New Orleans Facing Katrina and Where Is the President?- Page 3

[TheatreDiva90016]

Posted: 8/30/05 at 9:11pm

But wait! I think ol George is finally telling the truth:


Updated: 04:43 PM EDT
Bush Compares Iraq War to WW II
President Marks 60th Anniversary of Earlier Conflict
By JENNIFER LOVEN, AP

CORONADO, Calif. (Aug. 30) - President Bush on Tuesday answered growing anti-war protests with a fresh reason for American troops to continue fighting in Iraq: protection of the country's vast oil fields that he said would otherwise fall under the control of terrorist extremists.


So, it IS about the oil. prick.

[Auggie27]

Posted: 8/30/05 at 9:15pm

Yes, and I find Papa's use of the phrase "...his governing style..." particularly rich. "Style." Right. He's such a compassionate conservative, he's holding back to keep from stealing focus from the hands-on team.

[PalJoey]

Posted: 8/30/05 at 9:24pm

Hey Auggie! Where the hell have you been hiding out? How ya been?

[Greg-4now]

Posted: 8/30/05 at 9:25pm

"Bah. That picture's like three years old. It's not that funny anymore."

That picture was never funny...

How long before the next election?

Yeah...when's the next election? Maybe we can get another guy who likes to rape women and ask office clerks for oral sex.

The Bush-bashing on this site is ridiculous. Sure, there is enough to criticize, but never a word when its a democrat. If you are going to criticize, at least be fair-handed about.

What's next?

"Bush blamed for hurricane"
AP - Washington D.C. - Breaking News
Apparently the White House has developed a weather generating machine, under a secret government project based in Crawford, Texas. The President actually order this Hurricane to test the power of this new secret weapon.

More at 11

[theatrebabe]

Posted: 8/30/05 at 9:26pm

that made me laugh

[PalJoey]

Posted: 8/30/05 at 9:28pm

Jack Cafferty on CNN just told Bush he should end his vacation, stop visiting airbases in CA and "given his current approval ratings, Mr. Bush might want to consider returning to the White House."

[Greg-4now]

Posted: 8/30/05 at 9:33pm

So, it IS about the oil. prick.

Duh. No oil - no bright lights on Broadway, no power for the sound systems, stage lights, no air conditioning in the theater. Or did you think think all those big boards in Time Square were solar panels?

Stop picking pepper out of fly $hit.
Updated On: 8/30/05 at 09:33 PM

[PalJoey]

Posted: 8/30/05 at 9:46pm

From AmericaBlog:


Bush's Response To Horrific Disaster: Indifference. How Will You Respond To Bush?

by Michael in New York - 8/30/2005 05:36:00 PM

We've got a lot of good arguments posted here from John and Rob and Joe and Chris. Use them, add your own and start writing letters to the editor of your local newspapers, tv stations and radio outlets -- not to mention your elected representatives.

-- President Bush staying on vacation when EVERYONE knew a massive hurricane was getting ready to strike

-- President Bush flogging politics AFTER the hurricane destroyed New Orleans and Biloxi; the President joshing with McCain over birthday cake while the waters were rising

-- President Bush's father sending 25,000 troops after Hurricane Andrew. Either his dad was WASTING time and money or W is falling far short of his father. Again.

-- President Bush pushing a joke of an energy bill that did NOTHING to decrease our dependence on foreign oil, nothing significant to develop alternative fuels and nothing to strengthen our infrastructure. Now we can see how vulnerable it is since one storm is impacting our nation's ability to refine oil.

-- President Bush going back to Texas for another night of vacation instead of going straight to the White House AFTER the disaster struck.

--President Bush jamming on the guitar while the disaster worsens.

-- President Bush finally, grudgingly ending his vacation two days early and going back to DC. If he can stay in touch in Texas, why go back, as John says? If he needs to be back in DC, what the hell took so long?

-- President Bush's backdoor draft that abused the compact between the country and the brave men and women who volunteered for the National Guard and Army Reserve has damaged them for decades to come. Many fewer people leaving the Army are going to volunteer for these groups in the future. And this natural disaster reminds us all of how vital they are.

-- Widespread looting that one observer said made New Orleans look like downtown Baghdad. How many times can Bush turn a bad situation into a disaster before people start catching on?

