After Levees Failed, Bush Had “A Sense of Relaxation”
After Levees Failed, Bush Had “A Sense of Relaxation”
President Bush, after being asked whether he was ‘misinformed’ by his advisors before he said that no one anticipated the breach of the levees:
What I was referring to is this: When that storm came by, a lot of people said we dodged a bullet. When that storm came through at first, people said, Whew. There was a sense of relaxation. And that’s what I was referring to.
And I myself thought we had dodged a bullet. You know why? Because I was listening to people probably over the airwaves say, The bullet has been dodged. And that was what I was referring to.
Of course, there were plans in case the levee had been breached. There was a sense of relaxation at a critical moment.
President Bush’s story doesn’t hold up.
As our timeline shows, Bush learned of the serious potential that the levees could be topped as early as Sunday, well before the storm hit, during a briefing with the National Hurricane Center director. More importantly, water was flowing over the levees before Katrina hit land at 6:30 a.m. (By late Sunday night, waves were crashing over the levee walkway. By 3 a.m. on Monday, they had failed.)
So Bush’s “sense of relaxation” came long after the levees had been breached.
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Bush had a moment of Zen! Sweet! Ohhmmmmmm
September 12th, 2005 at 12:48 pmYou know what is missing, Nico? You still haven’t made note of the fact that winds were hindering efforts before the hurricane ever hit. No, there is not an exact time, but the phone lines going down is the most significant part of the then impending tragedy. And this is what was supposed to be remedied by the 911 commission.
We all know Bush played guitar and ate cake and generally did not have a grasp of things. Now let’s get to the items that are going to bury him.
September 12th, 2005 at 12:54 pmYou mean like why couldn’t a helicopter get to the children’s hospital with medicine the first day? Like why babies in incubators went without power for nearly a week?
If anything will bury this corrupt do-nothing President, that will.
September 12th, 2005 at 1:05 pmSpot the blatant lie?
“Because I was listening to people probably over the airwaves say, ‘The bullet has been dodged.’”
You have the the entire DHS/FEMA infrastructure at your beck and call, and yet you choose to get your updates on Katrina from the “airwaves”?
Bull.
And now he’s playing the “probably” I heard something from somewhere that misled me. You can spot that fib a mile off. Bush was either getting baloney updates from his own appointees, or he wasn’t asking for updates. Either way, Bush is the chump. Again.
And now he’s lying. Again.
September 12th, 2005 at 1:07 pmYou’ve got it wrong. He was referring to the political levees, not New Orleans’ levees.
Before the storm came he was worried because he knew he had slashed the Army Corps of Engineer budgets to strengthen New Orleans’ levees.
September 12th, 2005 at 1:12 pmRecall that Bush claimed to see on television the first plane hit the World Trade Center (and making the “joke” that he thought that was “a bad pilot”).
Of course, the video of the first strike was not seen until long after the event.
No matter–Bush got a quickie blurb to pad out his speeches, and to continue the media-enhanced myth that he is engaged and informed.
Another mission accomplished.
September 12th, 2005 at 1:15 pmAnother contextual error. What wasn’t reported was that Bush’s ’sense of relaxation’ was confined to his pants, as he discovered that his policy of ignoring science was about to come back to punish him.
September 12th, 2005 at 1:16 pmI can’t decide if I want Georgie to shut the f*ck up, or just keep talking.
September 12th, 2005 at 1:16 pmIt was rather astounding when Chertoff and Brown kept blaming their apathy on that they were hearing on the news. Now the President of the United States explains that he relaxed because he was listening to the news and they seemed to be claiming “the bullet was dodged”.
Since when was “I saw it on television” a viable explanation for government action or inaction?
And besides, what channel was he watching? Softcore porn on Showtime?
I watched wall to wall coverage that first week and I was never relaxed. On the contrary, I was in a rage, losing sleep, and figuring ways of explaining to my children why people were dying on television.
September 12th, 2005 at 1:17 pmNever in history has a leader more desperately wanted to take a bike ride.
September 12th, 2005 at 1:17 pmyou mean ol busie told a lie…a..a…’mis-spoke’
September 12th, 2005 at 1:18 pmspin-spin-spin…but not from NOW ON….his ship is SINKING and it to damn late. Meanwhile it’s almost 2000 dead U.S. in Iraq, and this war has killed 25,000 Iraq civilians. I wonder why they hate us??????
