We are a commune of inquiring, skeptical, politically centrist, capitalist, anglophile, traditionalist New England Yankee humans, humanoids, and animals with many interests beyond and above politics. Each of us has had a high-school education (or GED), but all had ADD so didn't pay attention very well, especially the dogs. Each one of us does "try my best to be just like I am," and none of us enjoys working for others, including for Maggie, from whom we receive neither a nickel nor a dime. Freedom from nags, cranks, government, do-gooders, control-freaks and idiots is all that we ask for.
Here they come - out of the woodwork like cockroaches, hoping that Katrina might offer a feeding opportunity. Or, could you say, like looters during a flood? You thought they were gone, didn't you? Irrelevant, ancient history, self-charicatures, now replaced with a healthier and more positive view of race in America, right? A new generation of positive, hopeful, independent, self-respecting black Americans, right? Nope. Sorry. Those old folks - the black leaders of the 70s who built their reputations on "government programs" weren't gone - they were just resting, biding their time, waiting and hoping for an opening.
And waiting for any opportunity with increasing apprehension, because the Repubs have been chipping away at the plantation with their emphasis on morals and responsibility.
What is the strategy of these old folks, raised on the politics of poverty scams? Scare the blacks back onto the Dem plantation, and guilt the whites into handing over more $ which they can deliver to their constituents. Same old same old.
Everyone jokes about the black hurricane caused by Bush, but some of these folks talk as if they believed it. As if the people harmed by hurricane Andrew, which devastated white Florida, did not also require 5 days for federal help to arrive. No damn difference. But facts have nothing to do with this. As RRWH delicately puts it: "But to those who've been sucking off the government tit for 4 generations, then Big Momma Government is the first ones they turn to to bail their asses out of a jam."
Does anyone take these losers and their race-baiting seriously in 2005?
In my opinion, nothing did more damage to American poor, including the black poor, than the 1970s "War on Poverty," and we continue to reap what was sown then - seeds of helplessness, dependency, excuse, grievance, and entitlement - the worst possible lessons for proud, free people in America. Far more lives down the drain than a thousand hurricanes. Let's hope this older generation of black "leaders" will be ignored. And let's begin hearing voices from black leaders who have faith in their people and who respect their intelligence and abilities and pride.
Now that the people of NO are safe, the blog-news cycle turns to coverage of the coverage - always a worthy task for newsy blogs, one of whose primary functions can and should be to try to keep the MSM honest...a sisyphusian task.
It is widely agreed that coverage was not only hysterical and lacking in facts, but it appears to have been used in an effort to bloody President Bush's nose via distortions, selective use of facts, etc. - something which the silly Sheehan story failed to do, despite their utmost efforts to make this poor benighted soul the spearhead of a 60s-style antiwar movement.
LLBS has a very fine rant about all of this (Thanks for the tip, Classical Values). One paragraph - but read the whole thing:
"...I don’t have the faith in Bush’s and FEMA’s godlike power to make everything all right that they have apparently betrayed I am unable to sympathize never mind empathize with this hyperbole. I wouldn’t be president in this unstable, infant-brained country for anything; sitting in the Oval Office must be like sitting in the middle of a giant nursery, and every baby has a full diaper."
"What is the real story of Katrina is (I suggest) not so much that nature wrought fury on land, water, people, property, and animals, not at all anything about racism, not much about federal government incompetence. The real story is that the mainstream media rioted."
"Jack Kelly supplies the information about hurricane response time that the MSM is too biased and lazy to provide. For example, he quotes Florida National Guardsman Jason van Steenwyk, mobilized six times for hurricane relief, who states: "The federal government pretty much met its standard time lines, but the volume of support provided during the 72-96 hour was unprecedented. The federal response here was faster than Hugo, faster than Andrew, faster than Iniki, faster than Francine and Jeanne." Indeed, Kelly makes a good case that the response to Katrina represents "the most monumental and successful disaster relief operation in world history." If true, then the MSM's coverage must rank among the most monumental and (thus far) successful frauds in the history of journalism."
Gwynnie reports a flash of insight reading the Houses of Worship article in the Friday 9/9 Wall Street Journal, which said in part:
"Pity Larry Lowenthal. His job as executive director of the Boston branch of the American Jewish Committee (AJC) includes finding and training leaders from among the 700,000 Russian Jews who have immigrated to the U.S. in the last 30 years. Mr. Lowenthal has fared well: Today there are Russians helping to guide a number of major Jewish organizations, like the one called Boston for Israel. But now these immigrants turn out to be … oh no! Republicans!
