Rantings of a Creole Princess

Dear onefromphilly:

Toxic Chinese drywall brings down Katrina rebuilding program

BK...AK...

"Katrina finished what she started today.  Granny died." ~ Weezy

Five years ago Weezy's grandmother was vibrant and sharp as a tack.  She knew her way around her kitchen blindfolded and she loved her life and her family more than anything.

Five years ago Katrina hit and she had to leave her beloved home in order to stay alive.  She evacuated with family and ended up for the next three years living in Houston, Atlanta and Dallas before being able to be returned to her beloved New Orleans.

She started showing signs of the wear and tear of missing her life and of how badly the tragedy rocked her.  Her health deteriorated at a rapid speed and...when she could return to New Orleans...it was to a nursing home that had been lovingly researched by her family as the best one able to give her the best quality care for her specific medical needs.

All she ever wanted, however, was to go back to her home even as her family knew she couldn't handle seeing the destruction of it and kept her away.

But she asked all the time.  "Why can't I go to my house?"

As the rest of the world was talking about the anniversary of Katrina as if it's something to do once a year...she, along with so many others, had been living with it every single day for 5 years.  It's not a sound bite.  Not a human interest piece.  Not an opportunity for someone to make money off what happened to our people.

BK...AK...Before Katrina and After Katrina...there is always still Katrina.

She left us yesterday on the anniversary of the storm that changed her life forever.  Her children were there and spent the night in the nursing home with her because the doctor had shared that it was just a matter of time.

And now she's gone.  On the anniversary of the day that started it all.

There are so many lives that will never be the same because of Katrina.  So many families still ripped apart.  So many people who would still do anything to return to their beloved New Orleans.

I hope yall are still praying for them.

"Katrina finished what she started today.  Granny died." ~ Weezy

Watching "Treme"

Watching "Treme"

Americans and Haiti

Some folks believe that we, as Americans, aren't sympathetic.  They believe we don't care about other countries and their people.  They believe we don't do what is needed across skin color lines.

They would be wrong.

I have spent three days since Friday answering phones along with countless other volunteers at the Center for International Disaster Information.  I have spoken to Americans from all over this great country of ours who feel helpless at the images seen and who have been driven to get up and move...do something...anything...to try and help those suffering. 

Sure...some of them can be a bit special but the main thing I remember from them all is that they cared enough to find out where to call and who to call.  They care.  THEY CARE.

RE-POST - Sobbing for the Soul of the South

ORIGINALLY POSTED AUGUST 30, 2005

Most days while I’m home the phone rings back to back and I’m on the computer talking to my friends and family members most of the day. We laugh about nothing and talk about everyday things sending each other articles or links to websites we’ve found interesting and/or amusing. Starting on Sunday, August 28, 2005, my phones were eerily silent, my email inbox empty.

As you know, being the Creole Princess I think I am, means I’m from Louisiana. More specifically…that dirty, dirty part of Louisiana we refer to the southern most parts of our beloved state. Robby’s family is from Mississippi, very near the Gulf Coast.

Most of my family and friends whom needed to evacuate started pulling out of Louisiana on Friday, the rest finished boarding up their homes, taking what they could on Saturday. We spoke with everyone and got the numbers to the hotels they were staying in or the coordinates of where they were going to be. We all knew it was going to be bad. But no one wanted to talk about anything specific. We waited. All of us, holding hands across the miles, stretching to pat each other on the back, bowing our heads in prayer, taking comfort in the fact that we were all safe while we waited. Me here in the D.C. Metro area, stranded, it seemed, from my beloved state. We waited.

Sunday night, we had a dinner party and our guests, we’re certain, never knew the extent of the helplessness in the face of danger to our homeland. We Southerners were all holding our breath and were barely able to get any sleep knowing that Katrina would hit land early Monday morning. My best friend, Cojoe, was on a plane to Paris. His family, natives of New Orleans, had made it to his home in Houston. My other best friend, Weezy, told us his family was safe in Houston as well and my one of my best girlfriends from home and her family had headed to Texas. I spoke with my sister, brother, grandmother and other members of my family in Baton Rouge and was assured they were ready to bunker down knowing they’d be without electricity. We waited.

