Sunday, April 29, 2007

Fucking the victims of Katrina

By Michael J.W. Stickings

This is completely and utterly appalling:

As the winds and water of Hurricane Katrina were receding, presidential confidante Karen Hughes sent a cable from her State Department office to U.S. ambassadors worldwide.

Titled "Echo-Chamber Message" -- a public relations term for talking points designed to be repeated again and again -- the Sept. 7, 2005, directive was unmistakable: Assure the scores of countries that had pledged or donated aid at the height of the disaster that their largesse had provided Americans "practical help and moral support" and "highlight the concrete benefits hurricane victims are receiving."

Many of the U.S. diplomats who received the message, however, were beginning to witness a more embarrassing reality. They knew the U.S. government was turning down many allies' offers of manpower, supplies and expertise worth untold millions of dollars. Eventually the United States also would fail to collect most of the unprecedented outpouring of international cash assistance for Katrina's victims.

Allies offered $854 million in cash and in oil that was to be sold for cash. But only $40 million has been used so far for disaster victims or reconstruction, according to U.S. officials and contractors. Most of the aid went uncollected, including $400 million worth of oil. Some offers were withdrawn or redirected to private groups such as the Red Cross. The rest has been delayed by red tape and bureaucratic limits on how it can be spent.

And here's a revealing statistic: "Overall, the United States declined 54 of 77 recorded aid offers from three of its staunchest allies: Canada, Britain and Israel, according to a 40-page State Department table of the offers that had been received as of January 2006."

I don't know what to say. Essentially, the U.S. government -- with the knowledge and inaction of the Bush Administration, which covered it up -- denied Katrina victims massive amounts of foreign aid and support, even aid and support from America's closest friends.

How fucked up is that? And how reprehensible?

The normal and ineffectual processes and operations of government may be partly to blame, but so too is the Bush Administration. And Bush himself, who must be held responsible for the government's response to Katrina.

For what we know now is that it wasn't just FEMA's slow response to the hurricane that was the problem. It was also failure on a massive scale to provide aid and support to the victims.


That is what is truly appalling.

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18 Comments:

  • My GOD! (can I say that here?) people "denied" welfare?! The inhumanity! They might actually build some real self-esteem due to their own personal actions! And then they might not want to be slaves to the welfare state! How on earth would I feel better about myself? Quick, think up a new program! Find someone who works and pick their pocket!

    By Anonymous Anonymous, at 9:28 AM  

  • So getting aid from the government amounts to welfare? What a genius. When someone breaks into your trailer and steals the radio you listen to Drug Limbaugh or Shemp Hannity on, you're not going to call the cops? Yeah, screw the people who were "lazy and foolish enough" to have their lives ruined by a natural disaster. What a compassionate conservative you are. What family values you demonstrate!

    By Anonymous Anonymous, at 11:20 AM  

  • But Bush is a 'man of God'...

    Then why does God hate Katrina victims?

    By Anonymous Anonymous, at 11:34 AM  

  • Our "compassionate" conservative probably never gave to Tsunami vicitms, or gives blood. Everyone is an island, and we must never help each other. Just ask Jesus.

    See, Bush was derelict, proves that government doesn't work, so glad I'm on top of the ratrace....

    May we take pity on you when you are in need, brother.

    By Anonymous Anonymous, at 11:58 AM  

  • Apparently God hates some conservatives enough to deprive them of functioning brain cells. The despicable lengths these people will go to in order to protect their golden boy Bush.

    By Anonymous Anonymous, at 12:07 PM  

  • Maybe the offered aid came with strings attached like say, the money can't be directed to incompetent, crony, GOP controlled companies through no-bid contracts.

    By Anonymous Anonymous, at 12:28 PM  

  • The post had some comments worth looking at . One was on how suppressing relief was a sure way of opening real estate opportunities . I left a snarky post , but I would never do that twice on the same day . Or on a Sunday . Wow you have really tough Word verification tests here in Transylvania .

