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Julian Sanchez | September 7, 2005

Jesse Walker examines how people respond to crisis, and finds it's usually more Locke than Hobbes.

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|9.7.05 @ 6:05PM|#

Good article.

I have a feeling that in about two weeks to a month, we're going to find that this disaster was not as bad as we've been led to believe. I may be hopelessly optimistic, but I think we will soon hear very few people were acting like thugs, fewer people died than imagined, and less time will be needed to make the Crescent City habitable again.

And no, I am not implying some conspiracy by the media to inflate the catastrophe to make Bush (or FEMA or Nagin or whoever) look worse; rather, I think our seemingly inherent love of a horror story takes over and makes us imagine the worst. I can still remember that on 9/11 all I heard was that as many as 50,000 people were dead in the WTC.

In NO, the old saw will probably come true again: it's seldom as good as you hope, but equally seldom as bad as you fear.

Gee...I sound downright sentimental...

|9.7.05 @ 6:09PM|#

Wonderful article, Mr. Walker, and I agree with your conclusion. However, it's both amazing and sad how the authorities in our country have taken it upon themselves to make people's lives more miserable even in the worst of situations.

|9.7.05 @ 6:44PM|#

What is most sad to me is how quickly our government and law enforcement have forgotten the people they serve. Or perhaps they haven't and I am just waking up to the reality that it was never the people at all. Great story, though coming from such a liberal site will prevent it from getting the attention it deserves.

And this comes from a die hard conservative who longs for the Goldwater Republicans to rise again like a phoenix.

Rough Ol' Boy|9.7.05 @ 6:52PM|#

I actually made some very similar points about a week ago on my blog here, in comparing what was happening in New Orleans favorably to what occured during the L.A. riots.

The Wine Commonsewer|9.7.05 @ 7:05PM|#

Good stuff Jesse.

|9.7.05 @ 7:10PM|#

quiet one,
You mean "classical liberal" site, right?

|9.7.05 @ 7:26PM|#

I don't think your average Rep or Dem would know what the fuck "classical liberal" is.

To Republicans, we're liberals, cuz we believe people should be free to do what they want with their bodies as long as they're not hurting others.

To Democrats, we're conservatives, cuz we believe people should be free to do what they want with their money.

|9.7.05 @ 8:10PM|#

Perhaps this is out of place, but can anyone provide any links to a case study where FEMA involvement led to a positive outcome? That is, has FEMA ever performed better than well-prepared local responders or volunteers? Isn't FEMA's primary mission to provide coordination among other federal, state and local agencies, yet now, that is the area where they seems most woefully inadequate? Has it ever been anything but a big piggy bank.

Shannon Love|9.7.05 @ 8:18PM|#

The way that people in crises are usually portrayed in the media and popular entertainment has long been a pet peeve of mine. The media likes drama more than it likes truth. I worried whether exaggerated security fears was delaying help in arriving when I saw the initial reports.

I do wonder. however, if the successful self-evacuation of 80% of the population of NO worsened the situation by altering the ration of dysfunctional to functional people in city. The evacuation took a lot of people with skills, resources and community spirit out of the city. I think one reason Mississippi saw so little disorder was that slammed though they were they still had integral communities.

Shannon Love|9.7.05 @ 8:35PM|#

Deus ex machina,

"can anyone provide any links to a case study where FEMA involvement led to a positive outcome'

That might be a tough one. FEMA actually has two roles to play in any disaster. Its supposed to coordinate the emergency response and then the cleanup. So it has a short intense time frame of about one week in the emergency mode, then it shifts to the long-term clean up mode. I think it sucks in the first mode and does okay (for a government outfit) in the second.

A lot depends on the local organization as well. After the disaster of Andrew, Florida seriously cleaned up its act locally. Since then they have weathered numerous serious hurricanes without major problems. Florida deals with almost all the emergency stuff and FEMA shows up later to write checks. That system seems to work out well.

