I hate seeing Bill Clinton, a man who I basically like and admire, sitting up there on a stage next to that slimy weasel of a war criminal, George W. Bush. Even if it is to help raise money for victims of the earthquake in Haiti.
During the Clinton administration, victims of disasters got prompt aid. I was living in L.A. at the time of the Northridge quake, and I remember how amazed everyone was at how quickly the federal aid agencies acted, and how quickly I-10 was rebuilt.
During Katrina, W was nowhere to be found. Eventually, photographers caught up with him playing air guitar in San Diego. While people were dying.
W feels no compassion whatsoever for the dead people in Haiti. He didn’t feel any compassion for the people of New Orleans. When the noise grew too great and the humanitarian disaster threatened to become a political nightmare for him, he arranged photo-ops. The first one (flying over, looking down) didn’t work out so well, so he arranged that charade in Jackson Square, reminding everyone that the city of New Orleans is very photogenic, if you aim the cameras away from the death and destruction.
Then, he began to spin away the political fallout by a steady blaming of Ray Nagin and Kathleen Blanco.
There’s plenty of blame to go around. We heard it again and again. It was slanderous. The big difference was that Nagin and Blanco, while they may have made mistakes (those damned school busses) were on the ground, were trying, were screaming on TV every damned day begging for the Federal aid which was being withheld.
Bush just flat out didn’t give a shit (the generous assessment) or else deliberately wanted the disaster to be as great as possible (the get the poor people out of New Orleans and thus turn Louisiana red).
Now, he sits there on a stage next to Bill Clinton and pretends that he cares what happens to the people of Haiti, who are even poorer and blacker and more foreign to him than the people of New Orleans.
Clinton, and Barack Obama, call this bipartisanship. I call it lying right in our faces.
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