As Hurricane Katrina evacuees headed to our state, Lindalyn
Kakadelis helped arrange services, volunteers, and educational options
in Charlotte. Her work included coordination with Charlotte Mecklenburg
Schools Superintendent Francis Haithcock and board members, and was
profiled under  “Newsmaker of the Week” in a Katrina newsletter from the Center for Education Reform.
In the aftermath of the hurricane, Jon Ham focused on media coverage,
writing about “the putrid reporting of the disaster by the mainstream
media.” His commentary generated national reaction and was linked on lucianne.com, polipundit.com, freerepublic.com, and Jim Romenesko’s media blog at the Poynter Institute. The exposure sent a flood of visitors to carolinajournal.com
on Tuesday. The result was record setting page views for the day
(10,319). Ham reports he’s received overwhelming positive e-mail from
readers who noted they’d never heard of JLF but have now bookmarked our
site. Because of the column, the Media Research Center’s media
criticism blog, newsbusters.org,
has enlisted Ham as a contributor. Meantime, on Thursday’s “Morning
News with Kevin Miller” on WPTF-AM, Donna Martinez discussed Katrina
with Miller, who was reporting live from the Gulf Coast. Miller joins
Martinez on NBC 17’s “At Issue” this Sunday to share his experience and
show personal video. The program also includes a debate over the
political fallout from Katrina — one of the subjects Marc
Rotterman addressed in a commentary published Friday at www.humaneventsonline.com. Rotterman
wrote that President Bush faces “problems of monumental proportions,”
including finger pointing about Katrina efforts, illegal immigration
and border security, the Iraq war, and gas prices. The president’s poll
numbers will take care of themselves, he wrote, if Bush addresses these
issues head-on.