I suspect that there is a serious institutional conflict between the emergency mode and the long-term mode. The emergency mode people will be akin to gungho marines while the long-term mode people are a bunch of accountants. It might be best to compartmentalize the two functions into sub-agencies. One that is a quasi-military emergency group and then a more accountable bureaucratic group that follows up after the dust settles.

|9.7.05 @ 8:46PM|#

RandyAyn,

Oops, I was mixing up stories here, as I had also just read the story linked at the end from Counterpunch, which some of my family (from NOLA no less) would label as ultra-liberal as in bleeding heart, commie, etc.

Jesse's story, as always, was a well written story that will be ignored for the simple fact that libertarians no longer exist. This is clear from the mainstream media coverage.

|9.7.05 @ 8:52PM|#

Let's rebuild New Orleans, and rename it "Darwin." Then we can always say, "Looking back at the lessons we learned from Darwin..." We can award new Darwin Awards. Creationists could talk about Darwin, while the scientifically inclined could talk about Acts of God. It's win-win.

Derek Ashworth|9.7.05 @ 9:09PM|#

From Houston, I have a few observations:

1.) If we (in Houston) are dealing with the same people waiting for buses almost a week ago, and there was so much violence and mayhem among those folks (at the Convention Center and Superdome, as well as outside), then I think the media is overblowing this thing. I have seen a couple of irate imported people here, but they were Al Sharpton and Jesse Jackson, plus one guy who couldn't get a job application.

2.) The "imported/exported" folks love Houston because they have already seen a considerably less corrupt police department, a reliable and well-run reaction to their plight, and the folks here are real friendly (no tourists here).

3.) Liberals will fight tooth and nail to make sure that they rebuild low-income housing in the same neighborhoods in New Orleans, subject to the same potential disasters, because as much as they feel for their fellow man, they want them to go back where they came from after the cameras are turned off.

Great article, Jesse. That's all from here.

Nick Gillespie Caused My Male |9.7.05 @ 9:27PM|#

"You mean "classical liberal" site, right?"

Reason has become a leftist disgrace since Virginia Postrel left. I constantly encounter opinions I disagree with and I hate that. Or no, wait, it's not that I hate opinions I disagree with; I hate the whinnying way they're expressed--that's it. In my day, even people I disagreed with expressed themselves with grace, wit, and elegance, not whinnying of kindergarteners trying to please their post-doc thesis advisers. And nobody disagreed with me back then either. Reason ruined it all.

|9.7.05 @ 9:31PM|#

"I have a feeling that in about two weeks to a month, we're going to find that this disaster was not as bad as we've been led to believe."

Only time will tell, of course, but I suspect you're right.

On a related note...

The past week of hurricane/flood rhetoric has morphed into such a frenzied blur of partisan fact-slinging, convoluted "gotcha" moments and numbing amateur dissections of bureaucratic minutiae, it's getting hard to remember what we're all so exercised about in the first place.

I mean this sincerely.

Yes, I realize we've got a major city half underwater, and potentially many fatalities. I realize this is a different kind of disaster than most anything America has seen. But what, exactly, raised this to the level of jesus-fucking-christ-this-is-the-worst-thing-ever-fucking-witnessed-good-god-the-humanity?

See, this is where I'm supposed to say, "Now, I don't mean to downplay what has happened in New Orleans." But I'm to the point where I'm having trouble figuring out exactly what I'd be "downplaying."

I know I'm not properly framing what I'm trying to say here. I'm not sure I can yet firm up the vague, bugging notion that's been lurking in the back of my brain this past week. But I do know that part of it involves wondering precisely which aspect of the disaster spurred this intense blame game.

I'm familiar with all the assorted after-the-fact arguments -- mayor shortchanged evacuations, president hates black people, governor didn't issue Form #63425578-A3432, FEMA was slow. But precisely which shitty part of this disaster is prompting Our Collective Anger? Is it about people stuck in their homes not getting rescued by such-and-such point? Is there some sense that a whole bunch of people drowned unnecessarily? Is it about the Superdome thing? Is it simply about the symbolism of the government's not "being there"?

