Thin veneer

It has been a catastrophic week for residents of the southern United States who are battling with the after effects of Hurricane Katrina both in property and personal terms.
New Orleans is no more. Even if they rebuild in the coming years, there is no way they can recreate New Orleans. One of my colleagues was lamenting the loss of the city - and its historical allure (even down to the lamp posts - each of which had its history - the move from gas, to oil, to electricity). All gone - and mostly unsalvageable.
Will it go on? Will the spirit of New Orleans survive?
More of an immediate issue - will the residents of New Orleans survive? There are some horrific stories appearing in the Australian media - and the more I read the more it seems all those "B" and "C" grade productions over the years about the complete and utter breakdown of society - post some climatic event - are, sadly, not that far wrong. One can only hope they ARE wrong, or at least badly reported given the difficulty even journalists would have in traversing the affected areas.
Pity then that some of the reports of looting, rape and murder come via mobile phone firsthand from people in the area to their Australian families - and more so when they add that they are scared to leave their (hotel) room as there are 3 corpses in the stairwell. Heaven help them.
And is it only because telecommunications are so good between the US and Australia that we are hearing these stories? I don't recall anything like this after the Boxing Day Tsunami ravaged South East Asia last December.
Update: National Guard Troops in New Orleans have apparently been given orders to shoot to kill looters - ? and other law-breakers - supposedly because authorities do not have the ability to declare martial law in the area!
There are many questions following Katrina, the largest natural disaster in the US.
* Why has it taken so long to get assistance to the area?
* If authorities had run computer modelling on exactly this scenario, why has the response seemed to lack co-ordination?
* Why did authorities not do more to assist those who could not arrange their own evacuation to escape before Hurricane Katrina struck? This should have been plannable for given the known socio-economic make-up of the area is well-known. It's pretty simple really: if people are too poor to have cars - they need help!
* Could the racial divide be sadder than this: The Associated Press has separately captioned two photos of looters in the wake of Katrina. The photo of a black man refers to his "looting," and the photo of a white pair refers to their "finding." Possible explanations for this are explored further at the Snopes site.