No wonder the lefties are distrusted.

Where did you get THAT, big bro? I MUST copy it and send to some of my friends. Author or publication, please!
David

quote:

For those who think what happened in New Orleans won't happen again levees.org

acad, I was referring to the FEMA response. The "brilliant" politicians are re-building under sea level. Wouldn't catch me there during hurricane season.
David

And as far as the outpouring of help and resources, it is still in full swing via local churches and other volunteer organizations.
I can remember only one person who felt they didn't deserve any help from the government. We had an interesting discussion about the role of the government in keeping its citizens safe and exactly what "safe" meant.
There are families that have re-located in our area and even further North. They got out with what they were wearing and are trying to make a new and better life for themselves and their family. So sad and disruptive.
I tell you, though, what sickens me to this day is the greater concern many people had over the endangered pets vs. the endangered people. They all needed help but I say children before dogs/cats/etc.
The sad fact is that disaster strikes and people have losses and are hurt or killed. To not lift a finger or to even have disdain for the suffering represents the worst of humanity.
David

Nice rich 'haves' who can afford a Caribbean cruse, sit at a table and stuff themselves and talk about how those stupid 'have-nots' deserved it for not being insured, whilst the bodies piled up in the streets.
Nice thought.

quote:

Originally posted by Mick Parry:

I was on a caribbean cruise after Katrina happened and nearly all of the Americans who sat at the same table for dinner as me had total disrespect for them.

Mick

Surely you found such pompousness on the part of these American cruise passengers almost sickeningly cold and heartless?

Surely?

Deane

Mick :

"Chaps, Ladies, It's been a magnificent day. With the goods and services that our wealth has bought us we have enjoyed ourselves immensely on this here cruise ship.

But what say you of these cretinous low rents who are dying in your New Orleans, they deserve what the got, in my view. Why they didn't even have the wherewithal to insure themselves, tough luck says I. They're a bunch of sods, sniveling curs and wastrels !!!"



Bob American:

" err ...aaaahm ...yes Mr Parry, that certainly is an interesting idea. Darlene, doesn't Mr Parry speak forcefully .....uuuuhhhm... by the way, we're not hungry...I think Mrs Bob and I will check out the shuffle board games..."

Mrs. Bob American:

" Yes dear, I've just realized I'm not hungry. (aside) " Dear, let's get out of here, that guy gives me the cold creepiies....."


Mick:

"Go ahead yanks,enjoy yourselves, just remember if you do not eat you will starve and therefore die. "


Exit stage right, Mr. and Mrs. Bob......

my dentist in l.a. took his whole office to the big easy a few months ago and performed free dental work for a week.

now if he'd only give me a discount on my next crown. my shed flooded once ....

the forum members certainly provide an interesting pov on the u.s. it's very ... well, european. i took the economist for years, not so much as it's great journalism (it's really kind of a "wall st. journal magazine"), but bcs. of that same perspective, which sheds a stark light on the events here. not to mention that the level of journalism here is "de minimis," shall we say; and almost completely driven by the two-headed monster of political force and hollywood drivel. i know there are plenty of farcical english papers, but there are also a few serious ones, and here there are virtually none.

Chaps

I could not care if the America tax payer bailed out the Katrina victims or not because I am not an American tax payer.

All I am repeating is what I heard, these middle Americans deeply resented bailing out people who had not insured their possessions.

Regards

Mick

quote:

Originally posted by Malky:
Nice rich 'haves' who can afford a Caribbean cruse, sit at a table and stuff themselves and talk about how those stupid 'have-nots' deserved it for not being insured, whilst the bodies piled up in the streets.
Nice thought.

I'm still finding it hard to believe that Mick allowed himself to be stuck on a cruise ship with a bunch of Americans at all... But in case he did you should all know that American Caribbean-route cruise lines aren't anything like the QE2 or Norwegian what's-it-called. They tend to do things in volume and the average customer is not what I would describe as a "rich have" by any measure. Typically, they are strecth-pants clad retirees who are taking a break from the road while their RV is in the shop, and only in the Caribbean to scour the ports for duty-free bargains on cubic zirconium. An ideal set-up for Mick's dinner-table pontifications, in other words, but by no means high rent.

