I was in New Orleans at the end of last month, leaving about a
week before Katrina struck. I actually
had planned to write an entry about two meals I had there (at Herbesainte and
Bon Ton), both of which competed for the best food I’ve ever eaten in my life. The recipe for one of my deserts (brown
butter banana tart) is bizarrely reprinted in this month’s issue of Bon
Appetit, which covers the nation’s top five restaurant cities. However, writing restaurant reviews about a
city where people are still struggling to find food and water almost two weeks
after the disaster makes me feel almost as clueless as Barbara Bush.
All I can say is that I have never felt more
without country in all my life. I am
ashamed of our government and ashamed of myself for not spending every breath I
have working against the unforgivable social and economic injustice that, to my
mind, literally caused the death of thousands of people and contributed to the
untold pain and suffering of tens of thousands more. Sound dramatic? What I have seen these past two weeks is that so many people are essentially big-hearted, huge-hearted in fact, but we can’t seem to move beyond our own complacency to do
the big work of ending racism, poverty, and violence against women. How did we get here?
Those of us who work in higher education have heard lots of
stories about the displaced students at Tulane and LSU and there are lots of
efforts underway to help them re-enroll at colleges and universities around the
country. Without underplaying the situation
of those campus communities at all, Inside Higher Ed offers a good article
about how (suprise!) community college students are getting seriously screwed over.
You also might “enjoy” this timeline.
Finally, a few ways to donate to the relief and
reconstruction effort that you might not have heard about yet, starting with the library-centric:
The Geaux Library Project will attempt to
meet the information needs at hurricane evacuee shelters around Louisiana and
beyond. Using computers and networking equipment donated to the Red Cross and
others by large commercial and local IT companies, they’ll be setting up small
computer labs at Red Cross shelters and staffing them with librarians and other
trained volunteers. They need librarians (on
or off site) and all kinds of other stuff.
LOUISIANA STATE LIBRARY ISSUES URGENT CALL FOR COMPUTERS,
PRINTERS
"To all-we are in desperate need of computers/printers. We are being
inundated with evacuees needing to file FEMA applications, unemployment, search
for loved ones, etc. and are coming into our public libraries to use the
computers. Our libraries have greatly extended their hours to accommodate the
people but they need additional computers and printers. If you can please put
the word out that if anyone wants to help immediately, this is our greatest
need."
Equipment Specs:
* Pentium 3
* Windows 2000, prefer XP
* Laser printers if you can still get toner for them
Send equipment to:
State Library of Louisiana
701 North 4th Street
Baton Rouge, La. 70802-5232
If you are able to assist them, please let Rebecca Hamilton know via email at rhamilton@crt.state.la.us .
The Nation’s Katha Pollitt has a great list of grassroots
charities that need your help.
The National Network for Abortion Funds is establishing a
special emergency fund for Hurricane Katrina survivors. With basic survival their top priority, lots
of women will be delaying reproductive health care and seeking extremely costly
later-term abortions.
To make a donation
to help with this effort, tax-deductible donations for abortion care for
hurricane victims can be sent to NNAF at the following address.
Please earmark gifts: Hurricane Victims Abortion Fund.
<>
NNAF
42 Seaverns Avenue
Boston, MA 02130
Donations can also
be made online by
clicking on the "donate now" button. Please specify that donations
are for hurricane victims. Donors can also call the NNAF office for
more information at: 617-524-6040.
Finally, if you are
a Buffy/Angel fan who wants to support the Red Cross’s efforts and prove that yes,
that prophecy is about Spike, not Angel, and that Spike is the ultimate
champion/helper of the helpless, then I suggest you check
out James Marsters Hurricane Relief.
I love that geeky book show they do on C-SPAN 2. I caught a few minutes of it today featuring photographer Stephen Shames promoting The Black Panthers, a book featuring images from his collection and celebrating the fortieth anniversary of the Panther's founding. If you've ever read anything about the Panthers, you've seen some of this guy's pictures -- he had access to both the public and private face of the Party from 1967 to 1972 and holds the world's largest archive of Panther images. Inspiring.