The superficial breaking news coverage of the earthquake is finally wearing off, and questions are being asked. The most poignant – where is the relief for Haiti?

Emerging reports indicate a massive troop and medical presence – at the Port-au-Prince airport. But disturbing images – coming in seemingly by the hour — suggest that large swaths of the capital and the smaller cities outside have yet to see any aid, including food, water or rescue assistance, since the quake last week. Tensions are roiling, according to reports, not only over the lack of humanitarian relief, but over a perceived “bottleneck” at the airport due to US control of the airspace (apparently a new agreement will circumvent that) and the increasing hype over violence (or lack thereof) among the hundreds of thousands of desperate survivors amid the rubble.

Despite widespread accounts of self-policing, and a relative lack of violence, UN officials are saying that “security” is keeping them from getting help out to where it is needed. “Security is the key now in order for us to be able to put our feet on the ground,” said Vincenzo Pugliese, a U.N. spokesman. He said a lack of security has limited peacekeepers’ access “to the operational theater” — the city beyond the U.N. compound’s walls.

Amy Goodman of liberal Pacifica’s Democracy Now! is on the ground in Haiti and she says the UN is leaving tens of thousands of people without food and water because of this supposed “lack of security.” She reported from Leogane, the epicenter of the quake, outside Port-au-Prince, this morning. She said there has been virtually no sign of aid.

“They are getting almost no help,” she said. “The UN itself made the statement about security. We walked freely from one place to another. The people are desperate but definitely peaceful. All they ask for  — they ask for food and water. They ask for search and rescue equipment … and to be told the UN is concerned about security before they get aid – that is a grave concern to people.”

The mainstream news has been juicing up the specter of rioting and looting since the first reporter touched down on Port-au-Prince a week ago. Luckily, they have been disappointed, on the most part. But now, seven days later, extreme hunger and overall desperation are setting in, and the sporadic reports of violence and looting (if that is what you call it when traumatized people, starving, living among the sight and stench of dead relatives, watching their babies and children waste away, start grabbing food from a collapsed grocery store) are apparently enough for some to justify the low expectations of the Haitian population.

One woman told The Washington Post – which apparently needed something to bolster the headline, “Haiti earthquake relief is stifled by chaos in Port-au-Prince” — that she “heard” about food arriving in the capital city, and a subsequent riot when the aid ran out.

“I have been here every day. I heard they gave away some food but there was a riot,” said Jean Marie Magarette, who was camping with her mother, sister and four children. “If you tell me they have been giving out food, I will believe you, but we have been on this spot since the day of the earthquake, and we have not seen anyone give away anything but water.”

Goodman suggests the UN is setting up a self-fulfilling disaster.“What do you think will happen when you (finally) bring in a pallet (of food) and there is so many more people than what is provided? Then they will talk about the riots,” said Goodman in her report this morning.

Democracy Now! reporter Sharif Abdel Kouddous has been in Port au Prince. “There is a real problem with the aid distribution here,” he said, noting the UN has demarcated “red zones” where relief workers are not allowed to go. “When the UN does come through, it really looks like an occupying force,” he said, describing how the trucks will “rush through” and quickly dump the aid, which is never enough. “They are not interacting with the people who are in the community, who can help distribute the aid through the community.”

He described an illuminating moment in which a Morman relief organization had flown in a helicopter to distribute aid. The helicopter supposedly landed, a crowd gathered. The helicopter took off again, without releasing the aid, Kouddous said, choosing to throw the packages from the helicopter high in the sky, making people scrabble for it on the ground.

“It ignited fury and indignation on the ground,” said Kouddous, quoting one Haitian man saying they were not animals, “we are proud people.”

“They are afraid of the people,” offered Goodman.

Dr. Evan Lyon, a doctor with Partners in Health, told Democracy Now! that he has been working around the clock at the site of the destroyed General Hospital in Port-au-Prince with no more medical supplies than they had in the immediate aftermath of the quake. They are in dire need, since they are doing surgeries and triage with barely the basics. He said the “security” issue is creating a fatal roadblock to survival in Port-au-Prince:

One thing that I think is really important for people to understand is that misinformation and rumors and, I think at the bottom of the issue, racism has slowed the recovery efforts of this hospital. Security issues over the last forty-eight hours have been our—quote “security issues” over the last forty-eight hours have been our leading concern. And there are no security issues. I’ve been with my Haitian colleagues. I’m staying at a friend’s house in Port-au-Prince. We’re working for the Ministry of Public Health for the direction of this hospital as volunteers. But I’m living and moving with friends. We’ve been circulating throughout the city until 2:00 and 3:00 in the morning every night, evacuating patients, moving materials. There’s no UN guards. There’s no US military presence. There’s no Haitian police presence. And there’s also no violence. There is no insecurity.

The U.S military, which has begun setting up distribution outposts and dropping food from the sky, and is expected soon to have 7,000 troops on the ground there, tried to downplay the rumors of violence, too, which leads one to really wonder about the UN, but also, where all the destructive hype and hysteria is coming from, and finally, if security isn’t an issue, why is it taking the USAID (U.S State Department) and military so long to get out to these people? Is is it just a matter of logistics, as were told?

“The level of violence that we see now is below the pre-earthquake levels,” assured Lt. Gen. Ken Keen, commander of U.S operation in Haiti, in a Tuesday al Jazeera-English report. Meanwhile, U.S troops are trying to burnish a humanitarian face in an attempt to dissuade rumors of “occupation,” said al Jazeera-English correspondent Sebastian Walker, in another report. He said some of the few troops on the ground in Port-au-Prince have chosen to take off body armor and helmets to try and assuage the fears of the people.

But Walker acknowledges that criticism is building into talk about the “militarization” of the U.S-led effort there.

From the AP: Over the weekend, the aid group Doctors Without Borders complained of skewed priorities and a supply bottleneck at the airport amid reports that US military flights were getting priority. French, Brazilian and other officials complained about the airport’s refusal to let their aid planes land, forcing many flights to end up in the neighbouring Dominican Republic, a day’s drive away.

Yesterday, French Co-operation Minister Alain Joyandet urged the United Nations to investigate the dominant US role in the relief operation, claiming that international aid efforts were supposed to be about helping Haiti, not “occupying” it.

The mounting criticism apparently led to an agreement between the UN and the airport to give aid flights a priority, according to the AP today.

Personally, I was very hopeful — and proud — to see the immediate reaction of my government, for which I pay taxes and spend a lot of time criticizing all year, after the quake. Fairfax County  urban search and rescue workers from my home of Northern Virginia were on the ground in a flash to rescue people from the rubble. Like so many have said (yes, somewhat gratuitously), this is “what we do best.”

But it is hard to see the depressing images, and hear the constant refrain from people that they have yet to see an aid worker or even soldier — that they feel “left behind” — and not wonder if bureaucracy and politics, whether it be within the military, USAID or the UN,  are getting in the way, to grave effect. It’s hard not to think what might happen if and when our own country is savaged by an equally near-apocalyptic natural event or terrorist attack. Haiti — the poorest nation in the western hemisphere — is certainly no fair comparison to the vast wealth and capability of the U.S. But Hurricane Katrina was no stellar example of how our governments — local, state or federal — react in a serious natural disaster, particularly governments operating in one of the poorest and blackest states in the union. How many of our own poor would be “left behind” for whatever social, political or logistical reasons during a similar disaster on our own soil? Are we truly ready to handle it? Should the military be taking the lead? If not, what government bureaucracy is readily equipped to take its place?

In light of the news coming from Haiti today, I do not think these are unfair questions to ask.