you really must understand the present:

Even here in California, 50% of cars on the freeway are SUVs, and they're political statements: they say, we're going to take the rest of the world down with us because we don't give a damn. Essentially they're Republican vehicles: when you see an SUV go by, you know the driver voted for Bush ...

So it'll come down to another election - and with the last two elections both in their different ways perhaps having been stolen, we can't even really count on democracy anymore. It's pretty scary here ...

The current guy is worthless, probably the worst president in American history. There's a sort of stupid, small-minded meanness - a pathological assholery - to him. I think he likes doing bad things. And I think a fair amount of his base approves of that resentment - against the idea of progress, against the future, against the rest of the world ...

-- Kim Stanley Robinson, via Guardian Unlimited

(Incidently, the author of my most-favorite sci-fi novel of all time -- one of my favorite novels period -- not to mention one of the best series ever written.)

One part boredom, two parts curiosity... no, make that ten parts boredom, two parts curiosity. Either way, this is what you get. Credit to Gabe Rockefeller for the original idea and much of the units-to-English translation that made this all worthwhile in the first place (we use "worthwhile" very loosely here, for obvious reasons). Tap that image to get more explanation, although it's about as un-interesting as it looks from here.

(Really, I just wanted an excuse to play with flickr, and without a digital camera the opportunity doesn't present itself that often.)

"There ought to be zero tolerance of people breaking the law during an emergency such as this," Bush said in an interview on ABC's "Good Morning America."

"If people need water and food, we're going to do everything we can to get them water and food," Bush added. "It's very important for the citizens in all affected areas to take personal responsibility and assume a kind of a civic sense of responsibility so that the situation doesn't get out of hand, so people don't exploit the vulnerable."

-- washington post

If only Mr. Dubya were one of the recently homeless "living" in what was the poorest urban area in the country, and what is now a low-lying lake filled with pieces of what used to build a city... then maybe he'd understand. Well, maybe if he wasn't retarded in the first place, that'd help too. Because civic sense is no sweat when civilization's played rochambeau with a category five.

Update 09.02.05, direct from the "front lines":

There are many infants and elderly people among them, as well as many people who were injured jumping out of windows to escape flood water and the like -- all of them in dire straights.

Any attempt to flag down police results in being told to get away at gunpoint. Hour after hour they watch buses pass by filled with people from other areas. Tensions are very high, and there has been at least one murder and several fights. 8 or 9 dead people have been stored in a freezer in the area, and 2 of these dead people are kids.

The people are so desperate that they're doing anything they can think of to impress the authorities enough to bring some buses. These things include standing in single file lines with the eldery in front, women and children next; sweeping up the area and cleaning the windows and anything else that would show the people are not barbarians.

-- Survival of New Orleans. Heartwrenching.

American Red Cross. Donate bitches!

Update 09.06.05:

"Out of the rubbles of Trent Lott's house -- he's lost his entire house -- there's going to be a fantastic house. And I'm looking forward to sitting on the porch. (Laughter.)"

-- Pres. Bush, whitehouse.gov

If you're shaking your head too, it's not a joke, he really said that. Lott's house must have been so large that it didn't just turn into rubble but rubbles (and rubbles and rubbles...). That's a big mo'fucking house.