"To judge by his public statements and writings, Mr. Lowenthal's idea of a faithful Jew is someone who opposes the nomination of Judge John Roberts to the U.S. Supreme Court, supports gay rights, abortion and euthanasia, and demands a strong separation of church and state. After all, as Mr. Lowenthal concluded approvingly in a July op-ed for the Jewish Advocate, Jews are "the most liberal" and "the least religious people in America."
"Imagine his consternation when an avalanche of emails from Russian Jews began to pour in to the Web site of the Jewish Russian Telegraph, a daily blog, in response to his article. About 100 people wrote to say that Mr. Lowenthal needed to stop making "outrageous statements" on behalf of people whom he doesn't represent.
"Alex Koifman, who arrived in the U.S. from Belarus in 1978, and whom Mr. Lowenthal trained for his position as a board member at the Boston AJC, criticized his old teacher for overstepping his bounds, saying: "Since when are these concerns [abortion, gay rights, and church-state separation] concerns that are specific to the Jewish community? These are the Left's concerns."
"This was only the most recent in the Boston area's Russian Jewish population's battles with the so-called Jewish leadership. Last fall, Mr. Lowenthal came down hard on the Hasidic community in Wellesley for putting up a menorah display on public property. The Russian Jews wrote scores of emails to the AJC and Russian-language media in response, suggesting that the display was actually a triumph of religious freedom.
"In August, Mr. Lowenthal found himself in hot water again. During an interview with the Boston public radio station, he showered praise on the leaders of the Islamic Society of Boston. When Russian Jews learned that the society was distributing Arabic-language pamphlets with the words of Dr. Yusuf Abdullah al-Qaradawi, a cleric who condones suicide bombings, they were outraged. The Telegraph editor wrote an article contrasting Mr. Lowenthal's intolerance toward their community with his embrace of the local Muslims.
"Mr. Lowenthal finally became so exasperated by these conflicts that he emailed Jim Kaufman, the immediate past president of the local AJC: "I am sorry we ever started up with the Russians." Unfortunately, his confessional somehow fell into Russian hands, and Mr. Koifman published it in the Telegraph."
Gwynnie would lo love to hear from Maggie's brilliant psychiatrist contributor Dr. Joy Bliss, but her insight is that the secular leftist American Jew is filled with a sense of self-loathing and guilt, which raises many issues.
Is a self-loathing Jew anti-Semitic?
Does this explain the NY Slimes' hatred of Israel and embracing of the Palestinian "cause"?
Does this explain the NYT's 9-part series on class which intentionally tries to stir up class warfare (even though their perceived under-classes aren't generally NYT readers, and and even though they would be among the first victims of real class warfare)?
Does all this guilt and self-loathing result in a subconscious desire for self-destruction (which would explain the sick embracing of the Islamofacsists and encouragement of class warfare)?
Gwynnie feels like a key has turned in a mental lock and all sorts of things are now falling into place. She feels like a passenger in a lifeboat with a maniac who keeps tryng to scuttle it; she sees they threaten her very survival and that she must fight them at all times and in every way she can, as well as their Islamofacsist allies.
Thanks to Mark Levin, here is the sad story of how environmental activists scuttled the 1977 New Orleans hurricane barrier project. The following is from the website of Save Our Wetlands, Inc. (S.O.W.L.).
LAKE PONTCHARTRAIN HURRICANE BARRIER PROJECT
During the same time period the Corps was also pursuing the development of a Corps’ project called the Lake Pontchartrain and Vicinity Hurricane Barrier Project. This plan proposed to build a billion dollar dam stretching from Fort Pike to the Rigolets under the guise of hurricane flood protection. This area is approximately one mile wide and is one the entrances of to the Gulf of Mexico. The proposed project would have created hundreds of millions of dollars in dredging contracts. This pork-barrel project was the brain child of U.S. Congressman F. Edward Hebert. Had this proposed project been undertaken it would have destroyed the wetlands of New Orleans east and promoted further housing development in extremely low-lying hurricane susceptible areas. The project also would have destroyed the ecology of Lake Pontchartrain by causing it to become stagnant.
. . .
What the Corps really wanted was the construction of the billion dollar barrier/dam across the Rigolets at Fort Pike, and the hundreds of millions of dollars in dredging contracts it would create.
. . .
