Left In Lowell

New Orleans dodged the worst of Katrina yesterday, getting the weak side of the eye of the hurricane. However, there’s still very little in good news:

While Louisiana officials have not yet confirmed any deaths there, New Orleans Mayor Ray Nagin said there have been reports of bodies floating in the floodwaters.

“My heart is heavy tonight,” Nagin said in the interview on CNN affiliate WWL-TV. “I don’t have any good news to share.”

Nagin said that about 80 percent of the city was flooded and that some areas were under 20 feet of water.
Water poured into the city from Lake Pontchartrain after a two-block-long breach opened in a section of a levee that protects the low-lying city.

In the city’s 9th Ward neighborhood, rescue efforts continued throughout the night, with authorities in boats plucking residents from submerged homes after water topped another levee.

Levees in New Orleans broke, even though the truly devastating parts of the storm hit Mississippi instead. It stands to reason that had the eye been a little further west when it hit land, that the dire predictions of a completely submerged city would have panned out. And Mississippi has over 50 dead, and they have not reached every area yet.

Where’s War President Bush? Apparently, dragging his heels on calling out disaster relief, while traveling in CA talking politics about WWII. Schmuck. He should be on the forefront of helping the survivors of this hurricane.

You’d think Bush would have had the troops standing by ready to go in BEFORE the storm, seeing as it was a Category 5 hurricane, wouldn’t you? Except, he probably would have had them protecting the oil refineries first.

[Update: Crap. It’s being reported that water is still rising in New Orleans. It’s not over yet.]