We spoke with Robby’s parents several times on Sunday, not voicing our adamant displeasure regarding their choice to stay with their home on their land out of respect. But we got off the phone feeling more than helpless. What if? What are we going to do if, if…..not able to voice even the possibilities that were included in IF. We waited.

Monday morning, Category 5…OH MY GOD!

Anyone from the South would immediately react that way when you hear Category 5. We’ve all lived through Categories 1 – 3 and remembered the devastation that remained once it left. A Category 5 was not within our immediate grasp as we had nothing to compare it to. My heart started hurting. I called those I could early…already getting “no signal” messages. I left my home for a doctor’s appointment and it all went straight to hell as I was fiddling around here away from my true home, where my heart truly resides.

Around 11:00 am on Monday we heard from Robby’s parents. They were battling the wind and the rain which had ripped off considerable parts of the roof of their main house and completely ripped off the roof of the barn. Several trees were uprooted on their land. They’d placed a tarp over their bed to see if they could keep it dry as the rain came through the roof and were trying to figure out how to save the piano.  They had hours of wind and rain left to battle.  That’s the last we’ve heard from them.

The shock that engulfs me as I watch the news of areas I have driven through and walked down is incomparable. The hurt I feel as I speak with people whom have lost everything is, well, I can’t describe it. Good people, who work hard everyday to provide a good life for their family are back at square one.

The reports were frustrating on Monday because a lot of the areas surrounding New Orleans weren’t being reported on. My girlfriend from Slidell called me from where they’ve evacuated to ask that I search for information on their homes. I couldn’t find a thing.  The lump in my throat is salty.

The looters of the grocery stores…I have sympathy for. They need food, have lost everything, the food is going to go bad anyway and if it can sustain their strength to move on to the next place to lay their heads…fine. BUT…the people looting the malls for material things…I can’t even express in words my feelings toward them.

As news of the devastation mounted…we all sat with broken hearts. Our most majestic city….destroyed. Some of the elders have said the city needed a good “cleansing.” If that’s what this was…then so be it.  I am ripped in two as I look outside and the sun is shining.  My house is dry and we are safe.  But my HOME, Robby's HOME is under attack.  We can't find peace.

It’s Tuesday and I spoke with my sister finally about 30 minutes ago at 5:30 am.  She and my nephew are fine, no damage other than the inconvenience of having no electricity.  As more news is available to us we are still without the knowledge that will help us sleep tonight….the knowledge that Robby’s parents are safe. We’ve decided that if we haven’t heard anything by tomorrow, we are probably going to fly to Atlanta, rent an SUV and take our chances on getting to the house in Mississippi.

Please pray for our people

We’re still waiting 

Please pray for our people 

Our hearts are breaking 

Please pray for our people

Please, please, please

Monnie

From Shelly:

http://www.nola.com/news/index.ssf/2008/08/city_mistakenly_demolishes_cou.html

What say you?

From Cojoe:

Do any of you feel weird that Brad Pitt is still in New Orleans two years later doing something about Katrina but no Black people are?

That NEW New Orleans

So...yesterday in New Orleans they decided to tear down B.W. Cooper, St. Bernard, Lafitte and C.J.Peete. These sound glamourous I know...French sounding...you know...chez chic...but they are not. NO WAY...NO HOW. They are housing developments. http://www.nola.com/news/index.ssf/2007/12/city_hall_girds_for_public_hou.html

I remember the first time I visited a housing development in New Orleans. I was with Cojoe and we went to pick up a friend to bring him to school. He told me to sit in the car with the doors locked. I was like...FOOL...I AIN'T STAYING OUT HERE HELL! It was rough. Looked like something out of a movie and if his azz was going up...I was following CLOSE on his heels cuz I DAMN sure wasn't about to be left outside solo with only window separating me from a crackhead.

