HERE’S the U.S. Navy’s Katrina rescue photo gallery.

Lots of interesting pictures.

Meanwhile, here’s a Katrina relief report card from RealClearPolitics.

And Chuck Simmins reports that total donations for Katrina relief have reached $465,769,985. And they’re still growing.

BRENDAN LOY remains unimpressed with Michael Brown.

BRUCE KESLER: “The mass media has begun its self-congratulations for its coverage of Hurricane Katrina. The party may be premature.”

UPDATE: No congratulations here. Or here. (WARNING: Talking squirrel at second link. SECOND WARNING: Squirrel makes more sense than Keith Olbermann or Anderson Cooper. And don’t get me started on Geraldo.)

ANOTHER UPDATE: Or here!

MORE: Or here! And don’t forget here: “I blame the media. In this country nearly everybody has a TV set. 80% of poor people have TV sets. The private media are the principle means of the public dissemination of information. They didn’t get the word out.”

I guess now we know why it’s mostly self-congratulation . . . .

IN RESPONSE TO MY EARLIER POST ON GILLIGAN, Steve Hayward emails:

Never mind FUTURE scholars:

See Paul Cantor’s fine book Gilligan Unbound which makes your exact point about mid-20th century Americanism.

I haven’t read it, but it’s self-evidently brilliant!

J.D. JOHANNES emails:

Back in Iraq.

You know, the war, the news story that doesn’t involve flooding, FEMA and blaming Bush for people who refused to comply with an evacuation order.

The guys saw on the news how the Dems were blaming Bush and it really ticked them off.

As usual, I think that eagerness to make Bush look bad has led some people to overplay their hand.

OUCH: “We never go after Maureen Dowd anymore, because there isn’t any sport in it. Poor Paul Krugman is rapidly getting into the same category.”

Jacob Sullum, on the other hand, is still blasting away at the barrelfish: “Paul Krugman offers the least plausible explanation I’ve seen so far for the federal government’s slow response to Hurricane Katrina.”

Likewise Radley Balko: ” A government-planned Brasilia-like New New Orleans would be an atrocity. The Paul Krugmans — or the Jonathan Alters — simply can’t win this debate.”

UPDATE: Tim Blair is still reading Dowd:

Maureen Dowd believes that a “cultural shift” is “turning 2005 into 1968”. Oh, how she must wish that it were so; in 1968, Dowd was 16.

Ouch. Er, but remind me again: How long was it after 1968 before a Democrat was elected President?

EUGENE VOLOKH: Does God dislike poor people?

YES, I’M BLOGGING ABOUT SOME OTHER STUFF, but don’t think that gets you off the hook if you haven’t donated to Katrina relief! Go here and give somebody some money. And if you’ve contributed, but haven’t logged your contribution over at N.Z. Bear’s place, and I’ll bet that’s most of you, well, go do it. (Bumped up on page). [LATER: Bumped up again.]

UPDATE: So far, this has raised about $865,000 $900,000 $970,000 $1 million $1.1 million $1.2 million (about $185,000 $200,000 $260,000 $282,000 $319,000 $360,000 from InstaPundit readers) based on people’s self reports. Let’s see if we can get it into the seven-figure range before the blogburst ends at midnight. [LATER: Made it! But don’t let that stop you!]

There are two kinds of people out there: Those who haven’t donated yet and those who have donated, but haven’t logged your contribution over at TTLB. If you haven’t donated, how about it? There’s a list of charities here, or if you just want to give where I gave without having to choose among the many choices you can go to the Salvation Army and donate there. (Just noticed that this is almost 1/8 what Amazon has raised, which is a pretty impressive achievement for the blogosphere).

If you haven’t logged your contribution yet — and I’m guessing that’s a lot of you — well, go do it.

UNSCAM UPDATE:

How widespread is the corruption at the United Nations? The multibillion-dollar Iraq Oil-for-Food scandal was just the beginning.

