So How Much Does Race Play into NOLA Disaster?

Democracy Now! today was filled with stories and filmed video of people talking about the black inhabitants of parts of New Orleans, especially the Ninth Ward, as crazy, felonous, not bright, etc.

Certainly, there's been a lot of talk on how the city's 70% black population with between 30 and 40% of them subsisting below the US poverty level, factored in the response.

But there's more. I suspect the population is also factoring into the dire estimates, the forced evacuations, etc. Did anyone suggest New York should be forgotten because of 9/11? No one suggested moving the folks out of Hurricane Country in Florida last year when hurricanes kept striking the same area.

I think some very "smart" business folks have decided that this is the way they can get property cheap and reshape the city away from poor blacks. To do this, however, they need the holdouts to leave so this can go on outside of America's view.

Note that Reporters Without Borders is noting that NOLA is a very dangerous place for journalists, especially those doing their job. What is not so outright but what is implied is that some of the dangers come not from angry, desperate holdouts but from the military and quasi-military infrastructure that has been sent in.