“The good news: If you’ve survived Hurricane Katrina, the government will let you register for help online. The bad news: But only if the computer you’re using is running Windows,” Gary Krakow reports for MSNBC.
“Yes, it turns out that to make a claim with the Federal Emergency Management Agency’s Individual Assistance Center, your Web browser must be Microsoft’s Internet Explorer 6 or higher and you must have JavaScript enabled. It even says so right on the page itself. One problem: IE6 isn’t available for Macintosh or Linux computers,” Krakow reports. “The safest way for non-Windows users to register for assistance is to call FEMA directly at 1-800-621-FEMA (1-800-621-3362) or for the hearing/speech impaired at TTY: 1-800-462-7585. FEMA says the phone lines are staffed 24/7.”
Full article here.
Ars Technica reports that this IE-only situation “has become a considerable problem for relief workers, who are attempting to setup as many kiosks as possible for refugees. Workers on the ground have told Ars Technica that they would prefer to avoid setting up Windows XP workstations because they take longer to setup, and even longer to properly patch and configure for use. You may recall that in an experiment performed last year, a Windows XP SP1 box put on the Internet was compromised in 4 minutes flat. While Service Pack 2 and recent updates undoubtedly improve XP’s defenses, techs are wary of using the OS in this situation.”
Full article here.
MacDailyNews Take: More short-sighted Windows-only bullshit from the U.S government. Don’t bug FEMA right now, they’ve got enough problems. Complain to your congressperson and/or your senator:
Contacting Congressperson: http://www.house.gov/writerep/
Contacting Senators: http://www.senate.gov/general/contact_information/senators_cfm.cfm
[UPDATE 9/7, 9:24am ET: added Ars text and link.]
Related articles:
Donate to The American Red Cross Hurricane 2005 Relief fund to help Hurricane Katrina victims – September 03, 2005
World Wide Web Consortium objects to US Copyright Office’s Internet Explorer-only browser plan – August 25, 2005
U.S. Copyright Office: Use only the world’s most insecure browser to secure your copyright – August 17, 2005
U.S. Copyright Office: is it okay if our new website only works with Internet Explorer? – August 11, 2005
Survey identifies strong demand for Macintosh and Firefox web conferencing support – August 11, 2005
Using Apple’s Mac OS X 10.4 Tiger’s included fax capabiltes – July 22, 2005
Security report shows Microsoft’s Internet Explorer was unsafe for all but seven days of 2004 – March 22, 2005
Penn State’s IT Services recommends dumping Microsoft Internet Explorer immediately – December 09, 2004
Security expert: Don’t use Microsoft Windows, Office, Outlook, Internet Explorer – December 09, 2004
German Federal Office for Information Security: Internet users should ditch Internet Explorer – September 13, 2004
Web Standards Project: Abandon Microsoft Internet Explorer and ‘Browse Happy’ – August 25, 2004
Security expert: Microsoft Internet Explorer ‘just cannot be trusted, use alternate browser’ – July 02, 2004
Security firm warns of new Internet Explorer flaw, advises ‘use a different browser’ – July 01, 2004
Microsoft axes Internet Explorer for Mac – June 13, 2003
Darknite
Please read this:
http://edition.cnn.com/2005/US/09/06/international.aid.flows/
and this
http://www.guardian.co.uk/worldlatest/story/0,1280,-5259960,00.html
The world does care. If anything, the world is simply shocked that the US needs such serious help.
To add to Lee’s comments, I’ve blogged about a related article in the Washington Post Express. See washingtonpost.com/express, or <a >”my blog”</a>. All you guys throwing around the “this country, that country” BS need to get over it. Some people are like that, but a lot of us everywhere (even in America) aren’t, and you don’t have to be either.
I congratulate MDN’s take for not encouraging people to attack FEMA right now – one of the best decisions I’ve seen from this site in a while.
MW: activity…yep.
This is why one browser should NEVER be a standard for web services.
The whole point of the internet is that EVERYONE can access the information.
ALL browser types should be supported and this should be compulsary for ALL web content.
This sort if thing makes me sick – the internet was concieved as a system for everyone.
