Posted on 09/06/2005 4:26:40 PM PDT by RWR8189
Houston ping
Don't kid yourself. Houston has it's graft and poverty just like any other large city. It's also home to Sheila Don't-you-know-who-I-am Jackson-Lee.
Houston has become the oil capital of the world, and one has to wonder if the oil companies still remaining in New Orleans will take this opportunity to permanently relocate.
Yeah, I just like hearing that.
Not sure I really know what he's saying. He should check the welfare rate of Houston before he proclaims victory. That town is one twister away from chaos.
Houston flooded in part because of poor planning a few years ago (2001) and had an incompetent mayor.
We have close to one party rule here as well as corruption that focuses civic dollars in the hands of a few connected developers.
They partnered with Ken Lay to get a 51% victory on the stadium referendum.
The same puppet master, Mayor Bob, who got run out by term limits has chosen his next two successors, both Clinton cronies.
Houston's only daily paper serves these interests and waited until after Mayor Lee P. Brown entered his final term to dump criticism on him and basically ask "how did this fool get elected three times?"
Tom DeLay is the AntiChrist to the Comical and they spare no opportunity to vilify him. In part this stems from his opposition to federal funding of their death train trolly.
New Orleans was a rotten place but Houston isn't heaven.
I seriously doubt that.
"The reason New Orleans slid so quickly from civilization into Third World conditions was that it was pretty much a Third World city already..."
Exactly right!
I don't know if New Orleans will survive as a city, let alone as an important port ... I suppose it could if it is artificially propped up by the federal government ... but I doubt very much that its stature as a desirable tourist destination will survive. Its ugly underbelly has been exposed. The New Orleans of Louis Armstrong, jazz, and goodhearted fun has decayed into the New Orleans of decadence, corruption, and crime. Thanks, but no thanks.
Yeah, a woman of her age who thought we planted an American Flag on Mars. Must have done a few too many drugs and men back in '69
I'll trade you one Sheila Lee and up you Memphis' Ford family?
Didn't New Orleans have legal whorehouses a century ago?
Didn't much of the music that the city is known for get played by the same names that later made that music famous?
From Huey Long to Edwin Edwards, corruption has been a way of life in Louisiana.
Go back centuries and pirate/smuggler Jean Lafitte is rumored to have put a bounty on territorial governor William Claiborne's head (the posters did exist).
Republican government? State, city, or national represenation?
It is doubtful this city will ever see a Republican mayor anytime soon. Not sure what the balance of power is on City Council although I do know some names/etc.
I do agree that Houston would probably not go into total lawlessness but the flap over the K-Mart parking lot raid (where minors were violating curfew and older young adults were meeting up to go racing up Westheimer) show that police in this town will cut and run rather than face more national attention.
Also I know 5 people who have been carjacked in the past year. The two women I know who had this happen in the past month have been unsuccessful to get the police interested in following up on their cases even though the cars were recovered and evidence (phone calls, ID badges, fingerprints) was left in the cars.
Houston is the biggest small town there is. The citizen don't riot when we win or lose a major sports championship. Then again, the more new citizens we get from other cities (be it their job or bad weather that brings them to town), the less they are familiar with the way things are around here. It only takes a small number of people going wild to have a "riot".
*note to self -- print this out tomorrow...*
They've already got the LA deep sea oil port back up to 70%. The other LA ports aren't far behind.
The problem is that the ports only require a relatively small part of the population to run.
If it wasn't for Texas...
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