Edgewise

George W. Ozymandias

It is hard to express how catastrophic these kinds of results from a very mainstream survey are for the President of unilateral "shock and awe."

There is no middle ground. The last great military Superpower must either rule the world , or else become mere meathead muscle for the policies of other lands

Public Rejects Using Military Force to Promote Democracy

"Only 35% favored using military force to overthrow dictators"

"Americans do favor the US promoting democracy through diplomatic and cooperative methods."

"Support is also strong for working multilaterally. Sixty-eight [68] percent said....it is better to work through the UN....while 25% said it is better for the US to act on its own because the US can act more decisively and effectively. "

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This is a good time to remind Mr. Bush of a poem they used to teach in every school, and which he may have had to learn "by heart," as a child.

Ozymandias
By Percy Bysshe Shelley
1792-1822

...on the sand,
Half sunk, a shattered visage lies,...frown,
And wrinkled lip, and sneer of cold command....
And on the pedestal, these words appear:
"My name is Ozymandias, King of Kings,
Look on my Works, ye Mighty, and despair!"
Nothing beside remains. Round the decay...

War Is Where You Find It

Anti-war protesters pick up steam and take cause to D.C. .
"Organizers expect more than 100,000 people for a march around the White House on Saturday. Sheehan is scheduled to speak. Rallies by war supporters are expected along the route."
USA Today 9/24/05

--The war supporters are expected to include some who support the current war being waged in Iraq.

Call Me a Shabbas Goy, But...

This kind of thing turns my stomach:

rove was just singing to the choir-- curious group of people, look at the names alot of Jews must have been a strategy session

I found it on the Huffington Post in a thread on off-the-record remarks by Karl Rove. The post, which I've quoted in full, is by someone calling himself "the Pope." It's hardly the worst thing on that thread; there are trolling wingnuts fantasizing gruesome deaths for Cindy Sheehan. But if this person doesn't like Rove, then he must be on "our" side, right?
How do we begin to make this unacceptable?

David Brooks can go to Hell or New Orleans

His choice--for saying "We have to think about whether we want to rebuild New Orleans" on the (Lehrer) News Hour this afternoon. Whaddya mean "we" Mr. Smarty Pundit?! Like, if a hurricane had destroyed Washington D.C. there would be a vote to decide whether or not it was wise to rebuild the nation's capitol in a former swamp (wetland to the environmentally savvy). Like David Geffen would be told by George Bush's FEMA Director (Army General, Air Force Captain, Monkey Cage Manager, whatever) that he couldn't rebuild his whumpdazillion dollar Malibu beach mansion after a major storm because "it's not safe". So what if the California coast loses forty feet a year to storm waves and earthquakes and sudden "slumps". So what if thousands of homes get burnt every year in wildfires. And the Mississippi (diked up and down the whole enchilada) floods its banks and millions of acres of farmland and river towns every few decades. So what if typhoons take out a couple of Hawaiian islands. Etc. Etc. Etc.

New Orleans is home to the people that want to go back and rebuild. New Orleans can decide for itself if it wants to be rebuilt. And David Brooks should just keep his smiley hole shut about what should and should not be done about rebuilding other people's cities.

Still somewhat slow on the uptake

Mike Brown took the hint, finally, and resigned as FEMA director. Look for him to receive the Medal of Freedom in a few months. Fortunately, Skeletor... er, I mean Chertoff is still firmly in control of Homeland Security.

Potential good news (or less-bad news) out of New Orleans

The News Blog @ i66.com relays a breaking nitem from the AP: Sweep of New Orleans finds far fewer bodies than expected

Ashes to ashes, funk to funky

(All credit belongs to the Editors at the Poor Man Institute for Freedom, Democracy, and a Pony. The image is a link to the full rock opera.)

Dispatch: A friend

Another email from a friend -- this one anonymous -- that I thought worth sharing here:

i've been wondering about the media folks and their bursts of honesty and anger about bush--like you said, even fox has them, but also it's coming from middle-of-the-roaders like brooks and some republican politicians too. it is sorta extraordinary, and while you could say that the events in the south are simply so horrific that these folks have no choice but to howl, really think about it--iraq is a huge screw-up too, and abu ghraib and guantanamo. plenty of horror there, and evidence of misdeeds. so why now and not then? well, i just got this feeling that perhaps these are reasonable people who have been supporting the administration by reflex for a long time but who've been privately getting more and more troubled. oh, not troubled enough to say anything out loud, maybe they felt some loyalty too, but uneasy. and finally, here's katrina--something simple and clear-cut enough to give them the cover they've been wanting, that will allow them to break with the home team. these breakdowns on tv--they're genuine, i think, and the things they're seeing are horrific enough in themselves to warrant that response--but i really wonder if there's this something else too, a terrific relief bursting forth of FINALLY being able to admit the fuck-up and get the hell over to the other side of the room. it feels like the infectious laughter of the crowd after the little boy points out the emperor's nakedness. only this crowd's not laughing.

