Questions about Katrina

[Franconicus]

I did not have time the last days to get all the news. But after all I heard I still have two questions:
1. German media paint a picture about the US that there is a social group of people who are poor (real poor), live in Ghettos, most of them cannot not read or write, live of crime, are black, do nnot have intact family structures and have no chance to improve their situation.
Is this just prejudes or realities?

2. I read the thread but I still do not understand why the US was not able to react adequate.

[Red Harvest]

I did not have time the last days to get all the news. But after all I heard I still have two questions:
1. German media paint a picture about the US that there is a social group of people who are poor (real poor), live in Ghettos, most of them cannot not read or write, live of crime, are black, do nnot have intact family structures and have no chance to improve their situation.
Is this just prejudes or realities?

2. I read the thread but I still do not understand why the US was not able to react adequate.

1. Yes, it is more or less true. There is a rather large underclass living in public housing projects. This is true of many cities. The reasons for it are numerous and cannot be put at the feet of any one group. The folks in the depressed zones are not necessarily black, although that is the predominant group in New Orleans; there are many very poor whites too. Most should be able to read and write, although the level of literacy is poor compared to the general population, and *functional* literacy levels are quite low.

2. That is being debated hotly. The main problem is that with New Orleans location, it was nearly cut off from the outside as a result of storm damage. The loss of the levees meant the entire city must be completely evacuated, in the worst possible conditions. The Feds/military are the only ones really to handle the level of infrastructure damage. However, there has been a leadership vacuum, where no senior officials stepped up to the plate and actually delivered. We heard some talk, but the action was not matching the talk.

[Lemur]

Franconious, there's a pretty good timeline at BBC News. Not a lot of "why" being answered, but it will help you if you're feeling a bit lost on what exactly happened and how the situation unfolded.

The "why" questions are just being asked now, and answers will be very, very hard to get. Nobody is going to want to accept any responsibility for this one.