An Unnatural Disaster: A Hurricane Exposes the Man-Made Disaster of the Welfare State

 

by Robert Tracinski - Sep 02, 2005

 

 

It has taken four long days for state and federal officials to figure out how to deal with the disaster in New Orleans. I can't blame them, because it has also taken me four long days to figure out what is going on there. The reason is that the events there make no sense if you think that we are confronting a natural disaster.

 

If this is just a natural disaster, the response for public officials is obvious: you bring in food, water, and doctors; you send transportation to evacuate refugees to temporary shelters; you send engineers to stop the flooding and rebuild the city's infrastructure. For journalists, natural disasters also have a familiar pattern: the heroism of ordinary people pulling together to survive; the hard work and dedication of doctors, nurses, and rescue workers; the steps being taken to clean up and rebuild.

 

Public officials did not expect that the first thing they would have to do is to send thousands of armed troops in armored vehicle, as if they are suppressing an enemy insurgency. And journalists--myself included--did

not expect that the story would not be about rain, wind, and flooding, but about rape, murder, and looting.

 

But this is not a natural disaster. It is a man-made disaster.

 

The man-made disaster is not an inadequate or incompetent response by federal relief agencies, and it was not directly caused by Hurricane Katrina. This is where just about every newspaper and television channel has gotten the story wrong.

 

The man-made disaster we are now witnessing in New Orleans did not happen over the past four days. It happened over the past four decades. Hurricane Katrina merely exposed it to public view.

 

The man-made disaster is the welfare state.

 

For the past few days, I have found the news from New Orleans to be confusing. People were not behaving as you would expect them to behave in an emergency--indeed, they were not behaving as they have behaved in other emergencies. That is what has shocked so many people: they have been saying that this is not what we expect from America. In fact, it is not even what we expect from a Third World country.

 

When confronted with a disaster, people usually rise to the occasion. They work together to rescue people in danger, and they spontaneously organize to keep order and solve problems. This is especially true in America. We are an enterprising people, used to relying on our own initiative rather than waiting around for the government to take care of us. I have seen this a hundred times, in small examples (a small town whose main traffic light had gone out, causing ordinary citizens to get out of their cars and serve as impromptu traffic cops, directing cars through the intersection) and large ones (the spontaneous response of New Yorkers to September 11).

 

 

 

 

So what explains the chaos in New Orleans?

 

To give you an idea of the magnitude of what is going on, here is a description from a Washington Times story:

 

"Storm victims are raped and beaten; fights erupt with flying fists, knives and guns; fires are breaking out; corpses litter the streets; and police and rescue helicopters are repeatedly fired on.

 

"The plea from Mayor C. Ray Nagin came even as National Guardsmen poured in to restore order and stop the looting, carjackings and gunfire....

 

"Last night, Gov. Kathleen Babineaux Blanco said 300 Iraq-hardened Arkansas National Guard members were inside New Orleans with shoot-to-kill orders.

 

" 'These troops are...under my orders to restore order in the streets,' she said. 'They have M-16s, and they are locked and loaded. These troops know how to shoot and kill and they are more than willing to do so if necessary and I expect they will.' "

 

 

The reference to Iraq is eerie. The photo that accompanies this article showed National Guard troops, with rifles and armored vests, riding on an armored vehicle through trash-strewn streets lined by a rabble of squalid, listless people, one of whom appears to be yelling at them. It looks exactly like a scene from Sadr City in Baghdad.

 

What explains bands of thugs using a natural disaster as an excuse for an orgy of looting, armed robbery, and rape? What causes unruly mobs to storm the very buses that have arrived to evacuate them, causing the drivers to drive away, frightened for their lives? What causes people to attack the doctors trying to treat patients at the Super Dome?

 

Why are people responding to natural destruction by causing further destruction? Why are they attacking the people who are trying to help them?

 

My wife, Sherri, figured it out first, and she figured it out on a sense-of- life level. While watching the coverage last night on Fox News Channel, she told me that she was getting a familiar feeling. She studied architecture at the Illinois Institute of Chicago, which is located in the South Side of Chicago just blocks away from the Robert Taylor Homes, one of the largest high-rise public housing projects in America. "The projects," as they were known, were infamous for uncontrollable crime and irremediable squalor. (They have since, mercifully, been demolished.)

