Christopher Hitchens: "Voters will remember disaster response"

[Bush_Eats_Beef]

http://www.abc.net.au/lateline/content/2005/s1453763.htm

TONY JONES: Pitch ahead for us, if you can. What lasting effect do you think this will have on the Bush presidency?

CHRISTOPHER HITCHENS: Well, in terms of political psyche, shall we say, it's good for the Democrats in about five different ways. One, it reminds people of the existence of the underclass, which tends to be downplayed, shall we say, by the Republican Party. Second it reminds people of the importance of government spending and government services, again, I think the same intuitive or subliminal point applies. Third it makes it at a populous level anyway harder to make a solid case for Iraq, though it doesn't really alter the case about whether you think the war is a just or necessary one. And then fourthly, it reflects very badly on the personality of the President himself. So this is not, I think, a transient story. This is not something that is going to be confined to the Weather Channel, shall we say. I think it will be remembered as a hinge event in the second term.

TONY JONES: If it is a hinge event, is there any way he can use it to his advantage, as he ultimately did after a very shaky start immediately after September 11?

CHRISTOPHER HITCHENS: Well, no, I think people forgave him for blundering around on that day, and not quite knowing what to do and making what must have been one of the worst speeches ever given by any politician. That could, as it were, be forgiven because everyone felt I'm sure, my God, how would I have held up on a day like that? This is worse because, a) it could be seen coming and b), I might just add, by the way, I mean, these States that have been devastated, Louisiana and Mississippi and Somerset and Alabama, they're all in the Republican column. The President is supposed to care about and nurturing the South, so is Karl Rove. What were they thinking? What were they thinking? I have no answer to that question that doesn't come up with a revelation of the most, really, catastrophic incompetence and insouciance.

[MintOreoCookie]

1. I really hope that those poor people who voted for Bush realize

how little he truly cares about them. Compassionate conservatism? NOT EXISTANT. I am hoping that the Democrats take over the Senate come next year.

[Bush_Eats_Beef]

3. But the media is slamming the fact that he does care...

Mr. & Mrs. Johnny Lunchpail eat this stuff up like it's candy.

[MintOreoCookie]

5. That's called a photo opportunity

If the man genuinely cared, he would have RUN to that area to express his sympathy. Instead, that selfish pig ran to California to boost his own ratings. That's the sign of a someone who doesn't give a rat's ass about the victims of Katrina.

[MADem]

2. Even a broken clock is right twice a day

He is still a drunken shill for the GOP--or perhaps a drunken popinjay. Have another drink, Hitch!

[bunkerbuster1]

13. Bobo Brooks hasn't been very supportive of Bush, either.

That's encouraging.

Note this clip from
<http://www.nytimes.com/2005/09/04/opinion/04brooks.html?n=Top%2fOpinion%2fEditorials%20and%20Op%2dEd%2fOp%2dEd%2fColumnists%2fDavid%20Brooks>

Reaganite conservatism was the response to the pessimism and feebleness of the 1970's. Maybe this time there will be a progressive resurgence. Maybe we are entering an age of hardheaded law and order. (Rudy Giuliani, an unlikely G.O.P. nominee a few months ago, could now win in a walk.) Maybe there will be call for McCainist patriotism and nonpartisan independence. All we can be sure of is that the political culture is about to undergo some big change.

We're not really at a tipping point as much as a bursting point. People are mad as hell, unwilling to take it anymore.

[Wordie]

17. Hoping this is right: all the Bush failures may have reached critical mass

At least that's what I've been sensing. Hope this is actually what's going on now, because it's about time!

[HereSince1628]

4. insouciance, there is a word you don't see everyday...

definition...uncaring, happy-go-lucky. And it fits so perfectly.

[DELUSIONAL]

6. ah -- Somerset -- is a state???

I keep hearing that he's a drunk --

It is very hard to imagine that bushie will get away with being incompetent and inept and stupid and cold and uncaring this time round.

Damn we watched the damn thing head straight for the Gulf States.

And FEMA keeps screwing up on a daily or hourly basis -- or is it Home Land Security that keeps screwing up? I think Brown has to ask permission to go to the bathroom from Homeland Security.

[The Backlash Cometh]

7. FUCK YOU, Christoper Hitchens. FUCK YOU, FUCK YOU, FUCK YOU!

That man is vulture, jackal & toad, all rolled into one. It sickens me how he can smell opportunity a mile away. He knows the tide as turned. I, for one, will not forget what side he was on in the last ten years. You, bloated pundit, you.

