Rich in Sun NYT Op Ed: Message: I Care About the Black Folks

[Laura PourMeADrink]

http://www.nytimes.com/2005/09/18/opinion/18rich.html?hp

snip
This White House doesn't hate all pictures, of course. It loves those by Karl Rove's Imagineers, from the spectacularly lighted Statue of Liberty backdrop of Mr. Bush's first 9/11 anniversary speech to his "Top Gun" stunt to Thursday's laughably stagy stride across the lawn to his lectern in Jackson Square. (Message: I am a leader, not that vacationing slacker who first surveyed the hurricane damage from my presidential jet.)

The most odious image-mongering, however, has been Mr. Bush's repeated deployment of African-Americans as dress extras to advertise his "compassion." In 2000, the Republican convention filled the stage with break dancers and gospel singers, trying to dispel the memory of Mr. Bush's craven appearance at Bob Jones University when it forbade interracial dating. (The few blacks in the convention hall itself were positioned near celebrities so they'd show up in TV shots.) In 2004, the Bush-Cheney campaign Web site had a page titled "Compassion" devoted mainly to photos of the president with black people, Colin Powell included.

Some of these poses are re-enacted in the "Hurricane Relief" photo gallery currently on display on the White House Web site. But this time the old magic isn't working. The "compassion" photos are outweighed by the cinéma vérité of poor people screaming for their lives. The government effort to keep body recovery efforts in New Orleans as invisible as the coffins from Iraq was abandoned when challenged in court by CNN.

[SpiralHawk]

1. A Thousand Armies of Compassionate Points of Light

The Bush Skull & Bones Relief Combo-Strategery for New Orleans & BushCo Cronies, Inc.

Kicked and highly recommended for Greatest

[bigbrother05]

2. Frank does it again

--snip--

ONCE Toto parts the curtain, the Wizard of Oz can never be the wizard again. He is forever Professor Marvel, blowhard and snake-oil salesman. Hurricane Katrina, which is likely to endure in the American psyche as long as L. Frank Baum's mythic tornado, has similarly unmasked George W. Bush.

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The ToTo/curtain/Prof Marvel meme seems perfect for the Katrina unmasking.

[rasputin1952]

3. The bush administration is the real "Culture of Death"...they live by the

death and misery of others; death to them is an aphrodisiac.

As long as death and misery are kept within the bounds of the poor and those that haven't a voice of power begotten by cash.Where does this guy get his notions....his nurturing mother, "They were underprivileged anyway."

The people will not be fooled by this again, it has become apparent to even the 'best' of the bush supporters, that this guy is just plain full of shit.

[demgrrrll]

4. Hit him with the chair!! Hard!! That was the most scathing op ed I have

ever read. Good.

[Laura PourMeADrink]

5. This is like the 4th great one in a row.

[Tatiana]

6. Scathing! Rich is on fire! More...

The cashiering of "Brownie," whom Mr. Bush now purports to know as little as he did "Kenny Boy," changes nothing. The Knight Ridder newspapers found last week that it was the homeland security secretary, Michael Chertoff, not Mr. Brown, who had the greater authority to order federal agencies into service without any request from state or local officials. Mr. Chertoff waited a crucial, unexplained 36 hours before declaring Katrina an "incident of national significance," the trigger needed for federal action. Like Mr. Brown, he was oblivious to the humanitarian disaster unfolding in the convention center, confessing his ignorance of conditions there to NPR on the same day that the FEMA chief famously did so to Ted Koppel. Yet Mr. Bush's "culture of responsibility" does not hold Mr. Chertoff accountable. Quite the contrary: on Thursday the president charged Homeland Security with reviewing "emergency plans in every major city in America." Mr. Chertoff will surely do a heck of a job.