It’s people like Microsoft that are fragmenting the internet and putting people in groups.
If this was anything other than the internet is would be called ‘racism’.
Just got this in an e-mail, FWIW:
A few facts are in order:
President Bush declared Louisiana a disaster area two days before the hurricane struck the New Orleans area.
President Bush urged New Orleans Mayor C. Ray Nagin and Louisiana Gov. Kathleen Babineaux Blanco to order the mandatory evacuation that was issued on Sunday, August 28.
First responders to a disaster are always state and local emergency agencies. FEMA is there to supplement the state and local activities.
The hurricane threatened an area as large as 90,000 square miles covering three states. Immediate relief could not possibly have been delivered to all the places that required attention.
An AP photo showed a large fleet of New Orleans buses soaking in six feet of water. The mayor apparently had the means to evacuate many of the folks who ended up stranded at the Superdome and the convention center.
FEMA began its activities immediately, not expecting the magnitude of the flooding, the non-response at the city and state level, and the anarchy that resulted.
The local and state governments had rehearsed for a different scenario. Disaster drills in New Orleans had taken place, but with a false assumption that the levees would hold.
Both the law and protocol prohibit the president from ordering military troops into a state without a formal request to do so from the governor of the affected state.
Hey FEMA,
Thanks a lot.
I am a Mac user AND I happen to be one of the recipients of Katrina’s wrath. Thank you for adding to my list of hassles by forcing me find a still-functioning Windoze PC, using IE 6+, in order to file a claim with you. As if I don’t have enough crap to put up with…
Fsck you very much.
Jake:
HOLY SHIT! Do you only watch FOX and have conservative friends?
What you are spouting is ALL neo-con spin?
The Gov. of Louisiana IN WRITING made the request of Bush on the 26th!
Bush did no urging until it was asked of him by the local officials in the affected areas. Rather than actually do anything to deal with the situation even after the storm had hit Bush was getting his photo taken with McCain celebrating VJ day… 2 weeks after THAT had passed!
The idea that the administration is anything but an embarassment right now is absurd.
Oh, Macs rule (had to keep the post on topic).
Is this because they like to develop web-sites in .Net? I worked on a project where the online/web portion was developed in .Net and we had to get the entire company to quickly upgrade to IE 6.
And BTW – to all the Bush apologists – enough already. We have a grossly incompetent President who is running our country into the ground and leaving people to die. That’s who YOU elected. Forgive me if I don’t say thank you.
Across America, millions of people are responding to the devastation of Hurricane Katrina by opening up their hearts and checkbooks to help those in need. Across the Gulf Coastarea, volunteers and rescue workers are responding to the horror by working around the clock, some risking their lives to pluck victims from rooftops and rivers.
And then there are those in New Orleans itself who, confronted by the devastation, reacted in a way that reminds us, not of the fearful power of Mother Nature, but the tragic depths of human nature: The stole everything that was not tied down.
These were scenes that made me shake my head in disbelief: Looters casually filling plastic bags, shopping carts, even handtrucks with loot, all in clear view of their neighbors, the media, even National Guardsmen.
What hit me like a punch wasn’t the looting itself as much as it was the attitude of the looters. Reporters challenged them, asking the thieves and thugs if it was their own stuff they were taking, and the looters just laughed.
One man, who had about 10 pairs of jeans draped over his left arm, was asked if he was salvaging things from his store.
“No,” the man shouted, “that’s EVERYBODY’S store.”
Moms and their kids lugged cases of beer and soda out of a grocery store, smiling at the TV cameras they passed. Men with bundles of clothes lumbered nonchalantly out of stores on Canal Street in the French Quarter, while others busted out windows to grab “emergency essentials” like jewelry and luggage.
Where were the cops, you ask? According to the New Orleans Times-Picayune website, they were at the Wal-Mart on Tchoupitoulas Street, helping themselves to computers and flat screen televisions.
A crowd in the electronics section said one officer broke the glass DVD case so thieving teenagers wouldn’t cut themselves. “The police got all the best stuff. They’re crookeder than us,” one man groused to the press.