The United States Army Corps of Egineer's [sic] Lake Pontchartrain and Vicinity Hurricane Barrier Project had the potential to make Lake Pontchartrain a stagnant body of water, which would have negatively affected its productivity. Under the guise of hurricane protection, this project was not only going to destroy Lake Pontchartrain but was in fact going to drain the wetlands of New Orleans East and promote development in these newly drained areas, regardless of the fact that they would have been highly susceptible to flooding due to hurricane tidal surges. This project was also going to create hundreds of millions of dollars in dredging contracts for F. Edward Herbert political supporters and for the cronies of the Orleans Levee Board. Judge Charles Schwartz ordered the Corps not to intimidate, threaten, or in any way jeopardize the job security of Glen Montz, for telling the truth.
After three days of testimony and hearing Judge Charles Schwartz stated from the bench that Save Our Wetlands had proven her [sic] case and ordered defendants to sit down and negotiate with Save Our Wetlands a type of solution and compromise. Save Our Wetlands spent an entire day communicating with counsel for the defendants in attempting to obtain a compromised injunction on these barriers. This discussion lasted into the night. At all parties met in Judge Charles Schwartz chambers Save Our Wetlands was of the impression that the defendants would agree to cease all of their operations on the construction of the Hurricane Barrier Project.
. . .
Judge Charles Schwartz orders the Army Corps of Engineers to do a new Environmental Impact Study on the Lake Pontchartrain and Vicinity Hurricane Barrier Project. During the trial one of the key arguments of Save Our Wetlands was that alternative hurricane protection measures should be considered including building up preexisting levees. The new EIS conducted by the Corps concludes that building up the existing levees is in fact a better alternative to the Hurricane Barrier Project. The end result of this litigation is that the wetlands of New Orleans East were saved and the Bayou Savauge National Wildlife Refuge was created.
An interesting side note is when the attorney for Save Our Wetlands went before Judge Schwartz to obtain attorney fees. Judge Charles Schwartz agreed, in his injunction that the Corps of Engineers lied to the public. However, now he tells the Save Our Wetlands attorney that, “he is interested in ‘fish’ and ‘birds’ while the Corps was interested in the welfare of the people.”
The Save Our Wetlands attorney says "how can you possibly talk to me that way after all we have proven." Judge Charles Schwartz says, “I have been waiting to hold you in contempt of court for sometime, one more peep out of you and you will go to jail.” The Save Our Wetlands attorney collected no fees for the time and energy he invested in saving the wetlands of New Orleans East and the entire Lake Maurapus, Pontchartrain, Catherine, Bornge, ecosystem. Many people in this litigation are now dead and even though Save Our Wetlands did not recieve any monetary compensation SOWL's legacy lives on and on within the heart and spirit of every man, woman, child, bird, red fish, speckle trout, croakers, etc.
Oil Issues In Latin America and China. Hugo keeps pecking away at the leftist, communist friends and even offered to help the "Big Easy" but before you go thinking he is being altruistic read the USA Today article pointing out his policies:
Chavez has been traveling the hemisphere offering preferential oil deals, barters, and loans to leftist and left-of-center governments. In the past 30 days, the leader of the world's fifth-largest oil exporting country, has inked deals with Argentina, Brazil, Uruguay, and Paraguay. Thirteen Caribbean nations signed a deal for cheap oil in June. And since April, Cuba has been getting almost all of its oil from Venezuela in exchange for doctors and gym teachers. Read the rest:.USATODAY.com - Chavez seeks influence with oil diplomacy
CHINA will not be left behind--Everyone must do the cha cha cha!
On Aug. 22, Venezuela said it expects to increase oil exports to China to 300,000 b/d by 2012 from the current level of 68,800 b/d. On Aug. 25, Ramirez said his country hopes eventually to supply 15-20% of China's oil imports. read the rest here:
"The Power and the Glory" I am sure everyone has heard of it or read it and if not you should but in the meantime take a gander at the real deal in Colombia and Venezuela.
Once again, the religious and political collide and the priests are murdered...."
but read on at Publius Pundit - Blogging the democratic revolution "One week after Pope Benedict wrote a letter to Venezuelan dictator Hugo Chavez, asking him to allow the Church full freedom of action, and got Chavez assurance that all was well, Chavista goons commandeered a church in a town in Venezuela ‘in the name of the people.’"
Remember the attitudes of the press and the "intelligentsia" during Nixon's admin? Has there been any difference with Ford, Reagan, Bush 1, or Bush 2? Any?
The nation has become smarter, wealthier, and more shrewd and skeptical since the Nixon years, but the hate and the use of lies and propaganda haven't changed one bit - nor the impulse to destroy any Repub. administration. (And, yes, Nixon was an excellent President - but not a conservative by any means -whose cover-up was about as classy as Clinton's.)
