The Chickens Have Come Home To Roost

Well, we see now the tangible results of what we've been hollering about for the last 5 years.

This is what happens when you undertax, underfund, undermine and under-support the American public. What has been theoretical is now, all too tragically, real. When the rubber meets the road, we don't have the resources or organization or anything to care for our own people.

I hold George W. Bush and his Administration personally responsible for the deaths of the victims of Katrina, and the destruction of a priceless American city, an irreplaceable heritage. When he's strumming his guitar, I hope he realizes that he has demolished the culture from which his guitar-playing sprung.

If this makes me sound like a nut-job liberal wacko, I really don't give a good goddamn.

Update: I bring joy to others.

TheStonerPundit:

You are laughable. You hold GW personally responsible for the deaths of the Katrina victims? Even the ones that died during the storm? Come on you've got to be smarter than that.

Me:

Yes I do. Laugh if you like. I hold him responsible because as president, he is responsible for the direction of the policy of this nation. And the direction of the policy has been one of tax cuts that have gutted this nation's needs and diverted our resources to his war of choice, and while cutting taxes during wartime slashed budgets for infrastructure.

If the money had been there for the shoring up of the levees like the state of Louisiana and the Corps of Engineers begged for, if FEMA was not managed by incompetents who were owed political favors, (like so many appointments in this Administration - not that he shouldn't appoint people who have done things for him, but that the people he chooses are as unbelievably incompetent as he is - failures at every other job they had, and completely unqualified for the job they're appointed to) if there were any kind of importance attached to planning for disaster at home instead of creating disaster in Iraq, I believe that this kind of catastrophe could have been mitigated.

Of course there would have been a terrible storm, but not the entire loss of a city; the loss of life would have numbered in the dozens, not the hundreds or thousands.

This pathetic, disorganized response represents the culture in place from the White House on down - the really callous disregard for those who can't do anything for him. If he cared one single fig, he would have had his ass down there in the shit-water as soon as he heard about it. He could have been offering moral support, which would have been better than nothing. That's one of his jobs as President. It's called a bully pulpit. I think people would have forgiven him a lot if he was down there in the wreckage for real, not some stupid-ass staged photo op that a blind person could tell was phony. If he showed one speck of real emotion or real empathy, people would not be feeling abandoned by this government. But he has abandoned the people of Louisiana not only by his policies, but emotionally as well. If nothing else, his caretakers should have made him go down there instead of partying and fund-raising. What a slap in the face to those suffering people.

But apart from that, the sad truth is that his lack of caring is evidenced in his priorities, in where he chose to spend money, in what he chose to cut. And his apathetic, lackadaisical response just reflects the reality of his attitude.

This did not have to happen the way it did. And for that, I hold him responsible.

He wanted this job - badly enough to steal it, in my opinion (but what do I know; I'm a liberal crackpot). However, he doesn't want the responsibility that goes along with it. For someone who's always lecturing other people about 'personal responsibility', he doesn't have a clue in hell about what that means.

So, if he won't hold himself responsible, I will.