I honestly can't discern anymore where the threshold lay last week -- which specific line was crossed to ignite the fury.

Maybe somebody understands what I'm trying to get at here, and can take a stab at expressing it more clearly.

|9.7.05 @ 10:31PM|#

Wow...

I don't know where to start, SP. But Matt Welch mentioned something on his personal site about babies dying of thirst, in full view of television cameras, and in easily accessible sites. That might be a start.

Then there were the police who locked people inside the Superdome and Convention Center, filled with shit and rotting corpses and with no food or water, rather than let them try to walk to safety.

I don't know about you, but those things still piss me off.

|9.7.05 @ 10:41PM|#

From the article:

(It's not even clear that it's properly theft to take, say, food that's bound to spoil before its owner can return to reclaim it.)

I've never been able to figure this out; while I'd certainly steal food to feed my family, I don't understand how it gets such an easy out from the "property rights" argument.

|9.7.05 @ 10:59PM|#

Nick Gillespie didn't cause your male menopause. Julian Sanchez did. Gillespie is merely the one who annointed him with the title of "Reason staff writer." And Tim Cavanaugh is the one who, as web editor, spreads Julian's word far and wide.

Julian Sanchez is the anti-Christ, Nick Gillespie is his John the anti-Baptist, and Tim Cavanaugh is the anti-Paul.

|9.8.05 @ 12:40AM|#

SP:

I think it is the epidemic of incompetence that pisses everyone off. First, you have the incompetence of many of the people who stayed behind. They failed to properly assess the risks. Or, if they wanted to get out, they failed to make arrangements. In short, many of the people who got into trouble did so out of personal incompetence, not through circumstances beyond their control.

For those who were imperiled due to circumstances beyond their control, to get out, there is the incompetence of the local government. "To Serve And Protect". Uh huh. Apparently evacuating people isn't service, and it isn't protection. Not our problem!

Then there is the incompetence after the levy broke. Communication breakdown, logistical breakdown, credibility breakdown. This is at all levels of government. The freakin' director of FEMA said that FEMA didn't know about people in the Convention Center when those people had been on the news nets for 48 hours. I know it's against the law for Bushies to watch CNN, but when did Fox become verboten too? Isn't there someone who is monitoring the news, to use reporters as proxies for searchers?

Underlying the incompetence of the last 2 weeks is the stupefying (in hindsight, to be fair) incompetence that is the New Orleans topography. Half the city is below sea level?!?!? I know, it wasn't always like this. But as the ground water got pumped and the ground subsided, who decided that a levy, rather than a general fill was the better solution? Levies break. They sing songs about broken levies. Those aren't happy songs. Sure, if NO had been built up, the storm surge would still have done some nasty damage, just as happened in Mississippi. But the storm surge is limited to a few hundred yards near the water. It doesn't leave the city under water for weeks. The city isn't uninhabitable after a storm surge. Damaged, yes. Uninhabitable. no.

If NO is rebuilt, I hope they have the sense to fill in the bowl so it is ABOVE sea level.

|9.8.05 @ 1:06AM|#

Thanks, Portlander.

But I already understand that "it is the epidemic of incompetence that pisses everyone off." I'm well acquainted with who's blaming who, etc.

What I'm getting at is more like: OK, so everybody's pissed at this so-called incompetence. No, not even "pissed" -- more like raging in fury in a manner that is starting to border on madness. But what is the impetus that is causing everybody to rage about incompetence in the first place?

Everybody is talking about "this failure" or "that failure," and that's OK. But it's the fury and madness that's making me wonder, "which shitty part of this disaster is spurring such fury and madness when people talk about failures?" Is it that the Superdome craziness lasted for X number of days? Is it that people were stuck in flooded homes for X number of days? Is it that Y number of people may have died in X manner?

|9.8.05 @ 1:53AM|#

Yeah Reasons a real lib mag.

