This could be the big one. SE US, prepare for the worst.

Well, as of this afternoon, the storm has now had an effect here in Georgia. Gas prices shot up 20-40 cents a gallon over night, and as of 5:00pm, most of the atlanta area stations are out of gas. I am turly sorry for NO an thier problems, But the @#$^$^%^ morons who control the oil need to be lined up and shot. The economy, in aother areas in now impacted. Fuel useing companys, like UPS, the Postal Service and so forth will be out of work with no gas available. Me, I may have to spend days at work due to not being able to get back and forth. True this is tiny incomparisume to the flood, but to me, it hits home and impact my wallett which is now leaner at the rate of $3.00 a gallan, when last night it was $2.48 a gallon. Gougers also have gotten busted for running it as high as $5.00 a gallon in the atlanta area. Ok, enough rant, just frustrated. <img src=smilies/icon_smile_sad.gif width=15 height=15 border=0 align=middle>

The South has it at around $2.50 (or has in recent weeks)? My cousins in Alabama were complaining about prices being around there a few days ago. I looked out the window and read the price on the nearest gas stations: $2.98. This was <i>before </i> Katrina. Now they´re hovering at around $3.50-$3.60

it´s still only half of what we have to pay. even $5 a gallon is cheap compared to UK/European prices (which is more like $8) Looks like the days of cheap fuel are over - you´d better start driving more economical cars and get rid of those gas-guzzlers and SUVs. Which you shouldnt be driving in this day and age anyway. been watching the live feeds from New Orleans - the water´s not stopping is it? I thought these dykes and levees were supposed to control this sort of occurence? As for the looting, well thats human nature for you. Doesn´t surprise me one bit. Someone once said that civil behaviour won´t last if there aren´t 3 meals a day. I understand martial law has been declared - so now there are weekend soldiers patrolling (whats left of) the streets and the looters are starting to form up in gangs. And you can bet they´re armed. I see Pres George W. Bush overflew the scene in Air Force One on the way back from his holiday at his ranch in Crawford. well that´s nice, I´m sure that makes everyone stuck there feel a lot better. Especially those 20, 000 people trapped in the Superdome with no power, no water and surrounded by raw sewage. thing is, its not all over when the water goes back down (which will take weeks) Threr are hundreds of thouands of homes to repair, so many people to feed and clothe and keep in temporary accomodation - lets call them what they are, <i>refugees </i> - the loss of livelihoods, businesses and incomes. And as for the city itself? even if it all gets rebuilt, whats to stop this happening next year, or the year after? Biloxi, Gulfport, all those places, are gone. They´re just names on a map now. Long-term this isn´t just a humanitarian crisis, it´s an economic disaster. Did i hear 20 oil rigs destroyed as well? people normally respond well to immediate crises but its the long term effects that need the bulk of the effort, other wise some of those people will be living in plastic tents this time next year. After all, refugees do have a tendency to get forgotten once an immedate crisis is over. Tsunami, Bam earthquake, Bangladesh flooding - hear what I´m saying?

Most of these homes and buildings will never be able to be repaired. In the part of the country I live in, flooding is a yearly occurrence from the runoff from coal mines. With the scope of the flooding, just about all of those buildings will need to be torn down and rebuilt altogether. Once the water goes down, most of them will see black mold begin to creep in, among other public health risks, and most of these things are damn near impossible to get rid of. Sure, you can repair the flood damage itself, and in many parts of the world they do just that and move back in, but I would be shocked if FEMA didn´t come in and order the whole city bulldozed. It will quite honestly be cheaper. That is what they have done for several towns in this area. I can think of a dozen towns that were reasonably properous twenty years ago that are nothing more than wilderness now from flooding and FEMA effectively &quot;totalling&quot; the entire place. Around here we call it being &quot;FEMAfied&quot;. If you think about it FEMA is nothing more than a federally subsidized insurance company, and if they deem a place as being high risk for repeat events, they´ll just total it, give you fair market value of your property, and tell you &quot;if it happens again, you´re screwed. We warned you.&quot; Usually that is enough to make people rebuild elsewhere. New Orleans will never be the same place again. Biloxi, MS is the same way. As for the gas prices, it does totally suck. For people that only make like $7 an hour and bring home $225 dollars a week, spending $50 a week in gas will thrust them into poverty, if they weren´t there already. From what I can tell about the world economy, the whole difference between the United States and elsewhere isn´t that Americans make more money, it´s really about the same. The cost of living in the United States is cheaper. When the gas price goes up, the price of everything else goes up too, thus driving up the cost of living. Unless the average wage goes up quickly to match it, which it won´t because companies have to pay more for goods already, they sure aren´t going to pay workers more too, you have the very real kickstart to a major recession/depression. I´d be shocked if the gas prices are permanent, but if it is the U.S. economy is shot.

