The White House Underwater - good piece in the New Yorker

[KaryninMiami]

http://rawstory.com/news/2005/New_Yorker_editor_says_Bush_failed_in_every_respect_And_more_Cavalier_delinquent_selfdelude_0906.html

Link to full story:
http://www.newyorker.com/printables/talk/050912ta_talk_remnick


THE WHITE HOUSE UNDER WATER
by David Remnick The New Yorker

One of the creepier vanities of most political leaders is the private yearning to be tested on a historical scale. Bill Clinton used to confide that, no matter what else he did as President, without a major war to fight he could never join the ranks of Lincoln and F.D.R. During the Presidential debates in 2000, George W. Bush informed his opponent, Al Gore, that natural catastrophes are “a time to test your mettle.” Bush had seen his father falter after a hurricane in South Florida. But now he has done far worse. Over five days last week, from the onset of the hurricane on the Gulf Coast on Monday morning to his belated visit to the region on Friday, Bush’s mettle was tested—and he failed in almost every respect.

---Snip-

And yet, to a frightening degree, Bush’s faults of leadership and character were brought into high relief by the crisis. Suntanned and relaxed after a vacation so long that it would have shamed a French playboy, Bush reacted with fogged delinquency, as if he had been so lulled by his summer sojourn that he was not quite ready to acknowledge reality, let alone attempt to master it.

-Snip-

The mismanagement of the Katrina floods echoed the White House mismanagement—the cavalier posture, the wretched decisions, the self-delusions—in postwar Iraq.

Just as serious, the President’s priorities, his indifference to questions of infrastructure and the environment, magnified an already complicated disaster. In an era of tax cuts for the wealthy, Bush consistently slashed the Army Corps of Engineers’ funding requests to improve the levees holding back Lake Pontchartrain. This year, he asked for $3.9 million, $23 million less than the Corps requested. In the end, Bush reluctantly agreed to $5.7 million, delaying seven contracts, including one to enlarge the New Orleans levees. Former Republican congressman Michael Parker was forced out as the head of the Corps by Bush in 2002 when he dared to protest the lack of proper funding.

[FlaGranny]

1. Good article - thank you. n/t

[Bernardo de La Paz]

2. And here's the pic

[Bernardo de La Paz]

3. Prophetic Auth Cartoon Aug. 23

[Toots]

4. the self-delusions—in postwar Iraq.

Hmmm I guess the Iraqi War is over and our boys can come home....