-- The Coast Guard is saving lives left and right. They are perennially underfunded but President Bush has given the Coast Guard massive new responsibilities to guard our coasts, inspect ships and more all while helping in emergencies like this. So in a post 9-11 world, his attempt to DELAY for DECADES the essential upgrading of the Coast Guard's ships that date to the Vietnam and Korean war is offensive and inexcusable. How would you like to watch your grandmother clinging for her life and find out the boat struggling to get to her is decrepit and unfit? That's what Bush is doing to the Coast Guard.

-- Every time Bush praises the Coast Guard and National Guard and Army Reserves for behaving heroically during this disaster, he insults our intelligence. Bush has delayed providing decent equipment to the Coast Guard even AFTER 9-11. Bush has abused the National Guard and Reserve and likely crippled them for decades to come by turning them into de facto regular army troops when their real purpose is to defend this country AT HOME and come to the rescue during disasters like this. And Bush has repeatedly underfunded and undermined these essential groups again and again and again.

I've looked through 10-20 newspaper websites from the US and overseas and naturally all of them are dealing with the unfolding disaster. But what will the Day 2 (or Day 3) story be? When will they stop blandly reporting the President talked about the hurricane while dawdling in California? When will they stop politely reporting the President is cutting his record-breaking five week vacation short and heading back to DC? When will they start asking why it took Bush so long to pay attention to a disaster everyone could see coming -- even AFTER it struck?

You need to WRITE YOUR LOCAL NEWSPAPERS AND TV STATIONS AND RADIO STATIONS. Simple, common sense questions (Why did the President go to California to push some political agenda when the worst natural disaster in our nation's history had already struck?); anger; comparing Bush's inability to see disaster here to his inability to see disaster in Iraq -- it's all important and needs to be expressed sensitively and smartly, all while keeping in mind that people are dying. But that's just it -- people are dying and Bush is falling short. It would be wrong NOT to comment on that. Fill their inboxes with these ideas. They won't all get printed but they will inspire story ideas, editorials and maybe give the MSM a little backbone to ask some tough questions.

And no, we are not politicizing a terrible disaster.

BUSH played politics with this disaster by leaving our country woefully unprepared thanks to his unnecessary war in Iraq.

BUSH played politics by dawdling in Texas when this massive storm was brewing, just like he dawdles in DC while Iraq sinks further into despair.

BUSH played politics by going to California to flog some attack on Medicare and lie again by pretending Iraq and 9-11 are linked all when the waters were rising, looting was spreading and people were dying.

And BUSH will be playing politics when he gets offended after people finally ask the obvious question: What the hell took him so long?

How can anyone look at the image of Bush goofily strumming a guitar while the waters are rising and people are dying and not get angry? So make a donation to the Red Cross and then start writing those letters.

America.blog

Updated On: 8/30/05 at 09:46 PM

[brdlwyr]

Posted: 8/30/05 at 9:51pm

Where is the shock and awe? This is one of the worst natural disasters to face our country and why has the Administration not told its citizens what specifically is planned to help the people affected by hurricane?

Where are the storm troopers? Where are the ships?

Why is the Green Zone safer than the French Quarter?

Updated On: 8/30/05 at 09:51 PM

[PalJoey]

Posted: 8/30/05 at 9:56pm

A friend emaills:

An entire major city is underwater in one state already. Not even counting the two other states with other cities almost completely destroyed..
Nobody is reporting death tolls at this point, because they know they will be off the map. They could easily be in the thousands, and that's not counting those who are going to die in the coming days
Comparisons to any other hurricanes or natural disasters in this country are laughable.
This WAS 'the Big One'.
Bush's response?

[PalJoey]

Posted: 8/30/05 at 9:59pm

WWLTV just reported that the Mayor of New Orleans reported that a massive miscommunication has occurred: The helicopters that were rescuing people were supposed to attempt to sandbag one of the levy breaches. Somewhere along the way, it was never communicated, night has fallen, and within 12-14 hours the entire city will flood.

The reason there aren't enough military choppers in this country to both save and try and mitigate disaster is that Bush sent them, along with the National Guard, to Iraq.

[brdlwyr]

Posted: 8/30/05 at 10:00pm

PJ - I am not being partisan tonight. I am outraged that the President of the United States did not cancel all plans today and come on national television to explain what is planned. Do they not get CNN in Crawford.

[Greg-4now]

Posted: 8/30/05 at 10:06pm

Jack Cafferty on CNN just told Bush he should.....

