N’Awlins vs. Katrina

There’s already tons of material available on the web regarding  New Orleans vs. Katrina, so I won’t post it here.  Except for a few choice tidbits that I found:

SciGuy’s science blog had these immortal (and not a littl creepy considering how things turned out) words from Mark Twain words about Men Vs. The Mississippi River.

Dottie Hiebing recently posted this note from Ray LaFever of the New York State Archives  this message on METRO-L:

"The damage/destruction to cultural and
historical institutions in Louisiana pales next to the incredible human
suffering, but we worry about them none-the-less.   The American Association of
Museums is developing pages on its website to report on museums affected by
Hurricane Katrina and recovery efforts."

One thing I noticed over the weekend trying to locate resources on the library collections in the city is that 90% of their websites were simply not responding to queries. That’s starting to change now as servers come back online but it’ll probably be a while before they’re back in force. I did hear that the staff of Tulane U. moved most of the first floor collection onto upper floors in the building before the waters came, and Cornell U. has been helping them out. Inside Higher Ed News has a bit more on Katrina-displaced students.

Actually, most of the on-line articles I’ve found have to do with the hit the U.S. economy will take because of the wrecked oil rigs in the Gulf Region . . . they generally ignore the real point, though which is that New Orleans is the biggest port in the United States. I’ll say it again: New Orleans is the biggest port in the United States. George Friedman points out just what that implies for our active living lives even here on the east coast.