One looter, 25-year-old Toni Williams, shrugged when confronted by a reporter as she loaded up with stolen supplies. “It must be legal,” she said. “The police are here taking stuff, too.”
The more I watched, the more stunned and angry I became. The more I listened, the more outraged I felt—as when Louisiana Sen. Mary Landrieu defended those people looting stores of food and water (“That’s understandable,” she told MSNBC). Instead of condemning this opportunistic thievery outright, this Democratic Senator urged Louisiana’s looters to “use good judgment.”
What does that mean—only steal from Republicans?
One news story quoted a local named Mike Franklin, who stood nearby and watched the looters’ progress. “To be honest with you, people who are oppressed all their lives, man, it’s an opportunity to get back at society,” he said.
Again and again as I watched these sickening images of brazen looting from an American city, I asked myself: Who ARE these people? Who are these pathetic losers who raise little kids to be lookouts while they steal and teach him the phrase “86” to warn of approaching police? Who are these people who, surrounded by the bravery of law enforcement and rescue workers in the midst of a crisis, choose to give into their lowest, most base selves? Who is this Mike Franklin who excuses this shameful theft and thuggery as a legitimate response to “oppression?”
“Get back at society?” You mean the society that gives you, for free, 12 years of education? Whose cops patrol your streets and whose taxpayers provide billions in welfare payments, health care and other benefits—not to mention billions in FEMA money? Is that the “oppressive society” you have in mind?
Because, speaking as a member of the oppressing class, I want my stuff back. The jeans and the computers and the beer and the chips—I want the selfish dirtbags who stole it to bring it all back. I want their ingratitude acknowledged and their shameful acts undone.
Because the store whose doors they kicked in did not belong to “everybody.” Those stores, and the products for sale on their shelves, represented work. They represented investment and sacrifice and saving and risk-taking, all to build a successful business that one day would face the unavoidable devastation of a hurricane and the unforgivable destruction committed by their fellow human beings.
It’s offensive to hear anyone, from a US Senator to a street-cruising sneak-thief defend this looting as legitimate. This thievery was not inevitable and it’s not excusable.
My family and I were in Richmond, VA in September 2003 when Hurricane Isabelle hit and knocked out power and water for more than a week. Like hundreds of thousands of others with rotting food in our fridge and thirsty kids at home, we had to stand in hours-long lines for water and ice just to get by…and we did.
No riots, not stealing, no jumping the ice truck and trying to hijack it. Just people standing in line waiting their turn. Why couldn’t that be New Orleans?
I believe the looting occurred because of what President Bush calls the “soft bigotry of low expectations.” When aUS Senator excuses your crimes and a neighbor can explain it as a sociological reaction, then why not? Why not steal? Why not (as occurred in New Orleans) shoot a fellow looter for getting better stuff than you? Or why not (as also happened) shoot a cop in the head for trying to stop the looting?
If you live in a community whose culture celebrates lawbreaking, and your neighbors and leaders expect no better from you, it must be awfully tempting to give in.
In many parts of America, a rising tide like the one in New Orleans would bring out the best, the most generous, and the most responsible elements in the human character. For whatever reason, the culture of New Orleans’ inner city instead brought out the very worst.
Insurance companies are talking about $25 billion in damages from Hurricane Katrina. But the damage to the image of the American character may be far more destructive than that.
Jim & Elaine Gallagher
Charlotte, NC 28277
From a different perspective!
I received a e-mail blaming the Bush administration for New Orleans
problems. This is in direct reply. Who really is responsible? Beats me!
This is surely the other side of the story.
dubya
In case you aren?t familiar with how our government is SUPPOSED to work: The chain of responsiblity for the protection of the citizens in New Orleans
is:
1. The Mayor
2. The New Orleans director of Homeland Security (a political appointee of the Governor who reports to the Governor)
3. The Governor
4. The Head of Homeland Security
5. The President
What did each do?
