be patient, the drowning are told
Condoleezza Rice took a break today from her round of Broadway shows and a shoe-buying spree that would do Imelda Marcos proud. Why? To tell the hurricane victims dying hourly in their homes that their prolonged suffering is God's will, not the government's fault, and to lecture them on the virtue of patience:
Asked to say a few words from the pulpit, Rice, a preacher's daughter, said: "The Lord Jesus Christ is going to come on time." She added: "If we just wait."
Earlier at the same church service "Rice nodded in agreement as the Rev. Malone Smith Jr. advised the congregation, "Wait for the Lord." Rev. Smith and Secretary Rice were playing on the words of a beloved gospel hymn that says, "He may not be there when you want him but he's right on time." They should both be ashamed of themselves.
The blame is not God's, or nature's, or fate's, or that of statistical happenstance. Whatever your conception of a Higher Power may or may not be, the United States was given everything it needed to cope with this disaster better than it has. God was on time: it is Rice and her colleagues that were too late. And when human beings are dying, it's a sin to suggest that we - or anyone - "wait."
http://nightlight.typepad.com/nightlight/2005/09/dont_hide_behin.html