We walked up several flights of stairs that smelled like piss with crap all over the walls. Me...I was truly clutching the pearls as green as a black chick could get. We passed kids playing on the stairs in the halls, etc. but all I could see was the gray. All I could smell was the stench and I concentrated hard on fixing my face so as not to call any attention to myself.

When we got to where we were going the door was opened and the smell that reached me surprised me considering what we'd just walked through. It was pleasant. Good food was cooking and our friend's Grandmother was sitting in an armchair watching "The Wheel of Fortune." Everything was clean, the food smelled good, all of her grandchildren's graduation pictures were framed up on the wall...hell...coulda been a Norman Rockwell portrait of a Grandmother.

We were offered food, which we declined to eat because we'd just eaten at Cojoe's mother's house and we sat and talked with our friend's Grandmother and cousin for about 15 minutes while he got his stuff together to return to school. His Grandmother hugged and kissed us, thanking us for giving her grandson a ride and that she was glad he had such good friends. We opened the door and stepped out...back into the war zone. The smell of piss in the hall, grime on the stair walls. Kids playing in filth and drug dealers and crackheads littering the "lawn" which was nothing but dirt where some had chosen to park their cars. Babies were outside with no shoes on...no one seemingly watching them.

We got in my car which, at the time, was a shiny new red Toyota Celica and we drove off. Two blocks down...a GORGEOUS neighborhood. *sigh* Shocking in its proximity.

As we drove away the conversation around me flowed. Cojoe and our boy were laughing, talking and catching up on the weekend's events because they were familiar with the area so it was no big deal to them...me...I was silent...because I was a newbie to it all and it hurt my heart.

I don't know how I feel about these places being torn down. I know to the driver passing by it looks bleak...hopeless...but I remember how pleasant it was inside my boy's Grandmother's home and the thought that there are others like her who will be pushed out into a situation where they cannot afford housing upsets me. BUT...is holding on to these projects a way for people to continue to accept their circumstances as they are and not strive for more and better because they don't SEE more and better. (Unless, of course, the go two blocks East to the GATED community.)

I don't know enough about this yet to make an educated opinion.

I'm going to rectify that.

Right.

Now.

What do YOU think? Should the projects be torn down? Where will the people who live in them go? If the NEW New Orleans has decided to make way for something newer and better...should we give them a chance or is this a way to shut up and out the poor of the city they helped to build just as some of them were helping them to destroy? I know more than Brad Pitt cares about this right? Hmmmmmm.

QUAGMIRE.

CreoleInDC STILL "Sobbing for the Soul of the South."

New Orleans just can't catch a dang break...

*sigh*

http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/20151051/

Damn

http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/20093139/

You think YOU got it bad regarding Homeowner's Insurance?

CreoleInDC: whatchu doing?

Shelly: reading brutha code

funny as hell

mama just called

insurance on the new house is gonna cost almost $6000 per year

all up front

no payments

CreoleInDC: WHAT?

NO PAYMENTS?

WHAT IS THIS YOU SPEAK OF?

Shelly: nope

all up front

each year

CreoleInDC: wow...they straight RAPING Louisianians...sheesh

Shelly: yup

that's why houses are just chilling on the market

nobody is writing insurance and the one or two companies that are...

ridiculous

CreoleInDC: wow

just...wow

Continuing Katrina: Black Pantherish

Even though this pic made me laugh a bit this story made me so very, very sad.  *sigh*  http://www.time.com/time/nation/article/0,8599,1606587,00.html?cnn=yes

Katrina Questions: What would you have done?

Scenario 1:

You just had surgery and were on narcotics for the pain when Katrina struck your home town. You get a frantic call from your brother asking that you come to get his 2 daughters. You are 19 hours away in Washington,DC. Word has it that your nieces won’t be able to attend school for months. Your nieces have already seen dead bodies floating. They are waiting on Red Cross to drop water from planes and trying to find out where they can line up for food.