Bird Dog is back (Do I hear that distant applause? Or am I hallucinating again?). I am not going to fire The News Junkie, but I would fire Brown, Nagrin and Blanco if I had the power. Baby Landrieu too, for good measure. But the NJ - who I rely on - has a tendency to get caught up in the headlines of the moment and to lose perspective. It must be his youth. He likes the adrenaline rush, the battle of the moment, getting indignant at stupidity and lying, etc. etc., but in two weeks, the hurricane story will be over and the story of life will resume, until the next Big Story. He gets obsessed, and wants to make a difference - but he doesn't. Biggest flood in American history - Big Story. Biblical. Apocalyptic and Dylanesque. But the politics of it are cheap and a shame and a pity and a bore. The only blog I've seen - and no newspapers either (The always- predictable NYT is trying to make a race war out of it) - that deals with it all rationally (eg non-politically) is Env. Economics. Also, a blog I like, Ex-Donkey, who has ignored it thus far, probably modestly and wisely figuring everyone else is doing enough with it.
Let's step back. The American Left, noisy as it is, is small but desperately angry and hateful. They have become opportunistic berserkers and annoying mosquitoes because, having been deprived of power, they have only the power to destroy and snipe and bite. The country has taken back the White House, the Senate, the House, and now the Supreme Court away from them, and they feel like they are down in the flood, not only in the US but everywhere. Being down in the flood can make people crazy. This "Left" includes the MSM and the NYT, for sure, and some fraction - not all - of the Democratic Party. They do go beyond the legacy of "loyal opposition" to the point of "disloyal" and the point of dishonest propaganda, and I do not excuse this. The issue could be anything. They seek to destroy when they cannot win in elections, but, as I recall, there were some who tried the same with Clinton.
It's a very dirty game, and far worse when not played by rules of honor and integrity and respect. Now, it's war. They will lose some and win some, but they will lose in the long run, because their ideas don't make sense in the real world, and because their hatred of time-honored traditions and morals give folks the creeps - most people are not ready to have reality reinvented by self-selected, self-important moralizers. Rather have these things maintained by elected, self-important moralizers! But right now, they are emotion-intoxicated and therefore irrational and dangerous. (And, may I add, Bush is no conservative. Maybe he was once, but now he's just a regular politician, and a below-average one too, without the manipulative instincts and with, let's say, only average ability to think when he talks.)
More importantly, Michelle has lists of places to donate clothing, supplies, etc. by mail. What a great motivation to clean those closets. There is a need for $, but for stuff too - so send both, or just send stuff. We're doing it here today - all the kids, too.
The Anchoress has two good pieces on the failure of local and state govt (thanks for the intro, neo-neocon). And Neo-neocon addresses the failure to prepare. View from 1776 discusses the moral failures of NO. Right Thinking has a little debate with the reflex Bush-bashers. Vilmar agrees with us - don't rebuild. RWNH covers the territory - the Bush-bashing, the immature blame-game, the racism issues, and mainly, money-raising to help out. And of course Michelle is on top of things.
My humble opinion: Despite total incompetence, ignorance, stupidity, and corruption of the local hack, low-life politicians, and unprofessional police (one third abandoned their posts, and many joined in the looting) no-one can quickly manage a natural disaster on this scale. Even if they weren't such losers. That's why they call it a "disaster." If it were manageable, it would be called a "problem." This is beyond a "problem." This is the nature-imposed destruction of a city, with a local response which was an embarrassment, both practically and morally. And why didn't Bush know they were too incompetent to handle things? Don't know. He should have been told they were incompetent losers who would pass the buck and give him the blame for their failures. Still, he was the guy who told the gov. to order evacuation, but she had no plan to do so even though everyone knew this would be a problem, for decades. And the mayor - forget it - what a pathetic grandstanding, alligator-tears, manipulative schmuck who evades responsibility for his shortcomings and errors like a seasoned politico-sociopath. I'm surprised he didn't bring out a dead puppy or dead ma or drowned grandma to the cameras, to emotionally strong-arm people in an amateur political way in a pathetic effort to save his political life. Who took care of 9-11? Guiliani and Pataki. Who has taken care of all of the hurricanes in Fla? Jeb. What is the purpose of local and state govts, if not to protect their folks? Hello. Well, I guess this isn't New York City. It's Amateur Hour. No local heroes here - too bad. They had their chance-of-a-lifetime to be national heroes instead of whining crybabies, and they flunked the test of life. And they know it, too - hence their immature blaming to conceal their shame: that's usually what blaming is all about. Well, the nation is now on the job, and those local "officials" should get out of the way and hide themselves in disgrace. Including the NO sleazebag cops and sleazebag politicians. Get out of the way. The grown-ups are arriving, now that these people have made a mockery of the concept of federalism and the notion of state and local responsibility. Because of local corrupt politics and idiot politicians, it is Bush's, and OUR, problem now.
