Katrina debate is over

[Caroline]

Folks on this forum have made many good and worthy points about Katrina and its aftermath.  However, Barbara Bush seems to have rendered moot all future debate over who was to blame, what should have been done, etc.:


Ex-first lady sees Katrina's good side

Washington -- As President Bush battled criticism over the response to Hurricane Katrina, his mother declared it a success for evacuees who "were underprivileged anyway," saying many of the poor 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 Monday with the American Public Media 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."


Maybe wiser heads have more to add -- I, for one, am speechless.

Caroline

 

[Nords]

"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."

Let them eat cake!

I think we'll sell our home and move into Aloha Stadium. It's so big, who would complain?

 

[justin]

As long as them there underprivileged (poor) can line up to get government handouts, I don't guess they care where they're lining up.

 

[SteveR]

"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."

I may need to don a flame-proof suit here, but maybe she has a point.  I had a "job" once where I had to spend a lot of time in Federal Housing Projects and other low income housing areas.  If you have not done so you would not appreciate how some of these peoople live everyday.   The "refugees" that are being sent to several states, including mine, are being treated much better than they have been most of their lives.  These people have been relocated to areas that are safe and clean with hundreds of Texans helping ythem by giving away free stuff; clothes, food, personal hygiene items, books, games and most of all kindness.  After living in abject poverty, this would be like being in heaven to these people.  

I can't support how the elder Mrs. Bush stated her comment, but I believe I see where she is coming from.  

 

[brewer12345]

I may need to don a flame-proof suit here, but maybe she has a point.  I had a "job" once where I had to spend a lot of time in Federal Housing Projects and other low income housing areas.  If you have not done so you would not appreciate how some of these peoople live everyday.   The "refugees" that are being sent to several states, including mine, are being treated much better than they have been most of their lives.  These people have been relocated to areas that are safe and clean with hundreds of Texans helping ythem by giving away free stuff; clothes, food, personal hygiene items, books, games and most of all kindness.  After living in abject poverty, this would be like being in heaven to these people.  

I can't support how the elder Mrs. Bush stated her comment, but I believe I see where she is coming from.  

I can see where you are coming from but A) I'm not sure that the horrible sh!t they went through before being given stuff is worth it and B) the kindness the refugees are being shown now just serves to underline the way the poorest of the poor are living in the richest country in the world.

 

[wabmester]

"What I'm hearing, which is sort of scary, is they all want to stay in Texas"

I'm sure that was taken out of context.   Maybe she was talking about the Bush twins.

 

[Mr._johngalt]

Folks on this forum have made many good and worthy points about Katrina and its aftermath.  However, Barbara Bush seems to have rendered moot all future debate over who was to blame, what should have been done, etc.:


Ex-first lady sees Katrina's good side

Washington -- As President Bush battled criticism over the response to Hurricane Katrina, his mother declared it a success for evacuees who "were underprivileged anyway," saying many of the poor 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 Monday with the American Public Media 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."


Maybe wiser heads have more to add -- I, for one, am speechless.

Caroline

Well, I'm not! I always liked that lady.

JG

 

[greg]

Well, I'm not! I always liked that lady.

JG

JG: Just to simplify it for you: if you had one ligitimate IQ point, you'd be a troll.

--Greg

 

[Mr._johngalt]

JG:  Just to simplify it for you:  if you had one ligitimate IQ point, you'd be a troll.

--Greg

Get a grip man. You can't even spell

JG

 

[justin]

Get a grip man. You can't even spell

JG

JG, your tagline has a misspelling in it too. Concors? Or concurs? Or are you baiting us?

 

[Mr._johngalt]

JG, your tagline has a misspelling in it too.  Concors?  Or concurs?  Or are you baiting us?

Just trying to keep everyone on their toes

JG

 

[Martha]

Or is it Concours i.e. Discordia Concours or discord in harmony.

As REW said earlier, we don't have to take the bait.

