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Masking New Orleans

By Fatima Shaik, In These Times. Posted February 28, 2006.


On the first post-Katrina Mardi Gras, the festivities just disguise the fact that New Orleans is a hollower, whiter, and richer place than it was a year ago.
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On Mardi Gras Day, the nation will be looking to New Orleans to see if we are wearing masks. We'll be wearing them in New Orleans, but they're being worn in Washington D.C. too. That's because the face of our tragedy is being covered up with a big smile -- we are having a party and pretending that the poor people can just go away.

The poor weren't seen in the years before Katrina. Dark skinned women folded down white hotel sheets for revelers in the French Quarter. Men ported and washed dishes behind the screen doors of restaurants where beer-sodden tourists cheered. Children asked for a quarter to sing and dance as visitors from all over the world eyed them like a passing parade. The poor of New Orleans remained a feature of the local scenery as described in a 19th century novel.

The masks we'll see this year have been worn in the past by outsiders who arrived with credit cards and attitudes of privilege and indifference. We too wore masks in our quest for the dollar. We smiled broadly and stepped lively -- livelier perhaps than we should have. We made New Orleans a comfortable place for everybody but ourselves. For the sake of good business, we didn't cry out that we were in dire straits.

At the last census, almost 40 percent of our households made under $20,000 a year, and in my neighborhood, 46 percent made under $15,000. When the police discovered that the seven square miles, which included the neighborhood where I grew up, led the city in homicides, we didn't mobilize ourselves to sweep every block. Nor did we take to the streets screaming for more cops, courts and federal assistance when we threatened once again to become murder capital of the nation in 2005.

We let the bon temps roulle.

Now, with the sight of American citizens exiled on highways, the paint should have washed off all of our faces. But instead, the government's plan for the poor masks a carnival economy without even a trickle down. Joseph Canizaro, chief author of the city's redevelopment plan, who reportedly raised $200,000 for Bush's 2004 reelection, told PBS' "NewsHour," "But I will tell you we will not have as many poor people. There's no question. I've talked to a lot of them. They are better where they are. They want to stay where they are because they have a better life."

In the past, we woke to the sounds of Mardi Gras Indians singing songs to wake the neighborhood. Homemade maskers walked to Canal Street, stopping at the wooden, shotgun houses of friends to eat breakfast. There was someone to visit, a place to sit, something to eat or drink and someone to dance with every few blocks.

This Mardi Gras, people will go to the parades, but mostly for their children's sake. To keep up their spirits, they might even dress up and join the Blue Tarp costume contest. But they will remember that the last march that met on the corner of Clairborne and Orleans -- where Black Mardi Gras is always held -- was a month ago. Then, the second line clubs marched for housing.


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Fatima Shaik is the author of four books set in Louisiana and a former reporter for the New Orleans Times-Picayune.

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A song
Posted by: Holland on Feb 28, 2006 1:54 AM   
Current rating: Not yet rated    [1 = poor; 5 = excellent]
A song for the forgotten, a cry for the downtrodden, a call for compassion, is how I read your piece.

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misery
Posted by: Holland on Feb 28, 2006 2:00 AM   
Current rating: Not yet rated    [1 = poor; 5 = excellent]
Ignorance and arrogant indifference create infinitely more misery than Nature's unaffected rage.

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broken
Posted by: Holland on Feb 28, 2006 2:20 AM   
Current rating: Not yet rated    [1 = poor; 5 = excellent]
A flood of this magnitude is called biblical, apocalyptic, and to all who look, so it appears; but it is the human deficit which broke the Seventh Seal, and afraid to look at one's own deficit, one looks away. In biblical terms, this is a sin; and to stay within these terms, this Apocalypse heralds a reckoning that no clause can ward off and no money can settle.

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Boycott
Posted by: Xynyx on Feb 28, 2006 8:07 AM   
Current rating: Not yet rated    [1 = poor; 5 = excellent]
Until there is justice for all the people who want to return, I plan to stay away from NO.

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» RE: Boycott Posted by: ecolib
» RE: Boycott Posted by: Asses of Evil
» RE: Boycott Posted by: ALANHESTER
» RE: Boycott Posted by: alterhead
» RE: Boycott Posted by: ecolib
» what to buy Posted by: beausoleil
Time to Renew American Whig Ideals
Posted by: Cosmo on Feb 28, 2006 10:24 AM   
Current rating: Not yet rated    [1 = poor; 5 = excellent]
The Bush Administration's focus on
increasing executive powers while
ignoring competent implementation
shows how far the current Republican
Party has drifted from its Whig roots.

The Whig Party was created in response
to "King" Andrew Jackson's "imperial" presidency
by merchants and farmers who, like all
Republicans, wanted individual representation
(as opposed to group). Whigs promoted
national standards for infastructure
(canals, roads, etc.) to unite the country
as a nation, instead of a loose confederation
of states with different standards.

