Prince, Camilla see N.O. damage

2theadvocate.com (Associated Press) ^ | 11/05/05 | JILL LAWLESS

[caryatid]

Associated Press photo
Prince Charles is greeted by Louisiana Gov. Kathleen Blanco
upon his arrival at the New Orleans Airport Friday, Nov. 4, 2005.

NEW ORLEANS -- Prince Charles and his wife, Camilla, flew into New Orleans on Friday for a brief glimpse of the ravaged city and a chance to meet a few of the hundreds of thousands of residents whose lives were turned upside-down by Hurricane Katrina. After an airport ceremony to greet their flight from Washington, the couple went to the impoverished lower Ninth Ward, which was all but obliterated when water breached one of the levees that protected the city.

Standing atop a patched 20-foot levee, they shook their heads in disbelief at the destruction: splintered homes, chunks of concrete, overturned cars. The couple also met residents and rescue workers.
...

[caryatid]

Y' think she is askin' him for a loan ... ?

[caryatid]

* Blanco ping *

[Ken522]

I read on another thread that Prince Charles is a secret muslim - think it's true?

[emiller]

Finally! Something is being done about the tragedy! It's about time.

Okay, I'm being sarcastic. Princess Diana was a hero because she wore pretty clothes. And yes, she would occasionally go and hold hand with an AIDS patient but c'mon--don't call a press conference 15 minutes before you do your good deed.

[emiller]

Close. I think he's scared because he ordered the hit on Diana.

[Graybeard58]

When Blanco wanted to tell him about the tragedy he said, "Go ahead Gov., I'm all ears".

[Issaquahking]

Loan? No....Extortion yes. Her threat of going public must be scary...

[sangoo]

Do you think he knows how stupid she really is?

[Hank Rearden]

Standing atop a patched 20-foot levee, they shook their heads in disbelief at the destruction: splintered homes, chunks of concrete, overturned cars.

Awww, how sweet. How many tax dollars were squandered setting up this public Weepathon for wastrel Brits?

NO should just turn itself into Povertyland, a big sidewalk-bum panhandling theme park.

[Hank Rearden]

Do you think he knows how stupid she really is?

He married a moron, maybe two, so he ought to be used to it.

[caryatid]

NO should just turn itself into Povertyland...

It already was ...

[river rat]

For the Prince to visit New Orleans and to call on Blanco -- must have been his attempt to go to the ONE place in America where he could find folks as stupid as himself and fit HIS image of a backward America...

Screw the Prince, and the HORSE he rode in on...

Semper Fi

[manwiththehands]

Thanks for visiting Prince Charles. You can go home now. Bye.

[caryatid]

...don't call a press conference 15 minutes before you do your good deed.

It was reported that there would be no "press conference" ...

I suspect that this was not a result of the royals ... but was Governor Memaw seizing upon yet another excuse to get her hair done ... for yet another photo op ...

And, what do you want to bet this picture ends up in her campaign literature for her next election.

Ever the opportunist ...

Somehow, my heart has been warmed by the sight of Gov. Barbour of Mississippi, dirty, sweaty and with his sleeves rolled up ... actually doing something to help.

Gov. Memaw has inspired nothing but contempt.

[Hank Rearden]

The Orlando expansion would be called Corruptionworld.

[caryatid]

For the Prince to visit New Orleans and to call on Blanco ...

I do not believe Prince Charles exactly "called on" Blanco ... quite the opposite ... it appears that she had her hair done ... and rushed to the airport to greet him before he could get away.

[kenth]

lol

[FreedomCalls]

I read on another thread that Prince Charles is a secret muslim - think it's true?

He wants his title as head of the Anglican Church (when he gets to be King anyway) to be changed from "Defender of the Faith" to "Defender of the Faiths."

[LA Woman3]

http://www.wwltv.com/local/stories/WWL110405royals.2b06b3c0.html

For a while, a 4-year-old kept a prince bowed down.

When Prince Charles bent to talk to a pre-kindergarten student at the first French Quarter student to reopen after Hurricane Katrina, the child was more interested in the prince's Mardi Gras beads, decorated with cowboy boots and ten-gallon hats.

Prince Charles visits children at St. Louis Cathedral Academy Friday. Many of the students are children displaced from their former schools by Katrina.

Those beads and a set decorated with big purple, green and gold masks were given the royal couple by a bystander outside the school, said Sister Mary Rose Bingham, the principal of Cathedral Academy, the first school to reopen in the French Quarter.

While the duchess went down the other side of the double line of students, parents and teachers, talking with them, England's crown prince stayed at a 90-degree angle until the child let go. So many people had gathered around that it wasn't possible to tell if it was a boy or girl.

A few steps later, a little boy held onto the string while the prince turned it slowly, showing him each decoration.

Gov. Kathleen Blanco and Mayor Ray Nagin accompanied the royal couple to the school. The tightly choreographed appearances kept reporters at a distance.

The prince and duchess left a crowd of fans as they pulled out of the schoolyard in the SUV that also had taken them to the Ninth Ward, which was devastated by floods after levees broke.

"They're delightful. Really a delightful couple -- very easy to be around," Bingham said. She said it was a deep joy to see how concerned they were about the different people they spoke to.

The assistant principal, Peggy LeBlanc, said she was surprised to find that "They're very gentle people, very kind people, very caring people."

"I talked to both of them, and took my picture with both," said Trionne Kohlman, a pint-sized seventh grader. "They asked how old I was. They said I looked like a small little girl."

She said they also asked what she'd been through. It was such a long story, she said, that she couldn't tell all the details of the many places she stayed while her mother spent a week in a flooded charity hospital, and after the family was reunited.

At the school, Archbishop Alfred Hughes said he thought the visit there shone light on its "extraordinary role," offering education without regard to race, creed, or ability to pay its $2,000-a-year tuition.

It has enrolled about 285 students from 28 other public, private and parochial schools. About 175 to 200 are currently attending class, with more expected in January and for the spring semester, Bingham said.

The visit is part of a week-long royal tour that included stops in New York and Washington, D.C., and continued in San Francisco.

In the Ninth Ward, the royal couple shook their heads in disbelief at the destruction: splintered homes, chunks of concrete, overturned cars. The couple also met residents and rescue workers.

Tommy and Gloria Jones, who lost their house in the disaster, presented Charles and Camilla with a Mardi Gras doll and a picture frame.

Yvonne Mirabin, whose home was in the Ninth Ward and whose 6-year-old grandson attends Cathedral, was almost giddy after her exchange with Prince Charles.

"I told him I was very glad to see him and his new wife," she recounted. "He asked what he could do for us. I told him, `You couldn't do nothing. It's our own government needs to build the levees higher."'

[Royal Sutton Coldfield]

Ken, you could be right.

Whatever, he's irrelavant. He will never be King.

Born lucky and massively rich (through no effort whatsoever - apart from talking fondly to plants), with a horse-faced old wife having spurned and destroyed Diana (who was a useless woman, BTW, but HOT!).

It just doesn't get any better than this.