“Because I was listening to people probably over the airwaves say…”
I guess he was for “not listening to the filters” before he was against it.
September 12th, 2005 at 1:19 pm“…people probably over the airwaves…”
What ?!?
September 12th, 2005 at 1:21 pm“bad pilots” , “dodged a bullet” :
that’s Bush’s management style. What do you think he said when he couldn’t find oil in Texas?
September 12th, 2005 at 1:21 pmIt looks like they’re floating stories to see if anything improves his image. Yesterday they floated another story that said bush didn’t know anything, because he doesn’t ever read the paper or watch the news and that his ‘yes men’ didn’t want to bring the bad news…
No matter how you sliced it, he was drunk at the wheel, and the car crashed. He’s never paid for that mistake in the past – I’m sure he thinks this case should be no different… An idiot drunk usually remains an idiot drunk – especially one that never went through 12 step.
September 12th, 2005 at 1:23 pmWhere is the link to Bush’s comment, please?
September 12th, 2005 at 1:23 pmThe only airwaves the “dodged a bullet” meme was broadcast on you need a tin foil hat brainwave receiver to dial it in. WingNutDaily
http://americablog.blogspot.com/2005/09/is-gop-media-partly-responsible-for.html
September 12th, 2005 at 1:27 pmAravosis has also checked all the front pages from around the world at …
http://www.newseum.org/
The only place that “dodged a bullet” meme was found was at …
http://www.worldnetdaily.com/news/article.asp?ARTICLE_ID=46025
So that means it came from Rove and the WH, not the semi-legit press.
September 12th, 2005 at 1:34 pmBush=Wingnut!
September 12th, 2005 at 1:36 pmPUT A CITATION ON THE BUSH QUOTE PLEASE. YOU GODDAMN BLOGGERS ARE ALMOST AS IRRESPONSIBLE AS THE ADMINISTRATION
September 12th, 2005 at 1:37 pmYou know, your Caps Lock key is only about 3/16 of an inch from where your pinky finger, on your left hand, rests on the “A” key.
Thanks.
September 12th, 2005 at 2:04 pmTry checking the white house website, “grow up”.
September 12th, 2005 at 2:05 pmLet’s all play, “The Blame Game”
Blame blame bo bame
September 12th, 2005 at 2:07 pmBanana fana fo fame
Me my mo mame
B-L-A-A-M-E.
Bush is C.E.R.T.I.F.I.A.B.L.E.
Lock him up before he harms a child or a small animal.
September 12th, 2005 at 2:09 pmTime some skel on the right “just keeps him warm and quiet”.
September 12th, 2005 at 2:12 pmCan anyone do a nice graphical timeline, with disastrous events denoted above the line, and pathetic Team Bush responses below? It would be nice to have a graphic showing “rape in Superdome” versus “Condoleeza Rice buys fabulously expensive shoes” to show off when Bushies start telling lies about what happened when.
September 12th, 2005 at 2:21 pm#20 – Grow up
For the idiot with the Caps Lock on, here’s the source for the Bush quote… pretty reliable source, don’t you think?
http://www.whitehouse.gov/news/releases/2005/09/20050912.html
September 12th, 2005 at 2:22 pmUnbelievable. The bushies cricize the press when they report the truth about Iraq, rather than the admin’s propaganda, then the admin says they trusted the press for news on New Orleans. So which is it, folks??? I’m surprised they aren’t all passed out on the ground with all the spinning they’ve done.
September 12th, 2005 at 2:24 pmI have to say that parcing this statement of Bush’s out this way, and inferring that he was relaxed AFTER the levees were breached is just plain wrong. In fact, I read the above peice ONE time, and could tell what he meant, and what he didn;t mean was that he felt a sense of relaxation after the levees broke.
September 12th, 2005 at 2:25 pmI am NO defender of this idiot lunatic, trust me. But this thread makes no sense. Clearly, MANY people felt a sense of relief before we all found out that the levees had failed because that had been our biggest fear for NOLA. And immediately after the storm hit and begain to move on, it appeared that the worst case, had NOT occurred. (enter sense of relief here) Then they failed and all hell broke loose. Then the real Bush admin. crimes began.