Whether we look at the debacle left behind
Hurricane Katrina, or ill-equipped soldiers
in Iraq, or the Bush Administration's
violation of the Bill of Rights, it is obvious
that it is time for our nation to renew our
Whig ideals to national infastructure
standards, and containment of the
Executive Branch.

The government and our Republic would
be well served to revisit the Whig Party
of Abraham Lincoln and William Seward.
Fortunately, the slavery issue that caused
Whigs to morph into Republicans is behind
us.

As citizens we can review our
Congressional representatives regardless
of party, by Whig standards for the 2006
elections. There is common ground here
for Democrats, Republicans, Greens,
Libertarians and Independents.

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Indifference Is Becoming A Neolibral Value Too
Posted by: dlf on Feb 28, 2006 12:13 PM   
Current rating: Not yet rated    [1 = poor; 5 = excellent]
The indifference many of you faced at home and now again away from home is mirrored on these boards. Few will find this place, know that those who do have a real concern for you. We know nothing can replace a home, family, and the memories contained in either. We only hope that your road to recovery finds you in good company, with a loving community. And should you need to rally support for government action, especially in DC, I will march till my shoes fall off for you!

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Look and Learn
Posted by: jeffrey7 on Feb 28, 2006 3:54 PM   
Current rating: Not yet rated    [1 = poor; 5 = excellent]
With all the news about Mardi Gras you'd think there would be some folks of color at the party. I personally did'nt see any in the reports. Excepting the ones that were still digging out. Mayor Nagin proclaiming that New Orleans was showing itself could'nt be more true. Showing it's a racist town out for the tourist bucks. Rich tourists bucks. They want the rich in New Orleans. They buy huge insurance policies. Have vast savings holdings and can buy back the hurricane damaged lots. I say now to you all, before the year is out there will be a bill in Congress to make the taxpayers pay back the insurance companies for their losses. Just like 9/11. Now you have to ask yourself 'Why should we taxpayers foot the bill for 9/11 insurance losses when people have been paying premiums for years?' The answer is the insurance industry is insolvent. They spend more money on administrative needs than they put into their insured's accounts. Let's all say it together.....MISMANAGEMENT. Keep an eye on the Congress,it's going to happen.
Yes N.O. wants to have the rich white folks in town as residents and Nagin's 'Chocolate Town' will be where the workers of the rich will be and their Mardi Gras will be at the end of a broom. I'm sorry Mr. Nagin, you act like a Honkey dipped in Chocolate. You screwed the poor,many of them black,like you, and now you're kowtowing to Rich Whitie again. It's the return of the Carpetbaggers. How shallow is it to think 'Party' over taking care of the clean-up. N.O. could be forgiven for letting Mardi Gras pass by this year as long as they were getting folks lives back together. This too they Failed on. So much failure,so much misery,so little leadership.
At least if they're Catholic,their guilt will be unbearable.

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» RE: Look and Learn Posted by: dekala1
» RE: Look and Learn Posted by: Holland
DaftAida
Posted by: DaftAida on Feb 28, 2006 7:22 PM   
Current rating: Not yet rated    [1 = poor; 5 = excellent]
Today, Fat Tuesday (Mardi Gras) I played some New Orleans music in London UK. Your comments are filled with tears and I feel those in my heart. The song 'Tears of a Clown' sprang to mind as soon as I started reading, how apt "now if there's a smile on my face, it's only there tryin' to fool the public, but when it comes down to fooling you, well honey, that's quite a different subject, don't let my glad expression, give you the wrong impression 'cause really I'm sad, you're gone and I'm hurtin' so bad ....but like a fool I pretend to be glad ... well there's some sad things known to men, that ain't too much sadder than, the tears of a clown, when you're not around'

People of New Orleans, know this much. Your plight is beyond words, for grief cannot contain mere words what you have and will experience, so will we all - I've seen it and it is telling how you use reptiles (the lizards and the crocodiles) to describe memories of celebration and the sense of your loss. You don't know the true horror behind your individual and collective tragedy, for you are the pioneers. All those who party carelessly on the shroud of your betrayal, too soon will be thier understanding of your loss, for they shall share in this, as we all shall in our own way, as the Iraq people's and all nations torched by this poison of anti-life. This is not prophecy, this is now The Law according to the NWO/Alien Alliance - so unholy, we've been too afraid to speak of it. Something beautiful is being murdered, aborted, abused or simply overlooked because it is so unknown to those of that coldness, yet so obvious to all of us warmblooded. It is humanity, community and dare I say, God. Thank you for your sharing - joining us together in our heart/souls, with this alone we have the courage to come out the other side of the tragedy and unholy alliance that certain humans have wrought with the unspeakable in betraying humanity. Blessings and strength in faith.

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» RE: DaftAida Posted by: dlf
» RE: DaftAida Posted by: dlf