But fear not - we will pick up the slack. For donations, we still prefer the Salvation Army - always first to arrive and last to leave. Still annoyed with the Red Cross. The $ is flowing in like a hurricane's flood. $5 or $100 - it all helps people, regardless of their characters.
And thanks, Editor Bird Dog, for unleashing me. You may need to kennel me up when you return, with a good whack with a newspaper, if you get any of them anymore.
Read our tasteless (post-hurricane, but pre-flood, satire) here, (which is coming true), and our piece on Send Money, Don't Rebuild, here.
Gwynnie has noted on TV and in news bulletins the extreme division of the African-American community in New Nairobi, LA. Most of them are gentle people of the deepest, most sincere faith, which comes through in everything they say. The other part resembles the most lawless areas of Africa: Nairobi, Darfur, and Somalia, and their shameless, smirking appearances in huge numbers on TV may well deepen the residual racism in the United States, which is not what we need. Black looters have even been shooting at the police, military helicopters, air ambulances and rescue boats, all of whom have had to cease or suspend vital search and rescue operations.
One would think that the Rev. Jesse Jackson, National Urban League President Marc Morial, and NAACP President Bruce Gordon would get down a to New Orleans as fast as possible to use their powers of persuasion to halt the anarchistic looting and bring order. But no; what is the NAACP’s current concern? Justice Roberts, whom they strongly opposed in a press release yesterday, August 31, while New Orleans and Mississippi writhen in agony!
Gwynnie says the media’s favorites in the African-American leadership appear much more interested working in their personal interests than in the interests of the people they purport to support. (She actually said, “pampered, over-stuffed, self-important, self-promoting political windbags”).
Update: Gwynnie heard on the radio last night that the country's African-American leaders ARE doing something about New Nairobi -- they are telling the maimstream media not to show pictures of the looting and riots. If you censor it, it didn't happen.
It's not news that the Left is at war with America and with the Bush administration. Lies are no problems for them - war is hell.
After all, we all know that hurricanes are caused by Bush's refusal to sign Kyoto, the levees were weak because Bush didn't give enough $, the blacks in New Orleans were poor because of Bush's racism, New Orleans is mainly black because, well, maybe Bush put them all there, Bush was too busy flirting with Cindy "Sheehan-Crawford" to pay attention to the crisis, gas prices are up because of Bush's Saudi cabal, we have too few National Guard units because of Bush's wrong and illegal war against the lovable and misunderstood Saddam ... what have I missed? Oh, of course - Bush has no heart and no feelings and no brain.
Glassman at TCS hits the contemptible exploiters of natural disaster here.
A Very Fine Novelist offers the View from the Paranoid, Enraged, and Helpless-feeling Left. E.L. Doctorow looks deep into Bush's eyes and "figures him out" in a scathing ad hominem assault. More fiction from Doctorow? Our favorite blond, Laura Ingraham, would say "Shut up and sing write."
I fault this president (George W. Bush) for not knowing what death is. He does not suffer the death of our twenty-one year olds who wanted to be what they could be.
On the eve of D-day in 1944 General Eisenhower prayed to God for the lives of the young soldiers he knew were going to die. He knew what death was. Even in a justifiable war, a war not of choice but of necessity, a war of survival, the cost was almost more than Eisenhower could bear.
But this president does not know what death is. He hasn't the mind for it. You see him joking with the press, peering under the table for the WMDs he can't seem to find, you see him at rallies strutting up to the stage in shirt sleeves to the roar of the carefully screened crowd, smiling and waving, triumphal, a he-man. He does not mourn. He doesn't understand why he should mourn. He is satisfied during the course of a speech written for him to look solemn for a moment and speak of the brave young Americans who made the ultimate sacrifice for their country.
But you study him, you look into his eyes and know he dissembles an emotion which he does not feel in the depths of his being because he has no capacity for it. He does not feel a personal responsibility for the thousand dead young men and women who wanted to be what they could be. They come to his desk not as youngsters with mothers and fathers or wives and children who will suffer to the end of their days a terribly torn fabric of familial relationships and the inconsolable remembrance of aborted life. They come to his desk as a political liability which is why the press is not permitted to photograph the arrival of their coffins from Iraq.
