Interesting. There are two versions of this story, one that emphasizes "food", one that calls people "thugs" and emphasizes the shootings.
NEW ORLEANS - Mayor Ray Nagin ordered 1,500 police officers to leave their search-and-rescue mission Wednesday night and return to the streets to stop looting that has turned increasingly hostile as the city plunges deeper into chaos.
"They are starting to get closer to heavily populated areas, hotels, hospitals, and we're going to stop it right now," Nagin said in a statement to The Associated Press.
The number of officers called off the search-and-rescue mission amounts to virtually the entire police force in New Orleans.
Amid the turmoil Wednesday, thieves commandeered a forklift and used it to push up the storm shutters and break the glass of a pharmacy. The crowd stormed the store, carrying out so much ice, water and food that it dropped from their arms as they ran. The street was littered with packages of ramen noodles and other items.
Looters also chased down a police truck full of food. The New Orleans police chief ran off looters while city officials themselves were commandeering equipment from a looted Office Depot. During a state of emergency, authorities have broad powers to take private supplies and buildings for their use.
At one store, hordes of people from all ages, races and walks of life grabbed food and water. Some drove away with trunkloads of beer. At one point, two officers drew their guns on the looters, but the thieves left without incident.
One young man was seen wading through chest-deep floodwater, carrying a case of soda, after looting a grocery store.
Police officers were asking residents to give up any firearms before they evacuated neighborhoods because police desperately needed the firepower: Some officers who had been stranded on the roof of a hotel said they were being shot at overnight.
"It's really difficult because my opinion of the looting is it started with people running out of food, and you can't really argue with that too much," Nagin said. "Then it escalated to this kind of mass chaos."
Gov. Kathleen Blanco said she has asked the White House to send more people to help with evacuations and rescues, thereby freeing up National Guardsmen to stop looters.
Then we have this under the title, "New Orleans Cops Told to Stop Looters" Notice the contrast between the stories.
NEW ORLEANS - With thousands feared dead and the city's remaining residents told to evacuate for weeks, conditions deteriorated further in submerged New Orleans as looting spiraled out of control.
Mayor Ray Nagin ordered virtually the entire police force to abandon search-and-rescue efforts and stop thieves who were becoming increasingly hostile.
"They are starting to get closer to heavily populated areas, hotels, hospitals, and we're going to stop it right now," Nagin said Wednesday.
Tempers also were starting to flare. Police said a man in Hattiesburg, Miss., fatally shot his sister in the head over a bag of ice. Dozens of carjackings were reported, including a nursing home bus and a truck carrying medical supplies for a hospital. Some police officers said they had been shot at.
Even as stopping the looting became a top priority, Tenet HealthCare Corp. asked authorities late Wednesday to help evacuate a fully functioning hospital in Gretna after a supply truck carrying food, water and medical supplies was held up at gunpoint.
"There are physical threats to safety from roving bands of armed individuals with weapons who are threatening the safety of the hospital," said spokesman Steven Campanini. He estimated there were about 350 employees in the hospital and between 125 to 150 patients.
Looters used garbage cans and inflatable mattresses to float away with food, clothes, TV sets — even guns. Outside one pharmacy, thieves commandeered a forklift and used it to push up the storm shutters and break through the glass. The driver of a nursing-home bus surrendered the vehicle to thugs after being threatened.
Both stories are from the AP. It shows the power that words have-one paints a picture of hungry desperate people- the other, lawless bands of armed thugs.
Just be glad it wasn't your city. Apparently the Dept. of Homeland Security, the people who are replacing FEMA, are a big fucking joke. Maybe if New Orleans had been overrun by a gang of gay terrorists giving out free abortions there might have been a more coordinated response to this disaster.