 

What Sherri was getting from last night's television coverage was a whiff of the sense of life of "the projects." Then the "crawl"--the informational phrases flashed at the bottom of the screen on most news channels--gave some vital statistics to confirm this sense: 75% of the residents of New Orleans had already evacuated before the hurricane, and of the 300,000 or so who remained, a large number were from the city's public housing projects. Jack Wakeland then gave me an additional, crucial fact: early reports from CNN and Fox indicated that the city had no plan for evacuating all of the prisoners in the city's jails--so they just let many of them loose. There is no doubt a significant overlap between these two populations--that is, a large number of people in the jails used to live in the housing projects, and vice versa.

 

There were many decent, innocent people trapped in New Orleans when the deluge hit--but they were trapped alongside large numbers of people from two groups: criminals--and wards of the welfare state, people selected, over decades, for their lack of initiative and self-induced helplessness. The welfare wards were a mass of sheep--on whom the ancompetent administration of New Orleans unleashed a pack of wolves.

 

All of this is related, incidentally, to the apparent incompetence of the city government, which failed to plan for a total evacuation of the city, despite the knowledge that this might be necessary. But in a city corrupted by the welfare state, the job of city officials is to ensure the flow of handouts to welfare recipients and patronage to political supporters--not to ensure a lawful, orderly evacuation in case of emergency.

 

No one has really reported this story, as far as I can tell. In fact, some are already actively distorting it, blaming President Bush, for example, for failing to personally ensure that the Mayor of New Orleans had drafted an adequate evacuation plan. The worst example is an execrable piece from the Toronto Globe and Mail, by a supercilious Canadian who blames the chaos on American "individualism." But the truth is precisely the opposite: the chaos was caused by a system that was the exact opposite of individualism.

 

What Hurricane Katrina exposed was the psychological consequences of the welfare state. What we consider "normal" behavior in an emergency is behavior that is normal for people who have values and take the responsibility to pursue and protect them. People with values respond to a disaster by fighting against it and doing whatever it takes to overcome the difficulties they face. They don't sit around and complain that the government hasn't taken care of them. They don't use the chaos of a disaster as an opportunity to prey on their fellow men.

 

But what about criminals and welfare parasites? Do they worry about saving their houses and property? They don't, because they don't own anything. Do they worry about what is going to happen to their businesses or how they are going to make a living? They never worried about those things before. Do they worry about crime and looting? But living off of stolen wealth is a way of life for them.

 

The welfare state--and the brutish, uncivilized mentality it sustains and encourages--is the man-made disaster that explains the moral ugliness that has swamped New Orleans. And that is the story that no one is reporting.

 

This is a great read.

You know, it probably doesn't help anything, but welfare isn't what we need to be blaming.

You know, it probably doesn't help anything, but welfare isn't what we need to be blaming.

930021[/snapback]

 

The article has almost nothing to do with welfare at all, you obviously didn't read the article.

I like how people are surprised about the looting and crime.

 

DUH! This is what happens when society breaks down and there is no law.

You know, it probably doesn't help anything, but welfare isn't what we need to be blaming.

930021[/snapback]

 

The article has almost nothing to do with welfare at all, you obviously didn't read the article. The term "Welfare State" is just to describe how poor it is there. Don't comment on articles you haven't read.

930029[/snapback]

 

They call it the welfare state for a reason. Maybe if the majority of these folks weren't sucking off of welfare, it wouldn't be such a poverty stricken state.

 

Have a nice day.

You know, it probably doesn't help anything, but welfare isn't what we need to be blaming.

930021[/snapback]

 

The article has almost nothing to do with welfare at all, you obviously didn't read the article. The term "Welfare State" is just to describe how poor it is there. Don't comment on articles you haven't read.

930029[/snapback]

 

They call it the welfare state for a reason. Maybe if the majority of these folks weren't sucking off of welfare, it wouldn't be such a poverty stricken state.

 

Have a nice day.

930033[/snapback]

 

f***ing kill yourself, please. I love how ignorant your views on life and people are, dodge. Some people aren't as well off as you or me.

You know, it probably doesn't help anything, but welfare isn't what we need to be blaming.

930021[/snapback]

 

The article has almost nothing to do with welfare at all, you obviously didn't read the article. The term "Welfare State" is just to describe how poor it is there. Don't comment on articles you haven't read.

