Peço desculpas a quem prefere textos menores, mas essa entrevista me deixou impressionado. Acho que quem ouviu pelo menos um pequeno trecho pelo rádio também deve ter ficado como eu. É uma entrevista de Ray Nagin, mayor de New Orleans à WWL, uma rádio local, após o furacão Katrina. Vale a pena ler até ao fim.INT: Have you talked with the President?
NAGIN: I've talked directly with the President. I've talked to the head of the Homeland Security, I've talked to everybody under the sun, I've been out there, man, I flew these helicopters, been in the crowds, talking to people crying don't know where their, where their relatives are. I've done it all, man, and I tell you, man, Garland, I keep hearing that it's coming. This is coming, that is coming, and my, my answer to that is bullshit, where is the beef. Because there is no beef in this city. There's no beef anywhere in southeast Louisiana, and these goddamned ships that are coming, I don't see 'em.
INT: What did you say to the President of the United States and what did he say to you?
NAGIN: I basically told him we had an incredible, uh, crisis here. And that his flying over in Air Force One does not do it justice. And that I have been all around this city, and I am very frustrated because we are not able to marshal resources and we're outmanned in just about every respect. You know the reason why the looters got out of control? Because we had most of our resources saving people. Thousands of people. That were stuck in attics, man, old ladies, when you pull off the doggone ventilator vent and you look down there and they're standing in there, and in water up to their fricking neck... And they don't have a clue what's going on down there. They flew down here, one time, two days after the doggone event was over, with TV cameras, AP reporters, all kinda goddamned --- excuse my French, everybody in America. But I am pissed.
INT: Did you say... did you say to the President of the United States, "I need the military in here"?
NAGIN: I said I need everything. Now I will tell you this, and I give the President, uh, some credit on this: he sent one John Wayne dude down here that can get some stuff done. And his name is General Honoré. And he came off the doggone chopper, and he started cussing and people started moving. And he's getting some stuff done. They oughtta give that guy --- if they don't wanna give it to me --- give him full authority to get the job done. And we can, we can save some people.
INT: What do you need, right now, to get control of this situation?
NAGIN: I need reinforcements. I need troops, man. I need five hundred buses, man. We're talking about, y'know, one of the briefings we had they were talking about getting uh, uh... y'know, public school bus drivers to come down here and bus people outta here. I'm like, you gotta be kidding me, this is a national disaster! Get every doggone Greyhound bus line in the country and get their asses moving to New Orleans! That's they're thinking small, man, and this is a major, major, major deal. And I can't emphasize it enough, man... this is crazy! I've got fifteen to twenty thousand people over at the Convention Center, it's bursting at the, at the seams, the poor people in Plaquemines Parish, they're at, they're, they're air-evac'ing people over here in New Orleans, we don't have anything, and we're sharing with our brothers in Plaquemines Parish. We, it's, it's it's awful down here, man.
(...)
INT: Well you and I must be in the minority, because there've been apparently, there's a section of our citizenry out there that thinks, uh, because of the law, that says the federal government can't, can't come in unless requested by the proper people, that everything that's going on to this point has been done as good as it could possibly be.
NAGIN: Really?
INT: I know you don't feel that way.
NAGIN: Well, did, the, the tsunami victims request? Go through a formal process to request? Uh, y'know... did Iraq, did the Iraqi people request that we go in there? Did they ask us to go in there? They, what hap... what is more important? This is, and y'know, I, I'm'a tell you, man, I, I am... I'm probably gonna get in a whole bunch of trouble. I'm probably gonna get in so much trouble that it ain't even funny, they probably won't even wanna deal with me after this interview is over.
INT: Well you and I'll be in the funny place together.
NAGIN: But... we authorized eight billion dollars to go to Iraq. Licketys... quick. After 9/11, we gave the President unprecedented powers, licketys... [snaps fingers] quick, to take care of New York and the other places. Now you mean to tell me, that a place where most of your oil is coming through, a place that is so unique, when you mention New Orleans anywhere around the world, everybody's eyes light up. You mean to tell me, that a place where you probably have thousands of people that have died, and thousands more that are dying every day, that we can't figure out a way to authorize... the resources that we need? Come on, man. Y'know, I'm not one of those drug addicts. I am thinking very clearly. And I don't know whose problem it is, I don't know whether it's the governor's problem, I don't know whether it's the President's problem. But somebody needs to get their ass on a plane, and sit down, the two of them, and figure this out. Right now.
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