Bush and Katrina Survivors: What's wrong with this picture?

[Modem Butterfly]

We were told that Bush hugged two women who had lost everything in the storm. What's wrong with this picture? Both women have clean, freshly-washed and combed hair. How did they do that? There was barely water to drink, let alone waste on something like haircare. And no woman in her right mind would put polluted water on her hair. Also, notice that the hair is extremely neat. Anyone who's spent anytime in the Gulf can tell you the effects of humidity on hair that isn't carefully styled with very strong "product": the word is frizz. People make fun of southern women for having big hair, but the truth is that either you tease it into submission or you have a rather ragged looking mess by the end of the day. Once again, how did these women do that?

Finally, I notice that although the women have lost everything, all their clothes and their home, one of the women is wearing a clean, white t-shirt. Remember, this photo was taken before aid started coming to the area, so where did this t-shirt come from? If you look at the other survivors, their clothes are dirty, with sweat and mud and muck. How did these women come to be so clean?

[bushisanidiot]

1. Maybe he ordered them to bathe before he'd agree to touch them

cuz he's the king of the united states, you know..

i also remember them having VERY clean shoes.. white even. do you have a wider angle shot to post?

[soup]

18. wider angle pic

[bushisanidiot]

20. Yep. It looks like they're wearing brand new shoes..

how nice.

i also noticed that pres. nosepicker is wearing his lifts..

[Mass]

2. They could not let Bush hug dirty women

Of course it is a cover up. Either they gave them a shower and clean clothes before the photo-op or these are actresses.

[JuniperLea]

3. What is the date on the pic?

Not one smudge on that clean, white t-shirt. Interesting.

[Modem Butterfly]

6. September 2

[Skittles]

4. this is so obviously staged

the fact there are only two women is the first clue

[ohio_liberal]

5. I don't know anything about these women

But I want to mention that my beautiful African-American sisters the media is showing in shelters and at the Astrodome have taken the time to do each other's hair. When you got nothing else, you do what you can.

These ladies you're mentioning, I think we all know they aren't the real deal.

[Modem Butterfly]

9. They have clean water at the Astrodome

They also have electricity to run blowdryers and straightening irons. They did not have that at Biloxi when this picture was taken.

[librechik]

24. these women have been identified--they are South African

not homegrown survivors--they are the Bassier Sisters, and they probably came to the area to see if there was salvage. ahem.

People were curious about them, so the DU Investigation Team (and other bloggers) went to work and found out a lot about these two. There's a thread somewhere, search that out when you can.

As to the clean clothes: The Bushies flew around prepared for portable set construction. They built fake rescue stations for the cameras, then
took them away when they left, including the food. Those nice shirts seem to be one-size-fits-all costuming brought along for the pictures.
Makeup and hair person are off camera.

[kath]

34. yeah, they came to Biloxi to "salvage" some clothes - interesting word

choice, eh?

[Ioo]

7. I bet they were on AF1, they are plants...

NT

[Modem Butterfly]

10. He does have a shower on Air Force 1.

[Ioo]

19. Yes it does....

[BrklynLiberal]

8. Because those two women were NOT among those trapped in Biloxi

by the Hurricane. That entire photo-op was staged.

There were several threads about this during the time when we were in DefCon3 so I cannot trace my posts. German reporters told of the entire "set" being taken down after the photos were taken.
These women were not local African-Americans. They were said to be Dominican or Haitian orfrom some other Central or South American country, (one report had them as being South African) and had traveled from another town where one of them was in school, ostensibly to get some clothes..????

You can be sure that every single one of his "compassionate" photo-ops was staged..

[Media_Lies_Daily]

17. One of the sisters has been traced to Gautier, MS, 17 miles........

...to the east of Biloxi. Additionally, Bronwynne, the older sister, has a website that states that she is from South Africa originally. The younger sister, Kim, has been attending college...I don't recall exactly where.

