not going to be CNN junkie

I'm going to work as if at home, developing the course I will teach online next spring concerning resolving water resource conflicts.  It's tempting to just sit in front of the tube, watching the same stories, quarter hour by quarter hour...Mayor Nagin urging people to get their "butts out of town," etc.  I'm intrigued with the idea that healthy people will ride out the storm, then offer guidelines afterwards to how it can be done.  I understand that the mandatory evacuation order by Nagin is illegal, as nothing about marshall law is written in the State Constitution, per a regular writer on a 7-year old listserv.  You know, in the migration west in the 19th century, it was always marshall law...Dillion, Wyatt Earp...the six-gun was the 911 call center.  That said, it's hard not to have an extreme amount of amazement regarding Cuba's ability to evacuate 350,000 from a western tabacco-growing area, where 14,000 homes were destroyed by a Category 4 Gustav in the last 24 hours, with no loss of life.  What the Cuban's did during the evacuation, and how the government responded to their rebuilding may be worth studying for use in New Orleans continuing recovery from Katrina and its possible re-recovery from Gustav.  I just learned (yes, I'm caught...CNN is on mute, and this story appeared so I turned it up) that Bush and Cheney will not attend the Repub Conv in Minneapolis...at first I thought it's because they want to play a key role in the federal role in response and aftermath of Gustav...silly me.  Here's something for the market...a webcam tracking what Cheney really does in his secret bunker...let's hope it's G-rated.  Somewhere there has to be a statue of the captain of the Titanic, that honorable gentleman who did not get in the first lifeboat and wave goodbye to all those he vowed to secure, as captain of his ship...he went down with it.  When is the last time you heard of someone recognizing their dishonorable behavior and letting the chips fall where they may or being accountable, voluntarily ended their misery ...outside of Japanese hara-kiri?  Do you think Alan Greenspan thinks twice about his commandeering the iceberg that rammed into our nation's economy?  Bush and Cheney's handling of foreign policy and economy?  They were so successful, they are embarrassed to show their face at their political party's charade of pretty / well-heeled people of wealth and influence.  News break - Nagin says a Category 4 Gustav will hit in less than 12 hours...and it's official, looters and people walking the streets after the curfew starts will go to Angola prison....it's hard to avoid that CNN fix and the soothing words of Wolf Blitzer.  I hit the mute button and I'm still OK...I have the courage to change the things I can and know the difference.