If it had been Texas and not Louisiana, it'd have been a different story.

Millions of dollars earmarked for coastal defences have been diverted to the Iraq campaign.

But it'll cost billions to put New Orleans back as it was, if they ever can.

This is not a racist issue - its not productive to suggest that. There have been bleeding heart black lawyers on TV saying this - then they interview the guys in he superdome - 'hell no this aint about race its about we couldn't afford to get out - we're all startving the white guys and us'. Exactly.

The differentiator is economics - if you had a car, could afford a train ticket or bus ticket and a hotel or somewhere to sleep - you left New Orleans. If you couldn't then you didnt and you are now stuck.

There are poor white people, poor black people, poor hispanic, etc but the common denominator is poverty not skin color.

As for the oil - well there is a significant oil impact - there are oil supplies in the area and at least 2 oil rigs are now broken, one ran into that bridge from its dry-dock being built/repaired.

I think it really demonstrates the leadership of the government and its structure or in this instance - lack of. You can have all the resources you like, but without good mangement of them its basically going to go wrong, and in this case - cost lives.

Billions of USD in aid has now been appropriated but I wonder just where that will end up and its a bit too late to have done the 10,000 dead any good

I wonder how Australia or the UK would deal with such a disaster. I hope they would fare better....

Thirty years ago when Cyclone Tracy hit Darwin (on Christmas Day no less), 100,000 people were evacuated within 4 days. And we're talking Darwin here - totally isolated and thousands of miles from any other large town. Cyclone Tracy was totally unexpected too - so no advance warning to plan and get things organised. In the US they hadn't evacuated anyone after 4 days.

When the Bali bomb went off, the RAAF were in there within hours airlifting people out. Sure the numbers were minor compared to New Orleans, but the response was instant.

The government offered NO free transpo to people who were trying to flee New Orleans before or after the storm -- not until yesterday (Friday).

Why give? I suggest that if you want to help your fellow human being that you give directly to the food banks that are feeding these people. They were left to die by their own government.

Also, I'm sure that many of us would gladly leave the US if we were granted asylum elsewhere. But America's poor in general would be laughed away from seeking asylum as there are poorer countries in the world. So we is kinda stuck here.