[KoKo]

14. Look at this snip from the interview where he reveals his racism and it's

dark and ugly. It's actually shocking to me to see him reveal what he really thinks. No wonder he wrote that book critical of Mother Theresa...Sheesh....He also lies about New Orleans turning it's "criminal element" out into the streets. He needs to be called on this terrible statement along with his other racist crap!

----------------------------------------------------------
CHRISTOPHER HITCHENS: And I think you might have to add also the criminal element. I haven't been able to confirm this, but I was told they just opened the jails and let people out. Because they didn't know what to do and the police department started to throw up its hands and buckle quite quickly. People actually deserted in the middle of the calamity. And if it's true that the criminal population was just released on to the streets then that's an additional inflection on the people who were remaining behind. It's like turning the wolves onto the sheep.

TONY JONES: How will America come to terms, do you think, with this, though, this racial element which Jesse Jackson has jumped upon so quickly. We've heard this rapper who made the public comments on network television which were censored from one coast to the other. It's obviously extremely sensitive, not many people have made these comments, but those who have have got an awful lot of publicity.

CHRISTOPHER HITCHENS: Well, yes. I mean, I don't think the Reverend Jackson's opinions are now taken as seriously as they once were. But, look, the thought is bound to occur to people naturally, you don't have to do any prompting let alone any incitement. I mean there it is, the revelation that a lot Americans live in effect in the Third World - and in a banana republic version of it too - and right within our borders. That's quite extraordinary. I forget who it was who said that if you looked at a lot of this screen footage and you didn't know where it was, you would have had to assume that it was perhaps in the Caribbean or in Somalia.

TONY JONES: We obviously saw at the beginning of this year tsunami in Indonesia and the extra civility with which the victims of that disaster treated each other. Why has it been so different in the United States? One thinks of these extraordinary scenes inside the Superdome in New Orleans?

[Totally Committed]

8. I love these Bush enablers who are trying to absolve themselves

these days... Andrew Sullivan is another Bush "enabler" trying desperately to get off the boat before it hits the pier. (Yeah, he half-heartedly supported Kerry for about the last day-and-a-half of the campaign, but that was to cover his ass on the off-chance Kerry won. He made nicey with the Bushies after their "re-election".)

Their "loyalty" when the times were "good" and the Bushies were all-powerful was unshakeable. Points out the differences in disasters right there...

9/11 made Bush " a leader", and the resulting "elections" enshrined him and insulated him, his administration, and all who supported him. So they supported him.

Now, the New Orleans debacle, and resulting human tragedy has them disavowing their Idiot King. They want out of his court NOW, before the peasants rise, and take down the monarchy, and "all the President's men".

It's LITERALLY rats deserting a sinking ship. What's worse than an UNrepentent Bushie? One who repents when it looks like it's the only thing that will save their asses.

I think they should be forced to go down with the ship they chose to ride on for the last 4-5 years. They made that choice, and should suffer the slings and arrows from those of us they screwed and who despise them for it.

TC

[leesa]

9. Awww...poor sop! "What were they thinking"??? Same as they've been

thinking since the beginning...profit at all costs. If you weren't so greedy and sauced, you might have noticed.

[robbedvoter]

10. Hate opportunists, love to see them turning - a little ray of hope

If Snitchens smells blood, maybe there is some after all. (I highly doubt it, but I put some stock in the opportunists' nose)

[Z_I_Peevey]

11. Another rat leaves the ship.

If this weren't so tragic, I'd be amused by the presswhores and their backpedaling.

As it is, I'm just glad that some of them are reconnecting with what's left of their humanity.

[CWebster]

12. It did not register

--and it still does not register, because they were mostly poor African Americans who are never on the Bush administration's radar - red South or not.

[magnolia]

15. That kind of puts things in perspective.

It takes the blame game to accountability and responsibility. When we think of National Security and disaster response...will it determine which mayor we vote for, or which governor...I don't think so.

[gratuitous]

16. Gee Hitch seems to see the consequences very clearly

What he apparently doesn't see quite so clearly is his deliberate connivance during the last 10 years in furthering the very policies that he now seems to have figured out were so detrimental.

Crawl back into the bottle, Christopher. The grown-ups are trying to figure out how to clean up the mess you helped make, and your "assistance" doesn't help.

[Wordie]

18. That may be...but I'd like to see that article circulated widely. nt

[DinahMoeHum]

19. Aw, Hitchens, go check yourself into the Betty Ford clinic. . .

you gotta dry out, and I don't mean from the flood waters of Katrina.

:argh: