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Get Off His Back (Updated)
By Ben Stein
Published 9/2/2005 11:59:59 PM
***UPDATED: Sunday, Sept. 4, 2005, 2:13 p.m.***

A few truths, for those who have ears and eyes and care to know the truth:

1.) The hurricane that hit New Orleans and Mississippi and Alabama was an astonishing tragedy. The suffering and loss of life and peace of mind of the residents of those areas is acutely horrifying.

2.) George Bush did not cause the hurricane. Hurricanes have been happening for eons. George Bush did not create them or unleash this one.

3.) George Bush did not make this one worse than others. There have been far worse hurricanes than this before George Bush was born.

4.) There is no overwhelming evidence that global warming exists as a man-made phenomenon. There is no clear-cut evidence that global warming even exists. There is no clear evidence that if it does exist it makes hurricanes more powerful or makes them aim at cities with large numbers of poor people. If global warming is a real phenomenon, which it may well be, it started long before George Bush was inaugurated, and would not have been affected at all by the Kyoto treaty, considering that Kyoto does not cover the world's worst polluters -- China, India, and Brazil. In a word, George Bush had zero to do with causing this hurricane. To speculate otherwise is belief in sorcery.

5.) George Bush had nothing to do with the hurricane contingency plans for New Orleans. Those are drawn up by New Orleans and Louisiana. In any event, the plans were perfectly good: mandatory evacuation. It is in no way at all George Bush's fault that about 20 percent of New Orleans neglected to follow the plan. It is not his fault that many persons in New Orleans were too confused to realize how dangerous the hurricane would be. They were certainly warned. It's not George Bush's fault that there were sick people and old people and people without cars in New Orleans. His job description does not include making sure every adult in America has a car, is in good health, has good sense, and is mobile.

6.) George Bush did not cause gangsters to shoot at rescue helicopters taking people from rooftops, did not make gang bangers rape young girls in the Superdome, did not make looters steal hundreds of weapons, in short make New Orleans into a living hell.

7.) George Bush is the least racist President in mind and soul there has ever been and this is shown in his appointments over and over. To say otherwise is scandalously untrue.

8.) George Bush is rushing every bit of help he can to New Orleans and Mississippi and Alabama as soon as he can. He is not a magician. It takes time to organize huge convoys of food and now they are starting to arrive. That they get in at all considering the lawlessness of the city is a miracle of bravery and organization.

9.) There is not the slightest evidence at all that the war in Iraq has diminished the response of the government to the emergency. To say otherwise is pure slander.

10.) If the energy the news media puts into blaming Bush for an Act of God worsened by stupendous incompetence by the New Orleans city authorities and the malevolence of the criminals of the city were directed to helping the morale of the nation, we would all be a lot better off.

11.) New Orleans is a great city with many great people. It will recover and be greater than ever. Sticking pins into an effigy of George Bush that does not resemble him in the slightest will not speed the process by one day.

12.) The entire episode is a dramatic lesson in the breathtaking callousness of government officials at the ground level. Imagine if Hillary Clinton had gotten her way and they were in charge of your health care.

God bless all of those dear people who are suffering so much, and God bless those helping them, starting with George Bush.

   

Ben Stein is a funny guy and his game show is very good. His political leanings are a tad biased to be sure. He firmly believes nixon was a great misunderstood humnaitarian who was framed. While I am not with those blindly blaming bush for all katrina's ills he is far from innocent and light-years removed from Ben Steins fawning admiration.

   

False. Mr. Stein commits a common fallacy as trying to convey his opinion as fact.

Other than that, a pretty good summation. I'm not going to blame George Bush, though I'm quite certain that when the post-mortem is conducted, few will escape blame.

   

Really?

Can you prove that the current warming of the climate is not a natural phenomenon and that human activity in North America and Western Europe and Japan caused the problem? And that pollution from China, India, Brazil, and the Third World is somehow unrelated to global warming since Kyoto does nothing to regulate their pollution?

Global warming is a figment of the anti-capitalist, anti-Western mind.

Have you noticed that mile-thick sheet of ice covering Canada lately? Neither have I. That's because the current global warming cycle that started 15,000 years ago has resulted in a warmer climate in the polar regions and countries like Canada are habitable because of it.

