Disaster preparedness in the Bush administration...? Sorry... No thanks... Not today...

the media should be all over this but i doubt it will make more than a ripple or two...

In the months before Hurricane Katrina, President George W. Bush sought to cut a key program to help local governments raise their preparedness, and state officials warned of a "total lack of focus" on natural disasters by his homeland-security chief, documents show.

The disclosures add to questions over the administration's emergency-response planning, Homeland Security Secretary Michael Chertoff's priorities and the way the White House budgets for disaster preparedness after the September 11, 2001, attacks.

Organizations representing emergency-response and security officials at state and local agencies had complained of funding shortages and what they saw as an excessive shift by the Homeland Security Department away from preparing for natural disasters, as it focused increasingly on terrorism.

In July, the National Emergency Management Association wrote lawmakers expressing "grave" concern that still-pending changes proposed by Chertoff would undercut the Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA).

"Our primary concern relates to the total lack of focus on natural-hazards preparedness," David Liebersbach, the association's president, said in the July 27 letter to Sens. Susan Collins, a Republican, and Joseph Lieberman, a Democrat, the leaders of a key Senate committee overseeing the agency.

He said Chertoff's emphasis on terrorism "indicates that FEMA's long-standing mission of preparedness for all types of disasters has been forgotten at DHS."

well, ain't THAT interesting...! the "emphasis on terrorism" was so strong and so effective that it has produced virtually no tangible results (see previous post)... so, what exactly HAS bushco been doing to prepare for ANYTHING...?? evidently nada, zip, zero, zilch...

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Documented: Our tough-talkin', gun-totin', "bring-'em-on" President is worthless

(thanks to think progress...)

take a look at bush's miserable report card related to the recommendations of the 9/11 commission...



4 "unsatisfactory" and 7 "minimal progress..." of those 11 items, 5 are completely the responsibility of the executive branch... all 11, of course, fall into the category of "capable of being influenced by effective executive leadership," assuming we had any...

folks, effectively preparing the u.s. to stand up against terrorists and to deal with national emergencies was the principle reason bush was re-elected - the PRINCIPLE REASON... and what have we got to show for it besides a few trillion more dollars of national debt... this is a clear example of a totally failed presidency... and, yes, here i go, yet again...

BUSH, CHENEY AND THE ENTIRE CABINET MUST SUBMIT THEIR RESIGNATIONS... IMMEDIATELY...

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Don't lose sight of the bigger picture...

there are so many things going on and such temptation to shift focus every time something new hits the fan, that we tend to lose sight of the bigger pattern... it's critical to keep bushco and the r's ultimate goals in mind... without doing that, the systemic nature of their assault on the foundations of this country cannot be seen and thus can't be forcefully addressed...

bushco's aim is nothing less than the complete evisceration of the federal government - social programs, transfer programs, regulatory programs, oversight programs, custodial programs, environmental programs, everything except the military... the bankrupting of the treasury that has been underway for nearly five years will virtually assure the achievement of that goal and open the door for a return to the robber baron era in full, rather than the pale imitation we've seen since the fdr era (sarcasm intended)... tossing billions into iraq and now into the katrina recovery effort will only accelerate what is already close to reality...

closely allied with the deconstruction of the federal government is the establishment of the mechanisms of social control based on fundamentalist christian ideology and "effective response" to terrorism a la the patriot act - suspension of geneva protections, holding detainees without providing justification, no-fly lists, etc... as an example, the move to allow a presidential declaration of martial law has picked up momentum as an outgrowth of katrina...

we are in deep, deep shit, my friends, and unless an eye is kept trained on the bigger picture, we are vulnerable on every front...

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Yet ANOTHER BGO - I'm party-less

after waiting in vain nearly five years for real leadership to emerge in the democratic party and hoping, again in vain, that katrina would be the kick in the pants needed to finally shake the dems out of their torpor, i had the sudden realization that, at this most critical time in the united states, there isn't a viable political party that represents my liberal, progressive, reality-based interests... howard dean's run at the democratic presidential nomination was the most encouraging sign i'd seen in years but now that he's toiling in the trenches (and hopefully accomplishing something although it's far from clear that's the case), i see nothing out there that even faintly resembles national democratic leadership... if it wasn't for the great, wonderful, sanity-preserving presence of my fellow bloggers, i would be feeling desperately alone... with outrage after outrage flowing from the white house like a river of shit, i'm suffering from "outrage fatigue," exacerbated by the fact that there's seemingly no one with the power and influence to change things that's actually doing anything... i want to move past being outraged... it's time for something to be done... but what might that be...? i don't know... but i do know this - don't look to the dems...

these pesky "blinding glimpses of the obvious" are hard on the psyche... this is two in one week...

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38% of NOLA stay-behinds were either physically unable to leave or were caring for someone who was; 50% waited three days or more

Half of Hurricane Katrina evacuees who were trapped in their houses by flood waters waited three or more days to be rescued, according to a survey of storm victims released on Friday.

Thirty-eight percent of the people who stayed behind despite orders to evacuate said they were either physically unable to leave or were caring for a disabled person.

how about the percent of those who were unable to leave because they had no way TO leave...?

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Let's see some internal strife among the r's... It's about damn time...

George Bush's promise to rebuild New Orleans and the Gulf coast "higher and better" has triggered a wave of anxiety among conservatives in his own party, who are shocked at the expansion of the federal role in disaster relief.

good... now, at the sound of the bell...

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I'm not sure I can support the Dems any longer - they've given the country away

david mamet's screed in the la times pretty much sums it up for me...

The Democrats . . . in their quest for a strategy that would alienate no voters, have given away the store, and they have given away the country.

i don't play poker but mamet must...

The Republicans, like the perpetual raiser at the poker table, became increasingly bold as the Democrats signaled their absolute reluctance to seize the initiative.

[...]

One may sit at the poker table all night and never bet and still go home broke, having anted away one's stake.

The Democrats are anteing away their time at the table. They may be bold and risk defeat, or be passive and ensure it.

whaddaya think they're gonna do...? i think the fix is in...

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Memo to Bush: write letter of resignation

it's been a couple of days since i've pounded my drum...

BUSH, CHENEY AND THE ENTIRE CABINET MUST SUBMIT THEIR RESIGNATIONS... IMMEDIATELY...

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Another stage-managed, photo-op, bullhorn, manufactured moment brought to you by Karl Rove Inc.

brian williams of nbc nightly news...

(thanks to kos...)