    By Anonymous Anonymous, at 12:38 PM  

  • To Anonymous1:

    The tone of your response here ("they might actually build some real self-esteem due to their own personal actions! And they might not want to be slaves to the welfare state") is vile, and uninformed. You have managed to insult hundreds of thousands of people by calling them "slaves to the welfare state" when they desparately needed charitable assistance because they lost lives, loved-ones, and all their earthly posessions. How heartless are you???

    "Find someone who works and pick their pocket!"

    So my family was a band of thieves when they needed to rely on strangers (not millionaire states) to house them? Did my family rob a community utterly foreign to them when strangers helped to enroll the children in neighborhood schools and helped to clothe and feed everyone in those very difficult weeks after the storm?

    I resent how you have characterized my family and the rest of my city's citizens.

    WE ARE NOT THIEVES. We were devasted and needy for charity, compassion, and resources. WE WERE ROBBED by callous, incompetent, uninformed, and dismissive individuals who failed to allow countless resources to reach Americans who were in tremendous and unprecedented need.

    By Anonymous Anonymous, at 12:48 PM  

  • Okay, first of all this was money offered as charity by other countries, not welfare. Exactly who was being robbed here? If you gave money to a homeless shelter and they never did anything with it or used it to buy themselves a Mercedes, who would be the pickpocket? The people you intended it for or the people who didn't pass it on to them, for crying out loud?

    This was charity. I thought you "compassionate conservatives" were big on having charity take the place of welfare. A lot of people and governments with far more humanity than you recognized that sometimes "shit happens" and you need help. They were screwed over by this administration just as the Katrina survivors were, since their good intentions were thwarted.

    I happen to believe in God, but I tell you sometimes I scratch my head at the mystery of why he created some people with no heart and very little brains.

    By Anonymous Anonymous, at 1:11 PM  

  • You'll scratch your head until it's bald if you keep looking for a coherent argument from the anonymous ninnies on the right. It's all just irrational anger and self-pity posing as reason.

    There is however, some consistency in the attitude of our administration; like the alcoholic who won't admit he has a problem and won't seek help because he doesn't need any, thank you, Bush hasn't made that first step.

    After all, the glorious hero on the white horse isn't going to accept anything from inferior people, is he?

    By Blogger Capt. Fogg, at 2:24 PM  

  • The more I hear and see about this administration the deeper it gets. To deprive anyone who is in such need as those victims were due to a natural disaster has got to be nearing the bottom of the barrel. They (this administration) just keeps proving that genocide in any form is ok for them. Then they whine and stamp their feet when caught.....I am so damned sick of this. Their behavior has nothing to do with compassion..nothing! It's all about keeping power, any way they can. It's way, way past time for accountability, which has been a foreign word since they took office.

    By Anonymous Anonymous, at 3:35 PM  

  • First of all, Michale Stickings is allowing his hatred of the Bush administration to cloud reality. Mayor Ray Nagin of New Orleans should have had a better emergency management plan in place IN THE FIRST PLACE (ahem, anyone remember those flooded school buses?). It is local and then state government that is to respond first to such tragedy and do so effectively, yet Mr. Stickings places all of the blame on the Bush administration.

    Second of all, if the funds are coming from foreign governments, then Anonymous is correct that it is a form of welfare. Charity comes from individuals as individuals. Besides, there are folks around the world who are in much worse shape than Americans and who could have used such aid. it is incumbent upon Americans - and those affected by Hurricane Katrina itself - to make the necessary choices to move things forward.

    By Blogger Shay Riley, at 5:54 PM  

  • Shay:

    Don't let your own politics "cloud reality."

    I'm not here to argue semantics. At least on my behalf, I was not so much offended by Anonymous' reference to charity as welfare. Rather, I was deeply offended to his cruel insinuation that those who accept handouts during their time of need are irresponsible, lazy, and no better than thieves.
    Talk about adding insult to injury! He may as well be personally attacking me for being in the situation my family and I were in when we became unexpectedly homeless and barred from our city after what was supposed to be a pleasant 3-day evacuation jaunt to a hotel. And my experience is super Katrina-lite. Thousands upon thousands were not so lucky as we were to even have eachother to cling to.

