Opinion: New Orleans’ Mayor Nagin shanghaied in Shanghai

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New Orleans Mayor Ray Nagin was quarantined in China on Sunday after another passenger on his flight was suspected of having swine flu. In a statement e-mailed to Bloomberg News, the mayor’s staff reports that Nagin doesn’t have any symptoms and that he, his wife and his security guard are being treated with “utmost courtesy.”

After the devastation of Hurricane Katrina, Nagin infamously urged residents to rebuild ‘a chocolate New Orleans,’ i.e. a majority African American city. (He later apologized).

Now, he’s shanghaied on an economic development trip in Shanghai and may have to miss a conference on climate change in Australia, where he was to give the keynote address.

It’s true that China has been fierce in its reaction to the swine flu outbreak -- instituting fever checks at airports, quarantining foreign arrivals and halting pork imports from countries with infections.

But back home in Louisiana, political critics wasted no time in suggesting that the Democratic mayor’s hotel incarceration was a bonus.

‘For the good of the people of the City of New Orleans,’ wrote talk show host and Republican leader Jeff Crouere in bayoubuzz.com, ‘I think it is imperative that the government of the People’s Republic of China keep Mayor Nagin in quarantine in their country for the next 11 months.’

Urging a petition drive to convince Chinese officials to keep Nagin, Crouere added:

During his 11 month quarantine, Nagin can return to health and the City of New Orleans can recover from another serious disease, the Nagin Flu. The symptoms of the Nagin Flu are quite severe and multi-faceted.

They include a lack of cranes in the sky, an anemic hurricane recovery, a poor public education system, horrific street conditions, rampant violent crime, boneheaded comments from City Hall, outlandish promises that are never kept, too many city vehicles, not enough working crime cameras, a strip club loving technology director, an email obsessed and arrogant sanitation director, and a disillusioned and disgusted populace just to name a few.

-- Johanna Neuman

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