Why waste time putting things into his mouth. His statement seems clear to me, and I can’t stand the guy either.
Perhaps Bush was anticipating the same sense of relaxation Brownie brought him during the four hurricanes in Florida in 2004:
“Louisiana’s Problem? It’s Not Florida.”
September 12th, 2005 at 2:27 pmBush is even inept at telling lies. Everyone knows he is fibbing. He is the total waste of a human body.
September 12th, 2005 at 2:27 pmWhat is the source for thoses Bush comments?
September 12th, 2005 at 2:29 pmI agree with liberal– you’re stretching it needlessly.
September 12th, 2005 at 2:30 pmI think Dumb Fox in #4 hit it spot on. What kind of leader gets vital information from the ‘airwaves’? Do you think he checked the ‘internets’ too? Wouldn’t you think there are more capable and reliable information sources than the ‘airwaves’? Geez! He’s so incompetent he can’t even make up a good excuse for his incompetence. What a moron.
September 12th, 2005 at 2:36 pmI give up: At what point did he answer the question that was ASKED him?
September 12th, 2005 at 2:39 pmThis isn’t the first time his alibi doesn’t work.
September 12th, 2005 at 2:41 pmRecall what he said when the first plane hit the WTC tower. He said he saw it while at the grade school — an impossibility.
Again, he claims he got the news of the “dodged bullet” from the “air waves”- when he has immediate access to every agency in America!
This is the Eddie Haskell president – lying with every breath – he can’t help himself.
#6, Sorry — I see you made my same point.
September 12th, 2005 at 2:42 pmWhenever you see him try to speak, you can just see there is nothing going on between those ears.
September 12th, 2005 at 2:42 pmI was curious this weekend as to where Chertoff and Bush’s bullet-dodging originated. I’ve posted the results of my search at my blog, http://www.PettyLarseny.com. The good news is, I found the magic bullet! The bad news is where it originated from…!
September 12th, 2005 at 2:43 pm#15 – I have also heard, as you note, that unless a drunk goes through the proven 12-step program, he is really just a dry drunk.
September 12th, 2005 at 2:45 pm#29
I never once (and still don’t) felt relieved. You see, waves were coming up over the levees. Scienist have released data (I will try and find) that shows that what was in essence a tidal way washed over the levees in the 9th Ward. This happened before the levees broke.
I, as a dumb normal, citizen knew there was big trouble in the South, not just New Orleans or LA, Monday morning 7:30AM PST.
If Bush has felt any moment of relief anytime between that point in time (I was sleeping before that time) and now, he is a bastard.
September 12th, 2005 at 2:48 pmliberal one: “I read the above peice ONE time, and could tell what he meant, and what he didn;t mean was that he felt a sense of relaxation after the levees broke.”
Me too. I remember going to bed worried for N. O. and waking up to news stories about how there was a little water in the streets. I sighed that breath of relief myself. But I was not following the news. I wasn’t listening to radio reports about levees. Plus, I had gone to bed at a nice hour and risen as I would any morning, turning on NPR only long enough to get a sense of the overnight damage assessments.
But I’m not the president. I have no responsibilities for monitoring or acting on those reports. And I don’t have access to any information other than whatever broadcasters and print reporters can carry to my T.V. and computer. And when the exent of the damage became clear, I did not think that no one had imagined that the levees would break, let alone say it out loud. Nor would I have said it out loud when I in fact meant that the morning news had reassured me.
Yeah, Bush wasn’t relieved that N. O. would be flooded. But he obviously doesn’t have a better grasp on the situation than I got from a casual attention. It pains me to think that a dozen vaguely concerned citizens could divide the presidency and outperform Bush in their spare time, but I bet they could.
September 12th, 2005 at 2:52 pmThat quote is just astonishing. That anyone in the govt would admit to “a sense of relaxation” is dumbfounding. That it’s the President saying such things is simply beyond belief. And AGAIN we’re being told, this time by the man himself, that the President was getting his storm briefings from the media. Instead of, you know, maybe… the NATIONAL WEATHER SERVICE!!!!. Or, I don’t know… A RESPONSIBLE, CAPABLE, FEMA EMPLOYEE ON THE SCENE!!!!!
