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How strident are they getting, blaming everything on Bush?

Yeah, Bush told Mother Nature to send a C4 to New Orleans, give me a break.

I do think that more military should be sent in, National Guard isn't enough.

And horray for the Coast Guard!

I'm very surprised actually...I haven't heard TOO much government bashing.

And it's not like there wasn't enough warning for people to evacuate. I think for the most part people recognize that and just want to help out. It's nice to see people so united for once.

Some putz halfwit, bless his heart, is on the Red Cross special on NBC going off script. He said black people are struggling to survive, and Bush just gave permission for the army "to shoot us." Mike Myers was standing beside him & didn't know what to do. Then he said "George Bush doesn't care about black people." The they cut him off quick.

"Oh no, life isn't easy! Let's blame the president!"

*rolls eyes*

Executive branch bashing is just so trendy.

And people ask me why I don't watch the news anymore.

Accountable wrote: Some putz halfwit, bless his heart, is on the Red Cross special on NBC going off script. He said black people are struggling to survive, and Bush just gave permission for the army "to shoot us." Mike Myers was standing beside him & didn't know what to do. Then he said "George Bush doesn't care about black people." The they cut him off quick.


Found this video..........



VIDEO HERE

He was just caring on the mantra started after Katrina and playing the race card.

Here are a few examples:

Jackson Blasts Bush Over Katrina Aid

Sep 02 3:48 PM US/Eastern



By DOUG SIMPSON

Associated Press Writer



BATON ROUGE, La.



Racism is partly to blame for the deadly aftermath of Hurricane Katrina, the Rev. Jesse Jackson said, calling President Bush's response to the disaster "incompetent."

"Today, as the President comes to Louisiana, Alabama and Mississippi for his ceremonial trip to look at the victims of the devastation, he would do well to have a plan more significant than a ceremonial tour," Jackson said Friday.

"His whole response is unacceptable."

Bush has acknowledged that the federal response has not been acceptable, but promised that the government would get supplies to survivors and crack down on violence in New Orleans.

Jackson questioned why Bush has not named blacks to top positions in the federal response to the disaster, particularly when the majority of victims remaining stranded in New Orleans are black: "How can blacks be locked out of the leadership, and trapped in the suffering?"

"It is that lack of sensitivity and compassion that represents a kind of incompetence."

U.S. Army Lt. Gen. Russell Honore, head of the military task force overseeing operations in the three states, is black. His task force is providing search and rescue, medical help and sending supplies to the three states in support of the Federal Emergency Management Agency.

Jackson was in Baton Rouge to take part in a local project using a caravan of buses to pick up people stranded in New Orleans and transport them out. He spoke at a news conference at the state emergency center.

The civil rights leader said the flooding that caused thousands to be trapped inside the city was caused by a lack of federal funding for its levee system and hurricane planning. The resulting tragedy, he said, has largely hit New Orleans' black residents, because they were too poor to evacuate before the storm hit.

"There's a historical indifference to the pain of poor people and black people" in this country, he said.

Jackson also said the news media has "criminalized the people of New Orleans" by focusing on violence in the city.



Politicizing Katrina: Blame Bush, Blame Feds, Blame Bush Again

Amazing that it took the media and politicians a full 4 days before they began inserting racial politics into a natural disaster.

San Jose Mercury: Katrina revives debate about race in America BY TONY PUGH

* * * * *

Opinion Journal comments on the tangential issue of race in the midst of human suffering:Al Sharpton showed up on Keith Olbermann's "Countdown" on MSNBC last night, and the pair sounded a theme that's becoming depressingly familiar in the effort to demagogue hurricane Katrina: Olbermann: I actually heard a commentator this afternoon--it was that Limbaugh--suggest that the issue of class and race in those who were left behind in New Orleans was irrelevant, because, as he put it, those people were not forced to live there and they weren't bused into New Orleans.

And I was thinking, A, this guy is even more clueless than I thought he was, which is saying something. But, B, there are people who actually believe that. How do you respond to them? How do you explain to them what the truth is? . . .

Sharpton: . . . The real question is not only those that didn't get out. The question is why has it taken the government so long to get in. I feel that, if it was in another area, with another economic strata and racial makeup, that President Bush would have run out of Crawford a lot quicker and FEMA would have found its way in a lot sooner.

In truth, Katrina's devastation was spread out over a huge area, not just the city of New Orleans with its majority-black population. The Associated Press quotes Sen. Mary Landrieu of Louisiana, who lists four suburban parishes that, along with Orleans Parish (which is coterminous with New Orleans) were hit hard enough to need "long-term rebuilding."

