We’ve lived so long under the spell of hierarchy—from god-kings to feudal lords to party bosses—that only recently have we awakened to see not only that “regular” citizens have the capacity for self-governance, but that without their engagement our huge global crises cannot be addressed. The changes needed for human society simply to survive, let alone thrive, are so profound that the only way we will move toward them is if we ourselves, regular citizens, feel meaningful ownership of solutions through direct engagement. Our problems are too big, interrelated, and pervasive to yield to directives from on high.
—Frances Moore Lappé, excerpt from Time for Progressives to Grow Up

Saturday, August 29, 2015

Big Easy to Big Empty: The Untold Story of the Drowning of New Orleans

Click here to access this introduction to a free (but asking for donations) 25 minute video made by independent investigative journalist Greg Palast.

The film is an antidote to all the corporate produced coverage of the Katrina disaster that happened 10 years ago. Corporate executives hired by the ruling capitalist class don't want you to know the gross corruption and racism of their government. Instead, they want you to be inspired as well as misinformed by all the recovery that has occurred since the disaster. I also noticed that the recovery they are celebrating in ruling class media (NBC-TV, CBS-TV, ABC-TV, NPR, PBS) all reference work done not by the government, but by non-profit enterprises organized by ordinary people. 

And, of course, they exaggerate the amount of recovery work that has been done, but worst of all, they omit coverage of the government's poor construction of the levees (which was well known by engineers), the government's lack of post-Katrina recovery operations, and the destruction of an entire community, many of whom still remained scattered all over the country. This film tells a significant part of the real story missing from mainstream media: an unnecessary disaster laced with racism and capitalist exploitation.