Catalonia and other Disasters
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Catalunya October 1 2017 I’ve seen a lot of videos and photos of the Catalonia attempt to hold a referendum today (Tyler has a “nice” series of
[See the full post at: Catalonia and other Disasters]General Honore disagrees with you regarding Puerto Rico and President Trump. Can we all agree that Teump is gratuitous and a bit of an a**hole?
Absolutely Ken. but that doesn’t mean he’s left Puerto Rico and went golfing, or that the US wasn’t there under his command. People’s opinions are being shaped by nonsense too much. By now, that’s what it is. You can’t un-echo the chambers anymore. Still, it would be good to realize that whatever happens, there’s a whole platoon of formerly journalists ready to blame it on Trump.
Thing is: could they have been there earlier? We don’t know. Everything’s gone there. Could more goods have been sent in? The reports say they’re already overstocked. Could more people have been sent in? Well, probably, but we have no clue as to how efficient that would have been. For one thing, where would they be based? It sounds good in the echo chamber, but it has no solid ground.
Looks to me like DoD and FEAM are doing a good job. How much of that is Trump, we don’t know. We do know he has good reasons to NOT f*ck this up.
I have big problem with the constant negativity. It sounds hollow.
No idea who Gen. Honore is
There are disasters and pain in many more place than the two you have listed as an example.
The Mediterranean has never seen peace.
Men/women in all those disasters are causing people to suffer or to get relief.
Some people are finding ways to benefit from the loss of others.Someone is always picked out to be blamed for bad things.
Chose.
It’s gods fault.
It’s the devils fault.I just live on this earth.
I heard the messenger.
I’m innocent.The ghost of Franco has risen; Rajoy is a fascisti…
The unprovoked brutality of the police is just stunning.
I have a friend living in Spain; and he’s considering getting out.Ilargi
No idea who Gen. Honore isApparently he was in charge of the Katrina relief efforts; or at least the logistics.
Certainly nothing to be proud of…First, about Spain/Catalonia: It has been clear for a month, and I have been saying (elsewhere) that the declarations and actions of the Spanish government were of a sort to increase divisiveness, the exact opposite of their stated intention of creating unity. This is now extremely evident, as people who went to the poll to vote “stay” got treated to badly that they voted “go”. The Spanish police and the Catalan police and firefighters contested some polling places, and Catalan police are being charged with dereliction of duty. When the enforcers change sides, the revolution has gone live, and this action forces the uniformed enforcers to change sides.
Whose interests are served by this antithetical behavior? I can’t answer. What is the utility of another Spanish Civil War? To whom? I can’t see the grand sinister plan yet. It just looks stupid. I doubt it really is.
Puerto Rico is still broken. My friend, Manuel is a doctor in the only hospital in the smallish town of Yauco, southwest part of the island. He has been getting one gallon of water per day to drink, and gets 2 minutes on the phone with his wife in Austin from the military, a couple of times per week. His hospital very nearly closed. The relief is just not getting to the rest of the island. People who can get fuel are driving to San Juan for water and food, which is dangerous at night with damaged roads. My main hope is that this will use enough US military resources to delay what looks like a planned invasion of Venezuela, to bestow democracy upon their oil reserves.
Have a nice day…Former Gen. Honore was on national news lambasting Trump’s response to the hurricane even back with Harvey. I’m not sure, considering Houston, Florida, and Puerto Rico, what he thought could be done, but that’s fair game, I guess.
…Except for Gen. Honore was the one running the Katrina relief, which was so mishandled it led to credible theories FEMA and the government were running an intentional, open genocide against the people of New Orleans, withholding aid, stopping supply trucks, re-settling people, confiscating guns, having police and EMTs raid houses and stores and even shoot people escaping NOLA, all overseen or at least in the jurisdiction of Gen. Honore. All of this is well-reported consensus fact. So the man who ran the worst relief effort in U.S. history, one so bad the population actually, credibly believed the U.S. government was trying to kill them, is invited on national TV to criticize Trump’s relief efforts? The gall is breathtaking. And viewers nod their heads and say, “Wow, yeah, F Trump! Here’s a general, he should know.” Yes, a general that should have been court-martialed if W. or anyone actually cared or had consequences for performance. That’s who General Russel L. Honoré is.
The actual recovery? Stinks. It’s really slow, tedious, expensive, and unpleasant. That’s what happens when everything in a 50 mile radius is put back to the 19th century. Let’s look at P.R. They had a 1-Star general running support after Maria passed, as would be procedure. As a naval exercise, that may have been delayed waiting for the storm to pass Norfolk. There are no roads or trucks, so available supplies quickly bottled up in San Juan. As you might expect, airlifting supplies inland is slow as you don’t know who needs what. They have mainland drivers but no beds for them, and still need parts and trucks. After a week, which involves finding out what needed and what was broken, they upped to a 3-star and additional supplies, as by the book. We have not had any particular emergency as the weather is good and the people are orderly. The power is out, but if anyone remembers, last month when PR went bankrupt, the power company said they might have blackouts due to corruption stealing their daily repair money for years, and the cash crunch might shut off a power plant or two. That’s not a strong territory. As a very poor place since the 1950’s, the houses are not Florida-code, the roads are weak, and the supplies and other depth of infrastructure mined in favor of well-reported corruption. It goes without saying the people don’t bother to prepare for themselves. So an eider feather could knock them over.