And even as the President and his merry band of spinsters frantically point to how they calibrated their entire disaster response plan based on what tha tee-vee was sayin’, we’re left to figure out how it was that Chertoff and Brown were COMPLETELY unaware of what was going on at the Convention Center EVEN AS THE MEDIA WAS BROADCASTING LIVE FROM THE SCENE AND PLEADING FOR HELP FOR THOSE PEOPLE!!
September 12th, 2005 at 2:52 pmGreat quotes…..
KATRINA TIMELINE
September 12th, 2005 at 2:55 pmhttp://www.thinkprogress.org/katrina-timeline
http://aliberaldose.blogspot.com/2005/09/breaking-holy-shit-they-canned-bastard.html
September 12th, 2005 at 3:01 pmHe breathed a sigh of relief. Brownie’s horrible secret was safe for another day.
September 12th, 2005 at 3:06 pmWater flowing over a levee is not a breached levee.
September 12th, 2005 at 3:08 pmBrownie just resigned.
September 12th, 2005 at 3:10 pmWater flowing over a levee is not a breached levee.
Water flowing over a levee continuously is how levees are breached.
September 12th, 2005 at 3:11 pm#47
“Water flowing over a levee is not a breached levee.”
But, it is still a goddamn emergency and nothing to be relieved about.
September 12th, 2005 at 3:12 pmKillcon, you are so wrong. And Spoodge, the Corps did think a bullet was dodged when first reports showed no levee failure.
September 12th, 2005 at 3:18 pmBush tries to “dodge the bullet”
As has been pointed out previously by any number of blogs (including this one), the media reports saying “New Orleans dodged a bullet” never referred to post-hurricane damage reports. It only referred to the idea that, rather than a catego…
September 12th, 2005 at 3:24 pmDateline: Mississippi. Elementary school.
September 12th, 2005 at 3:34 pmThe school “principal here has lost her school, and lost her home, so I told her she didn’t lose her smile.”
Relevance.
Fruminous,
September 12th, 2005 at 4:10 pmThere were numerous reports, including from the Corps, stating NOLA had been spared and even used the words dodged a bullet. What you’re refering to is the use of those words in newspaper headlines. Why don’t you read some of those reports and discover that you were mislead and lied to?
A.B. Lagonda, please.
This talk of levees is besides the point. When one hears reports of 20 feet of standing water, and all the AP aerial photos of New Orleans show water, water everywhere, and people are on their roofs for days at a time, does one wait several days to do something about all those people and all the stranded hospitals, or does one attempt a coordinated mass rescue and evacuation and/or supply drop as soon as humanly possible?
Who really cares about syntax? I mean, it’s ok to argue over it, sure, that’s what online forums are for.
But ultimately, who cares if New Orleans “dodged a bullet” when it’s blatantly obvious that, instead, it suffered a massive Category 4 water balloon?
September 12th, 2005 at 4:11 pm[...] That was President Bush’s reponse to a reporter who asked whether he had heard that his own FEMA director, Michael Brown, resigned today from the administration. For the second time today, Bush demonstrated that the Commander-in-Chief is not on top of things going on inside his own government. [...]
September 12th, 2005 at 4:19 pmYou’re right Aaroon, why would you care that this thread refers to breached levees that in fact had not yet breached. That’s an acceptable lie to you?
September 12th, 2005 at 4:20 pmOne basic, dumb, simple question for “bullet-dodging” theorists:
Did people stranded in New Orleans get the help they needed as soon as it was possible, or didn’t they?
We wouldn’t be having arguments over breached levees, dodged bullets, or red tape. We wouldn’t be bickering over who was in charge at what time, or what legal authority X had, if any organization or coordinator had actually managed to spare people’s lives and minimize people’s suffering and anguish in New Orleans. We’d be thanking the organizations for an amazing job.
To me, however, the fact that several people did lose their lives needlessly or lived through horrible conditions without food or water pretty much outscreams any lies or spin people put on it.
September 12th, 2005 at 4:25 pmGuess it’s all in what your definition of “breached” is, or maybe the definition of “levee” and “flood.”
After all, the Republicans thought it was worth $60 million to define the word “is” for us.
