Hubris

Do you want to understand how decisions are made in the bush administration? Decisions that have resulted in the death and maiming of thousands of Americans, not to mention the Iraqi's we're supposed to be saving? What's your best guess on the action plan for matters of import in the executive branch these days? For a clue, read "Without a Doubt" by Ron Suskind in the New York Times magazine Oct 17, 2004 issue.

Having read the article I couldn't stop myself from asking, did they really say that on the record? And did the American public really hear this? Can this be okay with the American public?

Here's a little snippet from the article. The writer is meeting with a senior advisor to bush:

The aide said that guys like me were ''in what we call the reality-based community,'' which he defined as people who ''believe that solutions emerge from your judicious study of discernible reality.'' I nodded and murmured something about enlightenment principles and empiricism. He cut me off. ''That's not the way the world really works anymore,'' he continued. ''We're an empire now, and when we act, we create our own reality. And while you're studying that reality -- judiciously, as you will -- we'll act again, creating other new realities, which you can study too, and that's how things will sort out. We're history's actors . . . and you, all of you, will be left to just study what we do.''

Hubris......

If you want to read the article, click on the title below. Its from the October 17, 2004 issue of the New York Times Magazine. The article is written by Ron Suskind:
Without a Doubt

Looks Like We Got What We Conspired to Get....And We Don't Like It!

Last year this country succumbed to a snake oil salesman. This guy used all his craftiness to sell us a bill of goods and we fell for his line of overblown rhetoric (...spread freedom around the world...) hook, line and sinker and voted him back into office. Now we're starting to find out just what we bought ourselves because we were such willing pawns. All it took was a slick appeal to our fears, our prejudices and our uncertainties. All it took was playing to the lowest part of ourselves, and we gave away the store. This man, this george bush has staffed government agencies with his political cronies, putting into place a leadership that is vastly less experienced and less qualified, putting into place people whose most significant qualification for their jobs is their allegiance to w.

We let him back in, we let him put unqualified people in these jobs and watched while the experienced veterans of these agencies have been leaving wholesale, leaving the political hacks in charge. Now the glaring inadequacies of just one of these political appointees is exposed in the face of the most catastrophic natural disaster in our history. There are others. They are quietly gutting agencies that are supposed to protect and keep us safe.

This was the administration that got into office because it convinced an audience willing to abdicate its responsibility to think for itself in favor of a falling for a cheap play on the emotions of a frightened nation, this man managed to convince the voting public that he could protect us better than "the other side". Now we're angry because the government did such a poor job of protecting and rescuing victims in this disaster. But we didn't really ask anything of him, did we? We took what he said at face value and didn't bother to check the facts. When its all said and done, We have only ourselves to blame.

For more details about these political appointments, read these articles (Some require subscription):
All the President's Friends New York Times
Leaders Lacking Disaster Experience - The Washington Post

Catastrophe in New Orleans

I've been watching coverage of the devastation going on in New Orleans all evening and my head is filled with the images I've seen. At one point I could only weep as I watched...so much tragedy. The last thing I watched was Nightline. Ted Koppel interviewed a Louisiana congressman who was so angered by the lack of response by the government. He said the Louisiana governor had asked, even begged for federal help, for 40,000 troups to help with the evacuation of the hurricane victims and yet no help came. Ted explained that the governor had not put her request in the right form so the government couldn't help until they got a correctly posed request! My god, could he really have been saying that the governor forgot to say "Please"?

And, by the way, why are the people "refugees" and not "victims"? These people need our help, let's everyone please do all we can to support these hurricane victims. Send money, clothes and food. There are also requests for anyone willing to open up their homes. Do what you can, okay.