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Report from Louisiana: Hurricane Ida

Posted: August 30, 2021 by Pat Austin in Uncategorized
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By:  Pat Austin

SHREVEPORT – Hurricane Ida has finally come and now has left Louisiana, but she is travelling through the eastern states leaving storms and plenty of water in her path.

The predictions for this storm were dire in the days leading up to landfall: “worst storm in Louisiana history!” said one, and “bigger than Katrina!” said others. As landfall was predicted on the sixteen-year anniversary of Katrina, comparisons were inevitable.

As the storm approached the coast, the cone consistently shifted to the east just a little more with every new track. This eventually took my beloved Acadiana region out of danger, and Shreveport, up in the NW corner was never really in danger. We spend a lot of time in Arnaudville and the Acadiana region, and we have a lot of friends there, so we watched the progress with a lot of anxiety.

The storm made landfall as a high-end Cat 4 about noon Sunday; it was hard to concentrate on the sermon in church yesterday. Wind gusts in places were as high as 180 mph when the storm hit Port Fourchon; I read where 28 people chose to ride out the hurricane in Grand Isle. This is akin to suicide in my mind. I don’t know how many of them survived. When the storm made landfall it briefly reversed the direction of the Mississippi River.

The only way to get any reliable news or information yesterday was via live streams of local channels. The Weather Channel was a joke. There was Jim Cantore standing in the French Quarter, braced against the wind as if he was about to fly off while two guys walked the sidewalk behind him sipping coffee. In another shot, Cantore is again braced in the street and another guy runs into the back of the camera shot and turns a cartwheel.  The only positive about that coverage to me was the humor factor in listening to the broadcasters mispronounce Louisiana place names. Houma, Louisiana (prounounced HOME ah) became HOOOOM ah for example. The news anchor did everything she could to avoid saying Atchafalaya and Tchoupitoulas.

This morning as damage is assessed, the Cajun Navy is busy making rescues. Levees were overtopped in some places and people have flooded. LaPlace, Louisiana is completely underwater and impassable. An Entergy tower fell into the Mississippi River leaving NOLA without power; this is expected to be a problem for weeks. It also means that 911 is down.

Damage assessment is ongoing. While some areas are obviously flooded, luckily we are not seeing the massive flooding that we did with Katrina. The damage is extensive of course and cleanup will take a long time. Lake Charles, over on the Louisiana/Texas border, still has not recovered from the triple shot of storms they endured in the last twelve months, the biggest being Hurricane Laura.  Nobody expects this to be fixed soon.

In our area we have a lot of evacuees in shelters anxious to return home. Officials are asking everyone to be patient. There are no sanitary services in most places, no water, no power. The death toll will certainly climb; it is early yet.

If you’d like to help, Catholic Charities of Acadiana has an Amazon Wish List and is assisting with disaster relief. The Cajun Navy is also requesting help. Prayers are good, too!

Pat Austin blogs at And So it Goes in Shreveport and at Medium; she is the author of Cane River Bohemia: Cammie Henry and her Circle at Melrose Plantation. Follow her on Instagram @patbecker25 and Twitter @paustin110.

More friends gone too soon!

Posted: August 30, 2021 by chrisharper in Uncategorized
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By Christopher Harper

I never really understood why my father turned first to the obituary page in his later years.

Now I get it.

I have seen many friends die in the past few months, including four remarkable women who played significant roles in my youth. It’s worth noting that none died from COVID-19. Although I don’t have any proof, it’s conceivable that they couldn’t get the proper treatments because so much of the medical community focused on the pandemic and not other illnesses.

Lynn Langway served as my teacher at Northwestern University and helped me get a job at Newsweek. She worked Newsweek for more than a decade, rising to the level of senior editor. Later, she became executive editor of Ladies’ Home Journal. Although we kept in touch over the years, we parted company over the 2016 election. I’m sorry that politics stood between us upon her death. https://www.linkedin.com/in/lynnlangway/

Ann Bartsch, the wife of the best man at my wedding, was among the most intelligent people I’ve ever met. She graduated Phi Beta Kappa from Stanford University—an honor I also held from a far less competitive university. Ann attended law school at the University of Chicago, where he met Doug Blomgren, my roommate in Chicago. 

Ann worked mainly with low-income and elderly clients in Oregon, her home and where Doug also practiced law. She served as the chair of the American Bar Association’s Commission on Legal Services for the Poor. See her obituary here.

I wrote about two others who died recently in my 2011 book, Flyover Country, which chronicled the lives of my high school class, which graduated in 1969 from Lincoln High School in Sioux Falls, South Dakota.

