[Laurita]

Agreed. However, assuming that I am one of the 50,000 or so residents of New Orleans living below the poverty level without a vehicle or the means to stockpile food and weapons BEFORE I find myself in a natural disaster induced warzone, I might still want to protect and feed my family.
The people of New Orleans were not expecting this. How many officials have you heard say recently that they went to bed believing that Katrina was a Cat I and woke up to a worst-case scenario. Generally speaking, the aforementioned 50,000 or so folks don't have the resources to draw on that their "surprised" public officials do. Even if they knew, it was the end of the month . . . where were they supposed to get the $$ to stock their pantries (which are under about 10 ft of water right now)?

[geopyg]

"I might still want to protect and feed my family."

Agreed! I just wanted to point out that WE ALL should be prepared to go a long time on our own if we can. Heck, just washing the old juice bottles and filling them with tap water with a few drops of bleach in them would be a real help in some situations - and anyone can do that.

And I pray that I'm never in the situation that these poor folks (both poor in $$ and in their tragedy) are in. Parental instincts may turn out to be stronger than my moral values.