Is Ray Nagin a Racist?

[drakethib]

Well, I'm not Harry Connick Jr. or Anne Rice (who don't live here anyway), but I am a white New Orleanian, and I think he's a racist and an idiot.

I've enjoyed reading all of your comments, but I'm sorry y'all just can't understand what it's like here. Reading about it, seeing it on TV and even visiting can't impart what it feels like to have to be here everyday.

I really, really want to rebuild this city. I love it and it is where my heart is now and always will be. But, this is just too much. It's getting hard to want to stay here.

This next election can't come soon enough. I just hope there are some qualified candidates who are willing to get into this mess.

I don't know how coherent this is and I really want to say so much more, but I just can't. The right words won't come.

I think you are right in saying we can know what it is like in NO.

My parents live fairly close to NO and my dad was working in NO with the Corp of Engineers BEFORE Katrina and has been back and he says the same thing.

I hope NO gets back on its feet soon.

 

[chyam]

If not rascist then extremely insensitive (another way of saying stupid). Can you imagine what would have happened if the white Governor of Louisiana would have suggested a white city?

But... He is black, so it's OK, I guess.

Stupid is as stupid does -- Forrest Gump

Yes he is racist and YES he is STUPID!.........He had ample time to get "his" people out of that city before that hurricane hit, but refused to do it as evidenced by all the school buses and all the poor handling of the whole Superdome thing ( if anything at all it should have been stocked) He better than anybody should have known "his" people were poor and had no way out. And now this comment..........he would be better off saying nothing!

 

[mickeyfan2]

Based on what he said, it appears that he has a direct line to talk to God.

Then maybe G-d will tell him to resign.

 

[disneyaggie]

It doesn't happen often, but I'm agreeing with an Aggie! Hook 'em!!!

Hey -- congrats on the big football win!

 

[sodaseller]

Don't know if this has been posted, but I thought Jason Zengerle at TNR's The Plank made a good point

Wow, Ray Nagin is the gift that keeps on giving. Following up on his MLK Day speech, in which (as I inexcusably failed to note in this post) he proclaimed that God wanted New Orleans to be a "chocolate" city, today Nagin had this to say:




"How do you make chocolate? You take dark chocolate, you mix it with white milk, and it becomes a delicious drink. That is the chocolate I am talking about. . . . New Orleans was a chocolate city before Katrina. It is going to be a chocolate city after. How is that divisive? It is white and black working together, coming together and making something special."



Maybe "mocha city" would have been the better phrase. All joking aside, however, Nagin is, in his own blundering way, making a worthwhile point. While he was certainly dumb to say that God wanted New Orleans to remain a majority-black city, the issue of how the city is rebuilt--and whether, in the process, it gets intentionally whitened--is a serious one. And Nagin, and other black New Orlineans, aren't being paranoid when they worry that some white people in the city are secretly, and not so secretly, hoping that a rebuilt New Orleans is decidedly more vanilla, or, to use Nagin's terminology, white milk-like. Of course, the most important thing is that the city be rebuilt in a way that not only allows its black residents to return there, if they so choose, but also allows them to return to neighborhoods that are not squalid and dysfunctional and impoverished in the way they were before Katrina. I don't know if Nagin has any sort of gastronomic analogies to make that point, but I'd love to hear them.



--Jason Zengerle

 

[sodaseller]

I will have to do a search to locate the info again, but Nagin was voted in by 80 something % of the white votes.

I have read the same - he basically switched parties to run, after being a GOP contributor and supporter. Bon Sommersby did the research on that

 

[Tigger_Magic]

Of course, the most important thing is that the city be rebuilt in a way that not only allows its black residents to return there, if they so choose, but also allows them to return to neighborhoods that are not squalid and dysfunctional and impoverished in the way they were before Katrina.

I wonder how Mr. Zengerle would suggest that this be accomplished.

 

[Southern4sure]

I wonder if Nagin has plans to use the submerged busses to bring any of the citizens back to New Orleans. It is great that he is encouraging the citizens to come back but how? They could not leave before Katrina, how are they going to get back to make NO a chocolate city?

 

[mickeyfan2]

I wonder if Nagin has plans to use the submerged busses to bring any of the citizens back to New Orleans. It is great that he is encouraging the citizens to come back but how? They could not leave before Katrina, how are they going to get back to make NO a chocolate city?

Good point. But why let facts cloud the issue.

Here is an even better senario - We are all going to buy them cars, pay for their insurance, give them free gas and then volunteer to drive them there and fly home on our own dime.

 

[castlegazer]

You know, I definately do not take Nagin's comments to be representative of the majority of NOLA residents, but here's the thing, it does take some of the good will in our hearts out as we begin to view the re-design of the city and the tax dollars this will take. Everyone has to understand that NOLA no longer stands in a vaccuum. The rebuilding is going to take a huge chunk of federal tax dollars which means we all have a stake in this pie now. I am very disturbed by this attitude of the leadership of the city - which is representative of the city - as we begin the debate of the marsh lands and the preservation of the city. This is no longer as Federalistic issue -its an issue that needs debating in larger context with the nation weighin in on it. I will not see my tax dollars go to a racist re-population of a city where the people feel that they need to live where we can not protect them from another Categary 5.