1. The mayor, with 5 days advance, waited until 2 days before he announced a mandatory evacuation (at the behest of the President). The he failed to provide transportation for those without transport even though he had hundreds of buses at his disposal. 2. The New Orleans director of Homeland Security failed to have any plan for a contingency that has been talked about for 50 years. Then he blames the Feds for not doing what he should have done. (So much for political
appointees) 3. The Governor, despite a declaration of disaster by the President 2 DAYS BEFORE the storm hit, failed to take advantage of the offer of Federal troops and aid. Until 2 DAYS AFTER the storm hit.
4. The Director of Homeland Security positioned assets in the area to be ready when the Governor called for them, before the flooding.
5. The President urged a mandatory evacuation, and even declared a disaster State of Emergency, freeing up millions of dollars of federal assistance, should the Governor decide to use it.
Oh and by the way, the levees that broke were the responsibility of the local landowners and the local levee board to maintain, NOT THE FEDERAL GOVERNMENT. The levee board has collected taxes for decades and spent the money on buying a casino, and a private airplane for their use. You haven’t heard much about that in the news, but watch for it, as it’s going to have to come out sooner or later. The disaster in New Orleans is what you get after decades of corrupt local and state government going all the way back to Huey Long. If you don’t remember him, he’s worth looking up. Funds for disaster protection and relief have been flowing into this city for decades, and where has it gone, but into the pockets of the politicos and their friends. (See “levee board”, further down) Decades of socialist government in New Orleans has sapped all self reliance from the community, and made them dependent upon government for every little thing, or a small welfare state of loyal voters. Political correctness and a lack of will to fight crime have created the single most corrupt police force in the country, and has permitted gang violence to flourish. The sad thing is that there are many poor folks who have suffered and died needlessly because those that they voted into office failed to protect them. For those who missed item 5 (where the President?s level of accountability is discussed), it is made more clear in a New Orleans Times-Picayune article dated August 28:
NEW ORLEANS (AP) ? In the face of a catastrophic Hurricane Katrina, a mandatory evacuation was ordered Sunday for New Orleans by Mayor Ray Nagin. Acknowledging that large numbers of people, many of them stranded tourists, would be unable to leave, the city set up 10 places of last resort for people to go, including the Superdome. The mayor called the order unprecedented and said anyone who could leave the city should. He exempted hotels from the evacuation order because airlines had already cancelled all flights. Gov. Kathleen Blanco, standing beside the mayor at a news conference, said President Bush called and personally appealed for a mandatory evacuation for the low-lying city, which is prone to flooding. The ball was placed in Mayor Nagin?s court to carry out the evacuation order. With a 5-day heads-up, he had the authority to use any and all services to evacuate all residents from the city, as documented in a city emergency preparedness plan. By waiting until the last minute, and failing to make full use of resources available within city limits, Nagin and his administration dropped the ball.
Mayor Nagin and his emergency sidekick Terry Ebbert have displayed lethal, mind boggling incompetence before, during and after Katrina. As for Mayor Nagin, he and his pathetic police chief should resign as well. That city?s government is incompetent from one end to the other. The people of New Orleans deserve better than this crowd of clowns is capable of giving them. If you?re keeping track, these boobs let 569 buses that could have carried 33,350 people out of New Orleans?in one trip?get ruined in the floods. Baton Rouge is not that far up the road, so they could have made multiple trips. Whatever plan these guys had, it was a dud. It probably would have worked if they?d bothered to follow their emergency preparedness plan, already in place. As for all the race-baiting rhetoric and Bush-bashing coming from prominent blacks on the left, don?t expect Ray Nagin to be called out on the carpet for falling short. You want to know why? Here?s why: It?s more convenient to blame a white president for what went wrong than to hold a black mayor and his administration accountable for gross negligence and failing to fully carry out an established emergency preparedness plan. To hold Nagin and his administration accountable for dropping the ball amounts to letting loose the shouts and cries of ?Racism!?. It?s sad, it?s wrong, but it?s standard operating procedure for the media and left-wing black leadership. Mark my words: you will not hear a word of criticism from Jesse Jackson Sr., Randall Robinson, the Congressional Black Caucus, the NAACP, or Kanye West being directed toward Clarence Ray Nagin Jr. Why? Because he is just another black politician, instead of a responsible elected official who happens to be black. In the mindset of more-blacker-than-thou blacks, black politicians who are on their side can do no wrong.