Questions:

Would you have stopped taking pain meds and driven 19 hours to get them?? Would you have taken your 2 nieces in and cared for them as your own, although you have not had any parenting experiences of your own and no family support in the area? Would you have sent them back when you started to visit oncologists and scheduling another surgery for yourself? Would you have sent them back when your pain got so bad that you cried every morning when you had to get out of bed to take them to school?

What would you have done?

_____________________________________________________________

Ever wonder what all the senior citizens are doing to cope with their losses from Katrina?

Scenario 2:

Your mother is a senior citizen. Retired. Living off of Social Security. Takes care of your disabled sister.  Used all of her hard earned money that she made as a nurse to pay for the house and to raise 4 kids after her husband died from a kidney disease.

Her house has been paid off for 20 years prior to Katrina. She loses her home in the flood.

She doesn’t qualify to purchase a new home, as she only gets $13,000 a year from Social Security. And besides, she doesn’t want to start over with a new mortgage at nearly 70 years old.

Questions:

Would you have taken out a loan to purchase a house for your mother to live in? Would you have taken out a loan on your newly purchased first home to get your mother's home back in living condition, although it’s not worth that much money? Would you have insisted that she and your sister come to live in your tiny 2 bedroom condo although she hates DC? Would you have insisted that she goes into a senior citizen home against her will? 

What would you have done?

THANK YOU JESUS!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

STATE FARM LOSES KATRINA CASE!!!!!!!!!!! http://www.cnn.com/2007/LAW/01/11/katrina.insurance.ap/index.html

"The Saints Are Coming"

Who Dat?

I am so happy the Saints won! So very happy! 

Weezy is a season ticket holder and started calling me early yesterday with a play-by-play of the tailgating I missed (Bruh...you shoulda came home bruh!!!!  Bruh, turn it on ESPN...I'm the only one with a brella! (Me:  WHAT CHANNEL IS ESPN?????????)).  LOL!  And I am EXTRA glad he was able to be there because he is the Saints BIGGEST FAN.

What did this victory mean to us?  Hope.  Hope that things are looking up for our most majestic city.  Hope that all will be right soon.  Hope that those who want to return home will be able to in the very near future.

It's a beautiful day. (LOVE U-2 by the way!!!!!)

Off topic:  How am I feeling?  Good.  Surprisingly good.  Is that odd?  Last time I was in pain around this time.  I get quick twinges of pain but not that constant pain I was in before.  That's a good sign right?  I haven't been stressed at all.  Haven't raised my voice except for once and have only been in a foul mood three times.  I had someone yesterday try to get under my skin but to be honest...they just made me laugh cuz I'd just finished watching Kat Williams (yes AGAIN) and when it got to the part that said if you're a woman and only have 14 haters you need to have 16 by the summer's end.  ROFL!  HOW FUNNY IS THAT?  BWAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA!  Diva said dang...you got a new one already!  Naw playa...she wasn't new...we peeped her a long time ago.

Tip:  How to know when Monnie is pissed.  Monnie cusses as you guys know.  LOL!  When Monnie doesn't cuss...she's usually laughin at you UNTIL you piss her off.  If she's laughin at you though...you probably won't piss her off cuz she thinks you're stoopit and it'll make her laugh harder.   

Aw well, good times.

The Saints won.

Weezy's ecstatic.

I feel FABULOUS!

I'm really excited folks.  Can you tell?  I just can't stop grinning.  LOL!

I'm All Katrina'd Out

Seriously.  I'm all Katrina'd out.  I can't take another second of this.  Geez.  We know what happened.  We know what didn't happen.  We know that ALL of the politicians should be held accountable.  I don't wanna see the mayor, the governor, and ESPECIALLY the damn president say another thing about Katrina and her victims. 

