinton, for abandoning you when your own life is destroyed by a predicted disaster for which you paid tax money for relief.
Re:What a horrible mess... (Score:1, Interesting)
Re:What a horrible mess... (Score:1, Interesting)
Last I checked, 29 - 28 = 1, not 5.
IF you are talking about from the time the Mnadatory evacuation order went out until Katrina actually hit,then yes, it was 1 day. But they knew for many days before that that Katrina was big, and was heading their way.
Re:Why not just machine gun the refugees? (Score:3, Interesting)
It takes *time* to get relief organized on this scale. It takes *time* to move people and equipment. The President doesn't have some magic wand he can wave and make everything all better - but a lot of people do have very unrealistic expectations as to how fast things can be done.
(And very few people seem to realize the New Orleans is about 2% of the population and about .01% of the land area involved.)
Was told not to come (Score:1, Interesting)
Now they've been told NOT TO COME.