I am duty-bound to report the talk of the New Orleans warehouse district last night: there was rejoicing (well, there would have been without the curfew, but the few people I saw on the streets were excited) when the power came back on for blocks on end. Kevin Tibbles was positively jubilant on the live update edition of Nightly News that we fed to the West Coast. The mini-mart, long ago cleaned out by looters, was nonetheless bathed in light, including the empty, roped-off gas pumps. The motorcade route through the district was partially lit no more than 30 minutes before POTUS drove through. And yet last night, no more than an hour after the President departed, the lights went out. The entire area was plunged into total darkness again, to audible groans. It's enough to make some of the folks here who witnessed it... jump to certain conclusions.

i wonder if bush has ever had an authentic, genuine, unscripted, from-the-heart public moment... i wonder if, when he looks in the mirror in the morning, he sees a reflection...

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Kerry on Bush's speech

"Leadership isn't a speech or a toll-free number. Leadership is getting the job done. No American doubts that New Orleans will rise again, they doubt the competence and commitment of this Administration.

Weeks after Katrina, Americans want an end to politics-as-usual that leaves them dangerously and unforgivably unprepared.

Americans want to know that their government will be there when it counts with leadership that keeps them safe, not speeches in the aftermath to explain away the inexcusable."

there's something else that's inexcusable, john... your pathetic presidential campaign... yeah, i voted for you but if you hadn't been such a weenie, we might not have to be dealing with all this now...

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Venezuela's Chavez dumps on George

hugo chavez, president of venezuela and pat robertson assassination target, had some harsh words for the u.s. and george in particular yesterday at the u.n...

Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez took President Bush to task in front of a global summit for waging war in Iraq without U.N. consent and won rousing applause for his critique.

The leftist leader told a U.N. summit on Thursday that fighting the war without U.N. authorization showed Washington did not respect the world body. He recommended moving U.N. headquarters to a country that has more regard for the organization.

(please note the "leftist leader" editorializing... but we're used to that, aren't we...?)

Bush was not in the audience when Chavez spoke to the world representatives. But the U.S. president did address the summit's the opening session on Wednesday morning, then returned to Washington later that day.

World leaders at the summit had been asked to speak for five minutes but Chavez ran long and when the presiding diplomat passed him a note saying his time was up, he threw it on the floor. He said if Bush could speak for 20 minutes, so could he.

When he finally stopped, he got what observers said was the loudest applause of the summit.

Relations between Chavez and Washington have become increasingly strained, though the United States remains the top buyer of Venezuelan oil.

what a shame george couldn't make it... maybe he can catch the video...

don't think for one second that bushco doesn't have a plan up its sleeve for dealing with venezuela... and iran... and syria... and north korea... and you can bet none of it involves diplomacy...

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The Boston Globe calls the wiretapping remark "Romney's Slip"

Romney was speaking at the Heritage Foundation, in his capacity of governor, on the topic ''Homeland Security: Status of Federal, State, and Local Efforts." He also was auditioning before a Washington audience for a potential national candidacy. A would-be president should know better than to slight Muslims, a vital foreign policy constituency.

Romney made the remark as he discussed his reactions to the Sept. 11 attacks. "Prevention begins with intelligence . . . How about people in settings, mosques for instance, that maybe are teaching doctrines of hate, are we monitoring that, wiretapping . . . ?"

there's little that aggravates me more than a major media organ deliberately downplaying a major news item... romney's suggestion was no friggin' SLIP... it was deliberately crafted and presented before a receptive audience... the only SLIP romney made was in not understanding in advance how such b.s. would be received on the national stage... just another pandering loser... how the hell do they keep getting elected...?

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Krugman sees vast possibilities for corruption and cronyism in reconstruction efforts

of course, given the track record of bushco, corruption and cronyism is the WHOLE IDEA... we also have this trenchant krugman observation...

And if any of the people killed by Katrina, most of them poor, had a net worth of more than $1.5 million, Heritage wants to exempt their heirs from the estate tax.

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Kemp on Bush's homesteading proposal - the black community is assuming the overwhelming burden of Katrina

oh, but jack... if this country "profoundly cares," why offer a program that can help only if you can secure a mortgage or nail down jimmy carter and habitat for humanity...? and, if you can't manage one of those two things, gosh, what a shame...

[T]he most innovative proposal would give away federal land through a lottery to low-income evacuees who pledge to build homes on the property, according to policy experts on both sides of the ideological spectrum. This "urban homesteading initiative" harkens back to the settling of the West in the 19th century.

[...]

The homesteading proposal was pushed hard by Jack Kemp, a former secretary of housing and standard bearer for conservative anti-poverty activists.

"We have to send a message to the black community that this country profoundly cares about them assuming the overwhelming the burden of this disaster of Biblical proportions," Kemp said.

Under the plan, those chosen from a lottery would receive federal land in exchange for their work and their ability to build, either by securing a mortgage or getting the backing of a nonprofit organization such as Habitat for Humanity.

Bruce Katz, a housing official in the Clinton administration, said Bush's proposal raises more questions than it answers: Even if impoverished evacuees can secure the financial assistance to build on donated land, how will they maintain the properties? Won't the homesteading plan re-create the racial and economic segregation that Katrina so vividly exposed?

"The president called this the largest reconstruction program in the history of the world, but when it comes to housing, the support is almost nonexistent," Katz said. "He's just handing out land."

Olsen said he is concerned that a lottery for the homesteads would effectively concentrate assistance among a random few who will have the least means to improve the property. It would be better to sell the land to the highest bidder, then use the proceeds to help the poor more uniformly, he said.

the status quo is, don't mess with the rich and don't go altering the economic balance (read: don't mess with the rich)... as with everything else that's dribbled from the lips of this president, the words sound nice until you start taking a harder look and find out there's no THERE there...

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2.5 TERABYTES of terrorist files DESTROYED...!!!

when stuff like this comes out, it makes my blood run cold...

A Pentagon employee was ordered to destroy documents that identified Mohamed Atta as a terrorist two years before the 2001 attacks, a congressman said Thursday.

The employee is prepared to testify next week before the Senate Judiciary Committee and was expected to name the person who ordered him to destroy the large volume of documents, said Rep. Curt Weldon, R-Pa.

Weldon declined to name the employee, citing confidentiality matters. Weldon described the documents as "2.5 terabytes" — as much as one-fourth of all the printed materials in the Library of Congress, he added.

why in heaven's name would this be ordered...? what earthly reason could there be...??