(Read the rest of this predictably hateful, manipulative, condescending, amateur psychoanalytic, arrogant, party-line, juvenile rant from one of America's finest writers by clicking continuation page below. It would be a good game to identify every logical, moral and factual inconsistency herein, but who has the time? Or maybe I will make the time - or one of our readers will...)
Floods are mythic things. They all refer back to Noah, and they all refer to apocalytic events in general, whether personal or widespread. I received some hypersensitive comments about the Dylanologist's photo post last night, but let me inform you: Dylan's song Down in the Flood is DEAD serious and not a lark. Songs and poetry are more serious than prose. We lowly prose-writers must never forget that.
The hate-Bush Jihad is politicizing the storm all around the wacko blogosphere, and yesterday German politicians joined the chorus of blaming Bush for hurricanes - seriously. And now the well-known expert climatologist RFK Jr. On Monday, we posted our satire, before the flooding began and when everything seemed OK there, which seems a bit insensitive in the current context. At the same time, the politicization of a storm is not only deplorable, it's a lie.
I kind of hate to interject this at this moment, but the Left justifies lying, because they believe they are historically right and morally superior, so the ends justify the means. People like RFK Jr aren't stupid, just unwise - they are clever and corrupted by arrogance. Most ordinary politicians are motivated by pure self-interest - money, perks, acceptance, stature, fame, favors, power, ego-building, and chicks in the Georgetown bars (sorry to state the truth, Chris "Little Tom" Dodd, Teddy and Gig-John...does not apply to my old college buddy Jerry Nadler) - those apply to the familiar smiley-face corrupt sad souls everyone easily sees and understands and accepts as one more dumb part of life in their towns, states and federal reps, and keeps a safe distance from the contamination, to protect their souls. Until they need contracts or favors...
But the Elite Left runs on deeper motives, and are therefore more insidious and dangerous than the average everyday conniving, mercenary political jerks that would use their poor mother or even their dog or kids for manipulative advantage, if they only could. Why? because the Lefty politicos think they have been anointed to save the world - not just their lowly selves and their pointless lives. They want to save you! But you don't want to be saved by them, do you? And one thing politicans know is that if you repeat a lie often enough, it will enter the ethos. Believe me on that, if on nothing else.
Anyway, having completed this highly therapeutic rant, the truth is that hurricanes appear in cycles - and we are in one. Rick Moran has already rightfully blown his top over this.
The best site I have found for New Orleans updates is the Times-Picayune's breaking news log, here. With hundreds, if not thousands, of people still stranded in flooded homes, attics and rooftops across the city, rescue boats were bypassing the dead to reach the living, Mayor C. Ray Nagin said. Nola.com: NewsFlash - Crisis grows as New Orleans looted, flooded . And who knew that Katrina's rains hit Palm Beach and Miami?
Instapundit today lists some good places to donate money. Let's all step up to the plate, and do the right thing, as we did with the tsunami - altho this is nothing compared to that, it's bad enough.
(Photo: Mount Ararat and Mount Ururtu, from the website named)
A rhetorical question, born of frustration: Why does it seem as if we members of Western, Northern European Civilization are required to "tolerate" and understand and empathise with those from different traditions and cultures and world views, when the same is never demanded of them?
New Orleans dodged the bullet, and why it is all Bush's fault
It will be a mess, but nothing like the most dire fears/predictions. Unfortunately, that means that, next time, people will be tempted to discount the warnings. The TV is still hyping things, but that's just to keep you watching to sell you soap. Storm now Cat 3 and fading fast.
In the meantime, I notice that every paranoid wacko and malevolent jerk is busy blaming Bush for the hurricane.
I am not one of those wackos, but personally, it seems simple to me that Bush and his oil and Halliburton friends created the hurricane with their hurricane-generating machine on a top-secret oil rig in the Caribbean to damage refineries and oil ports in Louisiana to raise the price of oil so they and their Saudi accomplices can get rich. That's all obvious, right? So why did they miss their target? Hmmm, the story gets even deeper and darker...Maybe Rove had a plan...nothing is by accident, right? Maybe Rove and Co. aimed the hurricane towards New Orleans for a quick jump in oil futures, which they shorted in advance, but had the hurricane trained to dodge east into Gulfport at the last minute, after they collected their winnings. That must be the explanation. And it explains why Bush stayed at his ranch sipping French chardonnay and flirting with the lovely, sexy, Rove-controlled Cindy "Sheehan" - he knew in advance it would miss New Orleans. It all becomes clear now. Another head-fake from the demonic Rove, just like the correct early exit polls in the election, proven to have been designed by Rove to make the Democratic electorate complacent and to get out the fraudulent Nazi Republican vote. Still, once again Rove lied and people died in Katrina. Same old story.
