The "BigUneasy", a different view of New Orleans

[Alareth]

The people in New Orleans had a reasonable expectation that the place they lived was protected by levees. They had a reasonable expectation the ACOE did a competent job designing and building those levees.

As I said earlier in the thread, as someone who lived in the region for most of his life, such expectations were unrealistic.

New Orleans was going to flood eventually and it was folly and arrogance to imagine otherwise. I was aware of this since I was old enough to grasp the idea it was below sea level and it surprises me that so many residents were and still to this day are ignorant of this.

 

[Metullus]

When you quit making the discussion about what I have or have not cited, documented, or posted to your satisfaction, and instead discuss the issues which are supported in the documentary, I'll be happy to carry on a discussion with you.

As for claiming I have not supported my assertions, the discussion is about the assertions made in the documentary. And not only have those been supported, I've also posted references which describe how those assertions were supported.

I have not seen the documentary in question so I am relying on your representations of what it says and upon the links you provided.

What you have said the documentary says is not supported by any evidence yet provided. If, indeed there is support for your assertions why not link them so that we can see them? They are not in this thread. Earlier I posted a short list of claims that you or the documentary made:

So to recap:

You still have not provided a report that says that a cat 3+ storm will never strike NO.

You still have provided no evidence that "science was ignored".

You still have provided no evidence of corruption at the COE as a cause of the debacle after Katrina.

You still have provided no evidence that COE Project Managers are at all at fault for Katrina.

Why not give us links to the support documentation for each of these?

I must therefore presume that either 1) your report of the contents of the documentary is accurate which would suggest that the documentary is as yet unsupported by the evidence, or, 2) your report of the documentary is inaccurate and it is therefore your claims that are unsupported. I do not know which is the case.

What I do know is that the report that you claim states that a cat 3+ storm will not strike NO is not to be found in the court report, contrary to your repeated insistence. That is what we call a lie.

What I do know is that you have no idea whatever what the process is that takes a project from inception to completion.

I do know that you cannot point to corruption in the COE as a cause for the Katrina debacle, yet you insist that it is the case.

I do know that you cannot point to any instance of the science being ignored by COE as a cause for the Katrina debacle, yet you insist that this, too, is the case.

So the only reasonable conclusion is that either the documentary is a study in hyperbole or that you are misrepresenting what is in the film.

 

[KateHL]

Hey, guys. Just wanted to pop in and say that I was living in Gulfport, Mississippi when Hurricane Katrina hit. Have you ever been swimming in your own house? I have! Have you nearly died of thirst because a convoy of aid trucks were stopped miles away, waiting on some signatures and red tape? I have! And I'm not even from New Orleans!

I often get really sick of people trying to tell me how it was when I was there living it. If you didn't experience it, quit bickering amongst yourselves and listen to someone who lived through it. You might learn something. And if you want to know what it was like in Mississippi, you might as well ask me since the media doesn't seem to care enough to report on it.

That being said, Morgan Freeman and Bret Favre will always have a place in my heart for promoting Mississippi interests in the aftermath of Katrina.

 

[Skeptic Ginger]

I have not seen the documentary in question so I am relying on your representations of what it says and upon the links you provided.

My links were to aspects of the documentary including extensive interviews with the producer and quotes from the experts who presented the evidence in the film. There were short clips from the film one could watch as fast as one could skim the transcript of the film.

Yet you continue to make the debate about me. You dismissed my link to the evidence in the film as, "Lots of opinion" and "hand waving". The evidence in the film were experts putting their careers on the line to blow the whistle on the COE, a contractor who documented their concerns about the levee, which were objected to by the COE and which were proved true, and a court ruling outlining all the evidence of negligence on the part of the COE.

You call this hand waving and opinion.

There's no way to have a reasonable discussion with you on this topic as long as you continue ignore what I've posted.

 

[Skeptic Ginger]

Hey, guys. Just wanted to pop in and say that I was living in Gulfport, Mississippi when Hurricane Katrina hit. Have you ever been swimming in your own house? I have! Have you nearly died of thirst because a convoy of aid trucks were stopped miles away, waiting on some signatures and red tape? I have! And I'm not even from New Orleans!

