Passage 2

Good evening. I’m speaking to you from the city of New Orleans--nearly empty, still partly under water, and waiting for life and hope to return. Millions of lives were changed in a day by a cruel and wasteful storm. In the aftermath, we have seen fellow citizens left stunned and uprooted, searching for loved ones, and grieving for the dead. We’ve also witnessed the kind of desperation no citizen of this great and generous nation should ever have to know. //
    These days of sorrow and outrage have also been marked by acts of courage and kindness that make all Americans proud. Coast Guard and other personnel rescued tens of thousands of people from flooded neighborhoods. Many first responders were victims themselves, with a sense of duty greater than their own suffering. They lost their houses and cars, but they still got their spirit. With such spirit they’ve pulled through this catastrophe and would rebuild their hometowns.