Our nation\'s ability to turn away from social misery and to avoid responsibility for those in need has never really surprised me--at least when such indifference and cruelty took place long ago. I am a historian and I teach about such moments in our nation\'s past on a regular basis. So why was I so shocked, horrified, and down right disbelieving when I watched the nightmare unfold in New Orleans after Katrina? I had always assumed that I was more jaded and cynical that most. I was never one who assumed that, over time, we learn lessons and naturally evolve into a more humane society. And yet, as my husband and I watched so many people--women, children, men, the old, the disabled--so thirsty, so hungry, so desperate, and so absolutely abandoned in that convention center, I couldn\'t even sit down in my rage and anxiety. \"What is going on?!\" I kept asking my husband. \"Why isn\'t anyone doing anything?!\" \"Why haven\'t they (the government?) dropped water over the convention center?!\" \"They can drop supplies over the desert a million miles away but they can\'t drop it over New Orleans?!\" \"They can airlift Americans out of the American Embassy in Baghdad but they can\'t airlift them out of the nightmare in Louisiana?!\" \r\n\r\nBut deep down I knew something unspeakable. of course \"they\" could and \"they\" chose not to. Why? Because, extraordinarily, they did not quite believe that things were as terrible, as desperate, as every reporter and eye witness was telling them it was. They still needed to \"verify.\" They still needed to make sure that none of these poor folks were running some kind of a scam. They needed to confirm that these people begging for help really were the \"deserving\" poor. \r\n\r\nAs I paced and paced, and cried, and shouted at the TV, I felt so helpless. Yes, I would feel more useful after I sent some money, volunteered a room in my house to someone, and sent clothes. But I wanted to vent too. I wanted to make it clear that some citizens were outraged and that we would not tolerate a nation that treated its most vulnerable citizens so horrendously. Then I heard about a rally that was going to take place a few weeks later in Washington, DC. I knew that this was supposed to be a protest rally--a way in which citizens could let the Bush Administration know how many were deeply opposed to the war in Iraq. That is it! I decided then and there to drive to DC with my husband, my 13 year old, my 4 year old, my 5 year old niece, and my sister. Meanwhile my 18-year-old would take a bus from his college campus and join us there, as would my parents who live in Detroit. On September 24, 2005 all of us, all nine of us from across the country, met up in DC and marched together (along with thousands and thousands of other families from around the country) to protest the war in Iraq as well as the treatment of Americans in New Orleans. And these things were, of course, intimately connected in all of our minds. After all, had the National Guard and Army not been in Baghdad, they may well have been able to rescue the suffering in New Orleans. \r\n\r\nI am not sure what difference we made in terms of foreign or domestic policy, but I know that we did something valuable. We stood up. We spoke out. And even if this meant simply showing our children the importance of ALWAYS speaking out against injustice, then so be it. At this moment in American history perhaps we all need to be reminded how important that really is.\r\n