Dispatch: Heroic Imp

Earlier today, my pal Heroic Imp sent me this chilling vision of the future I thought was worth sharing:

New Orleans has one of the world's greatest international ports, one of the largest in the nation, and it is a major focus of the city's economy. New Orleans is home to the corporate offices of oil companies with major offshore operations in the Gulf of Mexico, as well as the distribution and service centers of offshore equipment suppliers and fabricators.

The manufacturing industry is a significant part of the economy, with petroleum, petrochemical, shipbuilding, and aerospace industries all playing a role. The New Orleans region also functions as a mining, processing, and transportation center for other minerals, principally sulfur. Service industries are playing a larger role, with health care and telecommunications leading the way. The New Orleans region is widely regarded as a leading center of medicine and health care in the South.

The city was allowed to be destroyed, MARK THESE WORDS...it will be rebuilt, like Iraq, as a major "revitalized" oil refinery port. An all new "illuminated" oil town, afterall improved refineries, production, will "help our energy problems." Get us away from the dependency on foreign oil. Cheney is behind this. Halliburton, according to today's New York times, has just won the open "bidding" for the first round of re-building, $500 million to whet the taste buds.

Like Iraq it was destroyed to be rebuilt as an oil capital.

A Little Understanding, Please...

Aside from the very slight chances of a hurricane and a flood occurring coincidentally, planners had to identify and assign personnel according to their skills. It must be remembered:

--Every hurricane or flood is different. Some call for public-safety skills, boats and sandbagging, while others require clockmakers and paleontologists.

--The records had to be, by definition, antediluvian. [Def: "Bible. Occurring or belonging to the era before the Flood."]

--Hence, they were written in cuneiform. [Def: "Characters formed by the arrangement of small wedge-shaped elements, used in ancient Sumerian, Akkadian, Assyrian, Babylonian, and Persian."] Many of our cuneiform translators are currently on assignment overseas.

--Finally, we know from President Bush's own case, the Guard keeps its records in unmarked cartons, distributed at random locations throughout the country

Is the national guard stopping aid from getting in to New Orleans?

That's the word on indymedia.org and getyouracton.com.

One show-stopping excerpt:

Also heard that part of the reason our house flooded is they dynamited part of the levee after the first section broke - they did this to prevent Uptown (the rich part of town) from being flooded. Apparently they used too much dynamite, thus flooding part of the Bywater. So now I know who is responsible for flooding my house - not Katrina, but our government.

Donate to Habitat for Humanity

Help Hurricane Victims Rebuild Their Lives

The situation on the Gulf Coast is grave. Reports of devastation are staggering. Thousands of families are left homeless or with homes that are severely damaged.

Katrina was nothing short of catastrophic--especially for families in low-income housing and mobile home parks. In a disaster like this, families who were hanging on by a thread before the hurricane will sadly suffer the most in its aftermath.

They have lost so much. We must help them piece their lives back together.

Please respond without delay.

Click to donate by mail.

Help rebuild the lives of the victims of Hurricane Katrina, piece by piece, house by house. The sooner we know how much support we can count on from partners like you, the sooner we can get to work.

Make your online donation now.

What took so long

Can anyone verify the following assertions (from a mailing list I'm on)?

Halliburton hired for storm cleanup 01 Sep 2005:
The Navy has hired Houston-based Halliburton Co. to restore electric power, repair roofs and remove debris at three naval facilities in Mississippi damaged by Hurricane Katrina. Halliburton subsidiary KBR will also perform damage assessments at other naval installations in New Orleans as soon as it is safe to do so.

Halliburton gets contract to repair damage from Hurricane Katrina (HalliburtonWatch.org) 01 Sep 2005:
The US Navy asked Halliburton to repair naval facilities damaged by Hurricane Katrina, the Houston Chronicle reported today. The work was assigned to Halliburton's KBR subsidiary under the Navy's $500 million CONCAP contract awarded to KBR in 2001 and renewed in 2004. The repairs will take place in Louisiana and Mississippi.