Now the issue is becoming the scale of corruption in the U.N.’s normal operations — and which individuals and corporations are reaping the benefits of a network of bribery and conspiracy that investigators have just begun to uncover. So far, those identities are still a mystery — but perhaps not for much longer.

Last Friday, federal prosecutors in Manhattan indicted the head of the U.N.’s own budget oversight committee, a Russian named Vladimir Kuznetsov, on charges of laundering hundreds of thousands of dollars worth of bribes paid by companies seeking contracts with the United Nations.

Kuznetsov, who has pleaded innocent, allegedly took a cut so openly that he had part of it deposited into the United Nations’ own staff credit union in New York.

Kuznetsov’s arrest is the latest twist in the scandal involving the U.N. procurement department, which was the longtime post of Alexander Yakovlev (search), another Russian U.N. official recently fingered by U.S. federal investigators.

Read the whole thing.

UPDATE: Much more (including video) here.

YAHOO! HELPS TURN THE SCREWS:

According to Reporters Sans Frontieres (Reporters Without Borders), Information supplied by Yahoo! helped Chinese journalist Shi Tao get 10 years in prison

The text of the verdict in the case of journalist Shi Tao – sentenced in April to 10 years in prison for “divulging state secrets abroad” – shows that Yahoo! Holdings (Hong Kong) Ltd. provided China’s state security authorities with details that helped to identify and convict him. It reveals that the company provided the Chinese investigating organs with detailed information that apparently enabled them to link Shi’s personal e-mail account (on the Chinese Yahoo! service at yahoo.com.cn) and the specific message containing information treated as a “state secret” to the IP address of his computer. More details from RSF here.

Shi Tao was jailed because he e-mailed sensitive political information to be posted on dissident websites hosted outside China. His case is a cautionary tale to bloggers around the world: If you are publicizing information and views that your government doesn’t want exposed – even if you believe you have the right to do so under the Universal Declaration of Human Rights – companies like Yahoo! will not shield you from your government.

I don’t like this.

HE FINALLY ESCAPED THE ISLAND:

Bob Denver, whose portrayal of goofy first mate Gilligan on the 1960s television show ”Gilligan’s Island,” made him an iconic figure to generations of TV viewers, has died, his agent confirmed Tuesday. He was 70. . . .

TV critics hooted at ”Gilligan’s Island” as gag-ridden corn. Audiences adored its far-out comedy. Writer-creator Sherwood Schwartz insisted that the show had social meaning along with the laughs: ”I knew that by assembling seven different people and forcing them to live together, the show would have great philosophical implications.”

Future scholars will regard the show as a profound critique, and celebration, of mid-20th Century America.

AS PEOPLE PONDER THE ROBERTS NOMINATION, it’s worth noting that despite a fairly strong and consistent ideological core and a long term on the Court, Rehnquist’s Chief Justiceship didn’t, in the end, produce especially dramatic change.

Brannon Denning and I have an article on the Raich opinion and federalism (part of a symposium on the decision) that discusses that point.

UPDATE: Related thoughts on Rehnquist from Bill Stuntz.

HUGH HEWITT HAS QUESTIONS FOR TERRY NEAL.

HERE’S ANOTHER BLOG FUNDRAISING EFFORT FOR KATRINA: This one seems to center mostly around lefty blogs, but that doesn’t matter. The money’s all the same color, and it’s all needed. If you haven’t donated via my appeals, and would prefer to give through a lefty initiative, go there! (More background here, but for some reason people keep sending me the link above.)

HARDENING SYSTEMS AGAINST DISASTER: My TechCentralStation column is up.

DISASTER KITS: My earlier post on radios produced more emails with suggestions. Here’s one, from reader John Jones:

One of the first things I would grab in an emergency is the water filter that I normally use for camping. A filter like this is small, and can easily produce enough potable water for a family for weeks. The only problem I would foresee in a major flood is the presence in the water of chemicals such as pesticides and oil that the filter cannot remove. Still, for filtering rain water or questionable water from a city water supply, a basic water filter could literally be a life saver. I prefer this one.

