EMAIL OF THE DAY

“C’mon, do it; admit Mississippians are a breed apart from New Orleanians. Our people and government care, and we make do. We have learned to take care of our own, as outside help is usually unreliable and often ineffective in the context of our traditional social structures.
From your Sunday link, “The Competence Factor II,” I’m certain you read the Washington Post; but, evidently, any news that differs from your trope of governmental incompetence is unmentionable, such as the attached link. Governor Barbour demonstrated decisive leadership, he pre-positioned assets in Hattiesburg, including his wife and ninety State Troopers, who relayed disaster information back to the state capital of Jackson within hours of the storm surge’s retreat. As First Couple, they have been ubiquitous at the sites of the tragedy, not on radio chat shows or cable news talk fests, assessing and assisting.
The city of Ocean Springs, a beautiful Gulf pearl, with an artistic heritage not unlike your Provincetown, was heavily affected; but, though its plight was ignored by the national media, its people and leaders have pulled together to endure and triumph. I guess if your citizens are not complaining about federal aid to a celebrity reporter in a logo ball cap, pressed shirt, and creased “cargo” pants that has dropped in to exploit your personal tragedy, you don’t warrant attention.
Please draw this regional distinction and the need for differential disaster responses to the attention of your vast readership; or let it inform your thinking about the role of government in a federal system and the flexibility responsible agents need to make to deal effectively with regional differences, even among the states of a region.”