Letters and Legend

The internet is a wondrous thing, a great research tool; it’s a purveyor of news and opinion and sometimes, unfortunately, of what are called “urban legends.” An urban legend is a bit of fantasy initiated by an anonymous source; one was that “all pay phones have been tainted with anthrax,” and another “if you open an email with Jesus in the subject line your computer will crash.” Such hoaxes are almost always received from a friend — when you see that it’s a forward of a forward of a forward it’s probably a good idea to check it out.

There are several places to check when you receive “you may not believe this but” email, such as www.snopes.com, but too many computer users don’t know about them or don't bother to check, and simply choose to believe and pass along whatever they get in the mail.

Even more unfortunately, some of those urban legends end up as letters to the editor of the local paper, causing no end of confusion about the facts.

I had already received one called "The Battle of New Orleans," so I recognized that it was the source for a local letter about Katrina. Even though the writer didn’t credit it as the source, with the exception of a few opening lines her long letter was lifted word-for-word from "The Battle of New Orleans" email. That urban legend was all over the internet last week, and was declared by snopes.com to be false.

Here, word for word, are the high points of the snopes.com posting:

Claim: New Orleans mayor Ray Nagin and Louisiana governor Kathleen Blanco refused President Bush's pleas to declare an emergency in Louisiana before Hurricane Katrina struck.

Status: False.
...
According to the St. Petersburg Times, Max Mayfield of the National Hurricane Center contacted government officials in Louisiana and Mississippi on Saturday night (27 August), not Friday night.
...
In fact, Governor Blanco had already declared a state of emergency for the state of Louisiana eight days earlier (26 August).
...
On Saturday (27 August), Governor Blanco did indeed request that President Bush "declare an emergency for the State of Louisiana due to Hurricane Katrina." The White House responded to Governor Blanco's request that same day (Saturday) by declaring the emergency and authorizing FEMA "to identify, mobilize, and provide at its discretion, equipment and resources necessary to alleviate the impacts of the emergency."

Unlike the original email or the letter- to-the-editor that plagiarized it (if plagiarism can be found when lies are repeated by copying them!), snopes.com provides sources for its findings; those sources include the Washington Post and the White House’s own web site.

So we are left to marvel that, although FEMA was authorized to mobilize as of August 27th, it wasn’t until September that help arrived.