It started ages before we were born and there are now indications that the world may now be cooling.

Of course, the global warming fanatics say that the world is cooling because it is warming!

Poppycock.

   

And what's with the new avatar? You claiming me as your grandson?

   

It's amazing how (supposedly intelligent) Ben Stein can be so bold as to start off his rant with "A few truths", and then riddle it with so many argumentative fallacies.

(oh yeah, I'm supposed to add...)

Anyone who thinks otherwise is a baby killer.

   

Global warming theorists aren't much different from creationists. They have a faith, and they want to make it science because they 'know' it's morally true.

   

Ben, Ben. Ben. I used to love your show and respect you so much. Then you went and wrote this rot.

No, but it's Bush's job to man the appropriate agencies with competent people who know what they're actually supposed to be doing unlike the head of FEMA whose last entry on his CV was head of the Intl. Arabian Horse Assoc.



Yeah and all those thousands of scientists all over their world with their decades of data and maps and temprature charts have been using a magic 8-ball all these years.



Oh of course. Blame the victims. A Republican classic. 27% of New Orleaners couldn't afford cars or a ticket out of town. What were they supposed to do? Walk?



No, but it was the job of the incompetent head of FEMA (who Bush appointed) to ensure that Natl. Guard troops were reayd to secure the area in case the worst-case scenario happened, which it did.



How does he know? Can he read minds? Think about it: the same day black people are dying in New Orleans Bush is off playing guitar at a GOP fundraiser. What other conclusion do you think people would make?



So the 82nd ABN combat dropped on New Orleans Intenational Airport, and Special Forces teams were helicoptered into the city to support the police while Special Tactics Teams and pathfinders designated zones to drop supplies in? C-130's blanketed the skies with MRE flights? I guess it's too much to ask except for the fact that food and supplies were dropped in Indonesia the day after the Tsunami and that San Francisco was secured by the Natl. Guard by the end of the day after the 1906 earthquake, a time before trucks or radios.



So the 256th Brigade Combat Team is just extra soldiers? Half their gear is in Iraq and 4 out of 10 guardsmen from LA are in Iraq, but apparently that wasn't a problem.



I didn't know Jefferson Parrish had jurisdiction over the Army. Once this became a national emergency it became FEMA's problem. And does Stein want the MSM to sugarcoat the truth? A lot of people in positions of power fucked up mightily and need to be held accoutable for that. I have seen some of the best reporting from the US networks in the last 5 years in the last two weeks, but Ben wants happy stories. Dead people make him feel bad.



Yes it is. FEMA is grossly incompetent and has failed America. FEMA, not the locals, not the state, FEMA and DHS. They're supposed to protect Americans. They have not.

   

Bart, you first ask, "Can you prove that the current warming of the climate is not a natural phenomenon...", you later go on mention the lack of a sheet of ice covering Canada "because the current global warming cycle that started 15,000 years ago has resulted in a warmer climate." If these things you have said are not an admission to global warming, natural or otherwise, I don't know what is. How anti-capitalist and anti-western of you.

Anyways, in light of your not so subtle admission that global warming is occurring, don't you think the leaders of the richest nation on Earth should be leading the world in taking a more serious look at the problem and ensuring the safety of its citizens, infrastructure and wealth? Also, regardless of the global warming issue, should they not also be looking at curtailling ground level pollution and reversing the tide of asthma, allergies and other illnesses increased by the continued and worsening ground level pollution?

Where I live in Southern Ontario it is estimated that over 50% of air pollution comes from the American Midwest. Not from China, India or Brazil. Last I heard, Ontario was thinking of joining a lawsuit started by the New England states in an effort to curb 'out-of-state' pollutants coming into their states. How long is the American government going to allow big business and the energy sector to poison its citizens and it's neighbours?

An ounce of prevention is worth a few thousand tons of cure.

   

The Only Honorable Thing to Do

Dear President Bush:

This past week millions of Americans watched their fellow citizens suffer needlessly in the horrific cesspool that has become New Orleans. Reporters witnessed the death of Americans who could not get needed medicine for diabetes, asthma, heart attack, or liver and kidney failure. Elderly Americans as well as infants succumbed to dehydration, and countless others drowned to death waiting days for rescuers who never came. As civil order broke down, rapists and murderers are said to have brought terror to the thousands condemned to live in "safe" locations that had no electricity, no plumbing, no food, and no water.