My thoughts and my compassion with the people of the region of New Orleans. I can feel with them because I have been in a similar situation the past few days. (As you might know Central Switzerland has been hit by the worst flooding of the past 300 years. Several people have lost their lives, the damage is about 2´000´000´000 Swiss Francs (about 1.5 Billion US-$) - quite a lot for a country with only 7 Mio inhabitants.) In the public discussion about these desasters there is a big difference between Europe and the US. In Southern Europe (France, Spain, Portugal) there is one of the worst droughts of all times, in central and eastern Europe every year new floods - and there is an ongoing debate about the question if the (undisputable) climate change is man-made, partially man-made or not man-made at all. Even though the majority tend to accept that industrialization and carbon dioxide (CO2) is one of the reasons nobody has the ultimate answer. But no-one - I repeat: NO-ONE - denies that these questions has to be discussed. That is the difference to the US - here the political dominating class tries to stop that discussion. Example: the ultra-con Rush Limbaugh takes Katrina as a mean to attack the liberal journalist Katrina vanden Heuvel in the sense of: Katrina v.H. is worse than the hurricane. She asked about the correlation of globally growing temperatures and hurricanes. Joe Barton, head of the Parlamentary Energy Commission, opened a investigation against three leading researchers on climate. And President Bush opened a trial against the State of California because Schwarzenegger proposed lower limits for exhaust fumes (is this the correct wording?) because of climate change. Just to make it clear: I do not want to open a debate about the reason of climate change. But it is a fact that the actual political majority in the US tried to stop a debate on that topic. Fear of Kyoto? I think the people in the South of the US will ask their government the same questions as the people in Europe did before. And they expect answers. Quick. EDIT: I know; US-Citizens do not like Europeans to be critical against their policy - just read <A href=´http://service.spiegel.de/cache/international/0,1518,372434,00.html´ Target=_Blank> here </a> (in english Edited by - zazie on 9/1/2005 1:38:05 AM

$225 a week? thats something like £300 - £400, i´d have someones arm off for a job like that..

Wrong way ff, its $1.8 to every £1 - so the $225 a week roughly equates to £125 a week - BEFORE tax (mind you, you shouldn´t really get taxed on something that low.....but you do). When you consider that living in a shared 2 bed flat in Leeds, my monthly bills were roughly the same as that (no joke), and the flat was not decent by any stretch of the imagination (it took a year of badgering to have the light fitting in my room mended, so that I had a working light........), it gives some perspective.

&quot;The cost of living in the United States is cheaper&quot; that´s about the size of it. why do you think we all come flying over when the dollars weak? so we can take advantage of the fact that you guys pay half of what we do for stuff. cds. dvds, electronics, games, clothes - they´re all so much cheaper that its worth flying over, filling your suitcases and flying back again. As for food, well, average food costs per week in the US would last you a couple of days in some European cities. You have a much lower cost of living and a somewhat higher standard, than the UK at any rate. there´s no doubt that the recent hikes up in prices will stay, they won´t go down once the worst is over, and they´re likely to keep rising. Unless the Govt acts, you´ll be facing increasing (and possibly mass) unemployment, large scale economic migration and potential civil disorder. if New orleans is going to be closed down for the next few months, as Ive just read it will be, where will all those people go? a million displaced people aren´t going to sit around in refugee centres - they´re going to move out and start up somewhere else, after all, who´s going to sit waiting for a bowlful of emergency rations when theyve worked all their lives, and theyve got families to look after? releasing oil reserves is just the start. that will keep the price increase down, wont stop it but it will mollify it. but the production shortfall has to be made up, and oil production <i>worldwide </i> is at capacity, nore or less. I´ve already told you to ignore what OPEC say - any suggestion they´ll increase production overnight is not to be counted on. theyre already lying about production and reserve figures. then there´s gas, for industry and heating. there arent any strategic gas reserves and many of the rigs in Gulf have been destroyed or knocked out, and even the ones who are working now cant pipe their stuff ashore because the facilites are gone from there. in addition the local ecomies will be producing next to nothing and thus State revenues will go down, shortfalls that the Federal Govts going to have to make up quite separately to emergency aid. so taxes will almost certainly have to go up, after all, the money has to come from somewhere.