I know of no one who 'despises' the so-called have-nots for their situation after Katrina -- Mick was this cruise sponsored by the John Birch Society? The level of support from private, ordinary Americans after Katrina was truly amazing. Even more amazing is that, defying our national pastime of collective amnesia, people are still giving and still remembering.

I went down last year to help survey the situation for the foundation I work for -- we have several N.O. and Louisiana-based grantees. It was spring break for most of the big US universities and I was struck my the numbers of students who had taken that time to volunteer in N.O. to help gut and rehab homes. This was thankless, even dangerous work with zero ciy or state oversight, yet they turned out in incredible numbers. They outnumbered the presence of Government contractors by a huge margin.

Daniel

Daniel

I have repeatedly said over the years that the Americans on the cruises were just ordinary chaps. Therefore their views are probably mainstream.

America is an emormously wealthy country and it could rebuild the city 100 times over if it really wanted to.

These people genuinely resented their money being spent on people who never had the foresight to insure themselves.

I say once again, I hold no views on it because I am not an American taxpayer and I am merely repeating what was said.

Regards

Mick

quote:

Originally posted by NaimDropper:
Where did you get THAT, big bro? I MUST copy it and send to some of my friends. Author or publication, please!
David

David,

'The Gospel of Supply Side Jesus' illustrations by Don Simpson, from the book 'Lies, and the Lying Liars Who tell Them' by Al Franken.


BB

quote:

Originally posted by Mick Parry:
Daniel

I have repeatedly said over the years that the Americans on the cruises were just ordinary chaps. Therefore their views are probably mainstream.

America is an emormously wealthy country and it could rebuild the city 100 times over if it really wanted to.

These people genuinely resented their money being spent on people who never had the foresight to insure themselves.

I say once again, I hold no views on it because I am not an American taxpayer and I am merely repeating what was said.

Regards

Mick

Mick,
Fair enough. I was pointing out the mainstream-ness of Americans on cruise more for the benefit of Malky who seemed to have the impression that this was something more like the Titanic.

If your cruise took place shortly after Katrina I am not too surpirsed by some of the attitudes you encountered. There was much misinformation surrounding the entire debacle. For the record, many of Katrina's affected were in fact insured, only to find their insurers squirming out of their policies with lots of equivocal language splitting the hairs of "flood protection" and "disaster protection."

Your point that America, with its enormous wealth, could rebuild the city 100 times over is very compelling. For there is the root of much of the remaining controversy. New Orleans can be rebuilt and many of the finer neighborhoods will be. But the poorer neighborhoods, (the Lower 9th Ward, for instance) are being willfully neglected in the rebuilding plan. And for many of these residents, who are 4th, 5th even 6th generation New Orleans (that's a lot over here), the impression is that the city wishes they would not return. For those who have returned, or who never left, it is despairing. These are deeply rooted families and communities after all. Some as old as the city itself.

As for resenting their tax-dollars at work to rebuild N.O., I know all too well that many of these resentments are held by the same Americans who are willing to throw their money (and their chidren's and grandchildren's) away at a meaningless war that is seemingly without end.

Best,
Daniel

daniel, amen, bro.' $500bb could rebuild just about everything needing it stateside, upgrade the crappy train tracks, feed poor kids, you name it .... but instead we have a pointless dumbs**t w "vanity" entanglement and THOUSANDS of dead boys and many more thousands missing limbs, and a revitalized al quaida (and don't forget a fat and happy halliburton). what a travesty. we had the sympathy of the world on 09-12 and we squandered it.

fidelio,
It's really shocking to think what else we could have done with the money to fund this war. Of course had there been no war and someone said, "Hey, let's spend 500bb to fix education, and reduce world poverty" we would have heard a chorus of neo-cons shouting, "No! It's Too much! No new taxes!" But that's typical of them.

