Author: Trish

Katrina the Perfect Political Storm Too

Trish

Katrina might have been the perfect storm politically, shattering support for Bush’s key policies and changing, along with New Orleans’ waterfront, the political landscape as well. A.P.:

Population shifts caused by the exodus of hurricane victims from the Gulf Coast could have ripple effects for years to come in Louisiana political races and perhaps beyond…

The early thinking is the evacuees least likely to return to their homes in Louisiana may be the poorest – and thus, Democrats for the most part…

“The stars are aligned,” said one Democratic consultant. “But Democrats need a candidate with a message.”

[Political Consultant Elliott] Stonecipher sees the New Orleans area losing Democratic voters and a political network that was of great benefit to Sen. Mary Landrieu and other Democrats…

Landrieu was elected in a 2002 runoff by a 52-48 margin, a difference of just 42,000 votes. New Orleans was the base of her support…Kathleen Blanco, the Democratic governor, who also won by a 52-48 margin, faces re-election in 2007.

Ray Nagin, the Democratic mayor of New Orleans, is up for re-election in February. No one knows if the city could even hold an election by then…

On the other hand, Texas might make up some of Louisiana’s Democratic losses.

…[L]ocal races – for everything from school boards to legislative seats and perhaps even congressional districts – could be affected.

…With Texas’ Hispanic population surging and its black population growing faster than the white population, demographic shifts already are pushing the state toward the Democrats. Katrina could help hasten the trend.

[…]

Bush Record Shows It Really Is About Race

Trish

Some people disagree with Colin Powell that the failure of the federal emergency response in New Orleans “wasn’t a racial thing.” If it were really about poverty, as Bush defenders claim, then his administration wouldn’t spend so much time cleaning up his record on blacks, says the Palm Beach Post.

Poverty doesn’t polarize in the same vocal, fearful manner that race does…

If you were offended by Kanye West’s comments, you should be more offended by President Bush’s record.

The unending cluelessness in this administration is getting old.

President Bush so wanted minority voters to believe that his administration “is working very well for them” that a report by the Agency for Healthcare Research and Quality was changed last year to downplay that ethnic and racial “disparities are pervasive in our health-care system.”

Because a racial profiling report by the Justice Department demonstrated that, in traffic stops, things too often are not “working very well for them,” the report was ordered to be whitewashed. A supervisor who objected recently was fired.

President Bush’s meddling with the Head Start preschool program threatens to leave thousands of poor, black children struggling to catch up. No Child Left Behind, his underfinanced genius of a PR scheme, annually leaves thousands of black children behind academically.

He so values the equity the Voting Rights Act of 1965 offered African-Americans and others that he’s made no commitment to extend and strengthen the provisions that expire in 2007. Even though unemployment rates for African-Americans are consistently almost double the rates for white Americans, and black households had the lowest median income in 2004 ($30,134) among all race groups, and 72 percent of white Americans own homes vs. only 48 percent of African-Americans, President Bush believes that the work force and the educational system are working so well that they don’t need affirmative action.

Bush is not only predisposed to racism but his policies reflect the qualities we have seen over and over this summer, from the famous, “I have to get on with my life” line regarding Cindy Sheehan to the classic, “Brownie, you’re doing a heckuva job” in New Orleans.

This guy doesn’t get it. He doesn’t get anything outside of his privileged circumstances and narrow life perspective (uncluttered as it is with insights from newspapers or books). He chooses faith over facts, unshakably certain that his view is the only view. Who knew levees could break? Who knew wetlands matter? Who thought terrorists could fly planes as weapons? Who thought anyone would object to leaving thousands of poor blacks treading water with nothing for three or four days? The unending cluelessness in this administration is getting old.

Powell Heads Toward Redemption, But Bush-ness Overtakes Him

Trish

Reading the preview ABC offers of Colin Powell’s interview with Barbara Walters tonight almost makes me forgive him for his sins in the second Bush administration.

“When you look at those who weren’t able to get out, it should have been a blinding flash of the obvious to everybody that when you order a mandatory evacuation, you can’t expect everybody to evacuate on their own. These are people who don’t have credit cards; only one in 10 families at that economic level in New Orleans have a car. So it wasn’t a racial thing — but poverty disproportionately affects African-Americans in this country. And it happened because they were poor,” he said.

I said it almost makes me forgive him because he’s still toeing the Bush line on Iraq so closely.