What gets me is the cost - I have read that last year the insurance was $25 Billion in payouts, this year they are expecting it to top another $25 billion. Move the cities, Its cheaper! <img src=smilies/icon_smile_tongue.gif width=15 height=15 border=0 align=middle> <img src=smilies/icon_smile_big.gif width=15 height=15 border=0 align=middle> The looters should be shot dead on site - although I´ll be alone in my &quot;hardcore&quot; methods <img src=smilies/icon_smile_tongue.gif width=15 height=15 border=0 align=middle> Maybe they should instigate what Eastern countries do - cut a hand off those who are caught! May help reduce the problem slightly...... Edited by - Chips on 9/1/2005 4:07:57 AM

The higher fuel costs have also translated into more jobs lost as companys have struggled to stay afloat. They lay off more which has a dominal effect. Delta Air lets 500 go, of those 25 live at our apartments. Now they cant aford to life there and have to move out. We now have 25 more vacants, we lose income and have to cut corners to recoupe, and raise rent. 2 more move out because of that. It continues to have more and more effects. Truckers pay higher costs for fuel, thereby raising the cst of what they transport like food. So now, instead of $40 a week food, I have to spend $50. As to refiners lost, not true. Power out effected lines carring the fuel and knocked two major ones out. They hope to havce it back running in another day. Edited by - Finalday on 9/1/2005 3:31:06 AM

i was reading about Delta earlier. q a few airlines are struggling and might go under, and some that were trying to get out of bankruptcy wont be able to. raising rents to make up for lack of tenants? sure way to an empty complex that is. Chips - there´s always a place for you in the Tawakalnistan Ministry for the Promotion of Virtue! You´d have to grow a beard like FD´s <i>Taleban </i>-styled luscious growth, though... Edited by - Tawakalna (Reloaded) on 9/1/2005 5:58:32 AM

i guess loosing a hand would cut the theft in half?! <img src=smilies/icon_smile_wink.gif width=15 height=15 border=0 align=middle> I mean they can only carry about hlaf as much out. &quot;On this ship you are to refer to me as Idiot, not you Captain. I mean... you know what I mean.&quot;

Here in Washington State US we have been (for the time being) in my area protected from higher prices by distance, though I´ve heard reports of up to $3.28/gallon about thirty miles south of me. As bad as this disaster is, it´s also a shock to see other disasters being covered up. A single second page article was all that ever made it out over here on the stampede in Iraq that killed nearly a thousand people. No televison, no radio reports.

I would expect just a little bit of civility from people. It isn´t a whole lot to ask. Yes, you are hungry, yes, you are thirsty, but how in the hell are you going to use that 42&quot; flat screen TV when your house is under 10 feet of water, and you don´t have electricity even if it wasn´t? Many people went to the convention center to sleep last night, and this morning several people told reporters that three people were murdered, many people were robbed at gunpoint, and women were raped, right there in the convention center last night! Instead of sending money for the relief effort, I am tempted to take the few hundred I was going to send and by myself a gun instead. Just in case there should be some similar disaster here.

mayhaps i should stock up on photo-lithium batteries and film, yes its probably heartless, but should i be near something like this, i want to capture it, so people will know what happened when everything cleared up.