Yeah. Stored water’s best, of course — and you don’t have to be rich to store water, all you need are old milk jugs and a few drops of bleach. You can also store bleach, and use it (in higher concentrations) to purify water, though it won’t get rid of chemicals.

I don’t think there’s much of anything that would clean out the toxic sludge in New Orleans. This list of survival goods may be over the top, though.

UPDATE: Reader Stanley Tillinghast, MD emails:

The MSR Miniworks is a good filter but doesn’t kill viruses. This system includes a small bottle of bleach that is added to the water that chlorinates it, killing viruses.

That would be better for emergencies. I’m pretty sure that nothing would make that New Orleans floodwater safe to drink, though.

Meanwhile, reader Sarah Marie Parker-Allen sends this link to emergency water storage advice from the University of Wisconsin. Plastic 2-liter soft drink bottles are better than milk jugs, it says.

ANOTHER UPDATE: Reader Robert Davis emails:

I’m mystified by all the instructions for cleaning milk jugs, filling them with water, spiking them with bleach . . .

For about $7 you can pick up three 2.5-gallon bottles of water next time you’re at the supermarket — enough to last one person a week in an emergency.

It’s sterile and you don’t have to worry about the top popping off. Your time would need to be worth practically nothing to have the do-it-yourself version make economic sense.

True, but whenever I post on disaster prep I get emails saying “that’s all fine for rich guys, but poor people live hand-to-mouth, yada yada yada.” I’m not sure that this is true in a relevant way — poor people in America are disproportionately likely to be fat, suggesting that access to food, at least, isn’t an issue. But the other point is that if you put things off until the last minute, store shelves will be empty while taps still work. And most people have bleach around.

Several readers also note that there are other emergency sources of water. Brad Mueller writes:

All fine and good, but most households also have a water heater which holds 40 gallons of potable water and the toilet tank holds about 3 gallons of drinkable water. A small amount of preparation could have prevented a lot of suffering. I’m left wondering if there isn’t a segment of our population that, for whatever reason, steadfastly refuses to helped.

Well, yes, there is. Note that you should turn off the supply valve to protect the water heater from backflow of dirty water through the lines — or leakage — if lines are damaged. (Er, and turn off the heat!) Jugged water is also more portable than water in heater or toilet tanks — but it’s good to remind people that it’s there.

It’s aimed at earthquakes, primarily, but here’s a page on disaster preparedness from the Los Angeles Fire Department. And here’s a much longer PDF booklet from the LAFD, too, with instructions on water heaters, etc. Excerpt:

To those of us who live and work in the Greater Los Angeles area, earthquakes and other natural emergencies are a reality. In order to deal with this situation, emergency preparedness must become a way of life. In the event of a major earthquake or disaster, freeways and surface streets may be impassable and public services could be interrupted or taxed beyond their limits. Therefore, everyone must know how to provide for their own needs for an extended period of time, whether at work, home, or on the road.

That’s reality. Take note. (Thanks to reader Susan Kitchens for the links).

JOHN LEO writes that the press is looking the other way.

VIRGINIA POSTREL reports that refugee relief in Dallas is going well.

CONDI RICE on foreign governments and Katrina response.

JOHN TIERNEY WRITES on the Magic Marker strategy for disaster relief.

I’LL BE GUESTBLOGGING ALL WEEK at Michael Silence’s Knoxville News-Sentinel blog, while he’s on vacation.

I COMPLETELY AGREE WITH BRAD DELONG’S TAKE on New Orleans’ hurricane plan. Read the whole thing, but here’s the clincher:

They were going to make a DVD. A DVD saying, “you all are on your own.” They didn’t even care enough to make the DVD before the hurricane season began.

No. New Orleans did not have a functioning government as of the summer of 2005. This is a catastrophic failure of local governance–much worse than FEMA’s failures.

You would think that somebody–somewhere–would have called Washington and said, “You know, New Orleans doesn’t have its act together enough to have a hurricane evacuation plan.” And that somebody, somewhere–in Washington or in Baton Rouge–would have cared.

I’m not sure, but I assume this was the hurricane plan that James Lee Witt was involved with.