Powell told Walters he is unfazed by criticism that he put loyalty to the president over leadership. “Loyalty is a trait that I value, and yes, I am loyal. And there are some who say, ‘Well, you shouldn’t have supported it. You should have resigned.’ But I’m glad that Saddam Hussein is gone. I’m glad that that regime is gone,” he said.

When Walters pressed Powell about that support, given the “mess” that the invasion has yielded, Powell said, “Who knew what the whole mess was going to be like?”

Here we go again. Who knew? Who could have imagined? Who? The same folks who require blinding flashes of the obvious to figure things out, I guess.

They say Powell still thinks of running for president himself. I’d like to feel better about that, but reading the transcript and all the justifications he provides for what he did leaves me cold. Tune in tonight and see what you think.

UPS Sends Two Liaisons; FEMA, Governors Still Not Speaking

Trish

FEMA still hasn’t figured out to make nice with the folks it’s supposedly trying to help. As UPS, the shipping giant, tries to aid in Gulf Coast relief, it sounds as if FEMA still isn’t talking to the governors. UPS:

UPS today announced it had begun working directly with the governors of Louisiana, Mississippi and Alabama to support the Hurricane Katrina relief effort.

In Louisiana, Gov. Kathleen Babineaux Blanco has organized a team to help direct the state’s emergency relief effort. UPS is supporting the distribution and logistics efforts of that team.

In consultation with Gov. Blanco and also with Mississippi Gov. Haley Barbour, UPS has placed individual liaison officers at the command of the state governments. Two hurricane relief officers have been assigned to each of the two states, one to the governor and a second to the top Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA) official in the state. These UPS managers will remain accessible at all time to ensure that any emergency movement of food or supplies is handled as promptly as possible.

Can you say, “duplication?” Very good! Now can you say, “FEMA incompetence?” I thought you could!

As the federal government struggles to accomplish anything beyond roughing people up and justifying its poor performance, at least UPS is “gittin’ ‘er done.”

Over the past 10 days, UPS has transported more than 4 million pounds of relief supplies for federal, state and private relief organizations responding to the devastation of Hurricane Katrina. The effort, with starting points ranging from California to Vermont, has involved both air and ground movements and focused primarily on the transportation of water, medicine, baby formula, non-perishable food items, emergency supplies and paper goods.

Beyond those items, UPS also has moved a mobile kitchen for the U.S. Park Police; a mobile hospital from Reno, Nev., to New Orleans, and child-sized cots from California to Dallas. The company now is arranging the move of a mobile water treatment system from Johannesburg, South Africa, to Gulfport, Miss.

Mississippi Governor Blameless…and Republican

Trish

I would have missed this great editorial in the Palm Beach Post today, were it not for Florida Politics.

President Bush, who didn’t respond soon enough after Hurricane Katrina, wants to investigate why President Bush didn’t respond soon enough after Hurricane Katrina…

The president says he doesn’t want to point fingers. That’s because so many fingers are pointing at him. Those who work for the president who says it isn’t the time to play politics are playing politics by blaming the conveniently Democratic governor of Louisiana and mayor of New Orleans, while not blaming the inconveniently Republican governor of Mississippi for failing to evacuate all coastal residents of his state.

Doctors should not practice on themselves, lawyers should not represent themselves and, as history shows, presidents should not investigate themselves…

The White House fought creation of the 9/11 commission and offered only grudging cooperation. Then it blocked out portions of the congressional 9/11 report. The Bush administration is quick to place blame. As usual, it’s now moving quickly to escape it.

Rove Cheats at Voting in Order to Cheat on Taxes

Trish

Wanted: a registered voter in Kerr County, Texas who hates Karl Rove as much as we do. AP:

The Texas Secretary of State’s office doesn’t have jurisdiction to investigate a watchdog group’s complaint that presidential adviser Karl Rove may be illegally voting in Texas, a spokesman said Wednesday.

Rove has been receiving for 3 1/2 years a homestead tax break and cap on his property tax for his Washington, D.C., home, valued at more than $1.1 million. He also was getting a homestead exemption in Texas for his Austin home he sold in 2003.

Spokesman Scott Haywood said complaints about a voter’s residency must be investigated by county officials. He also said the group, Citizens for Responsibility and Ethics in Washington, did not have standing to file the complaint against Rove. Such complaints would have to be filed by another registered voter in Kerr County, the county where Rove is registered…

CREW sent the complaint Tuesday after the Washington Post reported that local residents, including the Democratic Party chairman, said they never have seen Rove or his wife in the two rental cottages that they claim as their residence for voting purposes…

Elizabeth Reyes, an elections attorney in the Secretary of State’s election division, told the Post that property ownership “doesn’t make that a residence.”

