The Economic Consequences of Katrina

[Sava]

Originally posted by VetLegion
Contaminated with what?

the whole New Orleans area is one big rotting cesspool... bacteria... raw sewage... dead bodies... dead animals...

Adam Smith: any proof or are we supposed to just take your word on this personal attack on this guy?

[Adam Smith]

Originally posted by Sava
Adam Smith: any proof or are we supposed to just take your word on this personal attack on this guy?

Well, there's THIS

WASHINGTON — Hugh Kaufman, the most public rabble-rouser at the Environmental Protection Agency, is gesticulating wildly. He's explaining why it took him and his colleague, EPA Ombudsman Robert Martin, four months before they examined the agency's handling of the World Trade Center disaster.

"Got a 91-year-old father. Got a mother in her mid-80s. I cook for them once a week," said Mr. Kaufman, leaning over the table. "I'm raising a 16-year-old daughter. And the whole world is going fekak and I've got 24 cases where people are being poisoned and EPA's trying to kill us, and some meshugenah A-rab is — some guy wants to go back to the 1600s."

Mr. Kaufman will soon join a lawsuit filed by Mr. Martin against EPA Administrator Christie Todd Whitman that challenges the agency's attempt to fold the office of the ombudsman into part of the EPA's investigator general's office. At present, the office of the ombudsman operates as an independent watchdog, funded by the agency as part of the office of Solid Waste and Emergency Response. A hearing on the case will commence March 25 in federal district court in Washington.

The EPA's attempt to move the office, Mr. Kaufman said, is an effort to stifle investigations. EPA officials counter that the General Accounting Office, the independent research arm of Congress, suggested the move in a report last year. Since being dismissed as one of Mr. Martin's investigators in 1999 and again in 2001, Mr. Kaufman has served as a program analyst at EPA.

Mr. Kaufman was a leading investigator into the New York Love Canal disaster of 1979. He also played a key role in developing the Superfund program, which manages hazardous waste sites.

And in case you think its just the Republicans who think he's wacko, there's THIS

Kaufman was removed from his position by Tim Fields on December 14, the day after Gore finally conceded the presidential race. Fields is a Clinton appointee who heads the EPA's Superfund division, a frequent target of criticism by Kaufman and environmentalists. Fields maintains that Kaufman is biased and abrasive and he called Kaufman's charge that he had been transferred as a retaliatory measure "another of his shams he's trying to pull."

The details of the Marshville, NC derailment and cleanup can be found in a report by the National Transportation Safety Board

Title: Seaboard System Railroad Freight Train Derailment and Fire Marshville, North Carolina, April 10, 1984.
NTSB Report Number: RAR-85-05, adopted on 4/30/1985
NTIS Report Number: PB85-916305

which unfortunately is not on line.

That good enough for you?

PS:
Great job of journalism by the Washington Post, publishing an inflamatory quote by "Hugh B. Kaufman, a senior policy analyst at the Environmental Protecion Agency" without any indication of the guy's colorful history.

edit: typos

[Ecthy]

Our top newssite says New Orleans might be totally abandoned.

[Sava]

AS: okay... just wanted a little proof is all... thanks

[Az]

If you ignore the loss of life, capital, and historical landmarks, the whole "abandoning an entire megapolis because of a natural disaster" sounds just way cool and sci-fi-ish.

[Pekka]

ECthy, right, here they say they are thinking of maybe rebuilding it all. But that there's lots of places gone. Hasn't sunk in for me yet. Something a mind has difficulties to grasp what it truly means, it's that big.

[Ecthy]

It's a rather small place methinks. The world can live without New Orleans.

[Dauphin]

Re: Re: The Economic Consequences of Katrina

Originally posted by Kuciwalker


Wouldn't this increase the prices of houses further by restricting supply?

I think che means that a lot of construction material, labour, etc will be put to use in the Louisiana/Mississippi area for rebuilding purposes. Therefore prices will rise for such materials and labour and so demand for building new houses everywhere (as opposed to rebuilding houses in affected areas) will fall.

I don't know if that is true or not but merely how I interpreted what he said.

[Chemical Ollie]

What close-past historical artifacts were kept at the D-day museum?

[Chemical Ollie]

To me, New Orleans' greatest treasure was non-physical values like food and music, that will live on and be remembered even without the town. You can cook Yambalaya and play blues and jazz anywhere.

[Pekka]

It was DEFINITELY one of the places to go in my list.. the food and music and atmosphere. What it's famous for.

[Ecthy]

Never wanted to go there, too cajun. Good thing it's gone now.

Atlantis 2005

[Az]

If they'll actually evacuate it, and leave it there, this will be way surreal.

[Ecthy]

A rotten ghost town.

[Az]

a rotten ghost ****ing metropolis!