my rant
 

I think if blame is what you are after there is enough to go around. I do not care about kanye's comments. I think they shine a light on some people's feelings and concerns where race and class are concerned. I think there has always been a "looking down one's nose" towards parts of the South because of issues of race and class. I think it is impossible to truly prove or disprove the influence of race and class on anyone's actions in this situation.

You can play what came first the chicken or the egg with this one all day. Before the storm, it would have been helpful in NOLA gov had done more to assist people with evacuating. Before the storm, it would have been helpful if more resources had been put in protecting the levees. Ultimately very little of the damage in NOLA is directly related to the hurricane, it is the result of the levee breach. Sadly, this point is going to become more and more important in the coming days as only about 40% of the population there had flood insurance and homeowners insurance WILL NOT cover damage from flood. Before that, you could say it would have been helpful if a more effective method of containing the river and the Lake had been developed. Let's blame the original engineers.

And after the storm, maybe it would have served us all better to have someone with a better background in emergency management heading FEMA. I do not care what anyone says but when I know there are evacuees at the Convention Center 2 days ahead of the Director of FEMA, something is seriously amiss. When it is being portrayed as impossible to get anything or anyone in to or out of NOLA but every major media outlet has someone on the ground, you cannot be surprised when the average person feels like something is amiss.

And we all know in reality the President does very little. (Seriously, not even a dig a Dubya and his idiotic self) President's rely on others to actually get the work done. No one thinks (or should think) that he was getting in a helicopter and pulling people off of roofs. But as one analyst put it, what people need is for the President to look Presidential. Unfortunately, if e cannot give a “we're going to catch em and kill em” kind of speech, he has always been weak in the looking presidential department. They need for their leaders to seem to have a handle on the situation. It does not strengthen the country's support to know you got up in the middle of the night for Terry Schivo, a sad story about a person who was already dead for all intents and purposes, but took two days to decide to cut your vacation short and return to the helm when thousands of people are dead or dying. And you can make all the teleworking arguments you want, leadership and politics are as much about how it looks as what you do. It is nonsensical to condemn "looters" looking for food and water to survive when you know not one supply has hit the ground. I know I am going to stop listening to any person who would say better that you lay on the street and die then break in to the Winn Dixie. To lump those stealing bread together with those stealing tv's is absurd, insulting and insensitive. The secretary of state shopping for $400 shoes is just not the right image at the moment. The ability to ferry aid to the tsunami victims faster that people in this country is not a good image right now. The president lauding the work of the FEMA director, who knew less about where refugees were staying than CNN, and then saying that the results of the gov's efforts are "unacceptable" is not a good picture right now. How NOLA, LA, MI and AL will recover from this is a heck of a good question. When you add in those who did in fact flee but have none the less lost everything, we are going to have half a million people in financial crisis. My best friend nearly entire immediate family lived in NOLA until last week. Together her immediate family lost 3 houses and a business the employed many of them. Mercifully they did not lose their lives. But while they are alive rebuilding a life is going to really take some time. I pray that they do. Right now, I am praying for a lot of things.

And for me, the scariest long term thoughts are: How the US will not look vulnerable to an attack to the world is a good question. Somewhere, some would be terrorist is kicking himself for not attacking that levee when everybody was home. Imagine what they could have done with city full of residents. And what would the response have been? The fact that even a minor attack is more than we can withstand at the moment says quite a bit.

WELL SAID KIMMIE1913!!

Stars Support West's Outburst


Jay-Z, Sean 'Diddy' Combs and Matt Damon are among a host of stars who have applauded Kanye West for his public attack on Us President George W. Bush on Friday. During an appearance on A Concert For Hurricane Relief - a live telethon broadcast across America - West broke away from his script to voice his disgust at the media's portrayal of the Gulf Region's African-Americans and to slam the slow delivery of aid. But the biggest stir of all came when West boldly declared, "George Bush doesn't care about black people." West's Def Jam colleague Jay-Z says, "I'm backing Kanye 100 per cent. This is America. You should be able to say what you want to say. We have freedom of speech. (The slow response to the disaster) is really numbing. You can't believe it's happening in America. You wonder, what's going on? Why were people so slow to react? I don't understand it." Combs notes, "I think he spoke from his heart. He spoke what a lot of people feel... It ain't adding up, man. It's not making sense. If the reporters can get there and you all can get there with microphones, somebody should be able to get there with food." Damon adds, "This guy with his moment on live television made a statement that hopefully now Bush will come out and address, because he doesn't have to address anything else... The White House Press Corp, they should all have their credentials taken away. Not one of them's an honest journalist. Not one of them asked a question of the guy." Meanwhile, actress Susan Sarandon has a slightly different take on West's comments: "I don't think that's an original thought, but it's probably true."

-- imdb.com

Kimmie, your post was amazing. I enjoyed reading it.

I was watching some Showbiz tonight show (I think on CNN? Headline News or MSNBC.) I can't remember.

And MasterP kinda sorta brought up the fact that Kanye's new CD is coming out next week. To me that insinuated that he thought that Kanye did it for publicity and to sell more records.

