A Perfect Storm of Lawlessness: New Orleans’ vicious looters aren’t the real face of the city’s poor

City Journal ^ | September 1, 2005 | Nichole Gelinas

[SwinneySwitch]

Any city that has relinquished it's authority to inner city gangs needs to take note of the anarchy in New Orleans.

[Last Dakotan]

The bold solid truth.

[Archidamus]

"it was their increasingly lawless behavior that kept willing but unarmed professional and volunteer rescue workers away from the city and from the poor people who needed saving."

Yep.

[Brilliant]

Let's be honest here. The looters, rioters, and rapists are most likely guys who spent 5 to 10 years behind bars, and were released for a "second chance." With this hurricane, they saw their second chance, and they took it. That's one reason why we need to beef up our criminal sentencing.

[johnny7]

“The federal government was unacceptably slow at assessing a rapidly deteriorating situation.”

Good article... except for this.

[LibWhacker]

Failure to put violent criminals behind bars in peacetime has led to chaos in disaster.

A "success" libs are just itching to see repeated in cities all across America.

[fso301]

What's at stake here is the survival of the Democratic party as we currently know it. If the black vote crumbles, the party cannot function nationally. Expect a lights out, no holds barred effort by Democrats to create an opinion in the mind of blacks that Republicans are to blame for everything bad that happened in New Orleans.

[MarineDad]

"That's one reason why we need to beef up our criminal sentencing."

How's about beefing up our criminal elimination?

The permanent variety, that is.

[Alberta's Child]

Al Sharpton went on MSNBC Thursday night to say that “looters are people who pay their taxes whose infrastructure caved in on them.”

This statement is so absurd that I'm laughing my @ss off right now. New Orleans had a population of about 450,000 before the hurricane, and I'd be shocked if more than 20% of them have ever filed a tax return.

[madprof98]

This should be widely reprinted . . . which is why it won't be.

[Alberta's Child]

Expect a lights out, no holds barred effort by Democrats to create an opinion in the mind of blacks that Republicans are to blame for everything bad that happened in New Orleans.

That's fine with me. Because blacks are only about 12% of the population in this country, and for every black voter in an Blue State urban center who shows up on election day to cast a ballot, there will be three or four middle-class white voters in places like Iowa, Wisconsin, Minnesota, Ohio, etc. who will look at those images from New Orleans and swear off the Democrat Party forever.

[I still care]

One of the best articles I've seen.

[BenLurkin]

"In truth, the looters, rapists, and murderers who have terrorized New Orleans since Monday began their post-Katrina reign of terror a full day before the situation grew truly desperate—and it was their increasingly lawless behavior that kept willing but unarmed professional and volunteer rescue workers away from the city and from the poor people who needed saving. "

[Dallas59]

I've poverty poor before...but never stole from or raped anyone. This whole race thing is idiocy. JESSE JACKSON STOP!

[Montfort]

Imagine if all felons could vote.

They would vote for the government to do looting for them. More than is currently being done, that is.

[swampfox98]

Any city that has relinquished it's authority to inner city gangs needs to take note of the anarchy in New Orleans.

I think racial hatred against conservatives is so intense in these cities, many of these people will gladly live like this in order not to appear on the side of law and order. It's too "white" for them, and they don't want to see their own go to jail. I think their mayors and other public officials don't want to be called racists themselves, and allow the criminals to keep the upper hand. Many also believe any looting or stealing is getting back at the country for slavery.

The Democrat black leaders are all race baiters, and are a disgrace to this country. If whites talked about blacks the way blacks talk about whites, we'd all be in prison or dead. Instead of promoting peace and promoting the jailing of criminals, the leftist liars on the main stream news shows promote more hatred against America and conservatives than the Muslim terrorists, and get away with it.

[Voltage]

Grand Forks ND/E. Grand Forks MN population about 50,000 flooded in 1997. There was no looting, no one fired on those trying to help, no arson, no deaths.