Not a nudder damn thing. 

Just SHUT THE HELL UP DAMMIT! 

SHUT YOUR DAMN PIE HOLES!

Unintentional Humor

Okay...so this wasn't supposed to be funny I know. But yall KNOW I'm stoopit.

During the documentary yall remember the dude that was talking about being in his boat and the helicopter dropped some water to him and almost sank his boat.  Why he KILLED me when he said, "I bet I won't ask fo no mo!"  BWAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA!

Sorry...I'm stoopit I know.  That was funny as hell to me.  Ya boy was REAL and he was just like any older dude from New Orleans that you know.  He was REAL! 

Now I KNOW some of you are sitting back clutching your pearls in disapproval of my laughin at that poor man...but hey...that mess was funny!

"I bet I won't ask fo no mo!"

Previously Posted

We are watching Spike Lee's documentary on HBO, "When the Levees Broke" and it brought back every emotion we felt last year during this time.  When I was home in July I visited New Orleans and drove through areas that I'd previously remembered as being vibrant, FABULOUS places full of vibrant, FABULOUS people. 

In July...I saw a few of those people, their spirits altered and, as a Louisianian, our most majestic city...broken.

I think Spike Lee did a magnificent job of portraying what happened in a humane way. Thank you Mr. Lee.  I'll admit to not having been a fan prior to "Inside Man"...but currently...you can do no wrong with me.

August 30, 2005

Sobbing for the Soul of the South

Most days while I’m home the phone rings back to back and I’m on the computer talking to my friends and family members most of the day. We laugh about nothing and talk about everyday things sending each other articles or links to websites we’ve found interesting and/or amusing. Starting on Sunday, August 28, 2005, my phones were eerily silent, my email inbox empty.

As you know, being the Creole Princess I think I am, means I’m from Louisiana. More specifically…that dirty, dirty part of Louisiana we refer to the southern most parts of our beloved state. Robby’s family is from Mississippi, very near the Gulf Coast.

Sunday night, we had a dinner party and our guests, we’re certain, never knew the extent of the helplessness in the face of danger to our homeland. We Southerners were all holding our breath and were barely able to get any sleep knowing that Katrina would hit land early Monday morning. My best friend, Cojoe, was on a plane to Paris. His family, natives of New Orleans, had made it to his home in Houston. My other best friend, Weezy, told us his family was safe in Houston as well and my one of my best girlfriends from home and her family had headed to Texas. I spoke with my sister, brother, grandmother and other members of my family in Baton Rouge and was assured they were ready to bunker down knowing they’d be without electricity. We waited.

Most of my family and friends whom needed to evacuate started pulling out of Louisiana on Friday, the rest finished boarding up their homes, taking what they could on Saturday. We spoke with everyone and got the numbers to the hotels they were staying in or the coordinates of where they were going to be. We all knew it was going to be bad. But no one wanted to talk about anything specific. We waited. All of us, holding hands across the miles, stretching to pat each other on the back, bowing our heads in prayer, taking comfort in the fact that we were all safe while we waited. Me here in the D.C. Metro area, stranded, it seemed, from my beloved state. We waited.

We spoke with Robby’s parents several times on Sunday, not voicing our adamant displeasure regarding their choice to stay with their home on their land out of respect. But we got off the phone feeling more than helpless. What are we going to do if, if…..not able to voice even the possibilities that were included in IF. We waited.

Monday morning, Category 5…OH MY GOD!

Anyone from the South would immediately react that way when you hear Category 5. We’ve all lived through Categories 1 – 3 and remembered the devastation that remained once it left. A Category 5 was not within our immediate grasp as we had nothing to compare it to. My heart started hurting. I called those I could early…already getting “no signal” messages. I left my home for a doctor’s appointment and it all went straight to hell as I was fiddling around here away from my true home, where my heart truly resides.

