New Orleans

Cao Steps Up

It’s about freakin’ time the health care bill passed on to the next stage in the process.  I like health care, I bet you like health care too.  Everyone needs it and we all need it to be inexpensive and accessible, to me making that happen as fast as possible is a no brainer but [...]

Bada-Bing, Bada-Boom

The Civil Trial regarding the Crime Cameras concluded with a jury finding for the plaintiffs. Dell Inc, along with former City Technology chief Greg Meffert and firms owned by a city vendor were found guilty of conspiracy against two local firms. The jury awarded Southern Electronics and Active Solutions 16.3 million dollars. The lawyers for [...]

Ed Blakely: so close, and yet…

Few New Orleanians liked former Recovery Czar, Ed Blakely. He was distant, he was presumptuous, and he spoke without thinking. Also — and this is a fault of our own parochialism — he was an outsider and therefore, suspicious. I never met the man. I don’t know what he was like. All I know is that [...]

On the need to be ever-vigilant, inside and out

New Orleans is not the place to live if you’re paranoid about safety. Things happen here — good, bad, accidental, deliberate, and frequently unpleasant. Of course, the city’s neighborhoods aren’t created equally. Despite its reputation as a hub for vice, the French Quarter is one of the safest places you can live in New Orleans. The [...]

“Exhilarating and frightening to behold”

I’m not sure where I found this article about New Orleans’ rebuilding process — probably via Gambit or from my pal Tyler. But no matter: it’s a beautifully written piece. Here’s an excerpt: Four years after Katrina, the rebuilding of New Orleans is not proceeding the way anyone envisioned, nor with the expected cast of characters. [...]

Zombie City: Public Nuisance Properties on NCDC Agenda Nov. 2nd, 2009

2220-22 First Street There are less and less of these cottages throughout the city. They are becoming endangered. The city of New Orleans has received CDBG funds to tear down more private properties. These were previously labeled Imminent Health Threat properties (IHT) and there were problems with due process constitutional issues regarding [...]

The pioneering Disney animator living quietly in the Marigny

Here’s the problem with New Orleans: its residents walk a lot and talk a lot (to each other, to themselves, and sometimes to no one in particular). We’ve been here for hundreds of years, strolling the sidewalks that buttress our narrow streets, stopping to chat with neighbors, and taking streetcars more conducive to conversation than [...]

David Vitter doesn’t think he’s the only racist elected to public office

Louisiana’s governor, über-Republican Bobby Jindal, and his nemesis, Democratic U.S. Senator Mary Landrieu, have both unequivocally condemned Keith Bardwell, the justice of the peace in Tangipahoa Parish who refused to marry an interracial couple last week. Louisiana’s other U.S. Senator, noted whoremonger David Vitter, has remained positively silent. Until now. In a clip shot by the worst [...]

Apparently, you need more than National Treasure to pay the bills

Nicolas Cage’s homes in the French Quarter and Garden District are listed for sale at auction Nov. 12 as a local lender foreclosed on the properties for unpaid mortgage debts, according to the Orleans Parish Civil Sheriff’s office. In July, the Internal Revenue Service placed liens on Cage’s New Orleans properties for $6.6 million in unpaid [...]

Open mouth, insert foot

I haven’t been paying attention to the wonderful Mayor of New Orleans lately mainly because he has become irrelevant. No one pays attention to him locally because he is a buffoon. Actually he is the leader of the buffoon’s. Now that doesn’t mean he hasn’t been screwing things up, saying dumb things or attempting to [...]