Platitudes
In case you haven’t seen it, here is the transcript of Michael Brown (of failed FEMA fame) warning the President that hurricane Katrina might create a “catastrophe within a catastrophe” the day before the storm hit the Gulf Coast. This is the briefing where Michael Brown and a series of hurricane experts warned the president, among other things, that the levees could breach.
Five days later, while New Orleans was underwater, and the nation was still discovering how many of our countrymen had been left to die, Bush lied to the press:
“I don’t think anybody anticipated the breach of the levees. They did appreciate a serious storm but these levees got breached and as a result much of New Orleans is flooded and now we’re having to deal with it and will,” he said.
Slate.com asks if we should be worried that Bush did not ask a single question during the entire briefing.
Let me just say, I’m not worried. I’m angry.
If my mechanic tells me my car needs a tune-up, I’m going to have some questions for him. That’s because I care about my car, and about my budget, and I want to make an intelligent decision that protects them both.
But our President doesn’t care enough about the lives of ordinary Americans to ask a single question. All he had time to do was mouth empty, ‘cover my backside’ platitudes to the “folks at the state level” that “we are fully prepared” before disappearing back to his vacation.
In retrospect, it’s obvious that even this was a lie.
