Challenging Late Capitalism, Neo-Liberal Globalization, and Militarism:
Building a Progressive Majority
By Harry Targ
Excerpt From Book:
Chapter One
THE PROBLEM
Hurricane Katrina or The Emperor Has No Clothes
Late summer, 2005, Hurricane Katrina vaults through the Gulf states destroying property, blowing holes in the levee that kept New Orleans from drowning, and leaving hundreds of thousands of people homeless, trapped in a sea of water, and despair. The city of New Orleans is destroyed; at first estimate, forever. Towns and cities in Alabama and Mississippi hit by the Hurricane experience similar destruction although the press coverage of the plight of their residents receives less attention. Initial estimated numbers killed from the apocalypse total 10,000 people. While later figures are much fewer, no full accounting is ever presented.
This greatest “natural” disaster in U.S. history uncovered ugly truths about American society. First, the vast majority of those victimized by the Hurricane were poor and Black people. They lived in parts of the cities and rural areas around the Gulf that were most vulnerable to winds and water. They were less likely to have the resources to prepare for the disaster or to protect themselves when it hit. Also, as the days that followed made crystal clear, resources to rescue them from harms way were of little interest to governmental authorities.
Second, federal government agencies, which had been the beneficiaries of billions of dollars to provide national security, freedom from acts of terrorism, physical infrastructure to protect against flooding and other natural disasters, and disaster relief had totally failed to mitigate the horrific brutality of Hurricane Katrina. Official spokespersons from the relevant agencies evidenced ignorance of what was actually occurring in the ravaged areas. The president of the United States even praised the work of some of the agency heads who lacked any evidence of competence or concern.
Third, the major emergency support force that historically is mobilized during periods of such disasters, the National Guard, was at less than full capacity because a third to one- half of the troops usually available were fighting a foreign war in Iraq to protect United States control of Middle East oil. Young men and women from Louisiana, Mississippi, and Alabama were in Iraq killing innocent victims instead of being in their home states rescuing the homeless.
Fourth, during the depths of the crisis of displaced persons seeking shelter, water, food, and clothing and as the desperate and the dead were viewed on television floating down the flooded streets of the city, oil companies were raising the price of gasoline at the pump by a third. No mainstream politicians made any proposals to freeze the price of gasoline. The deaths and destruction wrought by Hurricane Katrina were used to transfer wealth from the working people of the United States to a handful of oil companies whose profit rates doubled and tripled.
Finally, when the Bush administration launched a rescue program five days after the Hurricane hit the Gulf, he emphasized prayer, encouraged “faith-based” groups to raise money, endorsed the Red Cross as a major relief agency player, and with Congress only allocated modest funds for relief efforts.
While more government money was being proposed, major corporations and oil companies pledged funds for rescue and recovery. Ironically, the same multinational corporations that created the grotesquely unequal distribution of wealth and income in the country committed themselves to modest relief efforts. As was suggested in an early post-Hurricane commentary by Michael Parenti (September 3, 2005), the depths of the pain and suffering from the natural disaster must be seen as intimately connected to the market economic model that would be trumpeted as the solution to the effects of the Hurricane.
So in the summer, 2005, it became clear to many Americans what they either did not see or chose to ignore; they live in a society deeply split between the wealthy and the poor, the white and people of color, the powerful and the powerless, and huge corporations and isolated individuals. Along with the long struggle to reconstruct lives in the Gulf Coast, the American people need to reflect on the real meaning of Katrina and to develop an understanding of the U.S. empire in all its nakedness. And as that understanding is occurring, masses of people of all backgrounds need to come together to build a popular movement to change the economic and political system that allows a natural disaster to have such devastating consequences for its victims.