Anyone hear this? "Most evacuees from NOLA are felons" WTF

[we can do it]

My travel agent said she just read (faux news online??) that most of the evacuees are felons - when I questioned her about it and said that doesn't sound right, she said she had already closed the window, but it was on the NEWS. Good gawd. :wtf:

[silverweb]

1. All kind of garbage going around.

There are at least two e-mail chain letters going around that are such absolutely slanderous, racist, venomous filth that they'd make you vomit. I got them from someone I told long ago to not send me anymore of his RW shit, and all his e-mails go into my "bulk mail" folder for screening. I started to read them anyway, but they were so vile that I couldn't even finish them and had to delete them immediately.

[Tanuki]

2. Not possible

and I would find a new travel agent immediately. Anyone who could believe this and repeat it is a moron, and I wouldn't trust that person with my money and my travel arrangements.

[we can do it]

5. Thats what I was thinking.

Sheesh - I am so disappointed with people, they can't put themselves in the place of those less fortunate. I think a lot of people are using "evacuees" now instead of the "N word"...and are letting their bigotry show.

[SoCalDem]

3. poor=criminal according to republicans

:(

[Brotherjohn]

4. NPR ran a report this morning, citing criminal background checks...

... at two shelters (I think in Houston, and way up in the NE somewhere).

The rate of people with a "rap sheet" was somewhere around 50-60%.

Not "felonies", but just some kind of record.

Now, given that the majority of the people in shelters are lower income, it is possible that there is a higher than normal incidence of a criminal record of some kind (based on socio-economic status alone). But that could be loitering, for crissakes! As to whether these numbers are representative of all evacuees at all shelters, or even whether they are accurate, who knows.

But this is probably the basis for hoax stories like "most are felonies".

[slampoet]

7. Also remember these are people arrested in NOLA

...By the most corrupt police force in the USA and possibly the world!!

I would take Dick Cheney's word over the word of a New Orleans Cop.

[BiggJawn]

24. *I* have a rap sheet...

Driving w/o valid Operator's License.

And you could trust me with your cat.

[Tomee450]

6. Some of the comments about

the black victims of Katrina have been just awful. It seems that many in this country believe that all blacks are criminals or on welfare. And I am really bothered by the fact that on shows like Washington Journal, the hosts do not bother to correct those false statements. Even some of the guests who are democrats fail to correct the callers.

[sinkingfeeling]

8. When can we start circulating vile emails about the evacuees from

Texas? I'm sure their pouring across our border now (Arkansas). I know that several hundred arrived at Ft. Chaffee yesterday.

[Imalittleteapot]

9. Talked to a (desk) cop yesterday

He said not to go near the places where the "refugees" are staying because they are mostly criminals and pedophiles - that most of the residents of the coliseum were pedophiles (men,women & children???) and that they had to station cops in the bathrooms. Said they were being fed 3 good meals a day, including steak almost every night. AND all they do is sit around all day to wait for the next hand out. When I asked what he expected them to do all day, he was unable to answer. I told him that I thought he was painting the evacuees with a large bigoted brush and was surely a victim of police department rumors.
:grr:

[txaslftist]

10. Steak almost every night?

Rigggght. Except for Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday, Friday and Saturday of that particular week. Sorry, all out of steak. How about nothing?

[Iris]

21. That was going to be my incredulous reaction!

How were they cooking this steak, I wonder?

Oh, yeah, it was steak tartar!

I wish people like that desk cop could just step outside themselves for a moment and realize how utterly ignorant they sound.

[samsingh]

11. i've heard that many repugs are felons and perverts

[SomewhereOutThere424]

12. We've all done something wrong in our lives

Hell I'm guilty of stealing a bit of money in my youth, doing a bit of things. To say 'the people of NOLA are mostly felons' is alike to say 'those people are worse than me'. Every single person to take the stance 'NOLA is so much worse than me' has, in their lifetime, done atleast one thing to make them not the little angels they pretend to be.

They survive a disaster, so we emphasize they're criminals, when most of it was probably admission of robbing grocery stores for food that had long since gone bad by now. Is there any question that america is a fascist nation?

[Cocoa]

13. ask her to open the window again

she must have read it wrong.

[we can do it]

15. I did say I'd like to know what the source is -

cause it sure doesn't sound right. Thats when she said - "It was on the NEWS"

:shrug:

[Iris]

22. what news? - should have been the next question.

[ET Awful]

14. She was probably basing that on a story that they ran checks

in Rhode Island and Mass today and found that around 1/2 the evacuees sent here had records (most from long ago). Oddly, the evacuees sent to Texas did not have the same high ratio.

http://www.cnn.com/2005/US/09/22/katrina.criminals.ap/index.html

[Tomee450]

19. This is the first time

that I've heard that background checks were done on the victims of natural disasters. So I guess it's automatically assumed that all blacks have criminal records and therefore background checks are necessary.

[Iris]

25. Given that a large number of the black men in this country will be

incarcerated at some point in their lives, it would not be surprising for a large number of them to have "criminal backgrounds" - but the question is what are the actual crimes? Some bull shit drug charge? Some petty theft or other youthful indiscretion that someone else from another socio-ethnic-economic background might have gotten away with?

[Gidney N Cloyd]

16. That's in case any of 'em wind up in Florida and

get some crazy ideas in their heads about voting.

[Balbus]

17. Yes. Just now.

From you. Why spread this disinformation without verification?

[kentuck]

18. Just a little warning to those potential voters that have moved.....

to other states. If you have been arrested or have a criminal record, don't even register to vote. We don't want to change the gerrymandering we have worked so hard to put in place...

[Iris]

20. Oh dear God. Where is this shit coming from? Today, my boss

said that carjackings in Atlanta and Birmingham were going up because prisoners in LA were released during the hurricane and subsequent flooding. She added, "Of course, you won't see this on the news."

Where do people get this shit?

[Arkana]

23. Sounds like par for the course for Faux News.