That is too heinous of a thougth for me to entertain right now.

What are peoples thoughts about that though?

I feel that NBC should not have edited his comments on the West coast.

Wasn't he the one that spoke out on Gay hate crimes and abolishing them? Granted, maybe people disagree with him (I personally don't) but his comment was aired.

I know I'm not quite comparing apples to apples but censorship is censorship and airing people's comments are airing people's comments.

Regardless, this trajedy is awful. Simply horrific.

Of course Kanye did it for publicity.

“In the 2004 election, President Bush carried Louisiana by 281,870 votes, according to data from David Leip's election atlas. A breakdown by parish shows that the two candidates ran almost exactly even in the New Orleans area: John Kerry had a 109,763-vote margin within the city (Orleans Parish), while Bush beat Kerry by a combined 109,546 votes in the suburban parishes of Jefferson, Plaquemines, St. Bernard and St. Tammany.

Obviously if more New Orleans residents than suburbanites move out of state, Louisiana will become more Republican. Less obviously, the state will become more Republican even if flight from the suburbs equals that from New Orleans, since the evenly divided New Orleans region will account for a smaller part of the population than the heavily GOP-leaning rest of the state.

New Orleans's Mayor Ray Nagin is up for re-election in February 2006, Gov. Kathleen Blanco and Lt. Gov. Mitch Landrieu in November 2007, and Sen. Mary Landrieu in November 2008. All four are Democrats. When they point the finger at the federal government for whatever went wrong in the Katrina response, remember that they are fighting for their political lives.”

-Rudey

Rudey-

After this fiasco, I doubt ANY of these elected officials (with the exception of those in Congress) will run for re-election...

Besides, Nagin doesn't have a city to be Mayor of... He's basically relying on what Honore is telling him now...


Coramoor and BigCityStripper--

Neither of you are poor and I seriousssssly doubt you have loved ones or know more than a few folks that were hit by the hurricane and the effects afterwards so what you all say in my eyes is an EXCUSE and FULL OF SHIT!!!

Whereas most of us posting here in defense of the negativity we have seen over the last few weeks is practically a result of having SEVERAL of own fraternity and sorority members, as well as their families being DIRECTLY AFFECTED by this tragedy...

You can point and spin doctor all the bullshit you want. But it is still bullshit you are spinning... It still reeks of the putrid sewage that's being removed from NOLA today and it is explosive...

I could say more but I'd probably be banned for it...

Maybe I am getting too old for GC now and it is time for me to leave like numerous others have before me...

Nooooooooo Soror, don't leave!!! :( :(

It amazes me that the blame game is still being played. Too many of these damn politicians are wasting so much time trying to find out whose fault it is that they are still not giving all the help & resources these people need.

Also, may I add that when we had the earthquakes here in CA that had our freeways collapse, our water to be contaminated (though not as bad as NO), & buildings to fall, we had help almost immediately. In total, the Northridge quake cost over $40 billion dollars in damage & the area was declared a federal disaster by President Clinton. We had help almost immediately which was amazing considering no one knew an earthquake was coming. How is it that here in California, we had almost immediate help from an unforeseen disaster but New Orleans is still needing help when they had prior warning? How does the government explaing that?

I beg to differ. Politics is politics and money is money even when people's lives are on the line.

All the elected officials from each party has used this as an occasion to attack each other.

Kanye has used this as an occasion to make money (publicity for his new CD).

I'm not saying everyone is innocent. In fact I'm saying there is enough guilt for everyone involved.

If these people were really that concerned they would be more active in helping instead of holding press conferences and getting their photos taken.

-Rudey

With that, I agree with you... Folks will always be hustlin' and pimpin' for a buck...

Which is why I say President Bush and his "response team" probably was NOT "intentionally racist" in there response time for this disaster relief effort--mainly because the only color Bush likes is green with Franklin on it in the form of huge campaign contributions... :rolleyes:

And given that most of poorer NOLA was African American that may have constituted at large portion of the "criminal element", they probably were unable to vote for president so they had no say in the election process in 2004--hence, they did not vote nor contribute to Bush's or Kerry's campaigns... :rolleyes:

So why the HAYLE should Bush wanna save the "poor REFUGEES" stuck in "Africa"--I mean N'awlins--I mean the Dirty Dirty Souf--I mean the Southeastern Untied States? I mean, really, they never paid much attention to him before, why now? :rolleyes:

Because California is a Blue State that voted for Clinton in the 1992 and 1996 elections...

But you had better believe that once San Andreas goes off and it's really jumpin' in California where you have Isle a San Francisco, Isle de Los Angeles and Isle a San Diego--with the San Fernando Sea along with the Mammoth Volcano going off for some reason and San Onofre Nuke Plant with El Diablo Nuke Plant blowing up and there's beach front property in Yuma, Arizona; Las Vegas, Nevada and Fresno, Central Sur Nuevo California and both Oregon and Washington states will have huge Tsunami's for years to come--well, NorCal and SoCal will just haveta kiss its assets goodbye... And the GNP will be hurting in event that should happen... So much for earthquake insurance...