A German reporting crew filmed Bush and the two girls prior to the actual photo-op, and their belief is that Bush and the two girls knew each other.

The question I have, is why would anyone travel 17 miles to the west of where they live along the coast if they knew what the conditions were like?

[eridani]

43. Where is the URL for her website?

Where is a link to the before and after video? The SA newspaper in another thread said they were checking out the possibility that the two women were South African, but this has not been confirmed.

Can we please back this up with solid links and get it sent out to Hartmann, Rhodes, Malloy et al.?

[buff2]

32. Flown in from Miami.......complements of brother Jebthro

Fake Photo-Op....fake pRESIDENT. Nothing new here...moving on....

[whatever4]

11. Saddness upon shame, I hadn't noticed this, but... yeah. Sigh nm

[BlueEyedSon]

12. STAGED PHOTO OP...HELLO????

[Zynx]

13. Bush: Eeewww...Get these two washed. I won't touch them dirty.

I can imagine it.

[bigbrother05]

14. It's all staged

I read here after this dog and pony show, the youngest girl approached * and asked if her family was alright, he replied their fine. Apparently knows the family. Can't have strangers approaching him.

[ComerPerro]

15. This man should go down in history, if nothing else, then as

the "Photo-Op President", because that is all he does.

Just staged events to build the myth of his greatness.

He and Reagan are so much alike its sickening...

[oneighty]

16. When first seeing this photo

I wondered why the girl on the left of the photo is suppressing a smile. Then I put that foolish observation behind me. She must be suppressing tears.

180

[Tesla]

22. Condi's cousins........j/k

[EnfantTerrible]

26. she was laughing at her sister's

bad acting.

[lonestarnot]

21. Oh gee couldn't have been STAGED could it? Duya will do just about

anything now to get out of this mess. He's a desperate cornered animal with rabies!

[beam me up scottie]

23. Good catch, MB, obviously staged.

I wonder how long his trainers had to work with him before he learned the new facial expression...

I'm going to go hurl now.

[hedda_foil]

25. Turns out these ladies are South African.

I don't have the link but someone here will. It was in the WaPo, I believe, either Sunday or Monday.

[toey]

27. I hope you all are proud of yourselves

Regardless of what these women were wearing, etc., they still lost everything. I personally do not believe this was a staged photo-op. I heard the women talking on MSNBC alone and I personally believe their story over what everyone has been posting here. Its ridiculous for people to dog these women just because they have clean clothes on. They had evacutated and were staying in a shelter outside of Biloxi.

Get a grip people, not everything is staged. You're making all of us sound like we're grasping at straws here and we don't need to. This will all work out in the end.

[CitrusLib]

28. I don't think they are dogging the women. They're dogging Bush.

Personally, I don't blame the ladies for accepting clean clothes, clean shoes and a bath from Bush's photo op team. It was a fortuitous godsend.

I do blame Bush for being so lily white elitist he can't summon the compassion to hug someone without a shower.

[speedoo]

29. So you believe the White House, huh?

"Regardless of what these women were wearing, etc., they still lost everything. I personally do not believe this was a staged photo-op. I heard the women talking on MSNBC alone and I personally believe their story over what everyone has been posting here. Its ridiculous for people to dog these women just because they have clean clothes on. They had evacutated and were staying in a shelter outside of Biloxi."

There are no facts to back up your assertions. How do you know they "lost everything"? Because the WH says so?

How do you know they were "staying in a shelter outside of Biloxi"? Because that's a convenient explanation for how clean they are after supposedly enduring five days of post-Katrina disaster? Because that's a convenient explanation for the fact that they are from Gautier, nearly 20 miles away and yet somehow got to Biloxi that day, despite severe damage to the roads between the two locations? With lily-white sneakers?

[beam me up scottie]

30. Hope you're wearing clean socks,

because your foot is going to taste bad enough as it is.
Maybe you should do you homework before you tell others to "get a grip".

