What I want to know is this.
Sep. 4th, 2005 01:48 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
kuangningOkay, fine, you think people's safety lies with local and state governments before federal. (Not true, by the way, since the Department of Homeland Security bears primary responsibility in the case of a large-scale disaster. It was one of the big reasons they pushed through that Department in the first place.) Okay, great, Red Cross is on the ground (aside from that little "ordered to stay out of the city" issue!) and they're in a better position to help, anyway, and it's hard to get around, to get into the areas that need it most.
It's worse than just a failure to act. When you start CPR as a bystander, you are required to continue until a qualified person arrives to relieve you, or until you cannot physically continue. To stop rescue breathing as soon as the witnesses walk away is to abandon a patient. It is more of a criminal act than to simply not begin helping in the first place. By going, by giving the appearance of help coming, he took on the responsibility to help even if it had not previously rested on his desk. And then he walked out on it when the cameras left. It's more than simply irresponsible, it is completely inhuman.
Worse even than that, Bush's visit delayed actual help while he posed for the cameras. During his visit, air traffic was halted, meaning deliveries of food and water, as well as search and rescue missions, were grounded. He obstructed critical aid in order to ... what, exactly? What more than staving off criticism and trying to shore up his plummeting approval rating, was he trying to accomplish with a fake feeding station? How many people died while he was faking sympathy? Did he think of that at all? Or were those lives acceptable casualties in the cause of regaining political ground?
Your President managed to make it in and stage an emergency feeding station and levee repairs for a photo opportunity, to make it look like he gave a damn. So why, while he was at it, couldn't he have had an actual feeding station set up there? Why not real repairs? Why?
At what point do people start to understand that this is a failure that goes all the way up, and that he's not allowed to stand aside and look pretty for the cameras, pretending his hands are clean? Anyone and everyone else headed into that area now is going with the intention of doing some real good, of lending a hand where they can. Why is it that the one person above all who should be rolling up his sleeves and making things happen flew in just to set up some shammery that dissolved as fast as he left?It's worse than just a failure to act. When you start CPR as a bystander, you are required to continue until a qualified person arrives to relieve you, or until you cannot physically continue. To stop rescue breathing as soon as the witnesses walk away is to abandon a patient. It is more of a criminal act than to simply not begin helping in the first place. By going, by giving the appearance of help coming, he took on the responsibility to help even if it had not previously rested on his desk. And then he walked out on it when the cameras left. It's more than simply irresponsible, it is completely inhuman.
Worse even than that, Bush's visit delayed actual help while he posed for the cameras. During his visit, air traffic was halted, meaning deliveries of food and water, as well as search and rescue missions, were grounded. He obstructed critical aid in order to ... what, exactly? What more than staving off criticism and trying to shore up his plummeting approval rating, was he trying to accomplish with a fake feeding station? How many people died while he was faking sympathy? Did he think of that at all? Or were those lives acceptable casualties in the cause of regaining political ground?