Wouldn´t going out and buying a gun be the same type of action that brought around all of the fear of people running around with guns in the first place? <img src=smilies/icon_smile_tongue.gif width=15 height=15 border=0 align=middle> You know what really makes me sick? How reporters down <b>IN </b> New Orleans, <b>AROUND </b> all the devastation, are setting up their little cameras, checking their hair and make-up, go on air, talking about how all these people need all of this help, and then as soon as they are done with their live feed, <b>BAM </b> pack up and <b>LEAVE </b>! <img src=smilies/icon_smile_disapprove.gif width=15 height=15 border=0 align=middle> Geez! Why beat around the bush? Those reporters might as well go up to some of those people and say &quot;Thanks! All this air time is REALLY helping out my career, kudos, good luck and whatever!&quot; And then punch them in the gut. Might as well, if they´re going to be a pricks, might as well go big. And like I said before, this looting is really making me sick. New Orleans´ 1500 police had to switch from search and rescue to controlling mobs and looting. A news article I read spoke about how some residents tried to steal an MP´s rifle, and he got shot in the leg. The U.S. National guard has <i>graciously </i> sent 100 troops to help coordinate the tens of thousands of people left in New Orleans. All we need now is Mel Gibson to reprise his role of Mad Maxx, and we´re all set. EDIT: Just had an evil conspiracy thought. What if the government is purposefully letting crap go out of hand and let people shoot each other because New Orleans is a poverty stricken city: <font size=1 face="trebuchet ms"><BLOCKQUOTE><hr size=1 noshade> New Orleans has one of the highest poverty rates of any of America´s big cities. According to a report by Total Community Action, a New Orleans public advocacy group, nearly one out of three New Orleans residents live below the poverty level, the majority of who are black. A spokesperson for the United Negro College Fund noted that the city´s poor live in some of the most dilapidated, and deteriorated housing in the nation. <hr size=1 noshade></BLOCKQUOTE></font><font face=´trebuchet ms, Verdana, Arial, Helvetica´ size=2> - From <A href=´http://www.blacknews.com/pr/looting101.html´ Target=_Blank>Click here</a> I would think most of the people who didn´t leave New Orleans were not people who didn´t want to, but people who couldn´t (no car, no other place to stay or go, etc.) Wouldn´t it be horrible if secretly the government was letting all this violence and death happen because it´d get rid of some of the &quot;lower level society&quot;? Then you could conveniently blame it on the natural disaster. I don´t mean to say this to offend anyone, but the lack of federal cooperation in this disaster is disturbing. Edited by - Sylverfysh on 9/1/2005 3:36:15 PM

news just in:- Pres Bush on tv said that no-one could foresee the levees would break and that no-one can be blamed... hmmm. US Army Corps of Engineers said back in <i>May </i> in an official structural report that the levees needed major remedial and redesign work to avoid a disaster, but that with the then current funding restrictions, it wouldnt be possible. oh dear <img src=smilies/icon_smile_sad.gif width=15 height=15 border=0 align=middle>

The government response was inadequete. They should have enlisted mass evacuation vehciles and services (including public and military vehicles) BEFORE the damned hurricane, and provided plentiful quantities of supplies to any remaining shelters. They additionally should have intialized shelters exogenic to New Orleans, to ship evacuees after and before the strom to. Also, supplies and transport should have been transferred to New Orleans and other affected areas at least the day after the hurricane. Even now BARELY any supplies or transport has been supplied, and the only major exogenic shelter has been supplied voluntarily by Texas. The quantities of supplies and troops shipped, even now, are miniscule. Thousands are starving and dehydrated, strife has intialized, and many are dead, even in the &quot;shelters&quot;! Champ Job, guys, champ job. Edited by - Andkat on 9/1/2005 5:39:58 PM

Sorry andkat, they were given a lot of warning and could have left before it hit. Most, as always, decided to stay and ride it out. Coastal people are not bright in that area. Warning are always given , but few heed it. Times like this, should be a wake up call to others. As to government sending in help? before it comes ashore, you don´t know the exact place that will recieve damage, nor can the &quot;Resuers&quot; be put in harms way waiting to help. Also noted, mississipy(sp) was hit with twisters as was Georgia. Those towns/areas lost lives as well and need help to rebuild. N O was just the most damaged due to the water, which if it had been just rain, would have held. But this storm was dropping 10 0r more inches of rain in an hour. No levie or dam could handle that much at one time. If you want to asign blame, put it on the builders who put a city below sea level next to a river and a lake. till then, FEMA and others will have to handle the work. Too many cooks in the kitchen get in each others way and slow the help down. <img src=smilies/icon_smile_wink.gif width=15 height=15 border=0 align=middle>