Moldy Peaches

All indications are that New Orleans is in a deeper state of chaos than could have been predicted and could use international assistance. A quick sampling of the daily news and you get the sense that things are going to get worse before they get better. A person knows that it is beyond serious when the whole city will soon be evacuated.

The city faces two crises that Louisiana's governor called nightmares: stopping rising floodwaters in the aftermath of Hurricane Katrina and evacuating survivors of the deadly storm. The rising flood waters overwhelmed pumping stations that would normally keep the city dry. About 80 percent of the city was flooded with water up to 20 feet deep after the two levees collapsed.

There is the engineering nightmare of trying to fill two breachs of the levees where the waters are pouring into the city and the problem of trying to evacuate thousands of people from the Superdome. The latter is a huge human problem since inside the sports arena, toilets are overflowing and there is no electricity or air conditioning to provide relief from 90-degree heat.

The ugly side of humanity is also starting to seep through in the city. There are reports of wide spread looting in the French Quarter and there have been at least two suicides inside the Superdome. The last one occurred as a man finished a game of checkers and then plunged to his death.

Pray for survivors and a return to normalcy in the South as soon as possible.

In the aftermath of these events one has to wonder why Canadian papers feel the need to quote lyrics from the Tragically Hip - classless, truly classless.

Flood relief assistance.