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"The Speech" is over...

big whoop...

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"The Speech" is underway...

big whoop...

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Rove in charge of Katrina recovery efforts

aw, shit... i'm just now back online after getting in from s. america only to read this from dan froomkin...

All you really need to know about the White House's post-Katrina strategy -- and Bush's carefully choreographed address on national television tonight -- is this little tidbit from the ninth paragraph of Elisabeth Bumiller and Richard W. Stevenson 's story in the New York Times this morning:

"Republicans said Karl Rove, the White House deputy chief of staff and Mr. Bush's chief political adviser, was in charge of the reconstruction effort."

Rove's leadership role suggests quite strikingly that any and all White House decisions and pronouncements regarding the recovery from the storm are being made with their political consequences as the primary consideration.

the only thing that "recovery" and "reconstruction" refer to in this gaggingly naked ploy is recovering and reconstructing bush's plummeting political fortunes... it has nothing to do with anything meaningful... i am so far over the top with my outrage, i simply don't know how to express it any more... i'd ask how bush thinks he can do this but the answer is the same as it has been for all of the uncountable number of previous outrages - not only because he can but because he can without any real consequences...

(thanks to americablog...)

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Aw, c'mon... Defaulting on their pension plans is the WHOLE IDEA...!

yeah, the cost of jet fuel is a factor but you can't tell me that delta and northwest weren't watching united's smooth move of handing their underfunded pension plan over to the feds... hey, if they can do it without consequences, why not us...? oh, and btw, we can destroy the unions at the same time... heckuva deal...

The US agency that insures private pensions warned Delta Air Lines and Northwest Airlines on Thursday not to skip payments to their pension plans while they are in bankruptcy.

"Northwest and Delta continue to be responsible under the law for making their pension contributions," Bradley Belt, director of Pension Benefit Guaranty Corporation (PBGC), said in a statement a day after both airlines filed for bankruptcy.

The PBGC said Northwest Airlines' pension plans were USD$5.7 billion underfunded and the PBGC would have to take over USD$2.8 billion of this amount if the plans were to terminate, leaving employees with a USD$2.9 billion loss.

On Wednesday, PBGC said Delta's plans were USD$10.6 billion underfunded. The PBGC would pick up USD$8.4 billion of this if Delta's plans were taken over by the agency.

and the employees, rightly so, are quaking in their steel-toed boots...

Employees at newly bankrupt Delta Air Lines and Northwest Airlines have every reason to fear that any leverage they once had in contract negotiations has evaporated, analysts said on Thursday.

[...]

Northwest currently is battling a mechanics' strike and has continued flying with the aid of replacement workers and outside vendors.

The bankrupt carriers could use court protection to extract the savings they claim they need to survive. Analysts say they will take their cues from United Airlines and US Airways to cut costs and dump their under-funded pensions on government insurers, a move that saves airlines money, but erodes workers' retirement benefits.

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Bush's potty break at the U.N.

condi...! con-deeeeee... I GOTTA GO...!


U.S. President George W. Bush writes a
note to Secretary of State Condoleezza
Rice during a Security Council meeting
at the 2005 World Summit and 60th General
Assembly of the United Nations in New
York September 14

isn't that special...?

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Watch out for Argentina's President, he bites...

give 'em hell, Néstor...

President Néstor Kirchner, addressing the UN’s 60th General Assembly in New York, yesterday accused the IMF of supporting the neoconservative policies that he blames for Argentina’s worst-ever economic crisis. And Foreign Minister Rafael Bielsa, speaking on behalf of the Rio Group of Latin American nations, said in another forum within the General Assembly that the IMF’s "irresponsibly fostered and pressured developing nations into adopting policies that, far from improving their economic and social situation, plunged them into deeper poverty."

Néstor's got all the same problems back home in Argentina that plague the presidents of every country, not the least of which is a very cynical citizenry...but, he's definitely got a point... Argentina was IMF's poster child for many years but at least part of the blame for their economic collapse can be laid directly at IMF's door... Joseph Stiglitz, neither a slouch, nor a dummy, nor an ax-grinder, in his book, Globalization and Its Discontents, paints this picture...

Stiglitz recounts his experiences in such places as Ethiopia, Thailand, and Russia. He finds repeatedly that the International Monetary Fund puts the interests of its "largest shareholder," the United States, above those of the poorer nations it was designed to serve.

in the book, he discussed argentina at length... and, yes, Stiglitz has the credentials to back him up...

Joseph E. Stiglitz, professor of economics at Columbia University, won the 2001 Nobel Prize in economics. He is the former chairman of the Council of Economic Advisers in the Clinton administration.

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Holy shit...! More Bushit...

michael at americablog posts a very, VERY disturbing revelation...

USA Today does a rundown of the two governors most affected by Katrina. Blanco was front and center in calling for more aid and expressing displeasure. Barbour seemed in remarkable denial as he insisted on TV that Bush was doing great -- even while reporters were saying Gulfport and Biloxi Mississippi (just to name two) were in desperate need and FEMA was in short supply or not in sight at all. Buried in the article is this telling contrast:

[Blanco] says that two days after Katrina, desperate for help, she couldn't get through to Bush and didn't get a callback; hours later, she tried again, and they talked....

Barbour hasn't had to wait hours to talk to Bush. In fact, Barbour said in an interview with USA TODAY, the president called him three to four times in the wake of Katrina. "I never called him. He always called me," he said.

Mr. President, is it true in the first five days of this disaster that you reached out to the Republican governor of Mississippi and called him three times? Is it true you NEVER called the Democratic governor of Louisiana during the first five days of this national tragedy that had hit her state harder than any other?

PLAYING POLITICS WITH DISASTER...??? i've been rendered speechless countless times since bush illegally took office in 2001... THIS pushes the bounds of reason...

BUSH, CHENEY AND THE ENTIRE CABINET MUST SUBMIT THEIR RESIGNATIONS... IMMEDIATELY...

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Bush takes responsibility - sorta kinda

crooks and liars has posted a link to the video of bush taking responsibility for the first time in nearly 5 years for something that happened on his watch... americablog has a few comments...

I finally watched the video of Bush, supposedly, taking the blame for the Katrina mess. Watch it. He fidgets, he squirms, his body language screams that mommy is twisting his ear behind his back whispering "take the blame."

you're absolutely right, john... a large part of my professional skill consists of observing and interpreting body language and, for someone of the positional stature and presumed polished professional skills of the president of the united states, it's plain to see that he would rather be just about ANYWHERE else... what a sad, pathetic man...