930029[/snapback]

 

They call it the welfare state for a reason. Maybe if the majority of these folks weren't sucking off of welfare, it wouldn't be such a poverty stricken state.

 

Have a nice day.

930033[/snapback]

 

f***ing kill yourself, please. I love how ignorant your views on life and people are, dodge. Some people aren't as well off as you or me.

930045[/snapback]

 

 

What's your problem? Christ, get a grip.

 

 

You want to know how much money I have in my checking account? I'm working full time and going to school full time. I have nothing. My parents aren't paying my way through. I can't drive but every couple days because I can't afford the gas.

 

The only thing well off about me is that I'm going to have a teacher's salary in another 3 years.

 

 

 

 

 

But you know what, since my views aren't ok with you, I may as well just kill myself - I care about you that much.

Good, good. I'd like to know that you care about me that much. Like I said, people aren't as well off as you and me. A lot of people aren't even as privledged as you to go to school and have a full time job. There are actual people out there who really need the help, not sit on their asses and collect free money.

 

Just a FYI.

Good, good. I'd like to know that you care about me that much. Like I said, people aren't as well off as you and me. A lot of people aren't even as privledged as you to go to school and have a full time job. There are actual people out there who really need the help, not sit on their asses and collect free money.

 

Just a FYI.

930057[/snapback]

 

I know, dude, that's what the program is there for, and I'm alright with that. Unfortunately a small fraction of the folks recieving welfare/unemployment deserve the help for the amount of time they're getting it, but I guess that will never change.

 

I'm not saying I'm not lucky to be where I am.

 

There is no need to get personal, alright?

Alright, I apologize for hitting you below the belt. It was uncalled for.

 

Anyways, I'm well aware of people that abuse the system and take a free hand out but you made it seem like all these poor people down there don't deserve a little help.

Alright, I apologize for hitting you below the belt. It was uncalled for.

 

Anyways, I'm well aware of people that abuse the system and take a free hand out but you made it seem like all these poor people down there don't deserve a little help.

930071[/snapback]

 

No, I didn't mention that because I hoped that everyone wouldn't think that I felt that way. But my fault for not clarifying what I meant, I was hastily trying to counter what Accord said about me.

 

And thanks for the apology, it means a lot.

Oh, and see you in Detroit. :plain

Redskins = no chance

Steelers = not looking so good after the pre-season.

 

But let's not get this off-topic, mk?

Redskins = no chance

Steelers = not looking so good after the pre-season.

 

But let's not get this off-topic, mk?

930082[/snapback]

 

I know, hence the plain face.

It's hard to take this article seriously when so much of the truth has been mischaracterized.

 

Start with the very first sentance "It has taken four long days for state and federal officials to figure out how to deal with the disaster in New Orleans". Federal officials weren't even on the scene during the first four days.

 

Let's move on to the next disinenguous comments:

For journalists, natural disasters also have a familiar pattern: the heroism of ordinary people pulling together to survive; the hard work and dedication of doctors, nurses, and rescue workers; the steps being taken to clean up and rebuild.

 

Public officials did not expect that the first thing they would have to do is to send thousands of armed troops in armored vehicle, as if they are suppressing an enemy insurgency. And journalists--myself included--did

not expect that the story would not be about rain, wind, and flooding, but about rape, murder, and looting.

The first part did occur over the first couple of days. Citizens of New Orleans helped each other reach higher ground. Hospitals worked to move entire floors of patients to higher floors where they were safe from the flood waters. Rampant looting and anarchy didn't break out for several days, after it became clear that no one was coming to rescue them or provide food, water, or medical supplies.

How exactly were these "welfare state" people supposed to work hard and develop food and water and better conditions? Were they supposed to follow the will of people who arent in welfare and create them out of thin air? Next thing you know we will be getting articles from Ann Coulter saying the hippies from the 60s are to blame for the crisis.

 

btw, where is the link to this blatantly right wing personalized analysis.

How exactly were these "welfare state" people supposed to work hard and develop food and water and better conditions? Were they supposed to follow the will of people who arent in welfare and create them out of thin air? Next thing you know we will be getting articles from Ann Coulter saying the hippies from the 60s are to blame for the crisis.

 

btw, where is the link to this blatantly right wing personalized analysis.

930356[/snapback]

 

Atleast he's posting articles from people that use their real names. :plain