Posted on 09/02/2005 8:04:20 AM PDT by finnman69
LONDON (Reuters) - The world has watched amazed as the planet's only superpower struggles with the aftermath of Hurricane Katrina, with some saying the chaos has exposed flaws and deep divisions in American society.
World leaders and ordinary citizens have expressed sympathy with the people of the southern United States whose lives were devastated by the hurricane and the flooding that followed.
But many have also been shocked by the images of disorder beamed around the world -- looters roaming the debris-strewn streets and thousands of people gathered in New Orleans waiting for the authorities to provide food, water and other aid.
"Anarchy in the USA" declared Britain's best-selling newspaper The Sun.
"Apocalypse Now" headlined Germany's Handelsblatt daily.
The pictures of the catastrophe -- which has killed hundreds and possibly thousands -- have evoked memories of crises in the world's poorest nations such as last year's tsunami in Asia, which left more than 230,000 people dead or missing.
But some view the response to those disasters more favorably than the lawless aftermath of Hurricane Katrina.
"I am absolutely disgusted. After the tsunami our people, even the ones who lost everything, wanted to help the others who were suffering," said Sajeewa Chinthaka, 36, as he watched a cricket match in Colombo, Sri Lanka.
"Not a single tourist caught in the tsunami was mugged. Now with all this happening in the U.S. we can easily see where the civilized part of the world's population is."
SINKING INTO ANARCHY
Many newspapers highlighted criticism of local and state authorities and of President Bush. Some compared the sputtering relief effort with the massive amounts of money and resources poured into the war in Iraq.
"A modern metropolis sinking in water and into anarchy -- it is a really cruel spectacle for a champion of security like Bush," France's left-leaning Liberation newspaper said.
"(Al Qaeda leader Osama) bin Laden, nice and dry in his hideaway, must be killing himself laughing."
A female employee at a multinational firm in South Korea said it may have been no accident the U.S. was hit.
"Maybe it was punishment for what it did to Iraq, which has a man-made disaster, not a natural disaster," said the woman, who did not want to be named as she has an American manager.
"A lot of the people I work with think this way. We spoke about it just the other day," she said.
Commentators noted the victims of the hurricane were overwhelmingly African Americans, too poor to flee the region as the hurricane loomed unlike some of their white neighbors.
New Orleans ranks fifth in the United States in terms of African American population and 67 percent of the city's residents are black.
"In one of the poorest states in the country, where black people earn half as much as white people, this has taken on a racial dimension," said a report in Britain's Guardian daily.
Luxembourg Foreign Minister Jean Asselborn, in a veiled criticism of U.S. political thought, said the disaster showed the need for a strong state that could help poor people.
"You see in this example that even in the 21st century you need the state, a good functioning state, and I hope that for all these people, these poor people, that the Americans will do their best," he told reporters at a European Union meeting in Newport, Wales.
David Fordham, 33, a hospital anesthetist speaking at a London underground rail station, said he had spent time in America and was not surprised the country had struggled to cope.
"Maybe they just thought they could sit it out and everything would be okay," he said.
"It's unbelievable though -- the TV images -- and your heart goes out to them."
Bingo
The world laughs at us now. But wait until they have a major disaster and then they will look to us for help.
The good things being done outweight the bad.
This is an all out effort by the news media to discredit Bush and the republicans and to make American in general look bad.
This is one town in America, one town, and in a few days, now that the feds are pulling the local governments ass out of the fire, the situation will be much better.
After this has all settled down, we will see who gets caught in the crunch and I am betting the local Democrat run government will be the ones in the wringer. They know this and are screaming bloody murder now to try to cover their tails.
Bump
My wife who grew up on the Mekong Delta floodplain said exactly the same thing.
People tried to help each other.
Not this anamalistic behavior, mayhem, and anarchy.
The people who are enmeshed in the chaos right now, as perpetrators and as victims, are those who were on the receiving end of a strong state that claimed it was just helping poor people. Chaos and despair are what our Great Society gave us.
When you subsidize low character, you get low character. The Social Welfare State MUST BE ENDED.
>"We need to take a breath and remind the world that NO is the exception. You are not hearing about outbreak of looting and violence in Mississippi and Alabama."<
Well stated...while most folks elsewhere pull together, New Orleans has turned into total anarchy.
New Orleans has always had a very serious criminal element. It is now just being made visible to the world.
It seems to me, they should have known this city would turn into this nightmare. Martial law should have been declared the day the hurricane hit. Incompetent NO mayor and LA governor, IMO.
Unfortunately the democrat party holds power by keeping these communities semi-civlized and dependent.
During 9/11 Rudy closed down downtown Manhattan and kept an imposing police force. During the Blackout the NYC police were everywhere. Peace and calm prevailed.
After Katrina, the mayor of NO let the looting and lawlessness prevail until it hit rock bottom
Who's fault is this?
I'm with you but I dare you to go on one of the illegal immigrant threads and say that.
A few summers ago, 10,000 people (mostly elderly) died in France due to a summer heatwave. The French should be the last ones to carp about this.
The tsunami area was very much a dangerous area for people to be in. Rapes and muggings occured and, I am sure, killings. However, the news coverage there is much more controlled than here, plus their news agencies are not trying to make the government look bad so they not only don't report some things that happen they certainly don't exagerate them as our MSM is doing right now.
"I don't know that I believe not a single tourist was mugged, but he does have a point. In defense of the US I'd point out that New Orleans is a high density democrat area, and a high percentage of democrats don't believe in moral absolutes."
I hear you but Yankee stadium clears out 60000 in 1 hr - why are we buildinga stage for this spectacle of 30000 still there after 5 days?
You're right, it is, and I think a lot of the fault lies with the governor & the mayor.
I know it might sound horrible to say, but I think the top priority should have been to maintain order, not search and resuce. As has been seen over the past few days, it's very difficult to help people when there is chaos on the ground. In the end, I think they probably would have saved more lives if order would have been established primarily.
Guys with big guns first, guys with search dogs second. I think it would have worked out a lot better.
It is unfair to look at NO and say, "See what is happening in America" as if NO was 3 million square mile city.
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