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Skadi scores a direct hit thanks to SkyNews Ireland

it doesn't get any better than this...



and it's an understatement at that...

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Bush at the U.N. - See the world as I see it...

now that bolton's been seated as u.s. ambassador without benefit of senate confirmation and has already succeeded in derailing the u.n. reform plan and its goals for dealing with global poverty, bush swoops into town to remind the world's leaders, as if they didn't already know, that WHAT THEY CONSIDER IMPORTANT, HE DOESN'T...

There is broad opposition to the U.S.-led war in Iraq among the more than 160 presidents, prime ministers and kings gathered for three days of U.N. General Assembly meetings. Many leaders also would rather hear Bush finally relent and support an international treaty on global warming or promise to donate foreign aid at a level more proportionate to other rich nations.

But in his annual speech to the U.N. gathering Wednesday, Bush was hoping to impress upon his audience the urgency of addressing the world's problems as he sees them.

dear lord... please, have mercy... save us from any more people who see the world as bush does...

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How much more Bush can we tolerate...?

maureen dowd asks the question...

President Bush continued to try to spin his own inaction yesterday, but he may finally have reached a patch of reality beyond spin. Now he's the one drowning, unable to rescue himself by patting small black children on the head during photo-ops and making scripted attempts to appear engaged. He can keep going back down there, as he will again on Thursday when he gives a televised speech to the nation, but he can never compensate for his tragic inattention during days when so many lives could have been saved.

He made the ultimate sacrifice and admitted his administration had messed up, something he'd refused to do through all of the other screw-ups, from phantom W.M.D. and the torture at Abu Ghraib and Guantánamo to the miscalculations on the Iraq occupation and the insurgency, which will soon claim 2,000 young Americans.

How many places will be in shambles by the time the Bush crew leaves office?

places in shambles are one thing... how about institutions...? constitutional protections...? relationships with allies...? credibility...? decency...? it is simply unacceptable for bush and his disastrous administration to remain in office for another minute...

BUSH, CHENEY AND THE ENTIRE CABINET MUST SUBMIT THEIR RESIGNATIONS... IMMEDIATELY...

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Another BGO - it's all leading to martial law

in another blinding-glimpse-of-the-obvious, why-is-my-forehead-
so-flat-it's-because-i-keep-saying-"duh"-and-smacking-it moment, patriot daily brings me crashing down into reality: bushco is slyly laying the groundwork for giving the president the power to declare martial law in response to natural disasters... let's be real... it won't be only natural disasters... he wants broad powers to do as he pleases, when he pleases, without interference from those pesky constitutional protections... the pattern is clear... he's been heading that way since 9/11 and katrina is just the push he needed...

as american citizens, we consistently underestimate the guile, opportunism and danger presented by bushco... i'm not a natural-born conspiracy theorist but given the not-so-terrible track record of federal responses to other disasters, is it in the realm of remotest possibility that the federal response to katrina was DELIBERATELY DELAYED...? DANGER, DANGER, WILL ROBINSON...

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Chicago Sun-Times - Say WHAT...??

AMERICAblog has requested spreading this chicago sun-times column far and wide... i agree and am posting it in its entirety - but not before beating my drum once again...

BUSH, CHENEY AND THE ENTIRE CABINET MUST SUBMIT THEIR RESIGNATIONS... IMMEDIATELY...

Say that again? 'Things are going relatively well'

September 12, 2005

BY RICHARD ROEPER SUN-TIMES COLUMNIST

From the disputed presidential election of 2000 to the terrorist attacks on America on 9/11/01 to the failure to find Osama bin Laden to the quagmire of a war in Iraq to Hurricane Katrina, this has been a terrible decade, century, millennium.

It's got to get better in 2006, doesn't it?

In the meantime, we're two weeks into one of the most tragic and shameful events in American history. Here, in chronological order, are some of the most memorable quotes from evacuees, politicians, journalists, media personalities and celebrities.

• "I wasn't going to let a little thing like a hurricane keep me from wearing my bathing suit." -- Eva Longoria on the Video Music Awards, Aug. 28. Had Longoria known what was going to happen in the days to come, one imagines she would have come up with another bit.
  

• "The looting is out of control. The French Quarter has been attacked." -- New Orleans councilwoman Jackie Carlson, Aug. 30. Meanwhile, President Bush was playing guitar with country singer Mark Willis in San Diego. Bush would return to Crawford, Texas, that night, for one more night of taking it easy before finally cutting his vacation "short."
  

• "I must say, this storm is much bigger than anyone expected." -- FEMA Director Michael Brown, on CNN, Aug. 31.
  

• "Excuse me, senator, I'm sorry for interrupting . . . for the last four days, I've been seeing dead bodies in the streets here in Mississippi. And to listen to politicians thanking each other and complimenting each other, you know, I got to tell you, there are a lot of people out here who are very upset, and very angry, and very frustrated . . . And when they hear politicians . . . you know, thanking one another, it just . . . cuts them the wrong way right now, because literally there was a body in the streets of this town yesterday being eaten by rats because this woman had been laying in the streets for 48 hours . . ." -- CNN's Anderson Cooper, Sept. 1, in an awesome tirade directed at Sen. Mary Landrieu (D-La.), who had been tossing compliments to fellow politicians and blowing bromides up the wazoo before Cooper cut her off.
  

• "George W. Bush gave one of the worst speeches of his life yesterday, especially given the level of national distress and the need for words of consolation and wisdom. In what seems to be a ritual for this administration, the president appeared a day later than he was needed." -- New York Times lead editorial, Sept. 1.
  

• "It was chaos. There was nobody there, nobody in charge. And there was nobody giving even water. The children . . . they're all just in tears. There are sick people. We saw . . . people who are dying in front of you." -- CNN producer Kim Segal, describing conditions in the New Orleans Convention Center, Sept. 1.
  

• "Considering the dire circumstances that we have in New Orleans, virtually a city that has been destroyed, things are going relatively well." -- FEMA chief Brown, Sept. 1.
  

• "From here and from talking to police officers, they're losing control of the city . . ." -- CNN's Chris Lawrence, Sept. 1.
  

• "We just learned of the convention center -- we being the federal government -- today." -- FEMA Director Brown, trying to deflect criticism to local government, on "Nightline," Sept. 1.
  

• "Don't you guys watch television? Don't you guys listen to the radio? Our reporters have been reporting on it for more than just today." -- Koppel's response.
  