Around 11:00 am on Monday we heard from Robby’s parents. They were battling the wind and the rain which had ripped off considerable parts of the roof of their main house and completely ripped off the roof of the barn. Several trees were uprooted on their land. They’d placed a tarp over their bed to see if they could keep it dry as the rain came through the roof and were trying to figure out how to save the piano. They had hours of wind and rain left to battle. That’s the last we’ve heard from them.

The shock that engulfs me as I watch the news of areas I have driven through and walked down is incomparable. The hurt I feel as I speak with people whom have lost everything is, well, I can’t describe it. Good people, who work hard everyday to provide a good life for their family are back at square one. The reports were frustrating on Monday because a lot of the areas surrounding New Orleans weren’t being reported on. My girlfriend from Slidell called me from where they’ve evacuated to ask that I search for information on their homes. I couldn’t find a thing. The lump in my throat is salty.

The looters of the grocery stores…I have sympathy for. They need food, have lost everything, the food is going to go bad anyway and if it can sustain their strength to move on to the next place to lay their heads…fine. BUT…the people looting the malls for material things…I can’t even express in words my feelings toward them. As news of the devastation mounted…we all sat with broken hearts. Our most majestic city….destroyed. Some of the elders have said the city needed a good “cleansing." If that’s what this was…then so be it.

I am ripped in two as I look outside and the sun is shining. My house is dry and we are safe. But my HOME, Robby's HOME is under attack. We can't find peace. It’s Tuesday and I spoke with my sister finally about 30 minutes ago at 5:30 am. She and my nephew are fine, no damage other than the inconvenience of having no electricity. As more news is available to us we are still without the knowledge that will help us sleep tonight….the knowledge that Robby’s parents are safe. We’ve decided that if we haven’t heard anything by tomorrow, we are probably going to fly to Atlanta, rent an SUV and take our chances on getting to the house in Mississippi.

Please pray for our people ...We’re still waiting... Please pray for our people... Our hearts are breaking... Please pray for our people... Please, please, please Monnie

Help Needed???????

For the past couple of days I have been enrolling people with FEMA using their website.  My number is being passed around in shelters and people call me and I go online and get them signed up for assistance.

Last evening I was on the phone with this woman, Nicole, who was here in D.C. at a shelter and was getting her registered.  She sounded nice and had two girls ages 7 and 4.  A single mother.  After speaking with her and listening to her concerns regarding living in a shelter with two daughters not knowing who they are sleeping next to, I told her I had two guest bedrooms and 2 guest bathrooms as well as an entire floor my husband and I rarely use that she and her children were welcome to.  I stated we had two dogs in the event someone was allergic as well as the fact my home was a non-smoking one.  I could have been at the armory within an hour to pick her up.  She said she couldn't come because she smokes.  I said okay, stunned, and finished registering her.

When I got off the phone I just sat back and thought about it.  This woman passed up leaving a shelter where she has to deal with very valid concerns regarding her and her daughters well-being so she could be where she could smoke.  *sigh*  I think that was one of those instances where God sends you pebbles before he hits you with a brick.  I would have hated to have her in my home doing something crazy so I'd have to kick her butt and put her out later.

The volunteer who was letting her use his phone to call me said he would bet she was a drug user from her demeanor and that she was actually the woman whom I had seen on the local evening news who looked a bit special.

We all want to help, I know this.  Let's just be careful and watch for those pebbles.

Monnie

Katrina - Day 7

This morning I got a call from the friend of ours whom had left to get her family from Mississippi after just having surgery on Tuesday.  They decided who was going where and she ended up bringing back her neices 12 and 13 from Mississippi where they were suddenly homeless.  She didn't have anyone to help her drive and was exhausted and in pain.  She couldn't take anything for the pain...because she had to drive. 

I got off the phone with her and called my best girlfriend, Noreen.  We decided we'd drive out to meet her in Atlanta and take over the wheel from her so she could get some rest.  We called our friend, told her the plan and were on the road an hour later (Noreen lives 40 minutes from me).

