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New Orleans Schoolgirls Demand Levees
Posted by wizeGurl
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[Activists] |
| When President Bush visited New Orleans for the first time in 3 months, he was greeted by a group of Catholic schoolgirls demanding Category 5 levee protection and coastal restoration. The girls wore life jackets and swim masks over their school uniforms, and carried signs that demanded the right to feel safe in their homes. |
The demonstration, organized by a parent who had lost everything in the flooded Lakeview area of the city, was non-partisan; the organizers asked that no political signs be brought, and the school had recently re-elected Bush in a mock election. Organizers stated that they wanted action in Washington to provide strong levees and protective coastal restoration, and they wanted both parties to help them get it.
Parents had to sign permission slips to allow their daughters to participate in the demonstration, which took place in an activity period so no class time was missed. From a private school with a pre-Katrina enrollment of 269, 230 girls attended the gathering. Clearly, even the mostly-white, upper-middle-class citizens and children of New Orleans want their levees, and they want them bad.
Signs seen at the protest included "Levees or life jackets," "Party Affiliation: Louisianian," "It takes a levy to make a levee," and "Thomas Jefferson thought Louisiana was worth the $." Girls also wore pieces of masking tape on their foreheads marked "water line." In many New Orleans neighborhoods, the actual water lines were several feet above the forehead-level of a teenage girl.
As the event's organizer pointed out, "Cat 3 ain’t going to do it. Been there, done that, got flooded." |
Read more about it in the NY Times, the The Advocate of Baton Rouge, and the Times-Picayune. |
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cool
Posted by PinkElephantsShouldNotBeLetRunAroundLikeThis on 2006-01-17 19:56:52 | | das coo |
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