• "Many of these people, almost all of them that we see are so poor and they are so black . . . " -- CNN's Wolf Blitzer's well-meaning but unfortunate description of the evacuees, Sept. 1.
  

• "Brownie, you're doing a heckuva job." -- President Bush, Sept. 2. One of the most idiotic, misguided, clueless and smug things the president has said during his two terms in office.

• "I'm satisfied with the response. I am not satisfied with the results." -- President Bush, later that day.

• "Out of the rubbles of Trent Lott's house -- he's lost his entire house -- there's going to be a fantastic house. And I'm looking forward to sitting on the porch." -- President Bush, cracking wise in Mobile, Ala., Sept. 2. And maybe when he sits on that porch, one of those unemployed evacuees can bring him a nice iced tea and a fan. After all, they'll be looking for work.
  

• "George Bush doesn't care about black people." -- Kanye West Sept. 2 on an NBC telethon for hurricane relief, as a deer-in-the-headlights Mike Myers stood beside him, no doubt wishing he was off making "Shrek 57."

• "I know you didn't want to interrupt your vacation and I know how you don't like to get bad news. Plus, you had fund-raisers to go to and mothers of dead soldiers to ignore and smear. . . . Mr. Bush, you just stay the course. It's not your fault that 30 percent of New Orleans lives in poverty or that tens of thousands had no transportation to get out of town. C'mon, they're black! I mean, it's not like this happened in Kennebunkport. Can you imagine leaving white people on their roofs for five days? Don't make me laugh!" -- Excerpt from Michael Moore's open letter to President Bush, Sept. 2. Moore is reportedly considering making a documentary about Bush and Katrina. It would be the easiest film he's ever done.
  

• "I open the television, there's people still there, waiting to be rescued, and for me that's not acceptable. I know there's reasons for it. I'm sorry to say I'm being rude, but I don't want to hear those reasons." -- Celine Dion in an interview on "Larry King Live," Sept. 3. An hour later, yours truly was in the audience at Dion's show in Las Vegas, where she told a baffled audience that she had cried and yelled at Larry King earlier that evening.
  

• "The guy who runs this building I'm in, emergency management, he's responsible for everything. His mother was trapped in a St. Bernard nursing home and every day she called him and said, 'Are you coming, son? Is somebody coming?' [starting to cry] And he said, 'Yeah, Mama, somebody's coming to get you. Somebody's coming to get you on Tuesday. Somebody's coming to get you on Wednesday. Somebody's coming to get you on Thursday. Somebody's coming to get you on Friday.' And she drowned Friday night. She drowned Friday night." -- Jefferson Parish president Aaron Broussard, Sept. 4, on NBC's "Meet the Press," in one of the defining media moments of all the hurricane coverage.
  

• "We lost everything. Katrina didn't care if you were poor or rich; all the houses look the same now." -- Mississippi resident Penny Dean, quoted in People magazine, which has covered the hurricane story in honorable and comprehensive fashion.
  

• "What I'm hearing which is sort of scary is that they all want to stay in Texas. Everybody is so overwhelmed by the hospitality. And so many of the people in the arena here, you know, were underprivileged anyway, so this, this is working very well for them." -- Former First Lady Barbara Bush, sounding like a bad caricature of a "Dallas" character, in the Houston Astrodome, Sept. 5.
  

• "I understand there are 10,000 people dead. It's terrible. It's tragic. But in a democracy of 300 million people, over years and years and years, these things happen." -- Republican operative Jack Burkman, MSNBC, Sept. 7, in an obvious attempt to go for the Humanitarian of the Year Award.
  

• "Go f-- yourself, Mr. Cheney. Go f-- yourself." -- Off-camera citizen heckling the vice president during a live interview that aired on CNN and MSNBC, Sept. 8. The "Go f-- yourself, Mr. Cheney" guy has his own Web site and is auctioning copies of personal video footage on eBay.

• "First time I've heard it. Must be a friend of John, er, uh, never mind." -- A chuckling Cheney's nonsensical, half-joke of a response when a reporter asked if he'd been hearing a lot of that sort of thing.

• "We finally cleaned up public housing in New Orleans. We couldn't do it, but God did." -- Rep. Richard Baker (R-La.), Sept. 8, in a quip to lobbyists quoted by the Wall Street Journal. Baker is denying the quote; the WSJ reporter stands by his story.
  

• "How, then, did we get here? How did the richest country on Earth end up watching children cry for food in putrid encampments on the evening news? How did reporters reach crowds of the desperate in places where police, troops and emergency responders had not yet been--three days after the storm?" -- Time magazine, in a report to be published today.

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Bush: Would you believe...?

bush is channeling secret agent maxwell smart...

U.S. President George W. Bush, on a tour of devastated New Orleans on Monday, rejected charges the government was slow to respond to Hurricane Katrina because most of the victims were black or because the nation's military was over-extended in Iraq.

would you believe indifferent...? would you believe arrogant and out-of-touch...? would you believe oblivious...? how about incompetent...? ignorant...? criminally liable...? ok, i give... what WOULD you believe...?

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It's expensive on the dark side

Sympathy can be hard to come by for White House officials who are summoned to appear before a grand jury.

Those whose identities remain a secret suffer in silence, discouraged from reaching out to their closest friends for help. Those whose names leak into the public domain become lightning rods for rumor, suspicion and innuendo, as politicians, commentators and journalists try to divine a meaning behind each summons.

The latest White House staffer to face the grand jury is Susan B. Ralston, assistant to White House Deputy Chief of Staff Karl Rove, who gave testimony to the committee investigating the leak of the identity of CIA operative Valerie Plame.

[...]

Witnesses face stress, uncertainty and -- worst of all -- crippling lawyer's fees that can take years to pay off. And as prosecutors cast their net ever wider, inexperienced staffers with few financial assets are increasingly facing the emotional and financial burden of grand jury testimony.

yep, i agree, and i'm sure that such vulnerability only serves to make public service even less attractive than it already is... however, pledging your soul to the dark side does carry consequences (and i'm not just referring to the r's here)... you'd think that the bosses of some of these poor bastards, with their access to the fortunes of america's super-rich, would be able to get them help... but, nah... it's just like new orleans... you made your bed, now lie in it...

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Start of Roberts hearings eclipses Katrina (as well as everything that came before)

the strategy is working, just like it has worked so very well since bush took office... replace hot issues, particularly ones that are causing george and karl problems, with something else... here's a short, admittedly non-comprehensive and non-sequential list... see if it triggers any memories...

