think about it

this is not new orleans

what with rita bearing down on the gulf coast, the last thing i want to seem is unsympathetic. but today, as i attended the first meeting of a class on caribbean societies (for which i'm TAing again), i was struck by something the professor said, the import of which, purposely provocative (but not so off-mark), really seemed to ripple across the lecture-hall:

"Think of New Orleans after Katrina as a permanent condition, and you're thinking of Haiti."

how's that for perspective?