Katrina victim sues U.S. for $3 quadrillion - U.S. business - MSNBC.com

The above (linked) story shows how much; in dollars, the victims of Hurricane Katrina think the government owes them for the devastation.

I'm not going to judge, but I bet a lot of these are highly exaggerated. I believe that it was a horrible event that transpired. But I don’t understand how the government is responsible for a natural disaster.

Yes, the levees failed, but when I was down in New Orleans 3 months prior to Katrina the residents were all convinced that they were solid enough. Everyone knew that the levees were only enough to handle a level 3 Hurricane, and that the cities water pumps could only handle about 2 inches of water per hour.

When I asked around about the threat of a level 4 or 5 hurricane, they said it wasn’t likely to happen (unanimous response from all asked). When I pressed the issue and asked ‘what if?’ Unanimously they all said the city would be lost.

That being said, days before Katrina hit the local and state government issued evacuation warnings, followed by direct orders to evacuate.

I saw the evacuation route signs in New Orleans; as there was a lesser hurricane which hit a few weeks prior. That is also why my hometown (at the time) of Shreveport was inundated with southern Louisiana residents for a few days during that previous hurricane.

Apparently the people of New Orleans (and southern Louisiana) didn’t take the threat seriously the second time around, because when they evacuated from the previous hurricane it turned out to be ‘not that bad’. So for Katrina they stayed.

Then when they realized it might actually get ‘that bad’, the state government and city officials didn’t agree to several attempts to evacuate the cities in the south. Amtrak trains, school buses, etc. were at the ready to evacuate thousands. The Mayor of New Orleans and Governor of Louisiana said, “No thanks”. Seriously, they did, and on record nonetheless.

The president of the US doesn’t have direct authority over FEMA, and the governor of a state doesn’t have direct authority over FEMA. And the governor of Louisiana didn’t request assistance from either the Federal Government or the POTUS until well after they realized the devastation.

Yes FEMA was slow to get supplies into the city; however, you must consider the thousands of tons of supplies which needed transportation. That required hundreds of trucks and helicopters. Those things take time to get ready and move into the area. At the time those resources were positioned days away from the hurricane site.

There were a lot of bad things that when brought together made the situation all the worse (on top of a category 4-5 storm). But I highly doubt that all the blame rests on the Federal Government or the Army Corps of Engineers.

I’m not trying to be insensitive, but I think the focus of blame and monetary claims has been misleading since the onset of this tragedy.