I often get really sick of people trying to tell me how it was when I was there living it. If you didn't experience it, quit bickering amongst yourselves and listen to someone who lived through it. You might learn something. And if you want to know what it was like in Mississippi, you might as well ask me since the media doesn't seem to care enough to report on it.

That being said, Morgan Freeman and Bret Favre will always have a place in my heart for promoting Mississippi interests in the aftermath of Katrina.

Have an opinion on Shearer's documentary other than to claim we can't have one because we weren't there?

(BTW, I'm glad you weren't killed and hope you've recovered by now. Clearly it must have been a terrible thing to have happen.)

 

[Metullus]

Hey, guys. Just wanted to pop in and say that I was living in Gulfport, Mississippi when Hurricane Katrina hit. Have you ever been swimming in your own house? I have! Have you nearly died of thirst because a convoy of aid trucks were stopped miles away, waiting on some signatures and red tape? I have! And I'm not even from New Orleans!

I often get really sick of people trying to tell me how it was when I was there living it. If you didn't experience it, quit bickering amongst yourselves and listen to someone who lived through it. You might learn something. And if you want to know what it was like in Mississippi, you might as well ask me since the media doesn't seem to care enough to report on it.

That being said, Morgan Freeman and Bret Favre will always have a place in my heart for promoting Mississippi interests in the aftermath of Katrina.

I do not envy your experience. My mother and my uncle and his wife were in NO when Katrina hit. I went down and dragged them out of there in the immediate aftermath (I flew into DFW and drove in from there). It was ugly. I was lucky because my family was not injured.

 

[Metullus]

There's no way to have a reasonable discussion with you on this topic as long as you continue ignore what I've posted.

The irony is palpable...

 

[Skeptic Ginger]

The irony is palpable...

No, it isn't. You're off on some personal pissing contest and I'm not interested.

If you want to discuss the documentary or the evidence in it, which I've posted more than enough links to for you to see what it was about, I'm more than willing to discuss the issues. If you want to whine that I personally have made unsupported claims, when the thread is about the documentary, then I'm not interested.

 

[Metullus]

No, it isn't. You're off on some personal pissing contest and I'm not interested.

If you want to discuss the documentary or the evidence in it, which I've posted more than enough links to for you to see what it was about, I'm more than willing to discuss the issues. If you want to whine that I personally have made unsupported claims, when the thread is about the documentary, then I'm not interested.

What is there to talk about?

There is no report from COE that states that a cat 3+ storm will never hit NO. If the documentary says that there is then I can only suggest that they are being less than honest. If we are to discuss such a report we need to see it. You say it is available in this thread. I have not seen such a report in this thread. I would be astonished if such a report existed. I suspect that either the film makers or you have misinterpreted a real document, but until I see what you (or the film makers) take to be such a document I cannot address the problem.

You talk about corruption. You say that the documentary blames much of the Katrina damage on corruption in the COE. Your links do not do much to support that allegation. I would be very interested in any evidence supporting such an allegation, not least because I know most of the players in the COE domain.

You linked to a youtube video that referenced a project constructed by Pittman. The implication of the clip is that Pittman found a design problem and that the Corps ignored it at its likely consequences and the result was the post Katrina disaster. There is not much information to go on but if it is your understanding that this is an instance of "ignoring the science" then please say so and then we can, perhaps, begin a fruitful discussion. If not this case, then give us another.

I have asked for backup your assertions and those in the documentary, and you told me to find it myself. When I could not find it you called me a liar (or word to that effect) and still refused to help.

You have made it about personalities, not I. I would like to discuss this - I am very interested in the subject.

SG, I have no dog in this fight, but I do know most of the players and likely the actual flesh and blood people who would be responsible for the alleged corruption. I have been retained at one time or another by almost all of the contractors that did dredging and levee work for the New Orleans District. I know how the process works, how a project is scoped, justified, funded, designed, bid, and constructed. I have been involved in lawsuits that hinged on these very processes.

