Katrina

I want to write something about Katrina, but I don’t know if I have the will for it. I have been glued to the Daily Kos in the past week. I had avoided Kos since the election. It was too fucking dispiriting to lose that election and it seemed pointless to follow politics. Now Katrina has some terrible kind of justice to it: everybody is finally seeing that Bush is incompetent, corrupt, and so on. It’s been horrible but I cannot look away. This is a major moment in American history. Andrew Sullivan has been good. It’s more interesting to see the right’s perspective, especially when it sides with the left. New Orleans is Bush’s entire Presidency in a microcosm: anti-environment, anti-poor, even anti-Homeland Security. And don’t talk to me about the local government’s inaction. This was the Feds’ responsibility--especially after trumping up American safety for the last four years.

I keep having arguments with my wife and family that this really will be the thing that turns the tide against conservatives. But I don’t know. Bush and Co. are evil people, not just incompetent. They don’t give a shit about public opinion any more than they seem to care about American life. This entire situation is mysteriously fucked up, and that’s why I think it wouldn’t be too surprising if Bush survived this. It’s a mystery that he’s being defended for half a second. Bush is not fighting the war on Terror. He is not looking for bin Laden. He is not fighting a competent war in Iraq. What the fuck is he doing??? I have said it here before, the Republican agenda almost seems designed to fuck everything up on purpose. And here is concrete evidence of it. This administration has shown indifference to an entire American city. Bush should have been impeached yesterday.

I have little faith in Americans to be reasonably intelligent and see the obvious. Then I have a wave of optimism that they are--but then I read another story about FEMA bullying photographers and taking their cameras. I read stories about police barricading exit routes. And I fear what the human race is capable of. Obviously this is not all about Bush. People are suffering in awful ways. Perhaps attacking Bush is a way to gain something positive out of this whole mess. I don’t know, and it makes me as fearful as hopeful.

…I’m not saying anything that has been written over and over again, but I had to write something. Read Kos and others. People there say it better than me. I’ll be reading.