I'm really impressed with this on-going high-level discussion, but
apparently some New Orleans folks have been "finding" stuff. Is this
really different from looting and should they also be shot? Maybe
shelf position is a key factor here. Off-the-shelf, shoot 'em. If it's
on the floor and they have to bend over to pick up, you could just kick
'em in the ass. Maybe not.

--

"Stark" wrote in message
...
I'm really impressed with this on-going high-level discussion, but
apparently some New Orleans folks have been "finding" stuff. Is this
really different from looting and should they also be shot? Maybe
shelf position is a key factor here. Off-the-shelf, shoot 'em. If it's
on the floor and they have to bend over to pick up, you could just kick
'em in the ass. Maybe not.

--

Picker-uppers only get half shot.

Stark wrote:
I'm really impressed with this on-going high-level discussion, but
apparently some New Orleans folks have been "finding" stuff. Is this
really different from looting and should they also be shot? Maybe
shelf position is a key factor here. Off-the-shelf, shoot 'em. If it's
on the floor and they have to bend over to pick up, you could just kick
'em in the ass. Maybe not.

--

I find it sickening that so many people can be so flippant about people
doing whatever they need to do to survive when their government has
abadoned them, literally, not for the first time, but repeatedly.
-L.

From the NY times:

"September 6, 2005

The Larger Shame

By NICHOLAS D. KRISTOF


The wretchedness coming across our television screens from Louisiana
has illuminated the way children sometimes pay with their lives, even
in America, for being born to poor families.



It has also underscored the Bush administration's ongoing reluctance or
ineptitude in helping the poorest Americans. The scenes in New Orleans
reminded me of the suffering I saw after a similar storm killed 130,000
people in Bangladesh in 1991 - except that Bangladesh's government
showed more urgency in trying to save its most vulnerable citizens.



But Hurricane Katrina also underscores a much larger problem: the
growing number of Americans trapped in a never-ending cyclone of
poverty. And while it may be too early to apportion blame definitively
for the mishandling of the hurricane, even President Bush's own
administration acknowledges that America's poverty is worsening on his
watch.



The U.S. Census Bureau reported a few days ago that the poverty rate
rose again last year, with 1.1 million more Americans living in poverty
in 2004 than a year earlier. After declining sharply under Bill
Clinton, the number of poor people has now risen 17 percent under Mr.
Bush.



If it's shameful that we have bloated corpses on New Orleans streets,
it's even more disgraceful that the infant mortality rate in America's
capital is twice as high as in China's capital. That's right - the
number of babies who died before their first birthdays amounted to 11.5
per thousand live births in 2002 in Washington, compared with 4.6 in
Beijing.



Indeed, according to the United Nations Development Program, an
African-American baby in Washington has less chance of surviving its
first year than a baby born in urban parts of the state of Kerala in
India.



The national infant mortality rate has risen under Mr. Bush for the
first time since 1958. The U.S. ranks 43rd in the world in infant
mortality, according to the C.I.A.'s World Factbook; if we could reach
the level of Singapore, ranked No. 1, we would save 18,900 children's
lives each year.



So in some ways the poor children evacuated from New Orleans are the
lucky ones because they may now get checkups and vaccinations. But
nationally, 29 percent of children had no health insurance at some
point in the last 12 months, and many get neither checkups nor
vaccinations.

The U.S. ranks 84th in the world for measles immunizations and 89th for
polio.



One of the most dispiriting elements of the catastrophe in New Orleans
was the looting. I covered the 1995 earthquake that leveled much of
Kobe, Japan, killing 5,500, and for days I searched there for any sign
of criminal behavior. Finally I found a resident who had seen three men
steal food. I asked him whether he was embarrassed that Japanese would
engage in such thuggery.



"No, you misunderstand," he said firmly. "These looters weren't
Japanese. They were foreigners."



The reasons for this are complex and partly cultural, but one reason is
that Japan has tried hard to stitch all Japanese together into the
nation's social fabric. In contrast, the U.S. - particularly under the
Bush administration - has systematically cut people out of the social
fabric by redistributing wealth from the most vulnerable Americans to
the most affluent.



It's not just that funds may have gone to Iraq rather than to the
levees in New Orleans; it's also that money went to tax cuts for the
wealthiest rather than vaccinations for children.



None of this is to suggest that there are easy solutions for American
poverty. As Ronald Reagan once said, "We fought a war on poverty, and
poverty won." But we don't need to be that pessimistic - in the late
1990's, we made real headway. A ray of hope is beautifully presented in
one of the best books every written on American poverty, "American
Dream," by my Times colleague Jason DeParle.


So the best monument to the catastrophe in New Orleans would be a
serious national effort to address the poverty that afflicts the entire
country. And in our shock and guilt, that might be politically
feasible.

Rich Lowry of The National Review, in defending Mr. Bush, offered an
excellent suggestion: "a grand right-left bargain that includes greater
attention to out-of-wedlock births from the Left in exchange for the
Right's support for more urban spending." That would be the best legacy
possible for Katrina.



Otherwise, long after the horrors have left TV screens, about 50 of the

77 babies who die each day, on average, will die needlessly, because of
poverty. That's the larger hurricane of poverty that shames our land."

On Fri 09 Sep 2005 11:44:57a, FDR wrote in rec.food.cooking:


"Stark" wrote in message
...
I'm really impressed with this on-going high-level discussion, but
apparently some New Orleans folks have been "finding" stuff. Is this
really different from looting and should they also be shot? Maybe
shelf position is a key factor here. Off-the-shelf, shoot 'em. If it's
on the floor and they have to bend over to pick up, you could just kick
'em in the ass. Maybe not.

--

Picker-uppers only get half shot.

That would mean that the shooter would have to be half loaded!


--
Wayne Boatwright *¿*
____________________________________________

Give me a smart idiot over a stupid genius any day.
Sam Goldwyn, 1882-1974

-L. wrote:
Stark wrote:

I'm really impressed with this on-going high-level discussion, but
apparently some New Orleans folks have been "finding" stuff. Is this
really different from looting and should they also be shot? Maybe
shelf position is a key factor here. Off-the-shelf, shoot 'em. If it's
on the floor and they have to bend over to pick up, you could just kick
'em in the ass. Maybe not.

--


I find it sickening that so many people can be so flippant about people
doing whatever they need to do to survive when their government has
abadoned them, literally, not for the first time, but repeatedly.
-L.



Can you tell us what this has to do with people looting jewelry stores,
electronic stores, and other materials that won't extend their life by a
second?

If it has gone over your ignorant head, let me spell it out for you:

None of us are complaining about stealing stuff that is related to
survival - food, water, blankets, diapers. We are objecting to the just
pure criminal intent looters.

Got a problem with that?

Tell it to someone who gives a FF.


jim

In article . com, -L.
wrote:

Stark wrote:
I'm really impressed with this on-going high-level discussion, but
apparently some New Orleans folks have been "finding" stuff. Is this
really different from looting and should they also be shot? Maybe
shelf position is a key factor here. Off-the-shelf, shoot 'em. If it's
on the floor and they have to bend over to pick up, you could just kick
'em in the ass. Maybe not.

--

I find it sickening that so many people can be so flippant about people
doing whatever they need to do to survive when their government has
abadoned them, literally, not for the first time, but repeatedly.
-L.

Ah L., you misunderstood my intentions. America's "two worlds" is
definitely a problem not to be taken lightly. I simply figured that a
kick-in-the-ass would soothe those hot-headed legalistic *******s
regarding looting/finding. Then I'd let the victms keep the stuff. No
shots fired and a few more hours of survival.