BTW, shame on Barbara Bush.

 

[Mr._johngalt]

Or is it Concours i.e. Discordia Concours or discord in harmony.

As REW said earlier, we don't have to take the bait.

BTW, shame on Barbara Bush. 

"Discord in harmony" is about it. Unity gained by combining
disparate or conflicting elements. I thought it kind of captured the
spirit of this forum.

JG

 

[sgeeeee]

So far, I'm avoiding this bait. But do you have to dangle it in my face?

 

[Cut-Throat]

Let them eat cake!

Maybe she (Barbara Bush) should hold a prayer service in the Astrodome thanking God for Hurricane Katrina and getting them out of the pits of New Orleans!

 

[HFWR]

So far, I'm avoiding this bait.  But do you have to dangle it in my face?

Reminds me of an old Gallagher skit about bass fisherpersons fishing during spawning season, trying to cast bait onto the nest. "How'd you like to be making love, and have someone dangle a pizza over the bed..."

 

[TromboneAl]

A few days after the Oakland firestorm, at a meeting for fire victims, one of the officials said "I'd kind of like to have a fire to get rid of all my junk, and replace it with new stuff." Man, did he get his head handed to him!

 

[sgeeeee]

A few days after the Oakland firestorm, at a meeting for fire victims, one of the officials said "I'd kind of like to have a fire to get rid of all my junk, and replace it with new stuff."  Man, did he get his head handed to him!

Someone should have set him on fire.

 

[greg]

JG: The big picture for me is seeing an ego that just can’t quit, especially the self-reinforcing part. And this ego holds one of the worst hypocrisies I have ever seen: You proclaim that you live in a dog-eat-dog world, where only the strong survive or get ahead. And your force of intelligence makes you the big winner. You spout your cynical-apathy regarding politics and the stupidity of everyone except you—survival of the fittest—which, of course, is you again.

You have said that you have leached off your wife and friends and family in the past. You see this as smart. You are planning to collect Social Security and see that as simply taking advantage of a chaotic and irreversibly sick government. The list goes on forever for you. That’s all you see, some advantage for yourself, some advantage for you if you’re nice to your wife, etc. Pitiful almost.

I see things differently. When you use your wife’s money to help you visit Texas, I see a kind and benevolent woman who does something out of care, concern, and, perhaps, even love. When you eat your parent’s food and loutishly come to this message board to “honestly” proclaim the advantage you took of them, I see a kind and gentle mother helping her son enjoy a small part of the day with them. Even your public goings on show your stupidity: you bad mouth the local government units that provided you with roads to get to fishing locations, sidewalks to walk the dog, streetlights so that you can see at night and help with crime, and sewers that carry away your refuse. These were often built with tax payer dollars provided by citizens who voluntarily wanted to bring a better life to everyone—even you. Perhaps they weren’t benevolent tax payers, but they were tax payers who thought that civilization and order is better than a dog-eat-dog world, a world of brutal thoughts and behaviors.

Even when you drive your car, you are depending on the orderliness, goodwill, lawfulness of 99.9% of the other drivers 99.9% of the time. But you don’t see that. You see the one miserable driver that doesn’t want to follow the rules and show goodwill. You end up seeing the worst in everyone or thinking the worst about everyone. No wonder guns are so important to you and the final arbiter of all actions

You feed off this stuff, this kindness, this orderliness, this general love and benevolence of all other human beings. Without it, you would have nothing; and yet you don’t see the better half of life, the human side. You stick your head into a dumpster looking for a typewriter that some ‘fool’ didn’t know was worth twenty dollars and then don’t recognize that you are only there and doing what you do because of the benevolence and goodwill of the property and dumpster owner.

I had a tenant once with an IQ of about 60-70 and a brain filled with cysts. Even he knew that the government and people were good most of time and were helping him. He made the connection.

So, am I wrong in how I see you?