Barbara Sidlo Hughes was my first girlfriend. We dated in our sophomore year, but she tired of my endless weekends on the road with my rock ‘n’ roll band. 

Upon graduation from Drake University, Barbara became a flight attendant for TWA, where she met her husband, Don. Eventually, the couple and their children moved to California, where she cared for her daughter, whose health issues kept her in a wheelchair much of the time. When her daughter was able to attend college, Barbara started teaching elementary school, where she helped students—many the sons and daughters of immigrants–for more than 20 years. See her obituary here.

Mary Hrdy Kaczmarek was my second girlfriend. We dated in our senior year and later at the University of Nebraska in Lincoln. We broke up after two years—a parting that angered Mary for many years. Alas, that divide never narrowed, and I blame myself that we never reconciled. 

She met her husband Norman, a physician, in Danville, Pennsylvania, which ironically is about a 30-minute drive from where I now live. 

Mary first worked as a medical social worker, then helped establish and manage her husband’s medical practice in Santa Fe, New Mexico. See her obituary here.

All of these talented women are gone far too soon! 

It’s a Crazy World When the Radical Feminists act saner than our Government (And a possible new Law of Media Outrage)

Posted: August 29, 2021 by datechguy in Uncategorized

There is not a lot of good I have to say about radical feminists whose efforts over the last 50 years have done untold damage to this country in general and ironically to women in particular.

However credit where credit is due these radical feminists took the time to act to save women actually under threat:

How did “Aisha” even get the last-minute paperwork? How did she know what gate to approach? How did she and about thirty other Afghan feminists (and counting) finally escape from Hell?

I am thrilled to share that answer. My team consists of radical feminists, anti-trafficking/anti-sex slavery activists and experts, honor killing experts, (myself included), a brilliant legal team—Europeans and Americans, mainly white girls, (who’ve lately been overly maligned): some Jews, some Christians, a Sikh, maybe some atheists—perhaps a Goddess worshiper or two. Who knows? It is my honor and my privilege to be among them.

Via Ed Driscol at insty & Yid with Lid (I know it’s just “the Lidblog” these days but he’ll always be Yid with Lid to me) and yes there are plenty of sane people involved per the list above including the redoubtable Phyllis Chesler who should need no introduction to longtime readers but never the less Radical Feminists are first on this list and they will willing to make common cause with some they might not have in the past to save the lives of Afghan women who might otherwise have to submit to, as what Bill Marr notes actual oppression as opposed to what they’ve defined as oppression for decades.

So today at least let me raise a glass to these radical feminists who have actually done right and will make the lives of the women and the generations that they produce better.

Closing thought #1: I hope I’m wrong but the fact that this piece is out there publicly suggest that the window of these efforts is practically closed. That’s a shame.

Closing thought #2 I suspect that will get almost no exposure in the MSM because highlighting it will only make the Biden Administration & their generals look even worse by comparison, perhaps this should lead to the creation of DaTechGuy’s fifth law of Media Outrage to wit:

Any positive action, even that supposedly advances a goals of or is done by a group allied or identified with the radical left, will not be considered newsworthy nationally if said action has the potential to highlight a failure and/or inaction by a Democrat administration that is in power at the time of said positive action.

Very Quick DaTechGuy Thoughts

Posted: August 28, 2021 by datechguy in Uncategorized

I see that the parole board has granted Parole to Sirhan Sirhan the killer of RFK with the backing of two of RFK’s kids. While I would not have done it as he served 50+ years for the murder and his kids went along with it who am I to say otherwise.

I’m old enough to remember when the media celebrated members of the military who attacked their Commander in Chief even as he led them to victory over terrorists. Apparently if a C in C has a “D” after his name then this type of dissent is no longer allowed., even if that C in C leads your forces to their worst defeat in decades and set them up for further slaughter.

Apparently a Bishop in Chicago has forbidden a priest from closing mass with a “Hail Mary” and the St. Michael prayer (which every mass at my parish is ended in). Not sure if this is a blanket ruling for his diocese but I’m remined of an old Catholic Quip: “In the days of Jesus 1 in 12 Bishops was a traitor, these days we’re not doing any better.”

That the Boston Red Sox are in a playoff race (although apparently not as much as they were a month ago) and I still haven’t bothered to watch a game tells me how much MLB has chased me away. If you told me three years ago this was possible I wouldn’t have believed you.

Finally a bit of Catholic advice. A friend of mine declined some advice to avoid confrontation with the devil taking instead a “Bring it on” attitude rather than one declining to engage & trusting in prayer. This has proved to be large mistake on my friend’s part. Never forget the Devil is a master psychologist with Millennia of experience dealing with humans. Don’t debate, don’t engage, prayer, scripture & occasional laughter are your best tools here.

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