Update: Got an email asking why I said "Rove-controlled Cindy "Sheehan."" Clear as day. She's the worst advertisement for the Dems they could possibly have. Everything makes perfect sense, if you only know how to look at it. Why "Sheehan" in quotes? Not sure it is safe to explain, with the Bushes running this police state we are in.
Update: Got another email asking me to explain the Ben and Jerry's connection with "Sheehan" and Rove, and to further elucidate the above. Heck, it makes all the sense in the world for the Nazi Repubs to be money-laundering funds through Ben and Jerry's to make her PR organization look authentically Lefty. Very clever to use the time-honored Ice Cream Tactic, perfected by Stalin in his annual Free Ice Cream for the People (but not for Jews) Holiday. It throws the press off the scent as they foolishly lick their Cherry Garcia cones and thus are distracted from the Real Story that is right in front of them. If those two pot-addled Vermont hippies were truly Left, they never would have charged money for their ice cream (produced at the expense of suffering, oppressed slave cows with only minimal voting rights, even in supposedly "enlightened" Vermont). Boycott Ben and Jerrys - tools of Rove and the Fascist Bush and the capitalist Bush-Saudi-Israel-Halliburton cabal. Free ice-cream (also, free health care, housing, food, sex, beer, gas, and SUVs) for the Masses, NOW! And you wonder why Cindy won't leave Crawford? She has a thing with GW. Obvious. What else would keep someone on a sidewalk in Crawford but true love? Cindy - Crawford...now you get it. See how it works? Just connect the dots. And don't believe those news photos, obviously doctored by Rove and his accomplices in the mainstream media to make her look like an aardvark. She is artful in the way she tries to disguise it by trying to sound anti-Bush. They have met already, remember, but she tries to keep that a secret - now you know why. It all adds up. It's a no-brainer.
Update: A thoughtful reader agrees, and points out that Laura Bush hasn't been seen for weeks. Somebody says they think they saw Laura sunning herself in the nude on the upper deck of George Soros' 120' yacht in Nantucket Harbor (anchored right off of Gigolo John's wife's mansion's beachfront) through their binoculars. That's all the proof I need. Hey, GW - call what you're doing "clearing brush" on the ranch, or polishing the doorknob, or whatever you want to call it, but the little wifey is having her fun too.
Update: Yes, yes. It is true. "Gigolo John" is John Kerry's nickname on Nantucket, among the locals. "Gig-John" for short. (As in "Aw, sh-t, here comes that arrogant f-ing a-hole no-tip Gig-John again for another skim chai latte.") Gig-John would be President today, if Rove hadn't changed the votes with his electronic voting machine controller, located offshore on a top-secret oil rig in the Caribbean, adjacent to the top-secret hurricane generator. And still the right-wing New York Times refuses to put a reporter on the story.
From James Bowman's The Myth of Control in The New Criterion:
Why is it that connections to our own previous acts are visible all over the place when we are being attacked while connections to the enemy’s previous actions are thin to the point of vanishing when we are the ones doing the attacking? Bush is a madman or a criminal for attacking innocent Iraqis, and yet the attacks on innocent Londoners are said, in the words of Nick Megoran, to be “inexcusable but not inexplicable.” But as the French proverb reminds us, to explain is to excuse, and the eagerness with which the Left has seized upon the actions of George W. Bush as an explanation for all the evil in the world sometimes almost provokes the doubtless unjust suspicion that the terrorists are being excused for the sake of Bush’s being attacked. Yet if sometimes his detractors simply forget to mention, pro forma, that they well understand it is terrorists who are guilty of terrorism and not those responsible for the terrorists’ real or imagined grievances, there may be an explanation for that too.
I think it is because the most cherished of all the myths of the Left is the myth of control. For those whose political starting point is the need to change the world, obviously the first article of faith must be that the world can be changed by the leaders they elect and the decisions those leaders take and the laws they pass. It is therefore fundamental to them to suppose that when bad things happen to Americans, or Britons, someone in political power in America or Britain must be to blame. “It is no accident, Comrade,” the Communists used to say, because in essence for Communists there were no accidents. And the habit of thought lives on even after the demise of doctrinaire Marxism.
