Katrina Archives
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It is often said, among Republicans who know the Bush family and are politely somewhat critical of President Bush, that he is very much like his mother: Determined and often vengeful.
In his very good and very long book on presidential candidates, "What it Takes: The Way to the White House," Richard Ben Cramer, paints a portrait of a woman who knows how the dirty work of politics functions and who doesn't mind throwing her weight around. Those are certainly traits this president has shown.
But so, as I said earlier this week, is callousness. And over the weekend Barbara Bush opened her mouth and all but told the Hurricane Katrina refugees to eat cake. I rarely reprint full-on accounts. But this one, from the New York Times, which also had the audio, is short and, I'm sad to say, telling.
WASHINGTON, Sept. 6 - As President Bush battled criticism over the response to Hurricane Katrina, his mother declared it a success for evacuees who "were underprivileged anyway," saying on Monday that many of the poor people she had seen while touring a Houston relocation site were faring better than before the storm hit."What I'm hearing, which is sort of scary, is they all want to stay in Texas," Barbara Bush said in an interview on Monday with the radio program "Marketplace." "Everyone is so overwhelmed by the hospitality."
"And so many of the people in the arena here, you know, were underprivileged anyway," she said, "so this is working very well for them."
Mrs. Bush toured the Astrodome complex with her husband, former President George Bush, as part of an administration campaign throughout the Gulf Coast region to counter criticism of the response to the storm. Former President Bush and former President Bill Clinton are helping raise money for the rebuilding effort.
White House officials did not respond on Tuesday to calls for comment on Mrs. Bush's remarks.
The White House is saying the former First Lady's remarks were "personal." Hmmmm. Well, the personal is very often, the political.
Thu 10:43 AM | permalink | printer-friendly version | email this article
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Kanye West is wrong.
George Bush doesn't hate black people. He just doesn't have any use for folks who can't help themselves. Like him. Folks who just show the gumption to get things done and lift themselves up. Just like him.
Yup. George Bush lifted himself up from Yale to Harvard. And from son of a president to governor of Texas. It was a tough row. But he hoed it with diligence and patience. Anyone can do that. They just have to try. It's hard work, of course. But life's hard.
That attitude's not a color thing. It's a privilege thing. Living your entire life unable to see past the end of your own nose is the ultimate luxury. It is one enjoyed by us white folks on a scale that we, uh, usually fail to fully appreciate.
But the reminders are coming fast and furious these past few days. NBC's fundraiser last night may not have been meant to reassure white America that things in New Orleans were under control but that's how it looked to me. Entertainment by black people (and Harry Connick Jr.) with announcing and platitudes by whites. Pretty standard fare, no?
But those of you who really listened might have noticed that Wynton Marsalis didn't say a word the whole show. Not a peep. And Aaron Neville had an interesting song selection. He sang "Amazing Grace," of course. But he also another song he didn't write, one about a forced migration and virtual imprisonment of black people that will sound - when you read the lyrics - a bit familiar.
Randy Newman's "Louisiana, 1927" is a memorial to flood where black folks were rounded up and told to remain while all the whites fled the rising waters. Many of those forced to remain behind died. Others were moved to relocation camps where they died of disease and other ailments. As Conservative David Brooks pointed out earlier this week, it was a seminal moment in U.S. race relations.
Aaron Neville may not have made a speech but he's got Kanye West's back:
What has happened down here is the winds have changed
Clouds roll in from the north and it started to rain
Rained real hard and it rained for a real long time
Six feet of water in the streets of EvangelineThe river rose all day
The river rose all night
Some people got lost in the flood
Some people got away alright
The river have busted through clear down to Plaquemines
Six feet of water in the streets of EvangelneLouisiana, Louisiana
They're tryin' to wash us away
They're tryin' to wash us away
Louisiana, Louisiana
They're tryin' to wash us away
They're tryin' to wash us awayPresident Coolidge came down in a railroad train
With a little fat man with a note-pad in his hand
The President say, "Little fat man isn't it a shame what the river has done
To this poor cracker's land."Louisiana, Louisiana
They're tryin' to wash us away
They're tryin' to wash us away
Louisiana, Louisiana
They're tryin' to wash us away
They're tryin' to wash us away
They're tryin' to wash us away
They're tryin' to wash us away
Two footnotes: Plaquemines Parish remains, as New Orleans mayor Ray Nagin points out in this interview, one of the poorest (and blackest) in the state.
And "cracker" in the song above refers to white people.
Sat 11:31 AM | permalink | printer-friendly version | email this article
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Wanna get even more upset that you already are? Sad to say, it's not too hard.
