Catching Up

I have returned from Montreal, and I'll be back to the working grind tomorrow. I had a few days away from internet access, which was probably a good thing considering what I've been seeing today. I guess the unity to help the poor souls in New Orleans lasted all of about five minutes. This article in the New York Times pretty much sums up what this crisis has come to. To be sure, there is plenty of blame to go around for the way this evacuation/rescue effort has been botched. The mayor of New Orleans will have to answer for why there were all those school buses sitting around when they could have been used to get some of the poorer residents out of town. Gov. Blanco has to take some blame if she underestimated the resources that her state would require. But the buck ultimately stops at the federal level, because that is where the Dept. of National Security and FEMA are. This fiasco can do nothing but embolden terrorists, because it shows that the federal agencies are ill prepared to handle a major emergency. And the way the Rove smear machine has gone into action to deflect criticism away from his Fearless Leader has been nothing less than shameful. I don't deny that there have been some shameful and gratuitous shots at the President coming from the Left over this tragedy, and they are all the more unfortunate because they distract attention away from the legitimate criticism of the way Bush has comported himself in the wake of the devastation. (Maybe this will shed light on where some of Dubya's attitudes and worldview come from.) But responsibility has to start at the top. No objective observer can say that the rescue operations have gone well, and we will never truly know the human consequences of these failures. We have all witnessed scenes that nobody could have thought possible in America. The main thing right now is to ensure everybody is rescued, brought to a safe place and receiving proper care. Please give money toward that effort if you have not already.

The other major story over the weekend was the death of Chief Justice Rehnquist. Since we have heard all of his praises sung in the media over the last few days, I found Alan Dershowitz's take on Rehnquist to be quite interesting. Once again, it appears that Bush will benefit politically from the misfortune of others. By creating an artificial urgency to fill out the Court, he will be allowed to install a judicial neophyte into the top job. And if the Democrats try too hard to challenge John Roberts' nomination, they might be weakened in their efforts to oppose the next ultra-conservative that Bush picks to succeed Justice O'Connor, lest they be labeled obstructionists. This is very clever politicking by Rove et al, capitalizing on Rehnquist's timely death and the Dems' lack of backbone. And the backdrop of death, destruction and the need to restore order don't hurt either.