katrina

While some details of what came after the federal state of emergency can be disputed, the massive flooding as the result of oft predicted broken levees cannot be. Thousands drowned, many inch by inch over days spent trapped, finally giving into fatigue and the lack of upward mobility. Thousands were trapped in the convention center and the Superdome without food and water or working bathrooms. People died in the streets for lack of medication and proper care. I could go on, but what I realize is that I can only write about this in the most distant way. I can’t do justice to the horror of this situation, to the absolute depth of this sickening feeling of watching this disaster unfold over days, with seemingly no help coming; all the while being told to send money, I thought we should have sent people, buses, planes. It was like having to watch people trapped in the towers on 9/11 again, knowing that people are dying, minute by minute, but having those few hours stretched out over several days. Feeling powerless and just wanting the power to somehow save them. To be honest, I couldn’t watch it on television. I needed the emotionally sanitizing distance of the paper and the internet. It has still been overwhelming.

The thing that really blows me away is that the people with the power to save the trapped in New Orleans were somehow not getting the same reports that everyone else seemed to receive. Or perhaps more to the point, they just didn’t give a damn. I don’t want to go into all of my many problems with the President. It all pretty much boils down to one thing: he has failed at virtually everything that he has attempted. Bush didn’t deserve a second chance anymore than he deserved his first. Before the last election I asked several Republicans what he had done, factually, to deserve another four years. Aside from feelings and strong Kerry dislikes (which I understood) they had nothing that was “factually true.” I'd have accepted even dubious accomplishments. The fact is that since that morning in the midst of his first massive vacation, six months after starting his new job. When he received the memo warning that Osama wanted to fly planes into buildings; he has gotten away with things that would have led to impeachment hearings for a democrat or led a feeling man to break down crying, begging for forgiveness on national television.

I want him held accountable for his choices and general inability and unwillingness to govern. Whether you voted for him or not, unless you live in Florida, is this the man you want responsible for seeing to your well-being if disaster struck your home? I know enough about the aftermath of 9/11 to feel nervous about staying in NYC. So basically what I have done is collected bits from several blogs that I’ve been reading to provide some simple tools for discussing this national emergency and its widespread repercussions factually. Use this, critique it, let me know what i've missed or where I'm wrong. Eventually the post will have links to the articles and video where possible. In the meantime you can copy the web address and paste it in your browser window. Or paste the video into your windows media player. Crooksandliars.com has much of the video as .mov’s.

j
sept. 13