My apologies to those republicans who genuinely are upset or ashamed with the lack of responsiveness from this president and this administration. I would suggest that if you are truly upset that you open your mouth, go against your party and stand up and be counted for what is right. If you cannot do that, then you are shirking your responsibilities and what you were elected for. You were elected to represent your constituents, not your party at the cost of your very soul.
You must understand America; this is the Bush vision for our country. It is exactly what the Republican Party has fought for, for decades. Their vision is one of Darwinian logic. It is the politics of Natural Selection. In a game where they have all the tools of survival, and won't share them, they decide that the rules are survival of the fittest.
They are very good at packaging their policies and convincing you that you need their brand of politics. But if you look beyond the flash and their media machine, which lies to sell you their vision, you will see their policies for what they are. Regressive, mean-spirited, and Darwinian. You can look at something as simple as social security. All unbiased experts agree that there will be no shortage in this program until 2053 at the earliest, and then it will still be able to pay 80% of the benefits. This would mean that the additional 20% would have to come from the government, or the government could simply stop stealing money from the fund to begin with. Either way, the GOP tried their best to sell us on the dire state of social security and how it needed to be "reformed." Their notion for reformation, and I have confirmed this from people on the right, is to dismantle social security. You must understand that the true GOP does not believe the government should even run social security. All social service programs they feel should not be run by the government. This is what they are truly talking about when they speak about "limited government." The core of the republican philosophy is that the government should not provide ANY support to the people. Instead, they believe that responsibility should be at the individual level and those that cannot fend for themselves will either fall by the wayside, or have to rely on faith or community-based charities. I kid you not. I have spoken with very well-intended people on the right who genuinely believe that all of the have-nots in our society can have their needs met by charity, despite what the economic times are like. It is the difference between buying a homeless man a dinner and supporting a policy that would seek to find the man housing or employment. The republican mindset is the overture of the individual dinner is somehow more benevolent than supporting the policies or programs that would seek to assist with the problem.
The other side of the GOP Darwinian philosophy is the corporatization of the country. You see, they recognize that some of the services can still be provided for a profit, so they outsource these to companies that donate millions of dollars to their party. This is the recycling of money between the super-rich. Money is taken from the government that was being used to provide services to people who desperately need them. That money is given back to the rich either through tax breaks or to the companies they own to provide some of the services that were eliminated by the government. In turn, those companies donate portions of these monies directly to the candidates themselves, or to the media machine they operate, with the goal of convincing you that this is all somehow in your interest.
The most obvious poster child for these abuses is Halliburton. They have received countless millions of your money to rebuild Iraq after we have blown it up. They continue to receive these contracts with no competition even though massive fraud and over-billing of your money has been proven. People who have dared to speak out about these abuses have been silenced by the administration. You can see the same designs within other government areas. Bush has pushed the "Teen Screen" scam for some time now. Essentially, Bush uses the guise of wanting to psychiatrically screen children for their benefit, to then diagnose them with psychiatric conditions which require treatment. Those treatments are a billion dollar boon to the pharmaceutical companies, who then donate millions back to Bush and his party, as well as the think tanks that pose as independent agencies. Never mind that every one of the kids that committed atrocities in their high schools, were already on these medications. It is not truly about them, it is about creating a generation of kids hooked on these psychotropic drugs to the never ending profit of the pharmaceutical lobby.
How do we now see this playing out now in the south? An administration that does not care about social programs or services to the majority of this country, will react that way when a crisis attacks them. This hurricane did not come out of nowhere. The foundations of this problem stem from when they were planning to strengthen the city against the likelihood of a hurricane; Bush denied over 50 million dollars they needed because of a cost-risk analysis. The government decided to outsource the preparedness of the city against a hurricane and the company decided the cost of preparing for a category 5 hurricane, was prohibitive when compared to the risk of a category 5 actually hitting New Orleans. Thus they prepared only for a category 2 hurricane and saved Bush 50 million dollars, which was then shipped off to Halliburton to build permanent military bases in Iraq. Fast forward now to last week and everyone knew that a category 5 hurricane was bearing down on New Orleans. To the casual observer, it would seem the president apparently either did not know, or did not care because he chose to continue with his vacation while the hurricane steamed toward America. It has been revealed today that Louisiana asked for help in declaring a national disaster four days before Bush ended his vacation, so it appears he just did not care. Even after Katrina hit and was gone, and the levees broke, Bush continued his vacation, stopping off for a photo op to strum a guitar with a country music star. As people died in the south, our president continued his vacation.
Six days later what has been accomplished? Well, Bush did manage to award Halliburton with another contract, this one to assist with the aftermath of the hurricane. He also managed to ensure that people donating funds to assist have the option of sending their money to Pat Robertson. We have seen people herded like animals into areas that then the government will not let them leave from. As the dead bodies pile up, the well get sick and the sick start to die. No buses, no helicopters, no help. Darwin America, Darwin.
Eventually, someone advised the president that he really should say something to the country. He sat down with Diane Sawyer for 15 minutes where he did very little to assuage our concerns. There were two messages he clearly delivered. The first was, "don't blame me." He made this clear by pretending that anyone who has the temerity to question his mishandling of this disaster was "playing politics." The second message was "send me more of your money." He specifically said to not send clothing, food or medicine, but rather money. No thanks Mr. President; we have seen what you do with our money.
This is the politics of apathy. A woman who lost her son in the war is made to sit in a ditch because this president simply does not care. Thousands upon thousands of people are made to wait for a week, for the government to at least try to help them, as they die. This is beyond apathy America, it is Natural Selection. It is the culmination of a party whose vision for America is one where corporate profit is more important than life sustaining services. If you ask them honestly, they will tell you they truly do not believe the government should be employing programs or services to help people. Instead we should take the people's money and give it to corporate entities that do a cost-risk analysis to decide if people get to live or die.
When the cost-risk analysis comes home to roost and people do indeed start to die, the reaction tells you all you need to know. Seven days and counting as the bodies pile up. Seven days as America watches the republican vision for America unfold before their eyes. Seven days and the only message is don't blame me and send me more money. Natural Selection America, Natural Selection.
During his interview with Diane Sawyer, the president with the empty eyes to a barren soul said that we have the resources to both fight the war in Iraq, and sufficiently answer the call to the aftermath of Hurricane Katrina. Unfortunately, it appears that he only wants to answer one of those calls. Halliburton gets another contract worth millions of your tax dollars while Bush has his hand out for more of your money. Pat Robertson is listed as the number two charity to send money to on the FEMA website, while the republican vision for America is played out across the buried south of this nation. That is his vision and the vision of his party. Let's see who can swim. Those who can't are simply deselected.