Katrina was very real to me. New Orleans was my home of record for thirty years. My mother lived there for more than 30 years. Hell, I own a house there today.
My mom's home was severely damaged by Katrina, thankfully she was insured; my Aunt and Uncle lost their house and all their possessions - and they were not insured. Another property in Biloxi that I owned in a partnership simply ceased to exist, and, though insured, we are not permitted to rebuild. Finally, my Hunter 34, berthed at Eden Isles, ended up in Slidell, well, most of it did anyway.

So let me ask you this: Have you ever seen a documentary or a newscast that purports to be about nursing or health care that makes little sense to you? A news story that betrays what, in your view, is a fundamental lack of understanding of the subject matter, subject matter with which you are fairly familiar? Well, that is sort of where I am with this.

 

[Skeptic Ginger]

Metullus, why are you ignoring the evidence the documentary presented and claiming they presented none? I can only conclude you didn't look at the links I posted:

The experts who blew the whistle, their testimony, their evidence; the court ruling which found the COE was negligent and which was addressed in detail in the decision; the company that complained and was told to build anyway which I pointed out and which was in a 1 minute clip from the film in a link I posted; and the entire problem with the MrGo Canal.

Your only dog in this fight is saving face on your claim there is no evidence the COE was negligent and that they didn't mis-state the science to support their decisions, which is why your position is so unfortunate.

All of this is in post #109.

 

[rwguinn]

Nothing like, say, using "Chariots of the Gods" as evidence that "Chariots of the Gods" is correct.

 

[Metullus]

Metullus, why are you ignoring the evidence the documentary presented and claiming they presented none? I can only conclude you didn't look at the links I posted:

The experts who blew the whistle, their testimony, their evidence; the court ruling which found the COE was negligent and which was addressed in detail in the decision; the company that complained and was told to build anyway which I pointed out and which was in a 1 minute clip from the film in a link I posted; and the entire problem with the MrGo Canal.

Your only dog in this fight is saving face on your claim there is no evidence the COE was negligent and that they didn't mis-state the science to support their decisions, which is why your position is so unfortunate.

All of this is in post #109.

The claim you made was about corruption and not about mistakes. The claim you made was about ignoring the "science" but the only example you can provide from the film is a contract dispute between a contractor and the COE with no evidence of the basis of either the contractor's claim or the COE response or why the COE made its decision (I have offered to discuss this in detail if you want, even given the paucity of data available).

I am very familiar with the Gulf Outlet and its problems. If you think that the Gulf Outlet history provides support for your (or the documentary's) assertions of corruption then please present it.

Finally, there is the assertion made by somebody that a COE report claiming that there will be no cat 3+ storm hitting NO. You have wanted to discuss this, and I will happily do so, if you can show me such a document. Hard to discuss something that we cannot read, though.

I have read your posts, I have gone to your links, I think that, at best, you (or the film makers) are significantly overstating the case...

 

[Skeptic Ginger]

Nothing like, say, using "Chariots of the Gods" as evidence that "Chariots of the Gods" is correct.

That's a straw man. The actual analogy would be evaluating the evidence von Däniken presents in his book to decide if his hypotheses have any merit.

 

[Skeptic Ginger]

The claim you made was about corruption and not about mistakes. The claim you made was about ignoring the "science" but the only example you can provide from the film is a contract dispute between a contractor and the COE with no evidence of the basis of either the contractor's claim or the COE response or why the COE made its decision (I have offered to discuss this in detail if you want, even given the paucity of data available).

I am very familiar with the Gulf Outlet and its problems. If you think that the Gulf Outlet history provides support for your (or the documentary's) assertions of corruption then please present it.

Finally, there is the assertion made by somebody that a COE report claiming that there will be no cat 3+ storm hitting NO. You have wanted to discuss this, and I will happily do so, if you can show me such a document. Hard to discuss something that we cannot read, though.

I have read your posts, I have gone to your links, I think that, at best, you (or the film makers) are significantly overstating the case...

(emphasis mine)

What I posted in the OP:

Went to the one night showing of this documentary on the flooding of New Orleans tonight. It was completely different from the anniversary of Katrina reruns on the news this week.

