You must check out his website (very tongue in cheek, but fun):

http://www.NoneoftheAboveforPresident.com

Way too cool!

Why do people live in New Orleans? It is, as you said, a bowl surrounded by a very thin lip and lots of water. Would you live there? I wouldn’t, but then again, I also wouldn’t live on a known flood plain, near a beach, or in the lee of an active volcano. So why do people live in New Orleans if it’s such a crappy place to be when the weather gets bad?

Maybe it’s because government at all levels makes sure that New Orleans stays where it is and makes sure there are people there to keep it running? Maybe because all the smart responsible people left, and government had to make some deals to get people in, say like subsisidized housing, welfare, tax breaks, etc.?

It’s the same thing about living in a flood plain, or near the ocean - smart responsible people insure their homes against natural disasters, but oddly enough, no private corporate insurance company will insure you against floods. You have to get that from the feds. Insurance companies know that insuring a house ten miles from the Mississippi River for ANY amount is a fool’s bet - the river floods every year to some degree, and annual payouts for flood damage would cripple the company. So they decide not to take the risk, and people who wanted to build either did so at their own risk or built elsewhere. In comes the federal government saying, we’ll sell you flood insurance so you can move to that piece of crap land. People buy it, and your taxes pay for it every year when a river floods and wipes out another couple hundred homes.

I’ll agree with you that people in New Orleans should have had more responsibility and gotten out of there sooner. However, after Katrina had gone, what was the government response? There were private firms ready to move in with donated supplies (Wal-Mart alone had semis full of supplies), but they were blocked by the feds from moving in. People in the Superdome wanted to leave and were prohibited. Reporters exercising their first amendment rights were prohibited from doing so - citizens exercising their second amendment rights were disarmed.

To top it off, the non-responsible members of society were decrying “price gouging” as if they had never heard of “supply and demand” or “capitalism”, and actually were defending looting. When a commodity (hotel rooms, bottled water, blankets, etc.) becomes rare (supplt goes down) and the desire for the commodity increases (demand goes up), then the price for the commodity should increase. If I have ten bottles of water, and one hundred people want them, I can cut the demand down to a reasonable number by increasing the price for the water to whatever people are willing to pay. Once more bottled water comes into the area and the supply increases, then the price will go down because someone else may want to sell their water cheaper. Simple supply and demand economics - it’s how DeBeer’s keeps diamonds valuable, why gold is such a precious metal, and why responsible libertarians like myself and Danny and others are outnumbered 1000 to 1 by fascists and socialists.

How can there be so many poor in the U.S.? You mention illegals working their asses off and being prosperous. What do they have that citizens don’t? Or more to the point, what do they not have to do that we as citizens do? I’d say forking over 33% of their paycheck to income tax, FICA, and Social Security would be a good start - think how prosperous you could be if you had half again as much money in your paycheck as you do now. They get paid under the table, and usually in cash, and don’t have to pay taxes or report it, lest they get deported. They form tight-knit small communities and work together voluntarily to make sure the group prospers. Plus, they do the jobs Americans won’t - I have yet to hear any American complain because they can’t get a job picking tomatos or avocados somewhere…

–Jon

The federal government is not responsible for evacuating people. First, it’s an individual’s responsibility. Then, the city, then the state can assist.

How can that many people be so poor in the United States? Here in California, illegal immigrants work their ass off and help each other out. Within a few years they have cars and apartments.

You should discuss personal responsibility as a libertarian.