You may not feel the burden yet, but these deaths and these tragedies are on your shoulders. The enabling legislation for the Department of Homeland Security is very clear: DHS shall coordinate the national response for major natural disasters, specifically through FEMA. The evidence is already conclusive that DHS and FEMA coordinated nothing for days and days while people died in New Orleans and elsewhere on the Gulf coast. The men responsible - Michael Chertoff and Michael Brown - have shown themselves woefully unfit to manage such a crisis, and consistently ill-informed throughout the past week about matters that the American public knew through print and television reporters.

Your staff and many Republican supporters will tell you that none of this is really your fault. The people of New Orleans were told to evacuate the city, and the mayor of New Orleans and governor of Louisiana were both unable to provide enough transportation for the evacuation or enough food and security for those left behind. But this is sophistry. Local officials will never have the resources to quickly evacuate a major American city, and they cannot summon up the rescue helicopters, hospital ships, emergency medical staff, or other support necessary to deal with a crisis that has long been predicted and feared. It is only the federal government which has the mandate and the capability to provide such resources.

No sir - there is no doubt that you and your administration are primarily culpable for the unnecessary deaths of hundreds and perhaps thousands of Americans. There are no words of comfort you can offer that will provide solace to the relatives of the dead. But while you cannot restore the dead or undo the suffering that your administration caused, you can resurrect a tradition that has long been absent from American politics - you can do that which is honorable and accept personal responsibility for these failures.

I know you have made it a personal point never to admit a mistake, and that you have felt this is a useful discipline for any politician. But you are not just any politician. As president you are responsible for the most fundamental pact between a government and the people - the agreement to provide security to the public in exchange for their obedience to the law. This pact was breached in New Orleans at terrible cost, and all for the lack of leadership and competence.

As our first-ever CEO president, the honorable thing for you to do, and for your Vice President as well (who was shamefully absent on vacation the entire week), is to do what any CEO would when faced with a significant loss on his watch - you should resign. A majority of Americans elected the two of you together as a ticket, and you should both accept responsibility for your failures.

Before you do this, you should ask for the resignations of both Mr. Chertoff and Mr. Brown.

It is quite unlikely that the present Congress would ever impeach and convict you and Mr. Cheney in order to remove you from office. But it is highly likely that your political effectiveness was washed away forever when water began pouring through the levees in New Orleans. It is a disserve to the nation for both of you to remain in office for the next three and a half years, unable to provide any leadership to America because you no longer have the trust of the people. It is a far better thing, and the honorable thing to do, to resign and allow the Speaker of the House to take over the leadership of the federal government. I have no particular fondness for the recent statements by the speaker regarding bulldozing New Orleans - they show an acute lack of sensitivity to the trauma taking place in that city, and the role New Orleans has played in American culture and the economy. Nor do I know how capable he would be as president, but I do know what the Constitution requires in these circumstances, and that all Americans must abide by the Constitution.

Honor is the most precious asset any man must maintain in both life and politics. It is the basis of all political credibility and the fundamental quality by which a man is judged. You have dishonored your office and yourself by allowing this grievous tragedy to befall America, and you must know there is only one way to atone, and one way only to restore your personal honor.

As difficult as this is to do, is it not better to live the rest of your life knowing you did the honorable thing by acknowledging your failure, rather than walking numbly through the rest of your presidency and retiring to a life of shame and opprobrium? You can salvage some degree of self-respect by resigning now. In so doing, you bring honor to yourself and respect to the many who died as a result of your misjudgments and failure to act.

   

It is not FEMA's job.

Look, I know you're a leftist and committed to not thinking about anything that deviates from the party plan, but FEMA does not provide aid in emergencies. They have no supplies, they have no equipment. They only exist to coordinate those agencies that do.

Did they do a good job? I can't say because I don't have access to every action they took and when they took it.

Regardless, responsibility for response is with the state governments. No asinine ranting from your side will change that.

Proof? Mississippi was able to repond. Louisiana was not.

If the problem was FEMA, then BOTH states would have been unable to respond.

   

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