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Hurricane Gustav determined to be a presence at the GOP convention one way or another

Is there anything more emblematic of the Bush presidency than a hurricane? And so it is fitting that a hurricane seems determined to attend the Republican convention. From the LA Times, in an article about whether the convention will be postponed:

In Washington, Bush -- scheduled to speak at the Republican convention Monday -- was receiving what White House Press Secretary Dana Perino said were "regular updates" about the storm's progress.

Perino said it was "too premature to say" whether Bush would alter his plan to speak to the convention.

Matt Burns, communications director for the Republican National Convention, emphasized that officials have not made any changes in their plans related to Gustav.

"At this juncture we are moving ahead with the planning of our convention, and there have been no changes to our schedule of events. We obviously share the concerns of many Americans as we watch the developments," Burns said.

Accuweather's model tracking of the path of Hurricane Gustav is here.  Whether or not Gustav goes to Minneapolis St. Paul, it seems very likely to hit New Orleans on approximately the third anniversary of the Katrina disaster and a mandatory evacuation of New Orleans seems imminent:

New Orleans Mayor C. Ray Nagin left the Democratic National Convention on Wednesday and announced that he would order a mandatory evacuation of New Orleans if a Category 3 storm got within 60 hours of his city. Meteorologists predict Gustav will swell into a Category 3 hurricane, defined as a storm with winds between 111 mph and 130 mph.

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UPDATE 8/30/08: Gustav becomes a Category 4 hurricane and McCain's people float the idea of turning the GOP convention into a Red Cross fundraiser:

A senior McCain source said Saturday that officials are considering turning the convention into a service event, a massive telethon to raise money for the Red Cross and other agencies to help with the hurricane.

. . . as opposed to a fundraiser for McCain? (I'm not making this up.) How 'bout this: why don't they just  pledge to donate all the money raised by the McCain campaign between now and next week to the Red Cross?

Meanwhile, on a very serious note, here is a list of the key words that brought the last ten visitors to my website:

Kathryn Cramer
Recent Visitors by Referral Search Words
Detail Search Words Referring Web Site
  1 new orleans levee map      google.com
  2 new orleans levies map      search.yahoo.com
  3 before and after      images.google.com
  4 new orleans levee breaks search.yahoo.com
  5 new orleans levees google.com
  6 "new orleans" levee map google.com
  7 
  8 new orleans levee map google.com
  9 escape routes from nola google.com
10 new orleans levys google.com

While I did do a lot of work on disaster relief maps following Hurricane Katrina and the Pakistan Earthquake, I do not have detailed maps on how to escape from New Orleans in the event that levees fail again. I hope someone else does.

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