When racism shows its ugly face

This article from The Independent (full transcript here) is simply scary, at least for those living the in the USA.
And this is not joke because I saw the interview on DemocracyNow.org of one journalist who was there, in the crowd which got pushed back.

Local police chief has admitted that he ordered his officers to block a bridge over the Mississippi river and force escaping evacuees back into the chaos and danger of New Orleans. Witnesses said the officers fired their guns above the heads of the terrified people to drive them back and "protect" their own suburbs.
Gretna (that's the name of the place) is a predominantly white suburban town of around 18,000 inhabitants. In the aftermath of Katrina, three quarters of the inhabitants still had electricity and running water. But, Chief Lawson told UPI news agency: "There was no food, water or shelter in Gretna City. We did not have the wherewithal to deal with these people. If we had opened the bridge our city would have looked like New Orleans does now - looted, burned and pillaged."

Another similar story from CNN.