So many vital issues: many dead, no power, residential & commercial structural collapse, bridge collapses, levee break, levee pump failure, oil rig damage and/or loss, contamination of the water supply, disease setting in, at least one vessel or barge leaking oil, total basic needs for perhaps hundreds of thousands of people for months and months, housing need in the tens of thousands (according to FEMA Director), water still continuing to feed into the area .. the list goes on and on and on.
IMO, it will be a couple of years or more before you'll start to see any semblance of normalcy return to this area. God bless them all ... the bulk of the population are now totally dependent on the Federal government and the goodness of the relief and charitable agencies for EVERYTHING and for a very long time.
I am very much afraid you are right--and it sounds as if you do know of what you speak. What is the most helpful thing people like myself who are no where near this disaster can do?
You give people too little credit.
Five bucks sez things will be cleaned up and business-as-usual by Thanksgiving.