Mr. corporate lackey, leave 'em behind and let god worry about 'em Mayor Ray Nagin has been re-elected. Words fail me.
I was pretty stunned when I read that, too: the guy’s incompetent, slightly racist (or at least makes boneheaded racist remarks), in over his head; he failed New Orleans in the last disaster and will fail in the next.
Thought no. 1: “New Orleans deserves whatever it gets, now.”
Thought no. 2: “Oh, right. The U.S. reelected an incompetent President, so we deserve whatever we get, too.” I just feel sorry for the unfortunate New Orleanians who didn’t vote for Nagin, like those of us who didn’t vote for Bush.
What do you mean, leave 'em behind? IIRC, Nagin stayed in New Orleans during the post-Katrina crisis.
Granted, he did NOT have a successful disaster plan for the city, by any means, but having lived in New Orleans I doubt they’ve ever had a mayor who would have done better.
Whatever else his failings, I got the sense he did an acceptable job of “going down with the ship” by staying in the city when things got ugly. He sent his family to Baton Rouge, and presumably could have gone himself if he were that kind of guy.
I’m not surprised, but I think it’s a stupid and disappointing development.
I wonder about the “slightly” part.
I lived in D.C. when my fair city reelected Marion Barry. I’m not stunned at all. I’m a little surprised by the narrow victory, actually, but the demographics of NOLA were altered pretty radically by Katrina, so there’s probably not much to explain.
Moving thread from IMHO to MPSIMS.
There are people who were with the mayor’s staff who report some pretty “skittish” behavior. But as you say, he remained in the city. Didn’t stay at the EOC, but was relatively close.
That said, I am disappointed in the results (I live just outside N.O. on the northshore). Whether Mitch Landrieu would have been better, I am not sure. But he would have been a different face.
One thing to remember, Nagin is an honest person. At least from everything I have heard and seen. Not a very successful leader, but refreshingly honest.
As far as doing well during/after the storm, ask yourself who would have done well? A few ex-military types did a great job, but every politician around was overwhelmed. The mayor of my city (Slidell) is an ex-marine and ex-police chief, he handled the storm pretty well. But believe me, not many people did. There is something particularly unsettling about losing your home, community, and country all in one day. Even if for only a few days. People’s home were gone, their entire community was gone, their country was cut off from them and not responding, it was a difficult few days. And I wasn’t even here-I evacuated. But lots and lots of people are dealing with the aftereffects and it isn’t easy. In other disasters people have their homes to go back to, their community is still there. That is a powerful anchor to help with coping.
Sigh. I would have liked to see a change in N.O. I suspect that it means the entire city and area will have to cut way back.
Didn’t he come to office on an anti-corruption platform? From what I understood, his efforts were long on promise, but rather short on results, mostly rounding up a few crooked taxi cabbies but otherwise leaving the notorious system of NOLA patronage intact.
I can’t wait to see the “Welcome to Chocolatetown” signs next time I go down there.
Ahem. Chocolate City. “Chocolatetown” is the offramp from the Hershey Highway.
Would he have likely been re-elected if Katrina had never happened?
There are never any certainties in New Orleans politics, but had Katrina not impacted us as severely, he had a lock on a second term. Ray had made a great deal of progress in modernizing the way the city did business. Ray is honest, and had rooted out some of the corruption in City Hall. He was pretty well liked. He inherited a lot of messes, including inadequate emergency preparedness.
He, like a lot of us here, put emergency planning on the back burner figuring that other issues were more pressing. Oops.
Let’s not forget that on Friday August 26th forecasts showed the storm headed to the Florida Panhandle. On Saturday the 27th those predictions changed. Most people started to leave on Sunday. By 5:00 am on Monday the flooding started. He didn’t have much time to work with.
That said, I’m not happy about the elections. We had the chance to get some innovative people, but the balkanized and racially charged atmosphere made their election impossible. We’ll soldier on, I guess, but man: we sure look stupid.
Not sure this is accurate but I heard that the voter turn out was roughly 36%. Seems that most NOLA residents would have a slightly elevated interest in their immediate future. But I guess even after the flood apathy waters run still and deep.
I’m with, “they deserve the gov’t they get”.
Is that a percentage of current residents, or the pre-Katrina population? If the latter, it’s worth noting many NOLA citizens currently do not reside in NOLA, and a fair proportion of them aren’t sure yet if they can or want to return. Anyone here an absentee balloter? What was the percentage of displaced and current residents who voted? Anyone know?
I have not seen anything with regards to the percentage of absentee ballots requested vs. sent in. Various new outlets report that 113,591 votes were cast in the mayoral race which represents about 38% voter turnout. The overall population in the metropolitan area has dropped at least 1/3, with many people in Houston, Atlanta, and other places.
To compare, turnout was as follows in past presidential elections:
2004: 55.3%
2000: 51.3%
1996: 49.1%
1992: 55.1%
1988: 50.1%
So… figure that a significant percentage of registered voters didn’t vote due to displacement, hassles with absentee voting, or didn’t like the available candidates, 38% isn’t too bad. Nothing to brag about either, for that matter.
Hey, that Brownie’s doin a heck of a job!
[size=1]I am so going to hell.
Nah, I think failing to close your “size” tag only sends you to heck.
This just in for the curious (or bored): there were 24,848 absentee ballots returned, or 21.87% of the total votes cast.
Whatever it is, they now have the same guy that brought them through the Katrina disaster.
It ain’t my fight, I am just happy that the folk of New Orleans are happy, and I hope their great choice brings them through the next disaster as well as he brought them through the first one. The People have spoken.
Whoa! Hold on just a minute. Nagin was with us during the disaster, but he didn’t exactly bring us through. And, not too many people are happy right now. I think if you took a poll of New Orleanians you’d find that about 60% of the citizens would prefer someone else as mayor. In my particular case, I didn’t want to vote for Nagin or for Landrieu. A small percentage of the people, but enough to re-elect Nagin, have spoken. Now we’ll see what he makes of the opportunity.