Has anyone even bothered to read micheal shit? Pretty pro Iraq but lacking the wet crotched love of Bush you can find at National Review.

But yeah liberal, sure.

|9.8.05 @ 6:37AM|#

3.) Liberals will fight tooth and nail to make sure that they rebuild low-income housing in the same neighborhoods in New Orleans, subject to the same potential disasters, because as much as they feel for their fellow man, they want them to go back where they came from after the cameras are turned off.

And Conservatives will fight to make sure they don't return bcs the land is worth more without them there.

The other day, one of the entries was worried that over-reliance on Fed Gov't incentivizes bad disaster relief at the state and local levels. Fair point.

On the other hand, wouldn't using this disaster as a big blight-cleaning taking incentivize bad disaster relief at all levels? Has this already been happening in New Orleans? Was it why the levee was so vulnerable in the first place?

|9.8.05 @ 8:00AM|#

"I've never been able to figure this out; while I'd certainly steal food to feed my family, I don't understand how it gets such an easy out from the "property rights" argument."

It actually is a very difficult question when you have government enforcement of property rights - when the government subsidizes your enforcement of your property rights. In such a situation, the decision is taken from the realm of personal responsibility and economics and injected into politics.

Where an individual is responsible for enforcing his own property rights (i.e., must bring a suit in replevin with his own funds), it's a question of personal morality and economics. Do you as a person feel comfortable suing someone for eating food that you had already lost? Further, if you had insured your stock (as a responsible individual) - you pass the loss to insurance company, so there is less incentive economically to recover the loss, and even the insurance company will have to think twice about possible PR hits for suing under such circumstances.

I guess it's just the difference between being libertarian and a libertine - just because you're allowed to do something, doesn't mean that it is moral. And it doesn't mean that others can't find you reprehensible for your actions.

|9.8.05 @ 8:49AM|#

But that, quasibill, just suggests that it's a matter of the sought damages being worth less than what it would take to obtain them, not that taking food from someone else's fridge is okay (so long as the circumstances warrant it).

That property rights end when another's suffering warrants it seems like a philosophical flaw - by whose standards, the grantor or effective grantee, can the ownership of property be conveyed without express permission?

Or, Jesse, did you mean that it's not clear that such examples were theft because the property owners have abandoned the property? If so, what constitutes abandonment - and would the scavenger still be in the right if the owner of the fridge came back a couple of days later?

|9.8.05 @ 8:50AM|#

SP,

My guess would be that we live with the delusions that we're invulnerable to nature; That American ingenuity can get us out of any problem; That should people find themselves faced with distaster, some higher power will bail them out; That money can solve any problem; Those kind of delusions die hard, with rage and fear.

People are mad that we weren't prepared but we never really prepare for anything. We don't prepare because we don't think anything will ever happen to us, and have more current needs to spend money on. People are disillusioned when they realized that government is just people, as inept as the rest of us, maybe more so.

There's also a whole segment people whose lives revolve around pointing fingers at each other's philosphies for the ills of the world. Their primary goal is to get people angry at the other side. Since they're already chock full of rage, it's easy to work blame for a disaster into their rhetoric.

|9.8.05 @ 9:56AM|#

I've hit a new low in misspelling my own name. Cursed typos!

|9.8.05 @ 10:19AM|#

But as the ground water got pumped and the ground subsided, who decided that a levy, rather than a general fill was the better solution?

Can't do a general fill when the entire area is basically built up. Doing a general fill 60 years after the property is developed would basically require filling in the first floor of most buildings.

