Via Newsday!
09.08.05 (6:00 am) [edit]
Sheryl McCarthy: 'Katrina highlights Bush's incompetence'
Posted on Thursday, September 08 @ 09:33:18 EDT
This article has been read 586 times.
By Sheryl McCarthy, Newsday
From the start, I didn't think much of George W. Bush.
That a man who mangled the language so badly, who couldn't say "terrorism," so he shortened it to "terror," who couldn't handle tough questions, so he stopped holding news conferences, who avoided going to war when his generation was called on to fight one, but lied us into a deadly, unnecessary war and got us bogged down there, wasn't fit to lead the country.
Now his administration's bungled response to Hurricane Katrina has highlighted his incompetence even more.
On 9/11 Bush stumbled, didn't have a clue about what to do after the World Trade Center was bombed. But he had good backup and sharp frontmen who covered for him.
Dick Cheney took charge and talked tough. Donald Rumsfeld sounded like the voice of reason. And pretty soon Bush was talking about "resolve" and sending our soldiers to Afghanistan and Iraq.
He had Colin Powell to put his own credibility behind the lie that our safety depended on toppling Saddam Hussein and to argue that case to the world. And he had Condoleezza Rice to defend the administration's mishandling of the intelligence.
They played the country like a drum: Osama and Hussein. Hussein and Osama. And although it wasn't true, enough Americans believed it.
This encouraged Bush to perfect his strut, to say "bring 'em on," to bully the United Nations, intimidate Congress, and send troops off to die. And, when you go to war, the country pretty much goes with you. By this summer things in Iraq were so bad that Bush's approval ratings hit an all-time low.
Then came Katrina. This time Bush couldn't hide behind trumped-up intelligence reports and the coattails of Cheney and Powell. The incompetence of his chosen people soon became glaring.
This president, who loves to backslap and tell jokes, had taken his cronyism too far in appointing Michael Brown, a man with more experience with horses than with governors and desperate folks fleeing floods, to head the federal disaster agency.
Meanwhile, he had downgraded, denuded and de-funded the Federal Emergency Management Agency in deference to cutting taxes and waging war.
Louisiana officials had warned that the levees needed repair, but the president refused to provide the money. And when the money to stave off disaster wasn't forthcoming, all the local officials could do was hope a bad storm wouldn't hit.
When it did, Brown and Homeland Security chief Michael Chertoff acted as if they'd never heard of the national disaster plan Congress adopted for just such occasions in 2004.
At first I suspected it was the long and convoluted chain of command for requesting and delivering relief that kept those folks trapped without help in the Superdome for days. Now we know it was sheer incompetence - that, if there was red tape, Chertoff and Brown had the authority to cut right through it. They deserve to be fired, and George Bush deserves a large share of the blame.
If this were his first term, I think he would have been turned out of office when he sought re-election. But now he's enjoying the immunity of the lame duck.
Recent polls show that the majority of Americans don't hold him personally responsible for the Katrina mess. And, of the ones who do, only about half blame him a great deal. Instead, they fault the unexpected violence of the hurricane, the fact that most people didn't expect the levees to break and the ineptitude of Southern officials.
People are madder about the high gas prices than they are about Bush's people coming in too late with too little for the people of New Orleans.
Even now they refuse to take him to task for the human misery there, and plenty of them still think he's a standup guy.
Some people never learn.
Sheryl McCarthy's e-mail address is mccart731@aol.com
Copyright 2005 Newsday Inc.
Reprinted from Newsday:
http://www.newsday.com/news/opinion/" title="http://www.newsday.com/news/opinion/" target="_blank"http://www.newsday.com/news/o...
ny-opmcc084415976sep08,0, 3720551.column
Posted on Thursday, September 08 @ 09:33:18 EDT
This article has been read 586 times.
By Sheryl McCarthy, Newsday
From the start, I didn't think much of George W. Bush.
That a man who mangled the language so badly, who couldn't say "terrorism," so he shortened it to "terror," who couldn't handle tough questions, so he stopped holding news conferences, who avoided going to war when his generation was called on to fight one, but lied us into a deadly, unnecessary war and got us bogged down there, wasn't fit to lead the country.
Now his administration's bungled response to Hurricane Katrina has highlighted his incompetence even more.
On 9/11 Bush stumbled, didn't have a clue about what to do after the World Trade Center was bombed. But he had good backup and sharp frontmen who covered for him.
Dick Cheney took charge and talked tough. Donald Rumsfeld sounded like the voice of reason. And pretty soon Bush was talking about "resolve" and sending our soldiers to Afghanistan and Iraq.
He had Colin Powell to put his own credibility behind the lie that our safety depended on toppling Saddam Hussein and to argue that case to the world. And he had Condoleezza Rice to defend the administration's mishandling of the intelligence.
They played the country like a drum: Osama and Hussein. Hussein and Osama. And although it wasn't true, enough Americans believed it.
This encouraged Bush to perfect his strut, to say "bring 'em on," to bully the United Nations, intimidate Congress, and send troops off to die. And, when you go to war, the country pretty much goes with you. By this summer things in Iraq were so bad that Bush's approval ratings hit an all-time low.
Then came Katrina. This time Bush couldn't hide behind trumped-up intelligence reports and the coattails of Cheney and Powell. The incompetence of his chosen people soon became glaring.
This president, who loves to backslap and tell jokes, had taken his cronyism too far in appointing Michael Brown, a man with more experience with horses than with governors and desperate folks fleeing floods, to head the federal disaster agency.
Meanwhile, he had downgraded, denuded and de-funded the Federal Emergency Management Agency in deference to cutting taxes and waging war.
Louisiana officials had warned that the levees needed repair, but the president refused to provide the money. And when the money to stave off disaster wasn't forthcoming, all the local officials could do was hope a bad storm wouldn't hit.
When it did, Brown and Homeland Security chief Michael Chertoff acted as if they'd never heard of the national disaster plan Congress adopted for just such occasions in 2004.
At first I suspected it was the long and convoluted chain of command for requesting and delivering relief that kept those folks trapped without help in the Superdome for days. Now we know it was sheer incompetence - that, if there was red tape, Chertoff and Brown had the authority to cut right through it. They deserve to be fired, and George Bush deserves a large share of the blame.
If this were his first term, I think he would have been turned out of office when he sought re-election. But now he's enjoying the immunity of the lame duck.
Recent polls show that the majority of Americans don't hold him personally responsible for the Katrina mess. And, of the ones who do, only about half blame him a great deal. Instead, they fault the unexpected violence of the hurricane, the fact that most people didn't expect the levees to break and the ineptitude of Southern officials.
People are madder about the high gas prices than they are about Bush's people coming in too late with too little for the people of New Orleans.
Even now they refuse to take him to task for the human misery there, and plenty of them still think he's a standup guy.
Some people never learn.
Sheryl McCarthy's e-mail address is mccart731@aol.com
Copyright 2005 Newsday Inc.
Reprinted from Newsday:
http://www.newsday.com/news/opinion/" title="http://www.newsday.com/news/opinion/" target="_blank"http://www.newsday.com/news/o...
ny-opmcc084415976sep08,0, 3720551.column
posted by: MissJane (reply)
post date: 09.09.05 (3:30 am)
good article