What You See Is Not Always What You Get;

Nobody’s Opinion; Good Lord…there was so much stuff on Katrina today that you would have sworn that no time had passed at all. Every single cable station and radio station was reliving Geraldo’s Oscar winning performance.

I almost went outside to look for incoming water.

It was obvious the media was more than happy to get off the John Karr embarrassment. Once again, our keystone cops with it seems, our more usual than not incompetent justice system, arrested a guy without checking out any facts at all. (John Karr)

We can’t do anything right it seems. O.J. was bad enough---9/11, well, supposeively no one had a clue. Most of us can agree we haven’t seen real justice in quite some time.

In fact, it seems to only happen in the movies.

The former past few weeks monolithic news obsession with the Middle East war, and the depressing but obvious fact that Israel and America caved in to the sensitive thugs at the United Nations, was getting us all down. It was demoralizing to hear Iran and Hezbollah parading their peacock victory rants on every news station.

So the Jon-Bonet resurrection was actually perfect timing. I don’t know about you, but that guy looked just a little too confident that he was going to be released no matter what he said. And then we had to watch him being wined and dined, after admitting to a murder. I’m sure I’m not the only one who thought he looked like Oswald--a patsy. It’s not going too far in thinking that this was a story thrown to the frenzied media, to get us to look the other way; to cover up the war.

After all, it was the John Karr story that saved us all from hearing over and over about the defeat of Israel, which has emboldened all of the Islamic World to go into a feeding frenzy for the destruction of America and all Jews.

Better we are focused on that pretty little girl, than the terrorists wanting to kill us.

In the meantime Mayor Ray Nagin, the puppet pimp for the Democratic attack machine, has been for the last few days attacking everyone Republican about the reasons the dikes broke, why the people were stranded, how the Federal Government was responsible for everything that happened, etc., etc.,

But that’s what the Democrats do…when guilty, they attack. Like the lover who has been caught in lies, the best defense is the offense, and nobody does it better then the liberals.

President Bush gave a speech in New Orleans today in which he looked like he was on the verge of a complete breakdown. He can barely read, let alone sound optimistic. He is so bad, that even the usual Bush haters are leaving him alone.

Actually, the big and ominous news from Iraq today was the very subdued story that the great Iraq Army went out with our guns, and…joined the other side. They don’t want to go beyond the street in front of their houses to actually go shot anyone.

The free guns, money, clothes, and pay were worth the training though.

Sure, everyone wants freedom. But they have to know what it is before they want it. Iraq hasn’t seen freedom in over 40 years…and that’s just the men. The women have never seen it.

America was free for over a hundred years before King George started getting tyrannical.

So… why do we keep arming our enemies, and teaching them how to fight? You’d think they’d have learned their lesson after arming bin Laden and the Taliban.

But, I got off the subject…sorry.

I was thinking about New Orleans today, (how could I not help?) and just how one little story, can affect the attitude and even economics of a whole nation. A story I witnessed.

Most of us have been to New Orleans, just to experience Mardi Gras. I went once when I was eighteen with my brother to visit a friend of ours, who played bass for Al Hirt’s band.

Now Al Hirt was not only a great and fabulous musician, (the triple tongue King), but he was also a great patron of the parade, and dearly loved all over the city. The man was a legend not only in his music, but in his generosity. Al Hirt and Pete Fountain (anyone under twenty-five, substitute your favorite musicians.) put Beale Street on the map. After their hit records, the tourists starting pouring in to New Orleans from all over.

Now New Orleans has always been a town of whores, musicians, and a port for the sailors, even before WWI. Louie Armstrong describes it pretty well in his autobiography. The whorehouses alone were known all over the world.

After the 1960s, it became haven for the gays. It had the reputation of a garden of hedonism and drugs, and it’s no wonder it was Bill Clinton’s favorite American City. (My Life)

But during the time I was there, it was considered pretty safe for tourists.

You can imagine how excited I was, being out of town for the first time in my life, and being allowed for the first time into a bar. The story starts the night before FAT TUESDAY, and Al Hirt was feeling no pain, as he got up to perform that night in his club.

Al was totally smashed, his picture from that night with me and my brother is above. His lip was swollen up as big as an apple. You see, the story was going around in the city that someone in the crowd had thrown a ROCK at the float that Al Hirt was on it, and it busted his lip up pretty bad. But the real story was that Al had had just a little too much beer and fallen down and cut his lip on a beer can. Rod, the bass player told us not to tell anyone.

So that’s the story that came out all over the nation. New Orleans was no longer safe to visit; Mardi Gras had lost all control. Al Hirt had been viciously attacked. For many years after that, Mardi Gras attendance went down substantially. Everyone then thought it was a city of violence. Who knows how much that story cost the city in lost revenue?

And it was all because they didn’t want to hurt Al, which could be expected. BUT, if the media had thought (hmmm, is this true?) or maybe not even reported it, maybe New Orleans would be more like a Las Vegas now.

Now, I don’t think Al drank much, and I say that because anyone that drank a lot could never have gotten so smashed. And Rod said that he never drank when working.

But that night, was an exception.

What is truly amazing is that the man played from 8 pm until about 4 am in the morning, with a lip that must have been killing him.

He never missed a note. Not one. Jumbo was a giant.

In fact he told us at 1 pm. “I’m going to lock you all in and play the rest of the night, so leave now if you don’t want to stay. “ It was the biggest night of Mardi Gras and he was not going to let us down.

No one left. The music that was made that night was almost beyond human. Dixieland was alive and well…the spirit of New Orleans was kicking Creole…and I, lucky soul, was witness to a concert never repeated.

Many will miss that spirit if it doesn’t come back. So far, it doesn’t look to hopeful.

But back to the point; the competition in the media is so great for ratings now, that anything goes. We all thought the Superdome was a hotbed of gangs, rapes and murders.

Now, it is reported, it wasn’t. I don’t think anyone will ever know the truth.

Frankly, it seems to this nobody that the news is more and more an engine to control just what THEY want us all to be focusing on…telling us not only what stories they think is important, but filling us with disinformation only to come back and change the story.

While the real stories that are going on are never told; like, just why is our President falling apart before our very eyes. Since no one will report it, we can only guess.

Someday the truth is going to come crashing down on us all. When that happens, Katrina I fear will be just a mild warm-up to what we didn’t know.


Nobody’s Perfect; Right---time and time again we heard that the neglect of the city after Katrina was Nagin’s fault, that it was the governor’s fault, that it was the President’s fault, that it was FEMA’s fault. There was so many at fault for Katina, it seems almost planned.

Nobody Knows; Will the population of New Orleans come back? Will the Mexicans move in instead? Will the rich come in and build some outlandish casinos and homes?
Will Mayor Nagin put Sin City up on his computer sometime soon?

Nobody Cares; Tonight on Fox news with Sheppard Smith, he was standing in front of a newly build million-dollar looking home with a Mercedes in the driveway, and down the street was the levee.

The funny thing was that was the only house on the block. All the other poor shacks were not even fit to live in.

I just wonder if that rich guy is going to want the poor people to come back and get into his neighborhood.