Use Your Power For Others

One person's fierce commitment to serve can illuminate the path when systems fail. 

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Transcript

Eighty percent of New Orleans lay submerged beneath floodwater. From above, the Big Easy stretched like a dark mirror, broken only by rooftops where desperate citizens waited for help.

"It broke my heart," Lt. General Russel Honoré would later recall of that sight. He didn't arrive until September 2nd, four days after Katrina made landfall, when thousands had already suffered or died due to a sluggish response from authorities. But at least he understood the brutal mathematics of disaster. That every hour of bureaucratic delay meant more preventable suffering.

General Honoré dove straight into the crisis. He assessed the situation as "a major logistics operation" and demanded boots on the ground. His first order as commander of Joint Task Force Katrina set the tone. They came to rescue, to serve, to save.

A nation reveals its character by how quickly it mobilizes to protect its most vulnerable. The United States, with all its military might and economic power, watched its own citizens drown in slow motion. The levees crumbled, and with them fell the basic covenant between a government and its people.

The mayor stammered, the governor hesitated, and the president posed for photos—disjointed leaders pursuing their political agendas. But Honoré bulldozed past the paralysis. He saw what politicians ignored. He saw the human crisis behind the headlines. He saw desperate American citizens who needed help. Poor families, mostly Black, abandoned by the systems meant to serve them.

The general worked around the bureaucratic roadblocks. When officials worried about protocols, he focused on getting water to the thirsty. When politicians debated jurisdictions, he coordinated rescue boats. When others saw chaos, he created order through compassion. His presence on the ground gave hope to the abandoned and direction to the responders.

Twenty years later, Katrina's scars still mark New Orleans. Empty lots dot neighborhoods where homes once stood, their residents scattered across distant cities. Without General Honoré's decisive leadership in those critical days, the toll would have been even more devastating. More lives lost, more families displaced, more communities shattered beyond repair.

One person with kindness and determination became a force of change in those desperate days. General Honoré moved heaven and earth for the people he served, proving real leadership flows from seeing and honoring humanity. 

The twentieth anniversary crystallizes his lesson. One person's fierce commitment to serve can illuminate the path when systems fail. Most people use power for their own benefit. Others, like General Honoré, use it to save lives.