• the failure to apprehend osama bin laden at tora bora...
  
• no wmd...
• bush suspending the geneva convention for detainees...
  
• torture and obscenity at guantanamo and abu ghraib...
• granting halliburton no-bid contracts seemingly in perpetuity...
• filling countless executive branch vacancies with party-loyal, litmus-tested, political hacks...
  
• eroding civil liberties under the patriot act...
  
• general ricardo sanchez' perjury before the senate armed services committee...
  
• the downing street memos...
  
• karl rove outing valerie plame and assassinating joseph wilson's character...
  
• colin powell lying in front of the u.n...
  
• pat robertson's call for the assassination of hugo chavez while bush solicits donations for his foundation...
  
• extraordinary rendition...
  
• cindy sheehan...
  
• criminally bungled federal response to hurrican katrina...
  
• bush's failed presidency and free-fall in the polls...

maybe it's the sheer volume of outrages... maybe it's our hypnotized press... maybe it's our sedated citizenry... maybe there's something in the water... all i know is there's no end in sight...

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Spam titles over an 8-hr period - nothing about dumping Bush...

it's funny how something as annoying as spam, if viewed in a certain light, can paint of picture of your country... here's a sampling of the spam titles that've appeared in my bulk email folder over the last 8 hrs...

"Go Shopping with someone else's money!"
"Make Good Money With SMC"
"Federally Authorized Student Loan Refinance Notification"
"Hair Loss - Complimentary Consultation with Bosley"
"Enjoy a Free BlackBerry 7250 Cell phone!"
"Gap Jeans Giveaway - Limit of 1 Pair per Customer"
"Immediate Results - Enhance your love life!"
"Spin the wheel to win the jackpot"
"Get Cash out for Christmas -- Refinance with Christian Family Loan"

lessee... 4 about money, one about making it, one about winning it, two about borrowing it... two about free stuff... one about personal appearance... one about sex... interesting about the "christian family loan" but, of course, we know nothing's above exploitation... also interesting that nobody's interested in spamming me about katrina disaster relief or dumping bush...

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Speaking of AMERICAblog...

john, joe, rob, chris, michael and kyle, the special correspondent in new orleans, are taking the generally excellent americablog and propelling it to a new level... their pointed running commentary on katrina and all things disastrous (a la bushco) is a wonder to behold... thanks, guys... my hat is off to all of you...

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Brownie resigns

aw, brownie ("drownie" as he was christened by americablog), we hardly knew ye...

The top US emergencies official has resigned following criticism over the response to Hurricane Katrina. [...] News of his resignation came after the president visited central New Orleans for the first time since the disaster. [...] Mr Brown said he was quitting "in the best interest of the agency and best interest of the president".

"The president appreciates Mike Brown's service," White House spokesman Scott McClellan told reporters on board Air Force One.

"This was Mike Brown's decision. This was a decision he made."

yeah, and i'm the reincarnation of jimmy durante...

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Bill Moyers - a shining light

with all the sincerity at my disposal, god bless this man... his mind and his voice have the clarity and purity of a finely cast bell pealing on a cold winter morning... this is taken from an address he delivered this past week at union theological seminary in nyc, where he and his wife received the seminary's highest award, the union medal, for their contributions to faith and reason in america...

We're talking about a powerful religious constituency that claims the right to tell us what's on God's mind and to decide the laws of the land according to their interpretation of biblical revelation and to enforce those laws on the nation as a whole. For the Bible is not just the foundational text of their faith; it has become the foundational text for a political movement.

True, people of faith have always tried to bring their interpretation of the Bible to bear on American laws and morals -- this very seminary is part of that tradition; it's the American way, encouraged and protected by the First Amendment. But what is unique today is that the radical religious right has succeeded in taking over one of America's great political parties -- the country is not yet a theocracy but the Republican Party is -- and they are driving American politics, using God as a battering ram on almost every issue: crime and punishment, foreign policy, health care, taxation, energy, regulation, social services and so on.

What's also unique is the intensity, organization, and anger they have brought to the public square. Listen to their preachers, evangelists, and homegrown ayatollahs: Their viral intolerance -- their loathing of other people's beliefs, of America's secular and liberal values, of an independent press, of the courts, of reason, science and the search for objective knowledge -- has become an unprecedented sectarian crusade for state power.

They use the language of faith to demonize political opponents, mislead and misinform voters, censor writers and artists, ostracize dissenters, and marginalize the poor. These are the foot soldiers in a political holy war financed by wealthy economic interests and guided by savvy partisan operatives who know that couching political ambition in religious rhetoric can ignite the passion of followers as ferociously as when Constantine painted the Sign of Christ (the "Christograph") on the shields of his soldiers and on the banners of his legions and routed his rivals in Rome.

bill moyers has been sounding the alarm about this clear and present danger for several years and, as he has watched and carefully reported, the urgency of his message has increased... we are under attack, my friends - from within... take the time to read the whole thing, please...

(thanks to alternet...)

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Bushco and my massive deja vu

i'm having bright flashes of deja vu...

when i worked for united airlines and was beating my head against a wall trying to make a difference, i nourished a fantasy of standing out in front of corporate headquarters in elk grove village, illinois, next to the flagpoles, dousing myself with gasoline and threatening to strike a match unless the senior officers of the company got their heads out of their asses and paid attention to the tragedy they were creating for the company... the second part of the fantasy had those self-same senior officers looking down at me from the executive suite on the second floor and commenting among themselves... "i sure hope he doesn't decide to do something like that HERE..." "think of the bad p.r..." "how terribly rude of him to cause a scene right here in front of corporate headquarters..." "i hope this doesn't make the evening news..."

in my desperate sense of urgency to DO SOMETHING about the criminal bush crowd, the same fantasy has once again reared its ugly head... i picture myself in front of the white house... this time, however, i am relatively confident that the only ones paying attention would be the d.c. police... i doubt george would ever even know, even if i did strike the match and burn myself alive and, if he was told, he would shrug it off in the same way he has done to cindy sheehan...

what has happened to my country...?

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Refusing leaves to Gulf Coast Iraq Guardsmen...

absolutely, positively disgusting... can we sink any lower...? sadly, every time i think we've reached rock bottom, bush finds a way to keep on digging...

Scores of Mississippi National Guardsmen in Iraq who lost their homes to Hurricane Katrina have been refused even 15-day leaves to aid their displaced families, told by commanders there are too few U.S. troops in Iraq to spare them, according to guardsmen.