But lest you think the problem is solely New Orleans, there’s this take by Mark Steyn:

“One of the things that’s changed so much since Sept. 11,” agreed Vice President Dick Cheney, “is the extent to which people do trust the government — big shift — and value it, and have high expectations for what we can do.”

Hard to see why he’d say that. Sept. 11 was an appalling comprehensive failure of just about every relevant federal agency. The only government that worked that day was local and state: The great defining image, redeeming American honor at a moment of national humiliation, is those brave New York firemen pounding up the stairs of the World Trade Center. What consolations can be drawn from the lopsided tango between slapdash bureaucrats and subhuman predators in New Orleans?

To be fair, next door, Gov. Haley Barbour of Mississippi has been the Giuliani of the hour, and there are many tales of great courage, like the teams from the Children’s Hospital of Alabama who’ve been helicoptering in to New Orleans to rescue newborn babies.

The comparison with Sept. 11 isn’t exact, but it’s fair to this extent: Katrina was the biggest disaster on American soil since that day provoked the total overhaul of the system and the devotion of billions of dollars and the finest minds in the nation to the prioritizing of homeland security. It was, thus, the first major test of the post-9/11 structures. Happy with the results? . . .

Oh, well, maybe the 9/11 commission can rename themselves the Katrina Kommission. Back in the real world, America’s enemies will draw many useful lessons from the events of this last week. Will America?

Will we? Read the whole thing. You can argue about the details, and God knows people are. But it’s clear that we’re nowhere near ready for primetime on this stuff — and unfortunately, it’s primetime already.

UPDATE: While not minimizing Katrina, Daniel Drezner reminds us that the Bush Administration has other balls in the air that shouldn’t be neglected.

ANOTHER UPDATE: Micah Sifry (whose permalinks are buggered for some reason) isn’t happy with the Bush Administration, but doesn’t trust the Democrats, either:

But here’s the deeper problem. Democrats have to stand for something other than “not Bush”–and there are many reasons to doubt they can. The dirty little secret of Washington insider politics is that both parties benefit from the game. I hardly trust the Democrats to clean up the mess left by the Republicans, do you? . . .

Nita Lowey, was just in my local paper bragging about $2 million she got for revamping a highway overpass nearby in Ardsley. Louisiana Senator Mary Landrieu, another Democrat, loved the highway bill, proudly citing the 30% increase in transportation funding that she secured for her state. Where was she when the Army Corps funding request was turned down? (Thanks to the Fairbanks Daily News-Miner for noticing that bit of news.)

Why should we trust these Democrats to fix our broken government? They’re part of the problem too.

Lots of things are broken. It’s up to us to see them fixed. It would be easier, of course, if one of the things that was broken wasn’t the political system. As I write in tomorrow’s TechCentralStation column, “I wonder if our political classes possess the requisite maturity and self-discipline to take constructive action.”

ANOTHER UPDATE: Mickey Kaus has more thoughts, continuing his anti-federalism theme. I don’t think that structural issues are the most important here, though. You can have management failures under any sort of governmental structure. Kaus writes, correctly, that “Anyone who knew anything about New Orleans would know that they wouldn’t get it together.” But that’s not a problem of federalism, really. And federalism compartmentalizes the problem — Louisiana may have done badly, but Alabama and Mississippi seem to be doing better. A hierarchical, unitary system opens the possibility of blowing it everywhere at once. On average, the feds are arguably more competent than state and local governments, but the difference isn’t all that drastic. Norm Mineta, after all, is a fed.

MORE: Reader Tom Brosz emails that James Lee Witt is disavowing any connection with the New Orleans hurricane plan, and notes that the IEM press release from last year has been updated to read: “James Lee Witt Associates was a member of the original team, but did not participate in the project.”

SEARCH AND RESCUE IN NEW ORLEANS: Gateway Pundit has a roundup, with video.

WHAT THE NAVY IS DOING for Katrina relief. Short answer: A lot.

HERE’S A Katrina response timeline from Rick Moran.