I just started an interesting book called, "Dark Ages America," by Morris Berman. It's too early for a synpopsis, but the introduction draws parallels to the Roman Empire's gradual slide into irrelevance and the consequent shift of power to the east(Byzantium) and north (Europe).

daniel

A few books worth reading:

Thought provoking stuff

chomsky is certainly brilliant. i would also suggest "the end of faith," harris. i just finished it a couple of weeks ago. interestingly pressed on me by a buddhist friend. one can agree or disagree w/ his pov, but it is certainly thought-provoking.

quote:

'The Gospel of Supply Side Jesus' illustrations by Don Simpson, from the book 'Lies, and the Lying Liars Who tell Them' by Al Franken.


BB

Thanks Big Bro!

quote:

Originally posted by fidelio:
chomsky is certainly brilliant. i would also suggest "the end of faith," harris. i just finished it a couple of weeks ago. interestingly pressed on me by a buddhist friend. one can agree or disagree w/ his pov, but it is certainly thought-provoking.

Fidelio,

I have read it and I have mentioned it on this ere forum some time ago together with a few others I have read. Here is what I wrote:

"‘In The Name of God: Violence and Destruction in the World’s Religions’ a book by Michael Jordan contains not one single reference to Buddhism but there is chapter after chapter detailing the violent legacy of Christianity.

In Ken Ward’s book ‘Is Religion dangerous?’ we see that the overwhelming baulk of the book concerns the many negative aspects of Christianity, Judaism and Islam. Having given a very brief overview of Buddhism he says ‘…it is hard to think of a set of beliefs that is less likely to be harmful, and is more likely to motivate altruistic behaviour and promote psychological well being.’

‘The End of Faith: Religion, Terror, and the Future of Reason’ by Sam Harris – Has nothing but positive comments about Buddhism but has chapter after chapter about nonsense in Christianity.

‘God against the Gods: A History of the War between Monotheism and Polytheism’ by Jonathon Kirsch has no references about Buddhism (other than mentioning the wanton destruction of Buddha statues in Afghanistan) but has plenty to say about the history of evil perpetrated by Christians.

‘The Dark Side of Christian History’ by Helen Ellerbe – The view that the ‘Religious Right’ asserts that Christian values will save the world from its rampart sins - given the history of the Christian church is patently ridiculous - the arrogance of these people who at best are just plain ignorant and at worst down right evil beggars belief".

As the warnings in the adverts often say :-

"Previous growth is no guarantee of future performance"

Remember, Acad is practicing to become a Buddhist, so his views are biased.

Cheers

Don

Is Acad Eric in another timeframe

Another timeframe, another world, another....

in short - Yes

But remember its Erik, not Eric. Gets a bit upset if you get this bit wrong...but my spellchecker always (*) changes Erik into Eric....and life's too short etc etc

Cheers

Don

(*) this is the sort of contradiction that Eric thrives on.

(*) oops!! probably should have said "this is the type of contradiction upon which Eric thrives"

Here is another by Sam Harris everyone should read.

Of course The God Delusion by Richard Dawkins does not criticise Buddhism either as there is no God delusion there.

What does he say about God?

‘The god of the old testament is arguably the most unpleasant character in all fiction: jealous and proud of it; a petty, unjust, un-forgiving control freak; a vindictive, bloodthirsty ethnic cleanser; a misogynistic, homophobic, racist, infanticidal, genocidal, filicidal, pestilential, megalomaniacal, sadomasochistic, capriciously malevolent bully. Those of us schooled from infancy in his ways can be desensitized to their horrors’.

He's not wrong

If you really want to see just how barking mad many Christians are and how they threaten world peace and the very planet itself you can watch this Channel 4 documentary The Doomsday Code Not to be outdone in lunacy league we see that Islam has it's own Muslim Doomsday Code

Don old chop,

Try and say something intelligent. If you think there is something wrong with what I posted earlier then develop an argument and refute what I wrote. That is the challenge I give you. Will you accept it or make some more brainless comments? Only time will tell. Maybe Derek Wright will help you but do two half wits make a whole? (it could be a question on your brain teasers thread)

acad

Who are you trying to convince of your vastly superior intellect, us or yourself.