These children have the most heart wrenching story.  They need our help.  If you want to help them, send me an email and I will send you their information.  They will need clothes, shoes, assistance with finding a school, medical attention, and, most importantly, friends their age.  At ages 12 and 13, they are unnaturally quiet.  *sigh* An indication of what they've been through.  Let's give these girls the support system I know we can provide.

On a much lighter note, the plea I made to my neighbors on yesterday was met whole heartedly.  When I returned home and hour ago (yes...I got lost getting out of D.C. AGAIN!  Shut up Celeste and Donald! LOL!), I had bags, upon bags, upon bags of toiletries, clothing, baby supplies, and bedding piled up.  All of the donations have filled up my front room which is a pretty nice size room.  Tomorrow I am going to take as much as my truck can carry to the D.C. Armory (http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2005/09/02/AR2005090202176.html) in preparation for evacuees whom are arriving sometime this week.  I am going to put a big THANK YOU sign on my door so my neighbors may see how much I appreciate how much they did for my people.  The people of the South.

I know you are tired of my begging, but I'm not tired of begging you.  If you are in an area where some evacuees are headed....take them some much needed supplies and clothes.  Keep in mind that what you give them will be their only possessions for a very long time so show them the diginity of giving them things you yourself would use pease.  If you are not in an immediate area DONATE TO THE RED CROSS NOW!  1-800-HELP-NOW! 

We can't depend on our government to take care of these people...WE HAVE TO DO IT!  1.3 million people had to evacuate New Orleans.  People from all races, ages, and economic circumstances.  They are ALL going to need us to step up and prove that we believe what we have been saying about ourselves for all this time...that we care about our fellow man...that we are good people. 

Monica

Another very poignant article:

New York Daily News - http://www.nydailynews.com

Shame of a nation Saturday, September 3rd, 2005 In rode the troops, with plenty of food and water and medicines, and for sure with firepower enough to make fast work of any armed-thug types who might choose to feel trigger-happy, and conditions last night in New Orleans were well on the way to being measurably improved. Thousands of storm victims were getting themselves evacuated from the hellhole Superdome. Thousands more were safe in shelters in Houston and Dallas and San Antonio and elsewhere. The airport was open, and medevac planes were regularly lifting out the desperately ill. Sadly - maddeningly, and indeed infuriatingly - help arrived not soon enough to spare the wretched souls of New Orleans from miseries and horrors they were forced to endure for entirely too long. President Bush himself snapped that the federal government's disaster-response performance had been "not acceptable." But yesterday, visiting the stricken Gulf Coast before signing off on more than $10 billion in preliminary aid, he made a point of publicly thanking Homeland Security chief Michael Chertoff and Federal Emergency Management Agency boss Michael Brown for their tireless work. What tireless work? The weasel Brown said the anticipated high death toll is "going to be attributable a lot to people who did not heed the advance warnings" and get out. Such compassion. Such stupidity. Many of them had no means of escape. And so they stayed behind, trapped in a doomed city as the lights went out and the poisoned waters rose. As for Chertoff, if this is the best his department can do, the homeland is not very secure at all. It is absolutely outrageous that the United States of America could not send help to tens of thousands of forlorn, frightened, sick and hungry human beings at least 24 hours before it did, arguably longer than that. Who is specifically at fault for what is nothing less than a national scandal will be a matter for the postmortems. It will never be known exactly what a day could have meant to so many unfortunates whose lives came to an end in those hopelessly tortured hours - on scorching roadsides, for lack of a swallow of water; in sweltering hospital beds, for lack of insulin. But what is already more than clear is that the nation's disaster-preparedness mechanisms do not appear to be in the hands of officials who know how to run them. You can e-mail the Daily News editors at voicers@edit.nydailynews.com. Please include your full name, address and phone number. The Daily News reserves the right to edit letters. The shorter the letter, the better the chance it will be used.