Yup, that's exactly what this country needs right...a career news man, who gets to sit in judgement of those of us that are worth judging, and yet he's never had a tough decision is life to make, or to make a decision that will impact millions of people. The biggest decision he's had to make is which profile looks better and what shade of bronzer to use.

Yeah, we need the news media tell the President what to do. Maybe we should run Jack Cafferty for President.

Sorry to those that I might take offence. But this topic is close to my heart and family. A family member was a high ranking official in the Reagan White House. I have some insight to what they went through and just how difficult the job is. The President is never on vacation. He maybe out of the White House, but as long as you are President, you are NEVER on vacation. You can't even begin to imagine, but if you could, multiply it by 10 and take it to infinity...then you might have a clue.

BTW...Clinton took plenty of vacation too, the difference was this: In 2000, towards the end of his term, he took 2000 people with him to Vietnam. It cost the taxpayers over $150 million. When he went on vacation to China, he took over 200 people and it cost the tax payers $40 million.

At least when Bush goes on vacation he does bring an entourage.

[PalJoey]

Posted: 8/30/05 at 10:11pm

With all due respect, Greg, Ronald Reagan would NEVER have ignored this disaster. He had enormous compassion for everyone.

Everyone except gays and people with AIDS, that is. But that's an argument for another thread.

Bush is as much a failure to the people of Mississippi and Louisiana today as he was to New Yorkers on September 11.

[brdlwyr]

Posted: 8/30/05 at 10:13pm

Clinton would have told us tonight what the government was doing for those people. And, he would not wasted our resources on a lost war! Neither would have Reagan's people!

[PalJoey]

Posted: 8/30/05 at 10:17pm

The esteemed Editor and Publisher discusses the fact that the administration deliberately reduced New Orleans disaster-preparation money to fund the war in Iraq, even though the New Orleans Times-Picayune repeatedly sounded the alarm.

snippet:

===

Did New Orleans Catastrophe Have to Happen? 'Times-Picayune' Had Repeatedly Raised Federal Spending Issues


By Will Bunch

Published: August 30, 2005 9:00 PM ET

PHILADELPHIA Even though Hurricane Katrina has moved well north of the city, the waters may still keep rising in New Orleans late on Tuesday. That's because Lake Pontchartrain continues to pour through a two-block-long break in the main levee, near the city's 17th Street Canal. With much of the Crescent City some 10 feet below sea level, the rising tide may not stop until until it's level with the massive lake.

New Orleans had long known it was highly vulnerable to flooding and a direct hit from a hurricane. In fact, the federal government has been working with state and local officials in the region since the late 1960s on major hurricane and flood relief efforts. When flooding from a massive rainstorm in May 1995 killed six people, Congress authorized the Southeast Louisiana Urban Flood Control Project, or SELA.

Over the next 10 years, the Army Corps of Engineers, tasked with carrying out SELA, spent $430 million on shoring up levees and building pumping stations, with $50 million in local aid. But at least $250 million in crucial projects remained, even as hurricane activity in the Atlantic Basin increased dramatically and the levees surrounding New Orleans continued to subside.

Yet after 2003, the flow of federal dollars toward SELA dropped to a trickle. The Corps never tried to hide the fact that the spending pressures of the war in Iraq, as well as homeland security -- coming at the same time as federal tax cuts -- was the reason for the strain. At least nine articles in the Times-Picayune from 2004 and 2005 specifically cite the cost of Iraq as a reason for the lack of hurricane- and flood-control dollars.
Did New Orleans Catastrophe Have to Happen? 'Times-Picayune' Had Repeatedly Raised Federal Spending Issues

[Greg-4now]

Posted: 8/30/05 at 10:28pm

Bush is as much a failure to the people of Mississippi and Louisiana today as he was to New Yorkers on September 11.

Don't even go there. I lost my best friend on 9/11 and my family and his, particularly his mother found great comfort in the President and his actions. (BTW, the President not returning to the White House until later in the day on 9/11 was not even in his control, its detemined by the Secret Service. I believe the term is "Hide the Ball". It where the President gets constantly moved from one location to another.)

And if the President flew down to New Orleans, and held a press conference all of you would be screaming that "he's just doing it for the PR", "He was on vacation, he's just here to take the spotlight off of his vacation".

Don't be such a fool. First, if its not safe for the residents to be there, why should the President go there? To make the liberals happy?? Stupid...very stupid, for him to even think of going there. If he does a helo-flyover and doesn't land then "he doesn't care about the people on the ground".