All this parsing and legal-beagle talk by the cons is like watching hippos dance.
September 12th, 2005 at 4:45 pm#57
You wish to determine whether people, possibly better-informed than I, who called the levees breached at a certain time are lying? Lying’s a strong word, As though the people claiming this are not trustworthy. But fine. I don’t follow their words blindly. I can concede your game, on your terms, and say ok, it’s an “acceptable” lie. Feel free to wave that flag around and lord my concession over me all you want. But to me, it’s more irrelevant than “acceptable,” because
A) What kind of leaders claim to rely on the media for information when its own agencies are far better equipped to inform them? Is that something that doesn’t concern you?
B) People knew the levees were going to break and/or were in great danger. The National Weather Service said so, etc., etc. I heard (via KYW 1060AM in Philadelphia, for example) and read various reports in which reputable and responsible sources said they believed that levees were, to paraphrase, in imminent danger of breaching, even after the hurricane had passed.
C) I saw the photos of water in New Orleans. Did the water get there by breaching? By overflowing? By dropping from the hurricane clouds? Even if by magic wand, the water flooded the streets, enough to destroy property and kill or strand people, enough to, you know, eventually breach the levees and let more water in, as predicted. Breaching was a likely, if not inevitable, scenario that left leaders with an urgent need to rescue people as quickly as possible.
What is more relevant to me and what is most unacceptable is this: after the levees broke, leaders with ample resources still didn’t make a coordinated attempt to save anyone until much too late.
P.S. A.B. Lagonda, ultimately, I don’t care, and it’s an “acceptable” transgression as they go, but I suggest that you try spelling names correctly, that is if you care whether people think you’re deliberately insulting them, or if you care about things like civility or respect. After all, you’ve done so well spelling every other word you’ve typed.
September 12th, 2005 at 5:10 pmit amazes me how the little language mix-ups or quotes can be taken out of context. i have read 4 posts, and 2 are. lol
September 12th, 2005 at 5:40 pmUnlike a dam, a levee is breached when it is overtopped.
September 12th, 2005 at 5:40 pmDams are always designed to withstand being overtopped [either by accident or on purpose] by the water they hold back.
Dams are designed to withstand the shock of being overtopped by the water they restrain; they have hardened foundations and outer faces. Levees are not, and are ALWAYS damaged [i.e. breached] when water flows over their tops and inevitably/automatically starts to undercut their unprotected outer faces.
By engineering definition, therefore, a levee is AUTOMATICALLY breached [i.e. damaged] whenever ANY water flows over its top.
Well, won’t you be relieved, A.B. Lagonda and others? Fear not the possibility that readers of Think Progress were lied to or misled, or that the readers lied or mislead on their own:
The Wall Street Journal (subscription needed) is reporting that, in fact, many sources knew that levees had been breached on Monday.
September 12th, 2005 at 5:44 pmLearned via Atrios
That is, the sources knew and were reporting such.
September 12th, 2005 at 5:46 pmA breach is an opening – not water flowing over the top of a levee. No one at the Corps would call water flowing over a levee an automatic breach, at least anyone who is an engineer. I’m a PE, you’re not. And this statement from the Corps should be read.
September 12th, 2005 at 6:06 pmhttp://www.usace.army.mil/PA-09-01.pdf#search=‘CORPS%20ENGINEERS%20BREACH%20LEVEE’
Looking at the transcript on the White House Web site, it seems Bush didn’t say he heard it over the “airwaves”; he said “airways.” Maybe he was referring to the breeze that wafts through his ears.
September 12th, 2005 at 7:15 pmBush is saying he probably heard about the bullet being dodged from the airwaves because everyone has proven them to be lying about reading it in the papers like brownie first saidhe did. These people read blogs, newspapers and anything else they can to try and cover their manay lies..
