Tuesday, September 13, 2005

Politics 1A: How To Miss The Point

Bush, speaking recently in New Orleans in an attempt to deflect the growing criticism over the almost every element of the way in which the current crisis has unfolded, was according to the Guardian, "particularly animated" when it came to the issue of the role of race in the crisis:

The storm didn't discriminate and neither will the recovery effort. When those coastguard choppers ... were pulling people off roofs, they didn't check the colour of a person's skin.

We can only hope that this kind of deliberately obtuse comment fails in its goal, which is to close once again the eyes of the American public, and indeed the world, that have been so dramatically opened to the current reality of perhaps the most difficult and persistent issue in the history of the US. The idea that "race was not an issue" in the Katrina disaster is, quite simply, intellectual dishonesty of the lowest order.

1 comment:

Anonymous said...

It is just possible that he doesn't really get it. He's not the sharpest stick in the bunch. He probably doesn't think he's racist. After all, he might say, he has a couple of dark-skinned friends and appointees, heck, even a relative. The question is, is the Katrina response impeachment-worthy? Added to the illegal war, how bad does it have to get? Aren't these things worse than Clinton's sex scandal?