The stench I'm talking about isn't the human death and misery in New Orleans, it's the stench coming out the Government, Republican from one end of Pennsylvania Avenue to the next.
To a single one, I have heard Republican Congressperson after Republican Congressperson toeing the Party line that "now is not the time to point fingers." This morning it was Mark Foley from Florida on CSPAN.
How dare they?
How dare they tell the public not to hold their Government accountable? How dare they think photo ops are enough to quell public outrage at the utterly preventable human catastrophe?
THE REASON THAT WE POINT FINGERS IS BECAUSE YOU REPUBLICANS ARE TOO STUPID TO FIRE THE IDIOTS YOURSELVES. If the President EVER held ANYONE accountable the public and the media wouldn't have to point fingers. Instead, the Republican Party looks more and more like Soviet Communists, valuing Party and self-enrichment over the people they profess to lead. From 9/11, to WMD, to Katrina, NOT A SINGLE PERSON HAS BEEN HELD ACCOUNTABLE FOR DECISIONS MADE THAT CAUSED THE DEATHS OF TENS OF THOUSANDS.
For the four years since 9/11 we've watched as Republicans, with total control of Government, choose themselves over the public. We've seen them put people wholly unqualified in positions of great responsibility. And they have failed. And people are dead as a result.
I'm sorry if the Party doesn't get it when the citizens of a nation are outraged at their Government. I'm sorry if the Party doesn't get it when the public demands that their leaders DO THEIR JOBS in either a time of war or in a natural disaster.
Jefferson County Parish President Broussard has it right:
I'm not surprised at what the feds say, they're covering their butts. They're keeping the body counts down because they don't want to horrify the nation. It's worse than Iraq, worse than 9-11. They just don't want to know how many were murdered by bureaucracy.The Republican Party hasn't, at least in my lifetime, believed in Government. They have railed against it for decades, calling it evil.
I used to believe that they thought it was a necessary evil. Now we've seen that they don't believe in it at all - other than as a trough at which they and their cronies gorge themselves. From Cheney's Halliburton down to patronage positions like Michael Brown. Since when is the Federal Emergency MANAGEMENT Administrator a patronage position? Since the Republican Party has controlled all of Government.
Sometimes you need to be outside of insanity to observe it and understand it. The UK's Independent is right: "There is a sense that the struggle for the soul of America is gathering pace."
Here at home, Keith Olbermann is right: "For many of this country's citizens, the mantra has been - as we were taught in Social Studies it should always be - whether or not I voted for this President - he is still my President. I suspect anybody who had to give him that benefit of the doubt stopped doing so last week."
This is not MY Government. This is not the people's Government. As we have seen now three times, 9/11, Iraq and New Orleans, this isn't a "Government" at all. What used to be a Government is now rotten to the core and the stench is horrific.
Throw them all out, now. As they have shown over the last three years, the potential for human death and misery over the next three years is terrifying. I would never have ever imagined that I could ever write that about my own Government and it would actually be true.