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O-M-G... A public smoking ban in ARGENTINA...!

ok, it's not bush, it's not katrina and it's not my customary rant, but, damn...!! who would have THUNK it...?

[T]he consensus reached over new anti-smoking legislation shows every sign of acquiring the force of law this week. This legislation will not only ban smoking in all public spaces but in the more public of private spaces as well, such as bars, cafés, shopping centres, etc.

folks, this is historic... i didn't think it would happen in ireland but it did... i sure as hell didn't think it would happen in latin america... who knows...? maybe the balkans or s.e. asia are next...

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A Letter to All Who Voted for George W. Bush from Michael Moore

Whoa.

To All My Fellow Americans Who Voted for George W. Bush:

On this, the fourth anniversary of 9/11, I'm just curious, how does it feel?

How does it feel to know that the man you elected to lead us after we were attacked went ahead and put a guy in charge of FEMA whose main qualification was that he ran horse shows?

That's right. Horse shows.

I really want to know -- and I ask you this in all sincerity and with all due respect -- how do you feel about the utter contempt Mr. Bush has shown for your safety? C'mon, give me just a moment of honesty. Don't start ranting on about how this disaster in New Orleans was the fault of one of the poorest cities in America. Put aside your hatred of Democrats and liberals and anyone with the last name of Clinton. Just look me in the eye and tell me our President did the right thing after 9/11 by naming a horse show runner as the top man to protect us in case of an emergency or catastrophe.

I want you to put aside your self-affixed label of Republican/conservative/born-again/capitalist/ditto-head/right-winger and just talk to me as an American, on the common ground we both call America. . . .

Complete post at link.

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And finally

[comment from profmarcus: the complete text of this remarkable commentary can be found at the link... skadi has provided us with a great gift in making this post... do yourself a favor and go read it in its totality...]

Your God is one with whom I am not familiar.

This is an open letter to the man sitting behind me at La Paz today, in Nashville, at lunchtime, with the Brooks Brothers shirt:

You don't know me. But I know you.

I watched you as you held hands with your tablemates at the restaurant where we both ate this afternoon. I listened as you prayed, and thanked God for the food you were about to eat, and for your own safety, several hundred miles away from the unfolding catastrophe in New Orleans.

You blessed your chimichanga in the name of Jesus Christ, and then proceeded to spend the better part of your meal – and mine, since I was too near your table to avoid hearing every word – morally scolding the people of that devastated city, heaping scorn on them for not heeding the warnings to leave before disaster struck. Then you attacked them – all of them, without distinction it seemed – for the behavior of a relative handful: those who have looted items like guns, or big screen TVs.

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US vs European Business Model

Okay, I'm ready to move to Europe.

This was not part of the Republican sales pitch in the presidential election of 2000. Then we were told that order was going to be restored to the White House. The late-night, improvised shambles of the Clinton administration was to be replaced by a far more businesslike and professional set up. Meetings would start and end on time. Ties would be worn.

This 'CEO President' surrounded himself with other CEOs: vice-president Dick Cheney from Halliburton, and treasury secretary Paul O'Neil from Alcoa (who was later replaced by John Snow from CSX). If anyone knew about getting things done it would be these guys.

But last week tens of thousands of sick and vulnerable people languished for days, waiting for their government to get a grip.

[...]

Is there a connection between this crisis of leadership at the head of the US government, and the crisis of corporate leadership witnessed in the US over the past five years, at Enron, WorldCom, Arthur Andersen and Tyco?

Three guesses and the last two don't count.

But has the culture of US business had a damaging effect on the wider polity? Donald Kalff, visiting professor at the Leiden school of management in the Netherlands, believes so. Next month he publishes An UnAmerican Business, an attack on US management style, combined with a rallying cry for what he calls 'a new European enterprise model'.

[...]

It may seem harsh to write these words on 11 September of all days. But we have seen in the past two weeks what the cult of the CEO and the worst kind of US-style management can lead to: angry, starving people, citizens of the world's richest country, left without food or water. Remember those images the next time someone tells you that what we really need in this country is more US-style dynamism and leadership.

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Chris Floyd

My fear exactly...

Let's be clear about one thing. Nothing that happened last week--the mass destruction in the Mississippi Delta, the obliteration of the city of New Orleans, the murderous abandonment of thousands of people to death, chaos and disease -- will change the Bush Administration or American politics at all. Not one whit. President George W. Bush will not reverse his brutal policies; his Congressional rubber-stamps will not revolt against the White House; the Democrats will not suddenly grow a spine. There will be no real change, and the bitter corrosion of injustice, indifference and inhumanity that is consuming American society will go on as before.

[...]

But it's obvious that nearly half the American people have now left the "reality-based community" altogether; they see only what they want to see, a world bathed in the hazy, golden nimbus of the Leader. The fact -- the undeniable truth -- that behind this carefully-concocted mirage lies nothing more than a steaming pile of rancid, rotting offal means nothing to these true believers. The Lie is better, the Lie is more comforting, the Lie lets them keep feeding on the suffering of others without guilt or shame.

This painful split between obvious reality and popular perception is nothing new, of course. Today we look at old footage of Adolf Hitler and wonder how on earth such a pathetic and ludicrous creature could ever have commanded the adoration and obedience of tens of millions of people. Yet he did. As T.S. Eliot once wrote, "Human kind cannot bear very much reality."

[...]

This is what you must understand: Bush and his faction do not care if they have "the consent of the governed" or not. They are not interested in governing at all, in responding to the needs and desires and will of the people. They are only interested in ruling, in using the power of the state to force their radical agenda of elitist aggrandizement and ideological crankery on the nation, and on the world.

[...]

None of this will change because of what happened in New Orleans. If the Bush Factionists could be touched by suffering and injustice, by death and destruction, by corruption and incompetence, then they would not be where they are today. If there was a viable opposition in the American Establishment to Bush's policies, it would have stood up long ago. Like the people left behind in New Orleans, we're all on our own -- "with no direction home."

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Read it all

Unbearable Crime on the Mississipi

When I woke up today, the only thought that came to mind was Reverend Jesse Jackson's indignant cry, "This is the bottom of the slave ship we are looking at."

I think Jesse actually put his finger on what happened to all of us this week. Those shots we've seen are, as he said, the bottom of the slave ships. I think that really goes to why all the rest of us watching are so traumatized. And I think it is necessary to repeat what he has said about how the people in this country have a high tolerance for viewing "black pain." Yes, while we are asking the unheard question as to why a third of New Orleans' population is poor and all black, everyone from the president on down is comfortable with these realities of our ongoing unemployment, overcrowding, homelessness, drug and alcohol addiction, neighborhood crime and despair.