    I can't express how appalled I am that offers such as medical supplies, shelter on cruise ships, inflatable flat-bed boats, and trained search-and-rescue dogs were all declined, or wasted. Perhaps your television set didn't do a proper job of conveying the sheer horrific scale of the emergency at that time... All of those items were desparately, SORELY needed. In those weeks following the storm, FEMA/the federal government (the only entity that had the power to mobilize such things) certainly was not providing these things.

    As far as blaming it on Nagin, that's a tired scape-goat excuse. I'm not a fan of Ray Nagin, but I'm weary of hearing about "all those flooded buses." Already, Mayor Nagin conducted the most successful evacuation in US history. Even if he did mobilize the buses for the fraction of citizens and tourists who remained behind, where was he to send all of the evacuees? His jurisdiction is the city, not the rest of the state, not neighboring states. Prior to Katrina, other mayors and governors would have scoffed at the concept of a coordinated evacuation... It's hard for me to imagine, at least, other cities and states clamoring for New Orleans' poor and starving masses prior to Katrina.

    Enough is enough. Stop defending such obvious malfeasance. We, as Americans, deserve better than what we got from this administration after hurricane Katrina.

    By Anonymous Anonymous, at 6:43 PM  

  • First of all, local and state officials don't have the resources to handle a disaster like this. That's why we have FEMA! And as for the schoolbus story (the stupid, red herring one about how the mayor should have used them to save the day), yeah, the morons over at Faux news taled about it endlessly, but it's nonsense. It's never been anything but a way to deflect criticism from Bush. If the mayor were really at fault wouldn't you have some real criticism instead of a stupid right-wing talking point? The same way with your ridiculous blanket claim that local officials are the ones at fault. What's your proof? Don't have any? Didn't think so. Oh,and your defense of the welfare statement is great. It's welfare because you say so. And as for the botched job cleaning up Katrina, let's again deflect criticism of golden boy Bush with some general statement that there are other people in bad shape elsewhere in the world. Yeah, it is incumbent upon American to move things forward. Let's start with the heartless idiots in the White House who have the power to move things forward. Heckuva a job, Brownie!

    By Anonymous Anonymous, at 6:45 PM  

  • How many of you dipshit loudmouths have been through a hurricane and had to deal with FEMA?

    I've been hit by three in less than two years and have seen the incompetence and confusion first hand, and yes, thank you I live in a wealthy area with a good emergency plan and I have watched FEMA hand out food and supplies and generators to millionaires while the less affluent were living in blown up houses with no real help - for years. George came down and handed out water in front of cameras for five minutes and then flew away to Miami in his air conditioned helicopter and we were on our own.

    I'm sick and disgusted with people and their theories and attitudes and their smug dismissals and their psychopathic and idiotic support of the worst, most corrupt and dangerous administration in American history. That "I've got mine and screw you" pose will have to face reality some day and frankly - I hope you die in some squalid hole while other pretentious, know nothing bastards pontificate about how you deserved it.

    By Blogger Capt. Fogg, at 10:46 PM  

  • Oh yeah, to the nitwit who claims that Michael has let his perceptions be altered by hatred of Bush -- could it just be that the man who had such overwhelming support and blew it all is hated by the whole world because he's a liar and a crook and a tyrant who feels above the law and acts outside the law and not because his eyes are blue?

    What a stupid argument!

    By Blogger Capt. Fogg, at 10:51 PM  

  • This is how these people have to argue--write off the critic as a "Bush hater", a liberal, a far left moonbat, etc. Or they blame the victims. Notice how there's never any logic, facts or reason to support Bush?

    By Anonymous Anonymous, at 1:46 PM  

  • By Anonymous Anonymous, at 8:46 PM  

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