Go over and read Andrew Sullivan's site. Read the comments that the President of the United States made about how we're going to get a better Gulf Coast out of this mess. Why a better Gulf Coast? Because, the president said, folks who have flood insurance to protect their homes - and pay to restore those homes - will be able to build nicer homes. He wasn't that explicit, of course. And he was making a "joke." And, to add insult to injury, he talking about? Sen. Trent Lott. You know, the guy who wanted to "make a 100-year-old man feel good" by endorsing Sen. Strom Thurmond's policies on racial segregation. Seems the president is counting on Sen. Lott to build a nicer front porch than the he had before Katrina rolled through town.
That's the kind of unthinking banter that sets a tone for even dumber - and more dangerous - conversations. A friend - one who has the patience I don’t to listen to talk radio - says there's a 'racially veiled" conversation going on about why so many New Yorkers were heroes after 9/11 and so many New Orleans residents are looters.
Huh? There was looting after 9/11. It was reported, too by William Langewiesche in The Atlantic Monthly. He wrote about stacks of blue jeans - lifted from the retail shops below the World Trade Center - found sitting in fire trucks.
His account was greeted with outrage. The firefighters of New York, led by the widow of biologist and media darling Stephen Jay Gould shouted Langewiesche down.
The nice hardworking, near starving black folks of New Orleans don't have any a well-connected widow to speak for them. So lots of us white folks are sitting and "wondering" why New Orlean is "filled" with looters and New York -- and its white, unionized fire fighters -- are all shining heroes.
Do you think it's the white horses they road in on?
Fri 03:47 PM | permalink | printer-friendly version | email this article
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Let's talk about race.
It's just us white folks, of course. 'Cause this is a white folks' site; built by a white girl for her people.
That's not the description that you'd apply, of course. You being white. But imagine if this site were run by a black woman. Well, that'd be different wouldn't it? You might take it a bit less seriously. You might think about this site as a way to get a black girl's perspective, not necessarily the broader thoughts and comments of someone who is interested in politics and culture.
Now don't fib. You might. You might not. But I’m betting you would. You - we white folks - would characterize the work here differently because of what we know assume about the person doing that work.
And that, my friends, is just the beginning of the problem we're having with the images and sights we're seeing from New Orleans. I was reminded last night - watching the half-hour of footage of frustrated, unhappy, desperately frightened people gathered at the New Orleans Convention Center and Superdome - of the ruefully remark a local San Franciscan made to me a few years ago. We were talking about the urban "renewal" of the Fillmore and a neighborhood known as the Western Addition, a once thriving black community in the north central part of town.
"Anytime white poeple see a bunch of black folks living together, they assume it's a slum and try to figure out a way to tear it down,'' he said. Now, San Francisco is the site of the one the epic legal battles over urban renewal in the mid-1960s. The city's black community banded together and stopped some - but not all - of what was planned. The result? A displacement of an entire community. The reward? Justin Herman, the architect of all that "renewal" has a landmark plaza in the city named for him and, one assumes, his good work.
Continue reading "Black and White"Fri 12:09 PM | permalink | printer-friendly version | email this article
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As you're reading the morning headlines and looking the pictures, please take a minute to read, if you have not already, Josh Trevino's piece about Nicaragua after Hurricane Mitch. The idea that water could wash away the land around a 15-foot well, turning it from a tunnel in the ground into a tower in the air, should give you pause.
And if have not made a donation to the Red Cross, please consider doing so. If you have not given blood recently, please consider doing so. The Red Cross site has a list of places in your area to make donations.
Here in San Francisco, Jewish Family and Community Services is coordinating donations.
Here are some links that Instapundit Glenn Reynolds has put up. He is updating them regularly.
Here's the deal: The storm moved north, the Mississippi flows south. So rain to the north is going to run back into Mississippi and Alabama. It's geography.
And even though flood waters may recede, the mud - and the damage - will be heavy and thick and filled with things you don't want to think about. There will be no drinking water for many people though out Mississippi and Alabama for many, many weeks. Many people will lose their homes forever; the city of New Orleans will never be the same.
Residents are going to have to deal with a host of problems, among them threats from contaminated water that go by quaint old-fashioned names like cholera and typhoid. On top of that, there's the heat. And the damage that heat and water can do.
And don't forget that New Orleans and the Gulf Coast are resort communities: this Labor Day weekend would have been a busy one for many of the folks working in the hotels and restaurants along the seashore. Many of those jobs are gone, too. Gone for a long time.
So if you can, please give.
Wed 10:46 AM | permalink | printer-friendly version | email this article
