Katrina Emergency Preparedness

Let me first preface this comment by saying that I hope you don't think I'm a terrible person for harboring these feelings.
Why folks didn't follow the mandatory evacuation is beyond me. Hindsight is a wonderful thing, but the satellite photos of this hurricane demonstrated that this was a big one. The fact that we're hearing about rapes murders and looting is very tragic too. The fact of snipers shooting at the helocopters that are trying to bring relief is just craziness. Having to use troops to contain order rather than have everyone doing relief effort is stupid.
It seems that the folks that stayed behind for whatever reason mostly seem to be a mixture of thugs and those not having resources. What we're seeing now is the ignorance that has been breeding here over many years. These folks seem to rely on the government to help out in every way. I never understood watching folks walking in the water back and forth staying in the town, why they didn't keep walking north out of town I'll never know. Anything would be better than staying in New Orleans.
Most of all the disaster plans encourage folks to have a family plan intact, to be ready themselves and knowledgeable in how to access information. The local government failed miserably as well, going off the deep end. It is sad that precious hours and days were wasted because of this. Why the local government didn't activate school busses to assist folks to get out before the storm hit is curious. With the evacuation site being the Superdome also below sea level is pretty crazy as well, also that no supplies were taken in preparation to the Superdome anticipating refugee's arriving.
I know this sounds horrible, as I like to think I am compassionate in alot of ways. I guess what I mean to say is I would like to help folks already making some attempt here. For it to be expected that everything be done is crazy especially in such an all out emergency. I'm not refering to the elderly or sick, I'm mostly refering to the able bodied.
To not see these guys help each other out is frustrating to say the least. I feel like we are failing the folks that were just too ignorant to leave or that decided to stay for other strange reasons (that escape me) and are stuck with these thugs. So much for emergency preparedness. Meanwhile I hope folks survive this tragic situation.

With New Orleans being below sea level, it makes me wonder if it would be good to rebuild the city to a higher ground. I know they will probably rebuild it where it stands, but it seems to me to be a bandaid, and that this tragic situation could happen again with the next horrendous storm.

I also wonder about the folks evacuated to Houston, they probably won't have the funds to travel back to New Orleans, especially after several months of starting school and jobs and most probably will get established in Houston.

My heart goes out to all of these families that are suffering so much in these very difficult times.