Strange fruit, bloating in the levees
Just as we’ve learned about the profound head-in-the-sand behavior of the Bush team towards terror warnings before 9-11, it’s now apparent that they also did not respond to Katrina reports when the levees broke and flooding was obvious.
It’s not much news to know that the Bushies lied about this one, too.
For a guy who bills himself as a compassionate conservative, the history of his compassion towards the hardest hit Gulf Coast states is fragile thin. From various sources, ranging from 2001 to December 2005, the following list provides a snapshot of the hardest hit victims mostly before Katrina hit them.
Country’s worst schools:
#49) Louisiana
#50) Mississippi
Country’s lowest median incomes:
#48) Louisiana
#51) Mississippi
Country’s highest unemployment rates:
#47: Louisiana, 6.4%
#51: Mississippi, 9.9%
Country’s highest poverty rates:
#48) Louisiana, 16.7%
#49) Mississippi, 17.1%
States with worst overall health:
#50) Louisiana
#51) Mississippi
States with the worst record of fatal car accidents:
#51) Louisiana
States with the highest risk of heart disease:
#51) Mississippi
States with the worst murder rates:
#49) Mississippi, 9.3 per 100,000 residents
#51) Louisiana, 13.0 per 100,000 residents
And, from a federal study conducted in the late 1980s-early 1990s, here’s where the literacy rate stood:
#50) Louisiana, 28% Level 1 Illiterate
#51) Missssissippi, 30% Level 1 Illiterate
Level 1 : ranges from those completely unable to read to those who can’t fill out a social security card application, can’t write a letter, and can’t read a medicine bottle’s instructions.
Level 2: up to 8th grade reading and comprehension level.
Counting level 1 and 2, both states’ rates were about 70% illiterate.
But let’s be fair. This sordid record can’t be placed in Bush’s lap alone. It’s a record of conservative racism with the benign neglect of both Republicans and conservative Southern Democrats at the root of those very profound levels of misery.
Bush’s immediate response to Katrina and his failure to follow through on his reconstruction pledge are simply the most visible reminders of a grand old boy tradition.
We lost more American lives in that hurricane than were lost in 9-11. And Communist Cuba, which bore the same brunt of that awesome storm, lost just one life to it.
9-11 changed everything? Why didn’t Katrina change anything? When conservatives are more concerned about the threat of funeral orators than they are with 4,000 dead of the neglect, poor planning, buckpassing and falsehoods of public officials, then nothing has changed to support the claim that the state of the union is strong.
The state of the union remains questionable, the advance of civil rights remains insufficient and the legion of self-appointed prophets proclaiming Katrina as a divine payback remains as responsible as any slaveholder for the deadly result of racism, classism and capitalism without conscience.
Remember August 30th. Make it count for something. Make it the armistice that ends the bloated bodies and other miseries of the old theocracy that continues to justify its crimes against humanity.
Pledge your life to that and we’ll regain the chance to save the union. Ignore the lesson of August 30th and you might as well kiss America goodbye.
February 10th, 2006 at 11:53 am
God made Mississippi in an attempt to make Alabama look better…..
February 10th, 2006 at 1:24 pm
“Conservative” southern Demoncrats…WTF???
Do you mean the same Dixiecrats that became the BACKBONE of the GOP in ‘72—Nixon’s ’silent’ majority!!!
The “new” world order somehow sounds like an *Arbiet Macht Frei* refrain to me
February 10th, 2006 at 8:28 pm
I had WAY too much to say about this post, so I posted it here. Wonderful work, Kevin.
February 24th, 2006 at 2:05 am
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