The Potemkin Photo Op
Saturday, September 03 2005 @ 09:40 PM Eastern Daylight Time
Contributed by: Stranger

The First 'Comforting Session': Then it was off to Biloxi, MS to survey the damage. As Bush, Haley Barbour and others walked down a street, 2 women appeared seemingly out of nowhere for Bush to 'comfort' them. But it turns out that the two women didn't even live in Biloxi, and had just come down for the day to try to 'salvage' clothes from the area for one of the women's son (were they looters?). But they were apparently reasonably telegenic and happened to be in the area, so they were recruited to represent an area where they didn't even live. A number of threads at Democratic Underground discuss the weirdness of these women showing up in a disaster area. And a trandcript of the conversation between Bush and the women reads like a bad comedy skit:


Bush to women: "There's a Salvation Army center that I want to, that I'll tell you where it is, and they'll get you some help. I'm sorry.... They'll help you.....
Woman 1: "I came here looking for clothes..."
Bush: "They'll get you some clothes, at the Salvation Army center..."
Woman 1: "We don't have anything..."
Bush: "I understand.... Do you know where the center is, that I'm talking to you about?"
Guy with shades: "There's no center there, sir, it's a truck."
Bush: "There's trucks?"
Guy: "There's a school, a school about two miles away....."
Bush: "But isn't there a Salvation center down there?"
Guy: "No that's wiped out...."
Bush: "A temporary center? "
Guy: "No sir they've got a truck there, for food."
Bush: "That's what I'm saying, for food and water."
Bush turns to the sister who's been saying how she needs clothes.
Bush to sister: "You need food and water."

http://www.blah3.com/article.php?story=20050903214041794

[Media_Lies_Daily]

33. What the heck are you talking about???? LOOK at the two women!!!....

Do they LOOK like they've been through anything as horrible as Katrina???

They are FRAUDS!! A German film crew have them on video YUCKING IT UP with Herr Busch like that had known each other for years!!!! And then they started whining and crying when the photo-op OFFICIALLY started!!! The whole set, including the food stand, was dismantled as soon as Herr Busch departed the area!!

Maybe YOU need to get a grip!!

[Griffy]

38. WERES THAT VIDEO?!?! behind the scenes.... nt

[Dr Fate]

35. Mabye if Bush was not so dishonest all the time, it would not happen.

Conspiracy theories arise when folks have legitimate reasons for not trusting govt.

When the govt. keeps secrets, people fill in the blanks themselves.

[kath]

36. "not everything is staged"?!?! Where've you been - with Bush, EVERYTHING

is staged. The Potemkin pResident.

[Cassandra]

31. On the Thom Hartmann replay this morning...

he was saying that they didn't live in Biloxi. They lived elsewhere and had gone to the area to look for the belongings of someone else. You didn't think Bush would touch actual dirty people, do you?

[liveoaktx]

37. Vid Clip-I don't know if the women were genuine or not but BUSH WAS NOT

Smile Pretty for the Camera, Wait Turn This Way

Political Videos

[Catherine Vincent]

39. Where have you been Butterfly?

There have been discussions on this for quite some time. But your observation was right on.:)

[Modem Butterfly]

40. Going to and fro across the earth and walking up and down in it

I've had a lot of stuff going on since Katrina.

[FreedomAngel82]

41. Very good point

And why is he just surrounded by these two girls? Why not a group of people? What made them special to see the president?

[Lydia Leftcoast]

42. I picked up on their non-American accents right away

I watched a German news clip on line in which the German reporter on the scene in Biloxi said that Bush's photo ops had all taken place in areas that had been evacuated, so there were no people around to "help."

Furthermore, I have tinfoily questions about another photo op, in which crowds of people appear to be ignoring the Bushboy's presence, which seems odd. Either they should be Bushbots eager to crowd around their "hero" or hostile and eager to get in his face, not oblivious to his presence.

http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=view_all&address=104x4665179