[StBernard] Anniversary - St. Bernard - Still "Absent"

[Westley Annis]

The liberal media continues to ignore St. Bernard Parish's "right" to exist
as victims of Katrina. 

As though St. Bernard has most conveniently been swept under a rug because
it does not fit into a "socially-economic" model for Hurricane
Katrina--wouldn't you say? The media is chock-full of New Orleans
homeowners, students and those who left the Crescent City in search of
refuge. Many were stuck where fate controlled their destination. The media
followed them there with interviews, reports and a plethora of attention.

St. Bernard Parish got the trickle and to many - like the underside of a
vehicle, the shaft.

Newspapers, news agencies and the websites promote an agenda of "helping the
poor" while ignoring the mentally and physically devestated people from a
parish that deserved honors for their courage in facing not only a
hurricane, but it's aftermaths which include FEMA, gutting, summertime lawn
and garden care, lack of money, problems in governments and a myriad
"daggers" which struck with pinpoint accuracy to each and every heart of our
community and inhabitants--both inplaced and displaced.

As this is the anniverary many of us anxiously approached as a "healing
point" to recovery we still feel our lives not ours quite yet to be in
control. Tens of thousands in St. Bernard and away want to go on, but having
to rely on third party financial help--we're faced with indecisions yet
about our futures.

To many of us, we'll have to go it alone. Others will be like elephants. We
may forgive, but we shall never forget anytime soon.

--jer--