September 12th, 2005 at 7:25 pmRove will exploit the diversion provided by Katrina if we don’t keep our eye on the ball. Iraq is barely in the news. Haliburton is out of the news. Plamegate is out of the news
September 12th, 2005 at 7:36 pmSandy, you’re misinformed. There were reports everywhere saying that NOLA was spared. Here are just a couple:
http://www.nola.com/hurricane/t-p/katrina.ssf?/hurricane/katrina/stories/083005catastrophic.html
And here
September 12th, 2005 at 7:48 pmhttp://www.newhousenews.com/archive/mcquaid090805.html
AB,
It’s true that much of the news report said that it looked like the city had been spared the worst, but it’s the job of FEMA to immediately asses this and review the state of the levies before they stand down. To simply accept a news report without doing due diligence is incompetent nonsense…
September 12th, 2005 at 7:50 pmUh, it was being assessed by the USACE (the Corps). FEMA does not have sole responsibility here. No doubt there was miscommunication and confusion, but there are errors all over this thread and no intention to correct them. The 17th St levee break probably happened late Mon morning (not 3am) and was formally announced at 2pm.
September 12th, 2005 at 7:59 pmI can’t believe that anyone expects truth in any way, shape or form from Shrub anymore. Him speaking and truth are mutually exclusive ideations.
September 12th, 2005 at 8:48 pmThank you A.B. Lagonda, you beat me to it. Yes, levees sustain damage when topped. No, that is not the same thing as saying it was “breached”.
It still does not excuse the clusterf*** that occurred down there.
September 12th, 2005 at 9:03 pm[Looking at the transcript on the White House Web site, it seems Bush didn’t say he heard it over the “airwavesâ€; he said “airways.†Maybe he was referring to the breeze that wafts through his ears.
Comment by eastbayted — September 12, 2005 @ 7:15 pm]
“Airwaysâ€> Is that the same thing as the “Internets”? :-)
September 12th, 2005 at 9:22 pmAgain, he can say it was bad “intelligence” or information, folks…
September 12th, 2005 at 9:26 pmThe Way of the Monkey is to play The Fool. As you laugh at his antics, he bites you from behind. Unmask his ego, and you find a coward disguised as a monkey.
- the Blind Man in The Circle of Iron
Where’s Andy Jackson, the hero of the Battle of New Orleans, when we need him the most?
September 12th, 2005 at 10:33 pmDubya “I Heard It On the Grapevine” Bush…the true leader of the new world of Etheria. This guy has to be snorting coke and guzzling Budweisers. We need to call the guys in the white coats to come and pick up this sick butcher and send him to a padded cell along with his cadre of co-conspirators, traitos all.
Bush was even lying about what he heard on tv. The
September 12th, 2005 at 11:42 pmfilms and reports were just about immediate showing the
damage to New Orleans and other cities. For days you saw people starving and dying of thirst with no supplies getting to them or blocked by FEMA and other agencies. You can’t trust anything that Shrub says. Never could and still can’t. All he’s trying to do now is cover up his irresponsibility in this event and the fact that thousands of people, pets and farm animals died that shouldn’t have. And, a city was destroyed that shouldn’t have been. If Bush wasn’t given the right information by the people he has around him, then he doesn’t know how to delegate responsibility responsibly, either. It all boils down to Bush not
doing his job and those around him not doing theirs.
Whatever mistakes the people and politicians in New Orleans and the other damaged cities made, their errors don’t even come close to those of Bush and his cronies.
The more I read of bush’s “we dodged a bullet” lie, the more I wonder about the minds of those who actually listen to him. I mean, don’t these people ever THINK? I for one cannot believe that the president would ever put more stock in a news report he heard on fox news, than he does from the reports he gets from his own national weather services. If anyone actually believes bush’s newest lie, they are either stupid, or so desperate to believe bush, they would believe him if bush told them he was actually IN NOLA all during the week, but in disguise. (Frankly, that’s more believable than bush’s dodged the bullet lie).
September 13th, 2005 at 12:24 amFor a minute we all thought The Gulf Coast had dodged another bullet. I believe the media was on the same idea. After all, this region had dodged many bullets over the year.
This post just proves the lengths partisan liberals will go to use any tough situation as a hammer with which to beat the President over the heard.
Yall need to get over your hate.
September 13th, 2005 at 12:35 amDear Everybody,
Here’s a few “facts” that you may be unaware of, but which form a backdrop for my commentary on the “relaxed” quote and which will tie some loose ends together and suggest an alternative and, I am sorry to say, fairly horrific interpretation of that remark. It will strike most people as completely REPULSIVE, but after the nausea passes, it will make a lot of things that don’t make sense fit into a pattern that is consistent with the behaviors that we as a nation have witnessed.