--Greg

 

[moghopper]

...knew that the government...[was] helping him. 

I can't deny that the government is trying to help people. And, like you, I think most people want to help others at some basic level.

The problem I see is that most people don't want to do the helping themselves, they want the government to do it. And the government just isn't that good at it. Frankly, they suck.

 

[Nords]

Someone should have set him on fire.

Build a man a fire and he'll only be warm until the wood runs out.

Set a man on fire and he'll be warm for the rest of his life!

-- Anonymous, quoted on many blogs

 

[MJ]

I think Babwa Bush is on to something.
By her logic, all those people who had lost a love one in one of the twin towers and were able to collect a million dollars or more from the generous American taxpayers, would have been grateful for the better life they could have because of the tragedy.
If I had lost someone, I could have retired that much sooner. Just my luck.

 

[Mr._johngalt]

JG:  The big picture for me is seeing an ego that just can’t quit, especially the self-reinforcing part.  And this ego holds one of the worst hypocrisies I have ever seen:  You proclaim that you live in a dog-eat-dog world, where only the strong survive or get ahead.  And your force of intelligence makes you the big winner.  You spout your cynical-apathy regarding politics and the stupidity of everyone except you—survival of the fittest—which, of course, is you again.

You have said that you have leached off your wife and friends and family in the past.  You see this as smart.  You are planning to collect Social Security and see that as simply taking advantage of a chaotic and irreversibly sick government.  The list goes on forever for you.  That’s all you see, some advantage for yourself, some advantage for you if you’re nice to your wife, etc.  Pitiful almost.

I see things differently.  When you use your wife’s money to help you visit Texas, I see a kind and benevolent woman who does something out of care, concern, and, perhaps, even love.  When you eat your parent’s food and loutishly come to this message board to “honestly” proclaim the advantage you took of them, I see a kind and gentle mother helping her son enjoy a small part of the day with them.  Even your public goings on show your stupidity:  you bad mouth the local government units that provided you with roads to get to fishing locations, sidewalks to walk the dog, streetlights so that you can see at night and help with crime, and sewers that carry away your refuse.  These were often built with tax payer dollars provided by citizens who voluntarily wanted to bring a better life to everyone—even you.  Perhaps they weren’t benevolent tax payers, but they were tax payers who thought that civilization and order is better than a dog-eat-dog world, a world of brutal thoughts and behaviors.

Even when you drive your car, you are depending on the orderliness, goodwill, lawfulness of 99.9% of the other drivers 99.9% of the time.  But you don’t see that.  You see the one miserable driver that doesn’t want to follow the rules and show goodwill.  You end up seeing the worst in everyone or thinking the worst about everyone.  No wonder guns are so important to you and the final arbiter of all actions

You feed off this stuff, this kindness, this orderliness, this general love and benevolence of all other human beings.  Without it, you would have nothing; and yet you don’t see the better half of life, the human side.  You stick your head into a dumpster looking for a typewriter that some ‘fool’ didn’t know was worth twenty dollars and then don’t recognize that you are only there and doing what you do because of the benevolence and goodwill of the property and dumpster owner. 

I had a tenant once with an IQ of about 60-70 and a brain filled with cysts.  Even he knew that the government and people were good most of time and were helping him.  He made the connection.

So, am I wrong in how I see you?

--Greg     

Re. "am I wrong?" No comment. What I will say is that this post reveals
a hell of a lot more about you than it does about me.

JG

 

[bogart]

To me, this post does indeed reveal a lot about its author. It shows that he has a great deal of wisdom and mature judgement.

 

[mikew]

Pretty much the whole quote is in here.
http://marketplace.publicradio.org/shows/2005/09/05/PM200509051.html

IMHO it seems like she was trying to say something nice but was filtered through whatever and came out this way. 

Edit: Anyway, I care more about what W says than what his Mamma says.

Sorry but can't figure out how to make the short URLs.

Mike