That said, the recovery is disappointing. There is no support at home because all the U.S. troops and trucks are overseas in illegal wars. The Navy seemed a bit lackadaisical, I mean, you can fly all day to F-stan, but you can’t clear a strip in the United States, you have no satellite photos and assessment of damage department in the Pentagon? No military cell-tower service ships, or are they busy in Syria? No one (including reporters) have satellite phones anymore? Really? I can’t say that’s represents a broke, third-world country but it’s getting there, which is why, for 20 years, we’ve needed that money at home, in Cleveland and Detroit. So if the Navy has been by the book, and Congress themselves don’t care, took them a week to suspend the Johnson Act, what are they after Trump for? Even the Mayor was fine with San Juan until the polito-boys arrived from Chicago, and the narrative, which was scattered and uncertain, galvanized into this week’s anti-Trump narrative(tm), along with the Cat and the Hat being racist ™ written by a librarian in a Cat and the Hat costume with a former black first lady promoting Dr. Seuss with a live-action performer and a brass band. No you can’t make this up. Also no one cares or reports that more people were killed in Chicago this weekend. So now the narrative is written, they can finally report on it with confidence: “P.R. was fine before Trump got there.” Immediate by the book support run by the Military is now impeachably inadequate. If he visits he’s an obstacle, and if he doesn’t, he’s racist and doesn’t care. Same as it ever was, and I think this is the tornado-of-nonsense ™ Raul was talking about. But just having a weak, lackluster, uninspired response isn’t enough. It has to be bad, Really Bad, “bad hombre” bad. In the new world, if it isn’t Hitler-mated-with-PolPot bad we can’t be bothered to report on it, and I just find that ridiculous. Like shut-off-my-TV-and-cancel-my-NFL-subscription ridiculous.
They stink? It stank before he got there, governments always stink, and what they need is the Cajun Navy and the Baptist Charities, who usually do all this crap while politicians posture on Camera and FEMA obstructs. But they can’t help this time, at least not yet.
One view (wrong) is that General Honore did a good job after the initial screwup:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Russel_L._Honor%C3%A9I have lived in Barcelona since May 2011 after moving from Australia. I arrived 3 days before 15M, the “Ocupada” of Pl. Catalunya, I met my first Catalan friends there. The “Mossas” moved in there too, put 170 people in hospital and cleared the square. Los Indignados were back next day 5,000 strong and stayed there.
Anyone who thought the thousands of Spanish police, sitting in rented cruisers in Barcelona port waiting for 1 – 0, would do anything else but beat the crap out of anyone who got in their way is naïve. You do not expect a scorpion to do anything but sting, and this is the land where bullfighting is part (thanks to Rajoy) of the “patrimony” of the country, where macho idiots from all over the world come to run in front of a pack of bulls. Historically this is a brutal country.
You are spot on with the Franco references Raul, it amazes me to this day that there has been no mass attempt to have a truth and reconciliation forum. Thousands of bodies still lie in mass graves around Spain, whilst “El Caudillo’s” monument is in pristine condition. Justice Balthazar Garzon was the last person to try and do something about that. He was also running a corruption investigation into 70 senior members of the Partido Popular (Rajoy). Garzon was suspended and banned from practicing law for 11 years by the same Spanish judicial system that made the Catalan referendum illegal, and gave instructions on how the “Mossas” should behave on 1 – 0.
There is a direct lineage from Franco to Rajoy, From 1951, Manuel Fraga served in various posts in the Franco regime, including minister for information and tourism. He took part in the Transition (restoration of the Monarchy), and formed the conservative People’s Alliance (AP), the precursor to the Popular Party (PP).
Appointing Jose Louis Aznar as head of the Partido Popular (PP) in 1989, Fraga became President of the PP. Fraga finished his political career as Franco did, in office. He died in January 2012 serving as Spain’s ambassador to the European Union. Rajoy was appointed head of the PP in 2004 after Zapatero’s election. It was not until 2004 that the monuments to Franco began to be removed in Catalunya. Streets named after fascist generals still exist. There is still an intense hatred of the Bourbon royal lineage, installed by Franco.The “agreement to forget” which is the basis for the “democracy” which exists in Spain, and Catalunya also deprives 100,000 bodies in mass graves around Spain the peace their families badly need.
It was Aznar that asked the Royal Academy of History to re write the “Spanish Dictionary of Biography”, which then attempted to describe Franco as “authoritarian” rather than a “brutal dictator”. Aznar introduces “friendly fascism” to Spain. Rajoy inherits a “crisis” when elected and has been the perfect puppet. Even tells Donald Trump that Rafa Nadal “is my friend”, Trump not impressed.
Whatever happens in the aftermath of 1 – 0 may not be pretty, it may be brutal again, its a brutal country, but the people of Catalunya and Barcelona have seen worse and will be back.
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