"The Big Uneasy"

The most notable things, The Army Corp of Engineers is one screwed up agency and the people of New Orleans are not the pitiful beggars the news media has cherry picked to portray the Katrina disaster.


The Corp, while staffed with knowledgeable engineers, has suffered from 'project managers' being assigned to oversee the science, and a culture of the scientists going along with it. So for example, as the engineering science said Katrina size hurricanes should be expected, the Corp reported that size event was so rare as to be no concern. They then proceded to ignore the science and under build the levees.

The documentary showed how New Orleans suffered a man-made disaster that would not have occurred if not for the MrGo Canal and the inadequate levees the Corp built.

Then the whistleblowers who reported on why the levees failed were punished (fired, etc.) while the people responsible for the failed levees and the cover up were never held accountable.


And on the second matter, I was thinking earlier how the media portrayal of the events following Katrina showed people who appeared to be expecting a handout. It was a false image in many ways. In reality, they were victims of a truly widespread flood, caught off guard since the hurricane wasn't the main event for them, the levees failing all over the city in a short period of time was. It was more like a dam broke than a hurricane.

And those people in the news videos were in some cases not allowed to escape the flooding except to go to the Convention Center and the Dome. Then there was no water and no food for days. You'd think by that time people would have just walked out of the city. But many of them could not get out for a number of reasons they had no control over.

Anyway, in the film they made a point of reminding us there were thousands of examples of people who have helped themselves and each other. The image of just expecting a handout is a totally distorted image.

If you will note, while I found the documentary most convincing, my post is about what was said/shown in the film. Nowhere in that post do you read any statement by me that I have independent knowledge beyond the documentary that the facts in the documentary are correct.

In the documentary, convincing evidence was presented. I posted numerous links to sources you could quickly scan, view, and/or peruse to see what evidence was presented in the documentary without having actually seen it.

This thread is about the documentary. I refuse to be manipulated by you into making it about me or what I claimed or posted. I claim the documentary presents a very convincing case. If you want to discuss the case, you can address the credibility of the whistleblowers. You can address the judge's ruling. You can address anything you want related to the film. I see no reason to repeat this beyond this post.

 

[Metullus]

(emphasis mine)

What I posted in the OP:If you will note, while I found the documentary most convincing, my post is about what was said/shown in the film. Nowhere in that post do you read any statement by me that I have independent knowledge beyond the documentary that the facts in the documentary are correct.

In the documentary, convincing evidence was presented. I posted numerous links to sources you could quickly scan, view, and/or peruse to see what evidence was presented in the documentary without having actually seen it.

This thread is about the documentary. I refuse to be manipulated by you into making it about me or what I claimed or posted. I claim the documentary presents a very convincing case. If you want to discuss the case, you can address the credibility of the whistleblowers. You can address the judge's ruling. You can address anything you want related to the film. I see no reason to repeat this beyond this post.

I am glad that you find it makes a convincing case.

It would be really cool if we could discuss those things about the film that you felt best made the case. Not in the cards, I suppose. Let me know by PM if you change your mind.

 

[Skeptic Ginger]

I am glad that you find it makes a convincing case.

It would be really cool if we could discuss those things about the film that you felt best made the case. Not in the cards, I suppose. Let me know by PM if you change your mind.

It's all there in post #109, Met, if you would just make a bit of an effort.

 

[The Central Scrutinizer]

I am glad that you find it makes a convincing case.

It would be really cool if we could discuss those things about the film that you felt best made the case. Not in the cards, I suppose. Let me know by PM if you change your mind.

The great irony is that this is a film I might have normally seen, but now probably won't. Because either A) Skeptigirl describes it accurately, in which case it is wildy flawed and innacurate and would not be of interest to a skeptic or B) She has purposefully misrepresented and distorted what is in the film to fit her own agenda. I'm going to assume A, which means I don't want to waste time seeing it. If it's B, then she owes the filmmakers an apology.

 

[The Central Scrutinizer]

Still no answers to the outstanding questions?

 

[Metullus]

Still no answers to the outstanding questions?

Now that you mention it, Scrut, no, there are not.

 

[The Central Scrutinizer]

Now that you mention it, Scrut, no, there are not.

What about post #109?