The impacted areas will receive billions of dollars in relief. Let's not be niave. Then there will be all kinds of cheating by the locals to scam the money, just like Florida, when contractors were charging 10 times the amount to repair roofs; making claims for roofs that never needed repair in the first place...and all the other cheating that goes on...but all of us here will be bitching because the President gave them too much money, and not say one word about the theives and those that are LOOTING right now in New Orleans. Its all very hypocritcal to me.

I have one question: Where's the rest of the world? We respond everywhere in the world when there is a disaster. Name one country who was stricken with famine, disease, natural disaster...whatever, that we haven't helped??? Right, you can't. Because we alway help.

Who helps us in our time of need? France? Germany? China? Mexico? Canada? Japan? Can you name one European country that will help us with this devastation?

[brdlwyr]

Posted: 8/30/05 at 10:36pm

I am very sorry that you lost you best friend on 9/11. God bless your friend and family.

Going to Omaha was very smart. Reading a child’s story was not.

I do not really care about whether France sends us a penny. We have resources to help this disaster. Unfortunately, many resources are not here, but in Iraq.

Updated On: 8/30/05 at 10:36 PM

[PalJoey]

Posted: 8/30/05 at 10:36pm

We're talking about leadership from the president, which we get none of.

Stop being disingenuous. You KNOW what this is about: It's about the kind of leadership Giuliani displayed, Reagan displayed, Clinton displayed, Churchill displayed, Truman displayed when he said the buck stopped with him.

Bush has no balls when it comes to that kind of leadership. If only it didn't take loss of life to bring this home to Americans.

[rosscoe(au)]

Posted: 8/30/05 at 10:38pm

If he does a hero-flyover

Being an Australian, and having read this hole thread, could someone please tell me what "BUSH" has done to make him a Hero?

Cause please don't get me wrong love 'America" and her people, but don't understand how a country, could allow a leader to send it people to war, based on a lie, that it was never about "Oil"

[brdlwyr]

Posted: 8/30/05 at 10:42pm

Neither do I!

(Welcome to those down under)

[Greg-4now]

Posted: 8/30/05 at 10:48pm

Clinton would have told us tonight what the government was doing for those people. And, he would not wasted our resources on a lost war! Neither would have Reagan's people!


You mean other than the oral sex he was offering? All kidding aside...

What planet are you on? Clinton bombed an asprin factory in the Kosovo debacle..., left our soldiers to die in Somolia, had bin Laden TWICE and let him go. Reagan gave us Iran/Contra

The Reagan admin has plenty of skeletons...no differently than EVERY admin. Most of this stuff we really don't want to know about...nor should we. You think being the most powerful, most successful, and the wealthiest country is easy?

In many countries around the World, just some theater shows that we take for granted would never be allowed in those countries (at least the themes that those shows deal with)?

Here's what I really have a hard time understanding. I didn't vote for Clinton, I didn't trust him and didn't agree with his politics. He seems like a fun guy to have a beer with; but I didn't want him to be PResident the first time around, that goes double for the second time around - but it didn't turn out that way...but not for one second did I ever get filled with hatred about him, or carry on like some people carry on about Bush. It boggles my mind. Why waste one once of energy talking about how much you hate someone? Why?? Why good do you get out of it? By sounding off about how stupid Bush is, or screaming about how he doesn't care about people??? Does anyone really believe that he doesn't care??? Only more hatred can come from hatred.

Maybe some of you are right, if we can have some people(not all) that can spew such aweful hatred about one man called Bush, maybe it is possible that Bush is really that horrible of a person. We all know some of the horribleness that has been written about him on this chat board.

"Peace starts from within"

Posted: 8/30/05 at 10:49pm

Neither do I!

[FindingNamo]

Posted: 8/30/05 at 10:54pm

HOLD THE PHONE, Greg. Everyone on this board took a vote months before you joined with this screen name and we all agreed that "But-but-but CLINTON..." is no longer a valid response (in his second term, W is on his own and can only be compared to himself and other Republicans) and cause for immediate disqualification from the boards.

As a law and order candidate, I hope you don't resent me being the bearer of the bad news. And as the Spelling Bee kids sing, "Good-bye! Good-BYE! Good-bye, good-bye good-bye good-bye!"

Don't let the door whack ya where the good lord cracked ya!

[PalJoey]

Posted: 8/30/05 at 10:55pm

This is how the president will be remembered at two pivotal moments of American history: