Helplessness

Maybe I'm too cynical. Maybe I'm overly critical. Maybe I lack perspective. Maybe I'm ignorant of disaster relief procedures. But as I learn about conditions in New Orleans, I can't help but wonder. Is our federal government doing enough? It seems like it's been awfully slow to respond. A tiny nagging voice wonders... is it because those left in New Orleans, mostly African American, mostly in a lower income tax bracket, matter less to those currently in power in the federal government? FEMA's head stated that those left behind in New Orleans bear a responsibility in their fates. What an insenstive thing to say. What if you had no place to go? What if you couldn't go? What if you had no car and no money? Do the elderly, the invalids, and the disabled bear a responsibility in their fates? And what about their families, who didn't want to leave them behind? Can you blame people for wanting to care for loved ones too sick to evacuate? And even if what Mr. Brown says is true, how does it help the relief effort?

Why is it that we're so ready to wage a war in search of those still-to-be-found WMDs (in actuality, it's not only oil, but a scheme to turn our tax dollars into a slush fund for the current government's supporters), yet we're allowing our own helpless, our own elderly, our own sick, and our own young to starve and fester in anarchy, filth and disease?

I was listening to This American Life on Saturday. A 9/11 fireman's widow who was quite vocal in her opposition to the war in Iraq spoke about a White House dinner she attended. When she told President Bush that 9/11 was supposed to have been her wedding anniversary, he replied (verbatim), "Wow. You got the double whammy." Not a simple, sincere, "I'm sorry for your loss." President Bush's remarks now seem almost just as flippant.

Something tells me that if a catastrophe this huge happened in say, Texas, our government would be a lot quicker to respond.