I’m not going to even reference 9/11–let’s just set that aside for a moment.
For those who were horrified by Abu Ghraiv and could not understand why any military men would engage in such awful behavior..
…for those who cannot understand why someone would bomb innocent civilians and seem unmoved by their horrifying deaths as well as the devastating injuries suffered by soldiers being attacked with IEDs
…for those who cannot understand why the notion of “large numbers” of people being starved to death, dehydrated into death or drowned through inaction and cannot understand the inaction or some of the inane comments made by “relatives” of the current leadership…think about the following:
=========================================
Bush Sr’s (or Old Bush’s) house in Houston had one of those old housing association’s clauses in the deed agreement. Do you know what it was? “that the house could not be sold to black people.” [my responsible cite: this information is contained in the following books--Kitty Kelley's The Family; Webster Tarpley's Unauthorized Biography of George H.W. Bush; Jim Hatfield's Unfortunate Son.] Jr. learned his attitudes from his parents…and
George Herbert Walker–descended from the Walker family of St. Louis who made their original money by first warehousing and then distributing goods brought into St. Louis via the riverboats and who parlayed his share of the family lucre into some serious dough via investment banking and stock stuff, was an extreme racist. Walker believed that blacks should be sterilized if they were caught “thieving” or (I apologize, I don’t remember the wording) staring with lust at white women. Walker owned a mine in Poland (the Silesian Mining Co) that was worked by Nazi-enslaved jews and Poles. When the U.S. kicked about “doing” business with the enemy, Walker proposed that he create a partnership with a dutch bank and then he “wouldn’t be doing business with the enemy” but with a dutch company and he couldn’t figure out why that arrangement wasn’t acceptable. Let’s just say that Walker never let morality or ethics “impair” his business judgement. GEORGE Sr. was named after this genetically-related moral destitute. (see cites above) Dubya’s many ventures were bankrolled by this same amoral racist pig…so a preference for WHITES only was also learned from Great Uncles and Grand parents on BOTH sides.
Prescott Bush==the Senator was also a racist, but he approached the situation differently. He wanted to provide free birth control and abortions to black women (to keep their numbers down, I presume).
Okay, so now you get the sense that Bush’s relatives are not exactly big promoters of affirmative action or proponents of assistance to minorities. What does that have to do with Bush’s “relaxation” statement?
Well…this is going to get disgusting, but..here goes…
Dubya was known as the killing governor. He refused to pardon a black carpenter that was actually proved via DNA not to have committed the crime that he was jailed for. Dubya said that “pardoning him makes a mockery of the jury’s decision.” BUT DUBYA pardoned Henry Lee Lucas–the worst serial killer in Texas history who began his murderous career with the particularly sickening crime of murdering his mother and raping her dead body. Why did Bush pardon Lucas (a confessed and PROVEN murderer of 7 people with many other murders not added to his criminal record because the bodies could not be found) and not other people? Why did Bush not pardon Karla Fae–a born again wife of a minister who visited her prison and who was never actually a killer just an accomplice? Why not the innocent ones and why a proven killer? (cites of this record are available in all the books above as well as the governor’s records relating to the Texas Dept. of Corrections)
One possible explanation could be that Shrubbish admired or felt affinity with Lucas. Let’s just say that there is a woman in a profession that has to do with “pain” as “pleasure” who was “employed” to teach someone how to inflict pain without creating a serious injury…and that evidently, some people are “untrainable” and the “training resulted in an injury to the person that the ‘trainee’ was “working on.” (the book will be out this year sometime)
SO, LET ME Suggest a completely different way to interpret the REMARK: When would a man who enjoys giving “pain” to achieve “pleasure,” relax? When he felt pleasure that he could no longer “contain” and he gave himself over to it. Most people call this moment an “orgasm,” but I am sure that he did not want to say that on national television…
Think about Caligula? Or Vlad the Impaler?????
MK
September 13th, 2005 at 12:42 amDoesn’t this sound like the ramblings of someone who is totally stoned?
September 13th, 2005 at 1:13 am[...] He said no one knew the extent of the storm’s devastation until days later (except for the headline editors of most American papers. They knew). [...]
