joining me now is a retired lieutenant general russell honoré. in 2005 russell on wright was brought in by the bush administration who managed the federal response to hurricane katrina in new orleans. he led a team of roughly 30,000 national guardsmen. 20,000 more federal troops, 50,000 people with a dozen navy ships and more than 200 helicopters. lieutenant general, welcome, good to see you, thank you for being with us. i would like, before we start talking, to play some sound for you. this is the resident i was just talking about, you know shrimpers. this is a small shrimping community here in fort myers beach, their situation right now is very bleak. these are some of the people who need the most help, listen to what they told me. how are you doing, how are you feeling, how long are you going to stay out here? we don t have anywhere to go. this is our family other than our families at home. this is how we support them. i ve got a granddaughter on the
Record high diesel prices and competition from cheap, imported shrimp are hitting Louisiana shrimpers in the wallet and driving some of them out of business.
i want to say a gentleman that said he used to spend $100, and now over 200, that s a little exaggerated right there. i think he should go on a diet. but sure, prices have gone up a little bit and i think for two reasons. one of them is there is a labor shortage out there. i ve talked to our ranchers out in kansas, i ve talked to our shrimpers in florida, and farmers and so forth, and they are short on labor. our ranchers would love to have the packing plants open six days a week. because of the omicron right now, they have people quarantined, only work five days a week. plus, you have a demand surge right now. i mean, everybody is wanting to buy, we have a lot of home chefs at home right now, they want to cook at home and so they want to buy more meat.