In this thread it was asserted that, in a month, the Katrina story would have no more significance than one about “missind white women.” I disagreed and promised to check back.
This google search brings up at least 333 discrete Katrina related stories. Katrina was a headline story on NPR this morning. Locally, Katrina is in the news daily, with most of the stories being displacee related.
So what say ye Merijeek, Harborwolf, and Finnagain? Do you feel that your predictions were accurate?
NPR had several stories on Katrina today. The big 2 were the Army Core of Engineers expect to have the Dike system rebuit by June 2006 and Charity Hospital will need to be taken down and it will be a long time before it is replaced.
I have heard daily reports in Hard News, Business news and Fluff pieces. (Best friends reunited: Boy gets dog back).
On a related note, it is interesting how Katrina killed 1000 or so and dominated the news for a month, while Tuesday’s Stan has killed at least 230 and has already disappeared off the BBC front page. If there was a feeling that black urban Americans were “worth less” than white suburban Americans, then Guatemalans must be loose change.
I’m not one of the people you mentioned, but found this thread interesting because the newscast I watched this morning (CBS) centered mostly around this story about a missing white woman. Granted, this one’s body has now been found. I don’t remember hearing anything about Katrina.*
(I only watched for about half an hour, but it was the first half-hour of the newscast. If there were Katrina stories, they weren’t in that first half-hour.)
Just an observation.
They’re not American. Now, if there were four American tourists who died in that one, they’d be all over the news.
Funny, I could swear I read “Central American death toll: 230 and rising”. I guess they’re not in the right county.
Let’s see New Orleans, a huge and World famous city submerged, a large part of the oil industry was shut down and 3 levels of Government of the “only remaining superpower”[sup]TM[/sup] failed miserably. Don’t you think that was legitimately more important world news than Stan. I know I am being callous about the deaths, but Katrina was more about Government Failure, Lawlessness, and huge economic impact.
More important, certainly - even the straight death toll would warrant greater coverage. But still, I am surprised by the sheer magnitude of the discrepancy: it almost didn’t make the news at all.
USAans often refer to the US as America. Please don’t try to turn that into some sort of political incorrectness.
Thats fair to say. Stan impacted a country of very little importance to the UK and limited importance to the US & Canada, so therefore, our respective News Agencies barely cover it.
Earthquakes, hurricanes, Famine, Floods probably strike a half dozen times a year that do serious damage. (Hundreds killed). This is a small news item most of the time.
Katrina was on a vastly different scale. Their has rarely been a similar disaster in the TV & Internet age with the dozens of angles and the huge impact.
Seriously. Don’t be obtuse.
I’ll admit that there’s still more coverage than I thought there would be.
However, let’s take a look at what’s going on right now on various websites.
Foxnews: Senate OKs War Funds, Armstrong Probe, Third Suspect Arrested (NY terror deal)
CNN: Economy Bends, not breaks under Katrina, New York spends day on alert after false alarm, A rush, a roar and two villages are gone, Oprah helps nab fugitive sex offender, Will Mini Cooper ride into SUV land?
CBS: NYC Probe Leads To Iraq, Who’s Cleaning Up New Orleans?
ABC: Man Abused Corpse of Missing Girl, Is the Subway Threat Credible?, The Biggest Purcahse of your Life
Google News: New Yorkers Baffled Over Differing Stances on Terrorist Threat, Japanese A-bomb victims congratulate Nobel Peace Prize winners, US September Payrolls Fall 35,000 After Hurricane (Update7), Engines of Ecotourism, Understaffed Wildlife Refuges Still at Risk
IMO, there’s not much on it. FEMA has been forgotten, the various local officials haven’t been pilloried, they are still finding the dead (but that doesn’t get mentioned).
I wonder if it’s time to start pointing fingers yet?
There’s more than I thought there would be. Admittedly, not many white women have disappeared lately, it seems. 
-Joe
Well it would be kinda wonky to feel that they were accurate when they’re obivously not. That sort of resistance to cognitive dissonance is reserved for… other folks 
Well, we dun seen 
I’m happy to note that while our culture’s attention span is normally miniscule, in this case it was longer.
Right now it has as much significance as the boat capsizing in New York and the new supreme court nominee. The “outrage” from the media has faded. Katrina gets mentioned now in the same breath as any other republican problem. It’s gone from a catastrophy to a political liability.
I also said this…
in that thread.
The story remains, but the medias testicles have gone away. I stand by my statement.
The original exchange may have taken place in the Pit but this thread isn’t a rant, flame or even very impassioned argument. Which isn’t a bad thing at all, mind, just more suited to IMHO than the Pit.
Over it goes…
Veb
Katrina isn’t front page news anymore. It basically lingers, as 9/11, as an excuse for everything from the price of tacks to the price of rabbit food.
That horse has already left the barn.
I guess it matters whether you mean U.S. or global news.
Here in Mississippi, Katrina is still in the news.
From schools on the coast strugging to get up and running, dentists’ offices and engineering firms trying to locate paperwork and workspace to get up and running, to communities struggling to assimilate the huge numbers of folks who have relocated there… it’s staggering.
My daughter was supposed to enroll in University in New Orleans this fall. Instead, she fled as a “transient” student to Mississippi State.
There are many students at State from the Coast who have no home left. Nothing.
I don’t want to appear callous, but it seems that in the big news of New Orleans’ troubles, no one appears to think of the devastation on the Louisiana, Missisippi, and Alabama coast populations.
Yes, Katrina is still a big story here. And will be for years to come. 
This one?–
Picked the words but missed the point. Man you’re adorable.
The point I was getting at, since you seemed to have missed it, was that the medias “outrage” would last as long as the publics attention span did. As I said in my earlier post, Katrina is still in the news but it isn’t the main issue. The medias testicles have disappeared again like I said they would. Do you deny this, or are you going to keep being cute?