Katrina's Real Name is Global Warming

New Orleans is one of my favorite American cities. It's a place where culture, crime, poverty, history, decay, sin, great food, humidity and voodoo all come together to produce an atmosphere unlike any other in this country. So it was with a good deal of horror that I awaited the landfall of Katrina, and with grief that I am now hearing of her aftermath. I drove home from my classes today (thunderstorms prevented my cycling there and back, I'm not a saint, after all) listening to reports on NPR of the levees protecting the city from the waters of Lake Ponchartrain being breeched in two places. Thus the nightmare that was expected from such a massive storm is happening after all. There was some hope yesterday that the worst was not going to be seen - today those hopes are gone.

It was my intention to spend the afternoon researching the facts that make up the underpinnings of this story, as I knew some of them (slashing of funds from the fed'l budget for the Corps of Engineers, the role the wetlands used to play in draining off floodwaters, the fact that a large percentage of LA's National Guard is currently in Iraq), but didn't have a coherent view of the whole story. However, The Progress Report, from the American Progress Action Fund, has saved me the research. Today's report gives you a complete scenario, replete with links. Borrowing from Bob Dylan, they have titled the piece "Here's the Story of a Hurricane." Read it, and weep for a city that may have become a new Atlantis.

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