September 13th, 2005 at 6:09 am[...] Think Progress – After Levees Failed, Bush Had “A Sense of Relaxation” [...]
September 13th, 2005 at 7:46 am[...] Think Progress – After Levees Failed, Bush Had “A Sense of Relaxation” Comments » [...]
September 13th, 2005 at 7:47 amSo, wait, my comments are going ignored, or unchallenged, A.B.?
#79
September 13th, 2005 at 10:56 amKevin D. Korenthal, whatever. If you can’t or won’t comprehend what is handed to you on a silver platter with hyperlinks galore, then believe what you want. Believe that I’m “hating” and not basing my unemotional conclusions on facts. That’s fine. Go team.
Further, sometimes news reports are wrong. Some of the news reports regarding New Orleans’ condition were wrong on Monday. For top federal executives to claim to have relied on news reports when they have access to immediate and accurate data is, at worst, a lie, at best, outright ludicrous.
That’s why leaders have agencies like FEMA (and DHS now) and NOAA (and its National Weather Service) and USACE and state and local officials (elected or otherwise) who are ideally immediately informed of the latest situations on the ground: so that those with the resources and authority might coordinate efforts quickly and appropriately.
September 13th, 2005 at 11:18 amAnd, sorry to be such a jerk by adding comments 3 at a time (I’m slow like that), but I just noticed that the Wall Street Journal article I referenced above (via Eschaton/Atrios) is now available for free:
Why Levee Breaches In New Orleans Were Late-Breaking News By JOE HAGAN and JOSEPH T. HALLINAN
September 13th, 2005 at 11:23 amI do not waste my hatred on idiots, but I sure as hell do not understand those who choose to be lead by one.
September 13th, 2005 at 2:12 pmI love watching the RW wingnuts sputter and attack ad hominem and nitpick because not only is that all they can do now, it’s all they’ve ever done.
But they’re so surprised none of us show them deference now.
Put “failure” into Google and see what’s at the top, cons. That’s all you need to know. Your day is done.
September 13th, 2005 at 5:55 pmI have a stupid question:
Why do we not utilize a two way radio system with a wide range and home base in these areas?
It’s been reported all communications were down? Cell phones go down as soon as electric is lost, unless a few towers have generators to keep the “tower room” cool. Then, of course those towers get over loaded.
I just doesn’t make sense that 2-ways aren’t utilized in these areas at all times, with towers out of harms way. The technology is out there, why don’t they use it?
September 14th, 2005 at 9:10 amsorry, meant to include this:
Two Way Radio Services- source:http://www.gencom2way.com/faq.htm#5
What kind of range can I expect?
Systems can range from in-building coverage only
to wide area coverage trunking systems capable of reaching multiple states.
While direct unit to unit range is dependent on local topography, portable units can expect 1-2 mile direct range, and mobiles can expect 10-25 miles direct. The addition of a base station will enable increased mobile/portable range to the base station depending on location and antenna height.
September 14th, 2005 at 9:37 amThanks Madame Karnak #80 for the most amusingly ignorant scrollbar-shrinker of a comment I have seen in a long time. Great link, too.
September 16th, 2005 at 9:53 pmUm yeh I am 16 years old and live in Lafayette LA. which is about and hour or two from New Orleans. I think that even though my Dad works for the Corps. of Engineers and is very high up, that the government was somewhat unprepared for this. Some people that are 55 and 60 years old said they have never ever seen something this big and devastating happend, well they are right because nothing this bad has ever happend to us. Now not only do we have to clean up the mess we have, we have to work hard to prevent this from happening again. We cannot be relaxed at all right now, I can’t really do much because I am underage, but someone has to say something and make it happend…I’ve been skipping out on the news lately, only because of homework and football, but things are still pretty much the same and are remaining that way becuase some people in Government are too laid back, no names… Well hopefuly this comment means something to you because I’m not really sure what I’m talking about haha, um thanks for reading…
October 19th, 2005 at 3:17 pmBush is lazy and he dont desevre to be president because just like on 9/11 he waited 5mins in a cllassroom full with kids andhe acted like it was nothing and when katrina happen he just mostly cared for the white people and not the blacks
December 20th, 2005 at 8:21 pm