The Message of Katrina (according to Houston Chronicle's Rick Casey)

[AuntieM1957]

Fellow DUers,

The Chronicle's columnist says it far better than I ever could.


Sept. 3, 2005, 8:19PM
Is Katrina whispering in our ears?
By RICK CASEY

Some preachers tell us Katrina is God's way of telling us to repent.

New Orleans is, to them, Sodom. Biloxi, I suppose, is collateral damage.

I think God's message is much less sexy. God is lecturing us on economics.

Katrina is God's way of telling us that for all the power of the free enterprise system, it doesn't take care of everything.

In other words, thou shall not worship free markets.

Read on....

http://www.chron.com/cs/CDA/printstory.mpl/metropolitan/3338550

[aquart]

1. YES! Thou shalt not worship free markets!

Finally. Of course, corporate welfare is hardly a free market system...but free markets are law of the jungle and I thought we'd left that place.

Obviously not.

[AuntieM1957]

2. Even more than coporate welfare, there is a belief in some

evangelicals that if you're "righteous", God will reward you with great riches.

By their logic (obviously lifted from scriptures not included in my personal copy of the Bible), poor people are evil, not righteous, worthy of God's wrath.

They've taken the simple message of a Jewish carpenter and corrupted it beyond all recognition.

[Bernardo de La Paz]

3. Well said. . . . nt

[bemildred]

4. "Thou shalt not worship oversimplified theoretical abstractions".

Of which the "free market" is only one of many.

[belle]

5. Is it just me, or is this becoming a theme?

Obviously the blogs and progressives 'zines have been shouting this for some time, but also there are at least three or four powerfully written editorials from major papers along similar lines these past couple days. The Frank Rich, another op-ed in the LA Times today, a couple from Time and Newsday...