But it would be a nice underwater biodiversity of museum ruins for your next upcoming family vacation!!!

Welcome to LaLa-Islandia!!!

Well to that I would say that there is a difference between killing people and covering your own butt. And that it's not just Bush but the mayor, governor, and every other administrator.

-Rudey

So you was on vacation with Dubya eh? Interesting.

Imperial1

But Rudey, honey,

How does one covers one's ass(ets) when his or her ass(ets) are hangin' out to dry in 150 mph winds?

Mayor Nagin is NOT Mayor Marc Morial... He is Mayor Marc's successor??? :confused:

And to me, Mayor Nagin was pimpin' too much Nautica and other items of clothing luxuries for my tastes...

But Mayor Nagin was tryin' to be the P.I.M.P. before Katrina bitch-slapped his assets... Then he couldn't hang... I think he did what he could do to the best of his knowledge--which isn't saying much...

And Governor Katheleen Blanco seems rather clueless to me... Like she doesn't know her ass(ets) from a hole in the ground...

It's like they have these Mayoral Conventions and Governor Conventions to learn more about public governance and public policy, etc... Apparently, these 2 folks were NOT attending these functions for awhile... And their lack of leadership shows...

But hurricane warnings, threats and the "recommendations to order an evacuation" is sent from NOAA, a federal agency... And ideas for handling these orders are sent respectively by advisors--federal ones--that is what I have been told...

From all I have read, Mayor Nagin had minimal advice from these folks for some reason...

And the longer he, Governor Blanco and President Bush's groups waited to MAKE a decision, the more people were found dead...

Along with that you get an "anarchial, mercenary, criminal element" were some kind of leader emerges that applies some level of organization--bad or good...

Thankfully, it came from Lt. General Honore... Now, that man can P.I.M.P. and doesn't have to wear Nautica to show out.

I loved this. It made my day to read it. And here I've been wasting my time with flood insurance for my new house. :p

When I lived in Mission Valley, San Diego, CA, I was considering flood insurance because I lived close to the San Diego River... I was on a 500 year flood plane... Anyhoo, I saw the insurance barely covered anything unless the house blew up by a gas main breakage and I'd just happenend to light a match and decided not to pay the extra $500 for flood insurance... And I did this a bit before they had all the El Ninos in 1998...

Apparently, it's the same for earthquake insurance. They won't pay for the house off it's foundation (so I've heard), but if you smell gas, light a match--you will get paid...

And a lot of folks in SoCal last year are really pissed off with Bush because FEMA did nothing with there were all those fires that blazed houses on the backside of OC and San Diego Counties... At least SOME of those folks had some money and could make a claim to replace some similance of a life... But these Gulf folks barely have anything left worth going back to...

At least a portapotty (Honey Bucket) on a septic tank buried in the sand where a full propane tank station is worth $omething in SoCal...

It's a dirty job, but somebody's gotta live in it... I guess :rolleyes:

http://new.music.yahoo.com/blogs/hip...ut-kanye-west/


GWB speaks out on the infamous Kanye West comment.

Ha ha! Neither the near-annihilation of an American city nor the worst terrorist attack on American soil, was the low point of his Presidency. It was a known megalomanical rapper's comments that sunk GWB to the bottom.

He couldn't say, "y'all know I'm not racist! Don't act like you don't know that I've been hittin' it with Condi ever since my daddy was President!" :D:D:D

At least he has better taste than Bill Clinton...

He didn't just have one Black Secretary of State, he had two, in a row, of different genders! Neither racist or sexist. He did the same thing to Taylor Swift with being rude and saying something dumb, and it is kind of said a 19 year old girl handled it better than a grown man did.

I'm not defending Kanye, he's an ass. But having a black secretary of state does not make one "not a racist"

In W's defense (a phrase I've never spoken or typed before), he said that Kanye's comment was the all-time low when it came to CRITICISM, not when it came to all events of his presidency.

Even so, it's pretty amazing to me that Kanye's criticism was the all-time low. People a lot more knowledgeable and credible than Kanye said much worse things about W.
________
InredibleLady

Thank you.

I replying to and playing off the belief and saying people have of not being a racist because they have a friend who is Black, sorry my sarcasm missed.

I am sure there were more critical things said by people, they just didn't have the publicity Kanye did or access to getting it out there to the point GWB was aware of it or wanted to acknowledge it.

Not only that, I'm sure they were presented in a far wonkier and less memorable manner. "George Bush doesn't care about black people" became a catchphrase to a ridiculous degree. I'm sure smarter people said smarter things but you can't put them on a t-shirt, to be repeated over and over for months on end.

Ahhhhhh ok, i took you as serious, sorry should have known better >.>

Yay, obviously there's a snarkist in this thread!

Some of my best friends are snarks!

For a snark is a boojum you see

I, too, thank you.

Kanye responds-

Shut the hell up, Kanye.

Oh yeah and where's that photo of Kanye's penis? Ha.

He even admitted it was him.

Bush accepts Kanye's apology....I'm getting all misty-eyed over here...
http://www.elpasotimes.com/newupdated/ci_16567338

iGiggled at "I'm not a hater"