After they raze the buildings, then they can do a general fill. That's probably not something you can do piecemeal, raising one property a few feet with fill makes the neighboring properties more likely to flood with your runoff. joe would know more about that.

gaius marius|9.8.05 @ 10:55AM|#

i'd submit that this is true even in the worst of times -- singular events which threaten survival often reinforce the innate social character of men.

what's most notable about these stories of cohesion in the wake of katrina is the sharp contrast which they provide to our everyday existence of insular individual isolation and unaccountability. such cooperation is shocking when it appears because it is so absent in our normal lives.

i recall a story reported out of afghanistan back in 2001 when we were trying to demonize the taliban and afghanistan generally as a savage land which would benefit from forced conversion to modernity. amid the endless condescensions, a reporter allowed himself to recount a bag dropped by a woman in a market -- and how everyone within earshot stopped, came over and helped her pick it all back up, only then resuming what they were doing.

in such a society, barbaric though it may be, cohesion is a daily norm. what is it in the postmodern west? an object of derision -- the "slave mentality".

when hellenic society finally collapsed in the third through fifth centuries, it was not because romans refused to help one another in crisis -- it was because they would not help one another in anything except the most dire emergencies. that pattern is increasingly what we seem to emulate.

|9.8.05 @ 11:11AM|#

The Counterpunch article is worth reading. It got my blood boiling this morning. The fucking cops caused more problems than they solved.

I saw Geraldo broadcasting from the NO convention center. He was crying and pleading for the people to be allowed to walk out of the place to the relative safety of the highway overpasses. As much as I like to make fun of Geraldo, he was making a good point. The authorities rounded up the unfortunate, trapped them into ad-hoc concentration camps, treated them like lepers, and prevented the freedom of movement for those who eschewed their "shelters".

This should be lesson #1 for those facing similar disasters in the future. Do not place your faith and trust in government authorities (especially the goddamn police!). They are no smarter than you and they are not looking out for your personal welfare. It seems the first response of authorities to major disasters is to suspend civil liberties and treat everyone as a ward of the state. I say fuck'em.

|9.8.05 @ 11:45AM|#

Rich Ard:

"But that, quasibill, just suggests that it's a matter of the sought damages being worth less than what it would take to obtain them, not that taking food from someone else's fridge is okay (so long as the circumstances warrant it)."

No, that wasn't my point, or at least only a subsidiary of it. My point is about personal responsibility and morality, which your next paragraph brings to light:

"That property rights end when another's suffering warrants it seems like a philosophical flaw - by whose standards, the grantor or effective grantee, can the ownership of property be conveyed without express permission?"

By the owner's standards, that's who. He can determine whether he has implicitly allowed these people to use his property. He gets to utilize his own individual morality in making the decision. And in the end, he is morally responsible for the decision he makes - noone else.

Larry A|9.8.05 @ 12:18PM|#

Not to worry. One of these days the big one will hit California. Then the producers and directors that survive will know how to make better disaster movies. Then maybe they'll show them to FEMA. Then...

Oh, forget it.

|9.8.05 @ 1:05PM|#

Great article. Interesting answer to George Will's conservative government as the "thin blue line" between civilization and chaos piece in Newsweek.

http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/9014028/site/newsweek

|9.8.05 @ 1:24PM|#

Hmm - guess I'll need to chew on this for a while, quasibill - my apologies if I misunderstood you earlier, and thanks for the clarification.

If you're still reading this, Jesse: is that similar to the tack you were taking when suggesting that these circumstances do not necessarily represent theft?

|9.8.05 @ 1:35PM|#

What I'm getting at is more like: OK, so everybody's pissed at this so-called incompetence. No, not even "pissed" -- more like raging in fury in a manner that is starting to border on madness. But what is the impetus that is causing everybody to rage about incompetence in the first place?

Race. And the inability to discuss it rationally.

|9.8.05 @ 2:20PM|#

Yeah, gm, damn that media for trying to "demonize" Aghanistan under the Taliban as "a savage land which would benefit from forced coercion to modernity."

Can I have some of whatever you're smoking?