Daniel from Venezuela News comments on this latest entry in Venezuelan politics and it is interesting to read what he thinks as he has been covering Chavez since the beginning:Venezuela News And ViewsVenezuela News And Views
If interested in learning more on the presidential problems inherent in Latin American politics check out:Journal of Democracy Latin American Presidencies Interrupted by Arturo Valenzuela , Professor of government and the director of the Center for Latin American Studies at Georgetown University. This piece is an excellent summary of the past presidential catastrophes in Latin America and why the system is flawed.
And of course, we wouldn't be Maggie's Farm if we did not post the truly funny and hysterical Cubans and Venezuelans who let all hell break loose when commenting on their favorite Dictator Fidel:Sundries: Bring Me The Head of Hugo Chavez!
CAFTA isn't the only way to promote business in Central America. MUNDO MAYA: the way to travel with a conscience is to promote preservation:
Sustainable tourism slowly builds up in developing countries and indigenous Maya and Latino communities in Guatemala, Honduras, Belize, El Salvador and Mexico. In efforts to combine the premium from environmental, heritage and community tourism to benefit local communities who actively participate in responsible tourism development, non-profit organization Counterpart International brings together the 3 diversified tourism products under one umbrella – the Mundo Maya projects in Central America.
Mayans want to preserve their natural and cultural heritage while benefiting from tourists who want to see one of the richest and natural and archaeological treasure houses on the planet. Today they look to preserved heritage as a source of tourism revenues.Read the rest here:http://www.travelwirenews.com/cgiscript/csArticles/articles/000053/005344-p.htm
Republicans in sheep's clothing? Spector and Chavez? What is going on? This girl blogger speaks her mind. Read the rest here:
Atlas Shrugs: Enemies Inside Aid Enemies Outside Is Spector effing nuts? He is making love to Chavez? Is he a member of the Fifth column or just plain stupid? Look I know we had to back him or lose his seat to a Dem but frankly this new trend of running on the Republican ticket while secretly being a Democrat is more than a wolf in sheep's clothing, it's a Pali in an IDF uniform. RINOs (Republican in Name Only) Chris Cannon, Chuck Hagel, McCain, Lincoln Chafee, DeWine, Graham, Linda Lingle, Collins, Snowe, Bloomberg, it's a nightmare.
WE NEED A STOP THE RINO MOVEMENT (but don't tell PETA)ClickPhoto
"Borking" is the acceptable practice of telling reprehensible lies about well-qualified conservatives or other figures unpopular in the left-wing. See alsoThomas, Clarence.
"Swift Boating" is the unacceptable practice of telling the truth about anyone the Left wishes to promote, no matter how craven or unbalanced she may be. See also Clinton, Hillary.
Ralph Peter's new book, reviewed by Col. Gordon Cucullu:
With the conviction of a visionary, Ralph Peters dismisses the negativity of those he accuses of promulgating America’s “bizarre cult of pessimism.” In New Glory: Expanding America’s Global Supremacy, Peters’ latest soon-to-be-bestseller, the author steadfastly expresses a belief in the innate goodness of an America he describes as “the greatest force for freedom and change in history.” But New Glory is no mere paean to an idealized America. There have been mistakes. “We have stumbled forward while looking wistfully over our shoulders at the past,” he acknowledges. Unlike those consumed with the cult of guilt for past sins – real or imaginary – Peters urges readers to “set our eyes firmly on the future once again.” New Glory is a page-turning guide on just how glorious that future could be.
Egyptian Generals - hopefully not Egyptian psychiatrists. Curious how this has happened. From DebkaFiles:
A high-ranking 100-man Egyptian military delegation has taken de facto charge of Palestinian security forces in the Gaza Strip and is handling talks with Hamas to avert an outbreak of terrorist violence. DEBKAfile’s military sources report General Ibrahim Shukri heads the team of three Egyptian generals and several colonels and majors. The same general also led the probe of the October 15, 2004 al Qaeda Taba bombings. His appointment betokens Cairo’s anxiety over the threat of al Qaeda terror infiltration of the Gaza Strip. Our sources add that all Palestinian operations, including the deployment of 24 battalions in the evacuated territory are coordinated with Israel indirectly through a direct channel set b y by General Shukri and Israel’s Shin Beit HQ. A second Egyptian general, Muhammed Ibrahim, is in close communication with the Hamas to guard against wildcat action including gunfire on Israeli targets
Katrina, and Politics