I think Nagin has forgotten that his hand is out to the entire population of the country - not just the chocolate population. We all will have to scrape a little deeper to help NOLA get back on their feet. We all need to come together to do that - not be separatist in that endeavor.

 

[JimB.]

Is Ray Nagin a Racist?

Naaah. He's just a politician.

Hard to tell sometimes which is worse though................

 

[Barqs]

To lighten this thread up a little...

http://www.imnotchocolate.com/index.html

What people will put on a t-shirt

 

[Tigger_Magic]

To lighten this thread up a little...

http://www.imnotchocolate.com/index.html

What people will put on a t-shirt

I may be in a minority, but this strikes me as being just as racist as Nagin was in his remarks. Why would I spend $20 to advertise that?

 

[Barqs]

I didn't mean to offend anyone with the link.

I just think it is crazy what people will put on a shirt.
I would never buy one myself, but there must be plenty of people who would. I was driving through Metairie (N.O. suburb) this past weekend and there were plenty of people selling "Katrina" t-shirts on the corners of busy intersections
I would hope the profits for these t-shirts would go to charity, but I highly doubt it does.

 

[mickeyfan2]

To lighten this thread up a little...

http://www.imnotchocolate.com/index.html

What people will put on a t-shirt

I laughed at it. But I would not buy or wear it. Give the person who did it some credit for creativity.

 

[Tigger_Magic]

I didn't mean to offend anyone with the link.

I just think it is crazy what people will put on a shirt.
I would never buy one myself, but there must be plenty of people who would. I was driving through Metairie (N.O. suburb) this past weekend and there were plenty of people selling "Katrina" t-shirts on the corners of busy intersections
I would hope the profits for these t-shirts would go to charity, but I highly doubt it does.

I wasn't offended by it... I just didn't find the t-shirt funny. Sure, it was creative, but not funny.

Just strikes me as sad that some will try to profit from the mistakes of others.

 

[TnKrBeLlA012]

I laughed at it. But I would not buy or wear it. Give the person who did it some credit for creativity.

That was very funny. I read it and I laughed out loud. I would not wear it but it was funny!

 

[bcvillastwo]

It doesn't matter whether Ray Nagin is a racist or not as long as the majority of the New Orleans voters continue to vote him into office. As a result, the majority of New Orleans get what they wants, or at least what they think they want.

 

[bimshire]

I may be in a minority, but this strikes me as being just as racist as Nagin was in his remarks. Why would I spend $20 to advertise that?

It's simply the American way. Make a buck however you can. There have been many different items on the market with Bin Laden's likeness. Talk about "Low" ? But hey, the almighty dollar is all that counts.

 

[arminnie]

Some Comments from letters to the New Orleans paper:

Your mayor serves as a beacon of hope for all intellectually challenged persons; that they too might achieve public office and notoriety.

Mr. Nagin, I truly don't believe you're a racist, anymore than I am. But I do believe that in the eyes of far too many who have the power to help your city if they so wish, you have tarred yourself with that brush.

To be honest, there actually are rumors among Black New Orleanians that the people "Uptown" are against them. I know lots of wonderful people who live or lived Uptown - Black and White people - and few of them are racist but I've heard these rumors passed around among New Orleanians in Texas. As a white New Orleanian, I have actually heard some other white New Orleanians comment that "it is good that the poor are gone" or "I hope they don't reopen the projects" and it has made me uncomfortable wondering if they are glad that the city's African American population has by and large not returned to the city.

Mayor Nagin no doubt hears these comments from Black New Orleanians rightfully and painfully wondering if they are welcome in their own city. I think the Mayor was trying to comfort these people who feel so hurt. But he definitely went wrong and stoked the fires of racial tension instead.

Please don't hold this against we who love our city or against our beautiful city itself.

I don't think that it was offensive for the mayor to attempt to reassure the black people in the community that they are still wanted here. What I do take offense to is everyone taking his words out of context and not looking at the purpose behind his statements.

As an African woman I do not agree with the way Nagin said it but I understand. The city has always been divided. I say that because the communities that are predominantly black that they should be concentrating on, they are not -- the housing projects,eastern new orleans and the lower ninth ward. Nagin said it stupidly, but if you read between the lines I do understand his point.

This just keeps getting better and better. Let me see, your congressman is being accused of accepting bribes, and your Mayor is blaming God and doesn't particularly like white people, or Hispanics either I guess.

This should make those people in Washington sit up and take notice. Brilliant strategy to get more money from the taxpayers.

Now how in the world do people think New Orleans has a corrupt and dysfunctional political class?