…All this arose because Rove has been receiving for 3 1/2 years a homestead tax break and cap on his property tax for his Washington, D.C., home, valued at more than $1.1 million. He also was getting a homestead exemption in Texas for his Austin home he sold in 2003.

Washington officials changed the district’s homestead exemption law in 2002, making the tax break available only to Washington property owners who don’t vote elsewhere. The White House took the blame for Rove’s error in claiming the Washington exemption.

“The White House took the blame?” I guess Bush has run out of people to blame for his bad judgement and corrupt cronies, so now he’s blaming buildings.

Come on, there must be a Kerr County voter who would like to see Rove not be held above the law, just once. Anybody?

Florida’s Mel Martinez Welcomes Cuban Doctors; Can Lamb/Lion Mating Be Far Behind?

Trish

Florida’s junior senator, Republican Mel Martinez, has shown the first tentative signs of growing a spine. Scientists caution it’s too early to say for sure, but the Cuban-American politico, famous for handing off both strategy and blame to his staff, is looking…firmish and principley.

Martinez said he welcomes help for Katrina victims from Cuban doctors, as offered by Fidel Castro last week. Miami Herald:

Castro’s offer has put the administration in a tight spot. Refusal could be perceived as placing politics before the needs of victims…

“But if we need doctors, and Cuba offers them and they provide good service, of course we should accept them,” he said in his Washington office. “And we’re grateful for that offer.”

Martinez truly has been such a Bush lackey up to now that it’s hard not to think the president’s stock is really low if Mel’s willing to go against him.

Oh, we need doctors. Despite FEMA claiming we don’t and turning them away at the gates, a medical team from Florida made it in to Waveland, Miss. earlier this week. People ran to the ambulance and beat on its doors before it came to a stop in a shopping center parking lot, wheeling loved ones unable to walk in shopping carts. The sick and injured told the medicos they were the first doctors and nurses they had seen since the hurricane hit, with one person already dying from lack of dialysis.

So we need all the help we can get, but someone should first check and see whether the earth shifted on its axis if Martinez said we are grateful to communist Cuba. Anyone not familiar with the bitterness found among some in the Cuban community toward Castro can’t appreciate the daredevil Mel is turning out to be.

Martinez recalled how Cuba rejected a U.S. offer to send $50,000 when the island was ravaged by Hurricane Dennis in July. “I regretted that,” he said. […]

Somebody Play the Blame Game Quick

Trish

Here’s why the blame game needs to be played, and played quick: because there’s a tropical storm out there and it’s headed for me. Maybe as a hurricane.

I want to know what went wrong on the Gulf Coast, and I want to know now. FEMA is going to be needed this weekend, right here where I live.

Whether Ophelia is headed for me or not, the fact is we need to know what mistakes were made and we need to know who made them. We don’t have the luxury of convening inquiries in a few weeks or months, we need to have this information right now.

Already officials in my area are announcing where the evacuation shelters will be. I, like many others, am picturing the horror that occurred in shelters in New Orleans. The thought of evacuating fills me with dread. Even worse than riding out the storm for a day in a shelter is the idea that things wouldn’t start functioning again quickly, and that I would have to stay in a shelter for days or even weeks. I want FEMA working, and it’s not now.

The news here is full of stories like this. WJXT-4:

A medical mercy mission to a Mississippi city ravaged by hurricane Katrina almost didn’t happen.

Doctors and nurses with HealthSouth St. Augustine Surgery Center said Federal Emergency Management Agency officials refused to let their group carrying staff and a trailer of medical supplies into the restricted area.

“‘Go home, we don’t need you,'” Kathleen Floyan of HealthSouth said they were told. “If it wasn’t for our state of Florida Highway Patrolmen … (who) told us. ‘Follow us, we’ll put you in this location.’ They put us across from the Waveland, Miss., Police Department.”

The city, right on the water southwest of Biloxi, was almost leveled by Hurricane Katrina. Residents there said they felt forgotten, abandoned and neglected.

The story went on to describe how desperately people did need medical treatment. Some of the injured were brought to the emergency crew – the only medical personnel there since the storm – in shopping carts. Hopefully they weren’t arrested for looting them.

Wherever you live, if there was a tornado, raging forest fire, earthquake, or any other natural disaster, you’d want to know FEMA could handle it.

I want answers. I want to assign blame. As our president might put it: Blame game? Bring it on!