Blackwater USA Joins Hurricane Katrina Relief Effort:
On September 1, 2005, Blackwater USA joined the ongoing relief effort in the Gulf Region devastated by Hurricane Katrina by dispatching a SA-330J Puma helicopter to help assist in evacuating citizens from flooded areas.... The following services are available: Airlift Services, Security Services, Communication Support, Crowd Control, Humanitarian Support, Services Logistics, and Transportation Services.

Have these people NO SHAME?

Peter

BTW, Mike ***** reports that Homeland Security FORBADE the Red Cross to enter New Orleans.

Government by photo-op

Is this really the best way to help the relief effort?

It goes to show how overwhelming things are here right now that I encountered the First Lady yesterday and I almost forgot to put it in this e-mail. It actually couldn't have been a worse experience; a team of us were working to put up a website with directions to every Red Cross shelter in the region when we were evicted from the computer room by the Secret Service.

There's only one room in the Cajundome with telephones and internet access for refugees, and Laura Bush shut it down for eight hours (along with the food service rooms to the side and the women's showers). You may have seen it on CNN; apparently seven refugees were allowed back so Laura could help them in front of the cameras. If you saw that footage, that's where I put in half my volunteer hours.

Not knowing Bush was still back there later I tried to insist on being allowed back into the room to a "Red Cross" guy who must have been a Secret Service agent undercover. A hint for future Secret Service agents: The real Red Cross guys don't look like they want to break your legs for walking too close to the barricade, because they're too busy passing out food and helping people. They're also less likely to use phrases like "Stand fast, sir!"

Now, I know this is the sort of thing that happens whenever a VIP tours a disaster site, and maybe Laura Bush handing out that loaf of bread really will lead to an increase in donations. All I can say is, to have paralyzed a third of a day of operations at this stage of the game, it fucking well better. And I tried to position myself to say this to her in front of the television cameras too, but instead I only got a wave and a smile as she hurried past me. Looks like I'm going to have to become nationally infamous another day.

FEMA Chief Brown: An Unqualified Success

Talking Points Memo on the qualifications of FEMA chief Michael Brown (aka "Brownie"):

The news out today about FEMA Director Michael Brown tells the ugly tale. So let's just review what we now know -- with key new details first from a diarist at DailyKos and now confirmed in more depth in this morning's Boston Herald.

Michael Brown is a lawyer and GOP party activist. Before he came to FEMA in 2001, he had a full-time job overseeing horse-shows as the commissioner of the International Arabian Horse Association. He started with them in 1991. But he was eventually fired because of what the Herald describes as "after a spate of lawsuits over alleged supervision failures." (The Kos diary has some more details.)

But the stars were shining on Brown because President Bush had just been elected. And he appointed his chief political fixer Joe Allbaugh to replace James Lee Witt as head of FEMA.

That was a good break for the recently-canned Brown, because, as we learn from the Herald, he and Allbaugh were college roommates. He hired Brown as his General Counsel at FEMA in February. And then, by the end of the year, he promoted him to Deputy Director.

Then, little more than a year later, Allbaugh left FEMA to set up New Bridge Strategies, a consultancy to cash in on the Iraqi contracts bonanza. On Allbaugh's departure from FEMA, Brown became Director, in charge of federal domestic emergency management in the United States.

So, just to recap, Brown had no experience whatsoever in emergency management. He was fired from his last job for incompetence. He was hired because he was the new director's college roommate. And after the director -- who himself got the job because he was a political fixer for the president -- left, he became top dog. And President Bush said yesterday that he thinks Brown is "doing a helluva job".

Sympathy for the FEMA

"In Louisiana's capital, Baton Rouge, the head of FEMA, Michael D. Brown said power outages, rising waters and violence by looters and others shooting at rescuers had complicated relief efforts." .-LA Times

How is FEMA supposed to function effectively under these kind of adverse conditions? Rising waters! Power outages! Looters! Who can be expected plan for that?

Let's please remember how proudly FEMA shines when they have good weather and well-functioning transportation and communications systems to work with.

Let's face it. This place is a disaster area!

Deep Thinker at the Helm

And they say his imagination is limited...

...in Air Force One. Turning to his aides, he said: "It's totally wiped out. ... It's devastating, it's got to be doubly devastating on the ground." (Newsweek)