Monday, September 26, 2005
Could We Start Again, Please...?
Is there a reset button? A do-over? Can we quit this level and go back to the previous one and play it again right? Did the earth fall into some Y2K glitch that no one expected, and everything has been a nightmare from the evening of December 31st 1999 onward? (Yes, I'm a purist who knows the big M didn't begin until 2001, but everything went to shit in a shoebox during 2000, so the error must have happened before then).
Just look at what's going on, and marvel at the mess we've fallen into...
Because of lies that led to a war in the Middle East (and ripped resources from a perhaps valid war in Afghanistan, so that that former struggle has lost both limelight and reason), we were not able to help the people of Louisiana and Mississippi during the worst natural disaster of the last hundred years. Aid from the federal government is not forthcoming, although they can drop the president into a photo-op in a completely evacuated city...
We were able to evacuate several million (white) people (sort of) in advance of another hurricane, but oops, it turned out to be not so bad. Until the media finally took a look at it again and, oops, it was that bad, but not until several news cycles later. Meanwhile, the president tries to raise funds for victims of Hurricane Katrina, and pulls in a whopping... six hundred dollars.
And two hurricanes out of a season that's already made it through seventeen storms with over two months left have shown the world something I'm sure our administration would love to hide -- we are woefully, terribly, totally unprepared for any sort of large-scale terrorist attack. We can't even evacuate out cities with warning, nor save them after.
Why? Because the money is elsewhere, the resources are elsewhere, the National Guard is elsewhere. And the president is always elsewhere, fundraising in San Diego or vacationing in Crawford; the vice president is god-knows-where, but probably always within phone's reach of Halliburton.
So... all those airport screeners, FBI snooping at bookstores, intrusive searches and rules and paranoia and bullshit, amount to nothing. You are not safer today than you were on September 10th, 2001. You are not safer today than you were after March 20th, 2003. You are not safe at all because the assholes in power have failed at every single turn. Every single turn. They have wasted our resources and our military on nothing, and mother nature has shown them to be the fools that they are.
Natural disasters are random, unpredictable and unpreventable. All we can do is batton down the hatches or clean up the mess. Terrorist attacks are non-random, predictable and preventable. In fact, as more evidence comes to light, it seems that 9/11 was quite preventable, if only something had been done about the information gleaned beforehand. It was almost as if someone wanted it to happen...
Is there a reset button? A do-over? Can we quit this level and go back to the previous one and play it again right?
Can we do what must be done now, get rid of the pack of jokers in power, clean house, start again? Can we convince our Senate and Congress to do their damn jobs, grow some balls, and kick out the branch of government that has failed us so miserably?
Can we do it before the People decide to do it themselves, and give Dubya and company the George III/Louis XVI treatment? I hope it doesn't go that far, because things got pretty ugly when the people were running things after the French Revolution. Sure, they went pretty right after the American Revolution -- but we don't have the advantage of a Jefferson, Washington and Franklin around now.
Is there a reset button? A do-over? Can we awake from this long national nightmare and become the greatest country on earth again, or have we been dragged the way of Rome in the early 1st Century, courtesy of Caligula and pals?
Can we quit this level and go back to the previous one and play it again right?
Just look at what's going on, and marvel at the mess we've fallen into...
Because of lies that led to a war in the Middle East (and ripped resources from a perhaps valid war in Afghanistan, so that that former struggle has lost both limelight and reason), we were not able to help the people of Louisiana and Mississippi during the worst natural disaster of the last hundred years. Aid from the federal government is not forthcoming, although they can drop the president into a photo-op in a completely evacuated city...
We were able to evacuate several million (white) people (sort of) in advance of another hurricane, but oops, it turned out to be not so bad. Until the media finally took a look at it again and, oops, it was that bad, but not until several news cycles later. Meanwhile, the president tries to raise funds for victims of Hurricane Katrina, and pulls in a whopping... six hundred dollars.
And two hurricanes out of a season that's already made it through seventeen storms with over two months left have shown the world something I'm sure our administration would love to hide -- we are woefully, terribly, totally unprepared for any sort of large-scale terrorist attack. We can't even evacuate out cities with warning, nor save them after.
Why? Because the money is elsewhere, the resources are elsewhere, the National Guard is elsewhere. And the president is always elsewhere, fundraising in San Diego or vacationing in Crawford; the vice president is god-knows-where, but probably always within phone's reach of Halliburton.
So... all those airport screeners, FBI snooping at bookstores, intrusive searches and rules and paranoia and bullshit, amount to nothing. You are not safer today than you were on September 10th, 2001. You are not safer today than you were after March 20th, 2003. You are not safe at all because the assholes in power have failed at every single turn. Every single turn. They have wasted our resources and our military on nothing, and mother nature has shown them to be the fools that they are.
Natural disasters are random, unpredictable and unpreventable. All we can do is batton down the hatches or clean up the mess. Terrorist attacks are non-random, predictable and preventable. In fact, as more evidence comes to light, it seems that 9/11 was quite preventable, if only something had been done about the information gleaned beforehand. It was almost as if someone wanted it to happen...
Is there a reset button? A do-over? Can we quit this level and go back to the previous one and play it again right?
Can we do what must be done now, get rid of the pack of jokers in power, clean house, start again? Can we convince our Senate and Congress to do their damn jobs, grow some balls, and kick out the branch of government that has failed us so miserably?
Can we do it before the People decide to do it themselves, and give Dubya and company the George III/Louis XVI treatment? I hope it doesn't go that far, because things got pretty ugly when the people were running things after the French Revolution. Sure, they went pretty right after the American Revolution -- but we don't have the advantage of a Jefferson, Washington and Franklin around now.
Is there a reset button? A do-over? Can we awake from this long national nightmare and become the greatest country on earth again, or have we been dragged the way of Rome in the early 1st Century, courtesy of Caligula and pals?
Can we quit this level and go back to the previous one and play it again right?
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