>The more I watched, the more stunned and angry I became. The more I listened, the more outraged I felt—as when Louisiana Sen. Mary Landrieu defended those people looting stores of food and water (“That’s understandable,” she told MSNBC). Instead of condemning this opportunistic thievery outright, this Democratic Senator urged Louisiana’s looters to “use good judgment.”>
Loot responsibly.
Dark Knight,
The way your president said it, help was not asked for and he was not expecting any.
I think it would be more accurate to say that the US really prevents ALL nations from working together.
You are usually the first ones to arrive to help to feed your egos, or you just happen to be there ready to invade some nearby country.
It’s hard to make web pages work under multiple platforms? Uhh, no, you have to go out of your way to make them incompatible. HTML, PHP, Java, Javascript, and CGI are all cross-platform technologies that are not dependant on the browser. There’s no benefit to using proprietary ActiveX that you can’t achieve more easily and with better, more expandable results with these other standards.Thankfully, IE-only sites are a dying breed, and a site this important should not have such a restriction. At least they also provide a telephone number.
I personally think that Microsoft should be banned from all government sites. Aren’t there laws against doing business with convicted monopolists?
As for our wonderful President: You people voted for him. He had no experience for the job. He put his friends in high ranking positions. Do you really expect anything more from FEMA when their director had no experience for the job?
I heard on TWIT that Condaleeza Rice was shopping in NYC on Saturday and people started screaming at her and the Secret Security had to get her out of the store.
Point well taken Jim & Elaine. And did all of you write your Representatives & Senators to protest FEMA’s platform bigotry?
I went to those sites and had no problem.
And if it was Safari-only you would be saying, “Another reason to buy a Mac. Macs save lives” or whatever other hypocritical BS that completely misses the real issue.
RE Bush: The system in general failed us. No one person is responsible.
“That’s the danger of being the greatest nation on earth”
How arrogant.
“When something bad happens to the US, we are left to fend for ourselves, with no help from anyone else.”
How naive.
Road Warrior said: >>I think it would be more accurate to say that the US really prevents ALL nations from working together.
You are usually the first ones to arrive to help to feed your egos, or you just happen to be there ready to invade some nearby country.<<
That is one of the most pathetic things I have ever read. Ironically, it is your very sentiment that is at the heart of much international non-cooperation. You obviously have neither grasp of history nor reality. The U.S. and its citizenry have a long tradition of helping others out that has nothing to do with ego or invasion. Your sort of rhetoric is just amazing. As an American who has been troubled by many things, both Democratic & Republican, but also has been proud of what I see many Americans do for others, all I can say is f*** you.
In the interest of keeping this on topic:
The hurricaine victims don’t have electricity. Unless FEMA’s online service supports a browser powered by treadmill, it kind of doesn’t matter.
Road warrior, your tired rant smacks of ideoligical idiocy. According to your post, whether the U.S. shows up or not, it’s wrong either way. And of course, the entire combined world can’t work together, and it’s all the fault of the U.S. Your comments are filled with racism, though it’s subtle. The world’s full of different cultures, but do you really think the average american is that much worse than the average ____ (put your own country here). If so, get a head check. Your one of those sick people who haven’t lifted a finger to help anyone else, at least not unless they meet your approval. In fact you’re what you’re accusing the U.S. of – of course humans are so often hypocritical that it isn’t even a surprise to encounter.
I think what Jake is saying is that the blame starts with the Mayor, goes on to the Governor and ends with Bush. Personally I put more blame on the Mayor for waiting until the last minute to order a mandatory evacuation and then blaming everyone else for the mess. They had a plan that they did not even attempt to implement. Only blaming Bush just shows how biased people are. The “leader” of FEMA and Homeland Security should both be fired of course, but the Mayor and Governor are idiots too.
realist – beautiful summary.
Reality Check, is that really you?
I posted on this also, opinions welcome on <a >ransomedhome.blogspot.com</a>.
MacDoctor: Not sure how far you got, but I went all the way through the character recognition pages only to be stopped cold by an IE6-only page.
MW word: “truth” as in not much of it on this page I am afraid.