Here are the 2000 census's racial breakdowns of the populations of those five Louisiana parishes, along with Mississippi's coastal counties, which suffered a direct hit:

Parish or county -- White / Black

Jefferson, La. -- 69.8% / 22.9%

Orleans, La. -- 28.1% / 67.3%

Plaquemines, La. -- 69.8% / 23.4%

St. Bernard, La. -- 88.3% / 7.6%

St. Tammany, La. -- 87.0% / 9.9%

Hancock, Miss. -- 90.2% / 6.8%

Harrison, Miss. -- 73.1% / 21.1%

Jackson, Miss. -- 75.4% / 20.9%



The New York Times notes that among those who lost homes in Mississippi were Rep. Gene Taylor, a Democrat, and Sen. Trent Lott, a Republican--both persons of pallor and neither one of whom can be called downtrodden. Rep. Bobby Jindal, a Republican from Kenner, La. (in Jefferson Parish), doesn't even know if his house is still standing. "Jefferson Parish as we knew it is gone forever," Reuters quotes parish president Aaron Broussard as saying.

Though Katrina is an equal-opportunity destroyer, the news media's coverage of the disaster has centered on the city of New Orleans--which is understandable, given that that is the center of the metropolis, that it is densely populated, and that it is 80% underwater. That means the faces of the suffering that we have seen have mostly been black ones. And so what? These are fellow human beings and fellow Americans; the color of their skin makes their misery no more or less heartbreaking, and their rescue no more or less urgent.

* * * * *

Understandably, the citizens of New Orleans are angry and frustrated. Who would not be? But for politicians and the media to insert racial politics in the midst of so much need is to only poison an already intense situation. As difficult and trying as their circumstances are, it is imperative that those remaining in New Orleans keep their calm and wits about them. Self-righteous talk of racism without concrete proof among those who don't have to worry about where to get water, or food, or electricity is utterly irresponsible.

Part of the blame should be placed also on the citizens themselves. Those who are find themselves in this horrid predicament were either unable to leave New Orleans or they chose not to leave. Recall that they were ORDERED days in advance to evacuate their city, and roughly 80% did, while others watched a Category 5 hurricane as it was approaching. To place full blame on the federal government and the President is not only unfair but it solves nothing. Even if the federal government has been slow in its response, blame can always be assigned later. If anyone was negligent, it was decades of New Orleans governing which knew of a potential for disaster and either did not or could not address it. (Perhaps New Orleans Mayor Nagin might place some of the blame on himself before lashing out at others.) The same goes for the State of Louisiana.



An aerial view of flooded school buses in a lot, Thursday, Sept. 1, 2005, in New Orleans, LA. The flood is a result of Hurricane Katrina that passed through the area last Monday.(AP Photo/Phil Coale)

Why in the hell did not the Mayor get these busses to higher ground BEFORE Katrina?

He hollers about no help but I think he let the city down with his P!$$ poor planning.......

[quote=actionfigurestepho]I'm very surprised actually...I haven't heard TOO much government bashing.

And it's not like there wasn't enough warning for people to evacuate. I think for the most part people recognize that and just want to help out. It's nice to see people so united for once.[/quote



i'm sure you have already heard this...but evacuation was difficult for many people (i'm sure there were yo heads that stuck around for the fun of it)...however, so many did not have cars and buses were out of control crowded...they simply could not get out

Oh, I know not EVERYONE could evacuate. They allowed for about 5-6 thousand legitimates. I just find it hard to believe that the 25,000+ are in that category. It's sad, people thought they were being frugal maybe, or maybe they just thought it would be easy, or you have your people who tried to wait till the last second to evacuate and couldn't and now people who seriously could honestly not get out or carpool etc. are suffering all the more. And of course now everyone down there is equally impoverished...I don't know. I feel terrible about placing blame ANYWHERE because who did what just isn't important right now. There's time for that later. People are dying and shooting each other and raping each other (wtf??!) and it makes me want to vomit. Let the news blame whoever they want to. I'm turning it off.

I was in charge of an evacuation in anticipation of a Tsunami in the mid 80s. The denial and dumb behavior was mind boggling. People refused to leave their homes with perfectly good vehicles sitting in their driveways. Others actually went to the water’s edge to get a better view.

The Mayor left town, got his mother and went to high ground. We didn’t hear from him until the all clear was announced. I could go on.

I have no doubt in my mind that most of the people who didn’t evacuate for Katrina made the choice with the means to evacuate at their disposal.