Kevin Drum is keeping a list of excuses: Here’s a sampling so far: It was the fault of state and local authorities. They never asked for help. The poor people of New Orleans were too stupid to evacuate when they should have. Nobody knew that Katrina was going to be so bad. Nobody could have guessed that New Orleans would … Read More
View From Abroad
I was always amused by Clinton haters who decried his sexual misconduct by saying that it made America an embrassment to the world . . . as if Europeans have the same amount of prudishness as socially conservative Americans. They don’t. But this article in The American Prospect indicates that we should be embarrassed by recent events. An excerpt: Europeans … Read More
Bush And Scotty Get The Reaming They So Richly Deserve
From the Associated Press: The Bush White House is known for its ability to remain in control of its message and image, sliding out of crises with barely a scratch. Not this time. Despite day after day of appearances by President Bush aimed at undoing the political damage from a poor response to Hurricane Katrina, the White House has not … Read More
Why The Pentagon Should Read My Blog
Via Think Progress, we learn that Joint Chiefs Chairman Richard Myers, in a live press conference moments ago, repeated Michael Chertoff’s debunked claim that newpapers on Tuesday had said, “New Orleans Dodged a Bullet.” But then he went a step further — Myers actually claimed that “most of the papers” had that headline on Tuesday, and that the Defense Department’s … Read More
Fox. Henhouse.
Bush to lead probe over Bush’s failure re: Katrina: Buffeted by criticism over the federal response to Hurricane Katrina, President Bush said Tuesday he will oversee an investigation into what went wrong and why — in part to be sure the country could withstand more storms or attack. Great.
Financial Times: “America Counts The Cost Of Curbing Government”
The Financial Times gets the big picture. Katrina is more than just a one-time outrage and a slow-to-move government. It exemplifies what happens when small government policies are put into place: ….For the past quarter century in Washington, since the Republican Ronald Reagan rode a conservative backlash all the way to the presidency, US politics has been dominated by the … Read More
They’re Better Off
Proving that the apple doesn’t fall far from the tree, here’s what former First Lady Barbara Bush said after visiting Katrina evacuees in Houston: What I’m hearing is . . . they all want to stay in Texas. Everyone is so overwhelmed by the hospitality. And so many of the people in the arenas here, you know, were underprivileged anyway, … Read More
Katrina And Democrats
From the NY Daily News: "It has become increasingly evident that our nation was not prepared," Clinton (D-N.Y.) said in a letter to Bush asking him to set up a "Katrina Commission." "The slow pace of relief efforts in the face of a mounting death toll … seems to confirm that our ability to respond to cataclysmic disasters has not … Read More
Katrina Quote Of The Day
Kate Hale, former Miami-Dade emergency management chief, speaking of FEMA director Michael Brown: "He’s done a hell of a job, because I’m not aware of any Arabian horses being killed in this storm." She is referring to Brown’s background in emergency management, which is to say . . . none. Read more here.
Katrina And Rove
Karl Rove has been assigned to handle the counterspin, trying to resurrect Bush from his failings of last week, according to the New York Times: Under the command of President Bush’s two senior political advisers, the White House rolled out a plan this weekend to contain the political damage from the administration’s response to Hurricane Katrina. It orchestrated visits by … Read More
Was The Levee Repair A Bush Photo-op?
I hear rumblings. In an open letter to Bush, Louisiana Senator Mary Landrieu questions why the equipment to repair levee damage that had been so plentiful when the President arrived, wasn’t there the next day: Flying over this critical spot again this morning, less than 24 hours later, it became apparent that yesterday we witnessed a hastily prepared stage set … Read More
Pat Robertson’s Prayers Answered – Rehnquist Dead
In a week of national nightmares, this is all we need. Saving grace is that Bush is so low in the polls that he really might be forced to nominate someone very moderate. But I’m not holding my breath. P.S.: If you don’t know what the Pat Robertson reference means, you can check out his prayer points here, e.g.: Pray … Read More
Now, With Color!
As I blogged about here and here, the banner at the Whitehouse.gov Hurricane Relief Page looked like this: That banner has been changed since Bush’s visit to the Gulf Coast yesterday. It now looks like this: I guess they didn’t have stock photos of Bush with his arms around black people . . . until now. So the trip was … Read More
He’s Only A First-Term Democrat
Bush finally descended deus ex machina into New Orleans yesterday where he met with officials about the status of the situation, reassured the nation that Trent Lott’s house would be rebuilt, and hugged a couple of black people. Wait. Did I say he met with officials about the status of the situation? Thousands of people stranded in two swamped parishes … Read More
The Norquist Doctrine
– sent to me by email