America Needs To
Hear Mayor Nagin's
Entire Interview
From Bob Barnes
9-4-5
Jeff...
This morning I happened to catch the ENTIRE playback of an interview
(done last night on WWL Radio) of New Orleans Mayor Nagin on CNN. THIS
RECORDED INTERVIEW NEEDS TO BE ON YOUR WEBSITE! It needs to be played
on your program and stored in your archives. The networks have reduced
it to highly edited sound bytes that simply DO NOT convey the Mayor's
frustration with the lack of prompt, active response from FEMA and the
US Govt, particularly the President.
In the wee hours (between 5 & 6AM, Indiana time) CNN broadcast the
entire (approx 10-min) interview during which Nagin alternately cursed
and pled with the federal government to speed help in the form of
troops, buses, and rescue equipment. The language was EXTREMELY base
and gutsy (and "un-bleeped")... but the logic, though interspersed
with emotional desperation, was bluntly to the point.
At one point, he called for a "moratorium on press conferences" until
all Americans were safe. At the end, both the Mayor and the
interviewer became speechless. The silence went on for what seemed
like an eternity--so long that I thought something had gone wrong with
the feed. Then... I could faintly hear both men sobbing... the Mayor,
having verbally vomited his frustration and despair, abruptly excused
himself and hung up.
Just prior to the playback of this interview, CNN anchor Carol
Whatever read a statement (which I'm sure you've heard quoted by now)
from the LA Governor that said (to looters) that National Guard troops
were on their way, were "locked and loaded with orders to shoot to
kill, and if necessary, THEY WILL."
Then, following these two truly shocking reports, CNN switched to a
staff reporter who was a native of casino-strewn Biloxi for a neat,
pre-edited report on her home town during which she interviewed her
high school classmates (all white, of course, well dressed, clean, and
with near-perfect makeup and operable cell phones) and visited the
now-destroyed home in which she grew up.
The piece closed with her gathering an armload of bricks ("one for
each of my family") and walking off from the camera. When the anchor
returned for a split-screen interview with the reporter, she was near
tears and actually said, "You really got to me with the bricks." What
the hell is WRONG in this country? Why do we have such a diametric,
black-and-white measuring stick for what we percieve as "survival?"
Desperate blacks being threatened for looting food and medicine while
studio anchors are "got to" by affluent whites gathering bricks as
souvenirs... I was embarassed.
To CNN's credit, their reporters in the field kept raising the obvious
irony. "WE made it into the area... why can't FEMA?" And they DID
spend some of the 6-7am spot putting some hard, on-camera interview
pressure on a FEMA representative and the Gov of LA, all of which they
dodged (of course) with the standard macro-key phrases engineered to
become soundbites... which, by 7AM they all HAD! Miles O'Brien was so
obviously angry with the Governor's "verbal dodgeball" that he closed
the interview without comment (unheard of for a TEE-VEE journalist)
and didn't even thank the Governor for her time.
Nothing, however, could match the intensity, the heartbreak, the
irony, and the sheer SHAME induced by the un-edited stuff they rushed
to air in the wee hours of dawn. Unfortunately, most of America will
never hear or see it!
My son-in-law is a Sgt in the Indiana Guard and will be shipping out
to the disaster area within 48 hours. That's not soon enough for the
people dying in the stench of their own waste in the streets of The
Big Easy, but when IS the right time to dispatch an Iraq War vet with
4 kids (2 under age 3) back into harm's way... This time IN OUR OWN
COUNTRY?
If our politicians and bureaucrats would get out from behind their
podiums roll up their Y-S-L sleeves, and get to work dropping supplies
to desperate people, there wouldn't BE any more looting. And the truly
sad part is, our troops may be ordered or forced to fire on "looters"
who are in desperate NEED of food, clothing, and medicine which we
should have been dropping "Afghanistan-style" on that city within
hours--not days--of the flooding. The TRUE scum-bag looters have long
since stripped the malls and are sitting somewhere high and dry on a
stack of wide screen TVs drawing a bead on a rescue helicopter.
If, God forbid, our sons and daughters are ordered to "shoot to kill"
a fellow American, I wonder if they will be able to do it? And, if so,
I wonder how they will live with it for the rest of their lives.
God help New Orleans...
God help America...
God help us all.
.
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