Jesse's metaphor is also so apt in that you only had to listen to five minutes of reporting to know families had been separated in ways that could be irreparable – across states, even mothers from month-old babies...just evacuating babies without contact with the parents is such a nightmare, I hate even hearing about it. These are the people who were marginalized from the Internet as well; are they going to run to a computer site?

More at link.

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my life is fine...it's the rest of the world that sucks

Hey all. I am sorry that I haven't posted in a long, long time. profmarcus almost always beats me to the news (does he ever sleep?) so I have been at least jump in and tell you a little bit of what is on my mind.

If nothing else, the past two weeks have made it crystal clear to me why I am a progressive, a liberal, a Democrat. I am a liberal because I believe in the common good, the need for community and making sure the most vulnerable in our society are looked out for. I believe in the Social Contract we make with our government and with each other that says we are all in this together, therefore I will turn over a portion of my earnings to the government so that we ALL can have security, infrastructure, and a safety net. Not just a special few. All of us. The Republicans want none of that. For them it's all about what's in it for them. Their you're-on-your-ownership society was on full display in the faces of the dying elderly and dehydrated babies held prisoner at the Super Dome and the Convention Center.

All in all, these past two weeks have made me sadder and angrier than I have ever been, more, even, than December 12, 2000.

I have always known who and what George Bush is. I have no illusions about him or his cabal. They haven't got an ounce of compassion between them and all they care about is how much wealth and power they can grab. I hate what these people are doing to my beloved country. I have never been as afraid for my country and my planet as I am now. Can we take another three years?

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Al qaeda threatens LA and Melbourne

the sydney morning herald reports on the purported al qaeda tape televised today by the australian broadcasting corporation...

A videotape purportedly from a US-born member of al-Qaeda has threatened Los Angeles and Melbourne on the fourth anniversary of the September 11 attacks.

ABC News televised the video today, and said it had received it in Pakistan yesterday.

It reported that the masked speaker appears to be Adam Gadahn, from southern California, who threatens attacks on the two cities, "Allah willing", and warns that the attackers will show no compassion.

"Yesterday, London and Madrid. Tomorrow, Los Angeles and Melbourne," he said.

well, ain't THAT interesting... meanwhile, osama is still kicking around out there somewhere and, smart money says, HE AIN'T IN IRAQ...

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He's getting desperate - and it shows

with his approval ratings sinking to the high 30s, the guy so badly wants people to see him as a leader, he's actually making his 3d trip to the gulf coast, doing his usual trick, sticking close by folks in uniform who have no goddam choice but to salute their commander-in-chief... what a pathetic loser...

President Bush, eager to show hands-on leadership in the Gulf Coast hurricane recovery effort, joined commanders working from a military ship docked in this flooded city on Sunday.

The president was spending the night on the amphibious assault ship USS Iwo Jima, which is serving as a control center in the relief efforts.

On Monday, he planned to tour the New Orleans area and Gulfport, Miss., in his third and longest visit to the region in the nearly two weeks since Hurricane Katrina and subsequent flooding struck the states.

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Nobody to tell him...?? NOBODY TO TELL HIM...???

all the miserable, rotten, m-f, s.o.b., piece of shit, silver-spoon-fed bastard had to do was to TURN ON THE FUCKING TV... ALL HE NEEDED TO DO WAS WATCH... IT WAS ALL THERE, IN LIVING COLOR... NEEDING SOMEONE TO TELL YOU SOMETHING THAT YOU COULD FLYING FUCKING WELL FIGURE OUT YOURSELF IF YOU WEREN'T SUCH AN IGNORANT ARROGANT ASSHOLE is the sorriest, lamest, most cowardly, despicable excuse imaginable...

When Hurricane Katrina struck, it appears there was no one to tell President Bush the plain truth: that the state and local governments had been overwhelmed, that the Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA) was not up to the job and that the military, the only institution with the resources to cope, couldn't act without a declaration from the president overriding all other authority.

BUSH, CHENEY AND THE ENTIRE CABINET MUST SUBMIT THEIR RESIGNATIONS... IMMEDIATELY...

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UK begging for Bolton relief

aw, man... this is PRECISELY the kind of shit that we knew goddam good and well would happen once that s.o.b. serial abuser parked his ass at the u.n. and started demolition operations... the u.k. covered major u.s. butt in iraq but do you think we're gonna return the favor...? do ya, huh, do ya, huh, huh...????

The British government is mounting a huge diplomatic effort this weekend to prevent the biggest-ever summit of world leaders, designed to tackle poverty and overhaul the United Nations, ending in chaos.

The Guardian has learned that Jack Straw, the foreign secretary, has made a personal plea to his American counterpart, Condoleezza Rice, for the US to withdraw opposition to plans for wholesale reform of the UN. He has asked Ms Rice to rein in John Bolton, the US ambassador to the world body.

Mr Bolton has thrown the reform negotiations into disarray by demanding a catalogue of late changes to a 40-page draft document which is due to go before the summit in New York on Wednesday.

there were those who said that bolton would behave in a lower key after receiving a recess appointment without senate confirmation... you gotta be kiddin'... bushco doesn't let a little thing like LEGITIMACY slow 'em down and you can be SURE they aren't asking bolton to step on the brakes... after all, he's got a major deconstruction job ahead of him...

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FEMA "underestimated..."

"underestimated..." what a friggin' euphemistic word to use to describe the criminal delay and the even more criminal lack of leadership that characterized the initial days of the federal effort to respond to katrina... if this was back in the "lord of the manor" days, the peasants would have already stormed the castle with rakes and hoes and tossed the bastard out on his ass...

FEMA appears to have underestimated the storm, despite an extraordinary warning from the National Hurricane Center that it could cause "human suffering incredible by modern standards." The agency dispatched only 7 of its 28 urban search and rescue teams to the area before the storm hit and sent no workers at all into New Orleans until after the hurricane passed on Monday, Aug. 29.

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Both Bush I and Bush II like to fish...

yeah, ok, it's MORE than a little snarky... just think of it as a "guy" thing - like snapping the end of a wet towel at somebody's privates in the locker room... for me, it's more like flipping the dirty digit with both hands...



assholes, both of 'em... and please remember just exactly what it IS that's thicker than water...

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