Gee 18,000 hotel rooms of idiots from out of state who can’t drive worth a crap. Half of fucking downtown blocked off I’m guessing. Plus a bunch of slimball reporters and lobbyists stinkin up my city. Can’t we please send them to NO?
Maybe we can russle up old Dick Lamm to to tell them to fuck off, like he did to the Olympic Commitee.
http://blogs.ameriteach.com/art-cain/2006/12/18/microsoft-tech-ed-2007-changed-to-orlando.html
Since MS did this as a support/PR move, and since they lost face backing off on it - my guess is that this was not done lightly - that there were logistical difficulties.
Thanks for the cite. Here’s another from the New Orleans Times Picayune.
“This month, 103 of the 162 flights the airport averaged pre-Katrina will fly from the city. The flights will yield about 12,600 seats, down from 20,600 before the storm.” Or about 64% (based on number of flights), which while not great, is more than the “about half” figure claimed by Microsoft.
Based on another quote from that article, we’re at 70% of capacity before Katrina, with plans in place to improve that figure throughout this year. It’s kind of a catch-22, though. Airlines won’t add flights if there’s not enough demand; conventions won’t schedule if there’s not enough flights. We need conventions to increase demand.
So, while Microsoft believes that NOLA may not be the best choice for this summer, I still believe that we’re capable of hosting a political convention in 2008.
What is the hotel/restaurant/event staffing like? I was under the impression that city population was at about 60% of pre-storm levels as well. (and did you see that University of New Orleans study I linked earlier? More are thinking of leaving…)
But that’s a huge risk for the Dems. TechEd - while its a huge convention - is not nearly the three ring circus that a nomination convention is. Believing NOLA will be ready and NOLA already having a track record of being able to host large conventions post-Katrina are two seperate things. I’m not risking the next presidency on “we think we can pull this off in New Orleans.”
A convention that is not done well will get spun by the GOP to be “the Dems are trying on purpose to make us look bad” - regardless of if its the Dems fault or if its the logistics of NOLA. Hell, just picking NOLA will get spun as “the Dems are trying to make us look bad.” Too politically loaded, too partisan, too risky. Even without Katrina, the racial issues of New Orleans make it look pandering. Add in the whole “will the logistics actually be feasible?” and its a very risky move.
And if the whole thing goes off without a hitch, the GOP can say “see what a good job we did with the hurricane recovery.”
Also Ivorybill, your linked article says that there was “virtually no international travel the entire year”. So in fairness, lack of international travel would affect MS’s convention more than the Dem’s
Overall population in the New Orleans city limits is down by roughly 50%. Many of those folks have moved to nearby neighboring communities within the greater metropolitan area and commute in to work. The Central Business District, Financial District, and French Quarter are probably between 80% and 90% of where they were in terms of shops, restaurants, and the like from before the storm.
As far as the UNO study you linked, I confess that I did not take a close look at it. One problem that many demographers are having is that it’s hard to find people using normal approaches short of a full census. For example, counting electrical hookups as an indicator of population levels is prone to big error, since many people are living in trailers with an electrical hookup while working on a house with an electrical hookup. As such, I tend to cast a jaundiced eye at those sorts of estimations, but instead look at the conditions I see around me (I’m looking at the Superdome - - about 100 yards away from my office at the moment) so I like to think that I have a pretty good handle on the pulse of the city.
I believe that if the Democrats had wanted to come here, we could have made it happen. There would have been glitches, certainly, but the convention could occur.
As for your political arguments, personally I think that one factor largely overlooked in this thread is that a lot of the mess can be laid at the feet of the democratic governor and the democratic mayor. Both made huge mistakes with the disaster. One reason the Mississippi disaster effort was better managed than the Louisiana disaster effort is that Gov. Barbour was very specific about what he wanted from the Federal government and FEMA. Governor Blanco was much less specific, according to some reports repeating “Send us everything you’ve got,” rather than requesting, for example, 40,000 MREs and cases of water be delivered to a specific location.
It’s my understanding that in order for the Federal government to make such specific decisions about where to deploy federal assets (Federal troops, National Guard, supplies, materials), the Governor has to give the Feds permission to “federalize” the effort. Governor Blanco took 3 days to decide that no, thank you, I won’t allow you to federalize the recovery effort. This is one major reason significant portions of the Federal effort were so poorly executed - - the state was in the way.
*I’m not * saying that the Feds didn’t make their own mistakes. Down here, FEMA stands for “Fix Everything, MY ASS!”. Regardless, having the convention here carries political risk for fewer potential electoral college rewards.
I understand Microsoft’s decision, but I don’t necessarily agree with it. Yes, some people would be inconvenienced in getting here and getting around here. It’s not like I, and other New Orleanians, have not been inconvenienced daily since late August 2005. If we can survive here full-time, I think some folks can survive for a week or so. But if I were organizing a big meeting and felt that a significant number of people would have a hard time getting there, I’d look for a more stable venue, too. How’s that for talking out of both sides of my mouth?
I’m not going to TechEd this year, but I was also disappointed by Microsoft’s decision. Had they never announced, it would have been one thing, but they did announce, chose to show support for NOLA by having it host a huge convention, and then pulled back. Its not like TechEd would have not sold out. It isn’t like they couldn’t have flown from Europe into New York and then grabbed a connecting flight to NOLA.
Wow, that’s some pretty tough talk. I’ll keep out of Branson. 
Personally, I think it’s a marvelously bad idea to come to Denver unless the candidates are willing to talk western issues: water and fuel. If they don’t, they’re missing a golden opportunity.