Here's What Gets Me

[Emit]

This is a great rant, and kinda' sums it up for me re: all this rightwing BS about school buses and the 'blame the Dems game':

Here's What Gets Me
People are going around and around about who should have done what at what time to get food and water to the victims of Katrina, and to get the buses there to evacuate people from the city who didn't get out on their own, and to get medical care to the elderly so they wouldn't die, and to get control of the shelter areas so that people wouldn't be beaten, raped, and murdered at the convention center and the Superdome. Let's assume we're not deciding who should have done what at what time.

My problem with Bush -- and here, I do indeed address Bush individually, as a guy -- is that during the time that the crisis was developing, from Monday to Friday, he never seemed to experience any actual sense of urgency as a result of the simple fact that people were, minute by minute and hour by hour, dying.

Let's give him the benefit of the doubt that he was being prevented from acting by bureaucracy and the sheer magnitude of the situation. Where are the stories of how he was in his office freaking the fuck out because there were tens of thousands of Americans trapped without food and water? Where's the story of how he ripped a strip off of somebody, demanding to know what the holy hell the holdup is getting water and food to those people?

I want to hear about how he was demanding that extraordinary steps be taken. I want to hear about how he sent his lawyers into a room -- he had four days, you know -- and demanded that they come back in an hour with a plan for him to send the Marines into New Orleans with 100 trucks of food and water, posse comitatus or not. I want to hear that he was panicked. Because I was panicked. Everyone I know was panicked. Everyone I know was gnashing their teeth with helpless rage because they couldn't get in a car, drive down there, and drive a load of homeless Louisiana residents back home with them for soup and a goddamn hot bath. I want to hear that he acted at some point out of genuine despondency about the fact that citizens of the country he is supposed to be running were being starved and dehydrated in a hellish, fetid prison. We are dancing around now about whether it is his failure or not his failure. Where is the decency that would tell him that he is the president, and FEMA is part of his administration, and this failure is his to own and apologize for, whether other people also were wrong or not?

~snip~

Cont'd:

http://www.thisisnotover.com/archives/2005/09/heres_what_gets.html

[texpatriot2004]

1. this is not over n/t

[bobbieinok]

2. exactly on target

Where are the stories of how he was in his office freaking the fuck out because there were tens of thousands of Americans trapped without food and water? Where's the story of how he ripped a strip off of somebody, demanding to know what the holy hell the holdup is getting water and food to those people?

[Emit]

4. If I hear or read about those damned school buses ONE MORE TIME!

This gal really captured what, IMO, is at the heart of the matter, for me, at least.

What president, in their right mind, would sit back and watch, as all America-- heck, the entire world-- witnessed, for FIVE DAYS, men, women, and children dying, starving and suffering and NOT DO SOMETHING? Where was his urgency? His outrage?

What president?

Bush. Bush did.

[SeattleGirl]

3. This is DEFINITELY not over!

I know there have been thread on DU where people are saying that BushCo will once again get away with it, but in my gut, I don't think so. This is a tragedy and an offense of such magnitude, affecting so may people, that even Evil Genius Turdblossom won't be able to stop it.

IT IS NOT OVER!!!!

[tabasco]

5. Deep down inside, most of these people don't believe this crap.

Cognitave dissonance !

It allows the remaining 35% to live in harmony, knowing that the great leader George Bush is guiding them to a bright tomorrow.

I have become utterly pessimistic because of the huge numbers of republicans that remain loyal to their CULT, rather than their nation.

They have the money, the media, and the millions of brain-dead believers.

We have the truth. I hope it is enough!

[I_Make_Mistakes]

6. That's what bugged me too! No sense of emergency.

People can not live that long with out water. I said last week it was like, they were planning the perfect recovery with graphs and charts as people were dying. The rule here last week was 3 days with out water, but I think there will be more health issues under the radar, with the body being deprived of water, food and sleep.

[Emit]

7. I find his lack of urgency very unsettling

And perhaps, for me at least, that is what has really bothered me about this entire last week. Watching it unfold on TV and on line, I am still aghast.

I'm finding it very difficult to believe that the delay wasn't either retribution (for what, I don't know--against Dems, Women, Poverty or African Americans?) or at some level intentional. And I hate that when I start to get paranoid and have to put that tin foil thingy back on. But, having a background in psychology, something is really amiss with his lack of outrage.

I keep seeing that pic of Gore, by comparison, that was posted earlier---the look on his face, the sweat on his brow, the down and dirty look of intensity and focus: THE URGENCY. That's what I expect of a leader in a disaster!

Leaves me with WAY too much to ponder.

[I_Make_Mistakes]

8. Emit

I fought the word game of urgency and emergency when I posted. Emergency won out, like in STAT. This is my theory. These type of people keep emerging in Corp America (the Peter Principle, you will rise to your level of incompetency). I have worked for many corps. and repelled their desire for promotion, because I didn't want to be promoted to incompetency, unfortunately, I am the minority.