Tuesday, September 06, 2005

Keith Olbermann's Blog - "The City of Louisiana"

I am admittedly a fan of Keith Olbermann. Going back to the Sportscenter days on ESPN, there's been something about his personality and sensibility that connected with me. Below is the transcript of an editorial given on his broadcast Monday night, September 5. The text comprises his current blog post.

I offer this not to ask you to agree or disagree, but to consider the larger questions of who we are, what we've become, and what can we do in our future to respond to crisis without hesitation or reservation - or above all things - spin.


SECAUCUS — Secretary of Homeland Security Michael Chertoff said it all, starting his news briefing Saturday afternoon: "Louisiana is a city that is largely underwater..."

Well there's your problem right there.

If ever a slip-of-the-tongue defined a government's response to a crisis, this was it.

The seeming definition of our time and our leaders had been their insistence on slashing federal budgets for projects that might’ve saved New Orleans. The seeming characterization of our government that it was on vacation when the city was lost, and could barely tear itself away from commemorating V.J. Day and watching Monty Python's Flying Circus, to at least pretend to get back to work. The seeming identification of these hapless bureaucrats: their pathetic use of the future tense in terms of relief they could’ve brought last Monday and Tuesday — like the President, whose statements have looked like they’re being transmitted to us by some kind of four-day tape-delay.

But no. The incompetence and the ludicrous prioritization will forever be symbolized by one gaffe by of the head of what is ironically called “The Department of Homeland Security”: “Louisiana is a city…”

Politician after politician — Republican and Democrat alike — has paraded before us, unwilling or unable to shut off the "I-Me" switch in their heads, condescendingly telling us about how moved they were or how devastated they were — congenitally incapable of telling the difference between the destruction of a city and the opening of a supermarket.

And as that sorry recital of self-absorption dragged on, I have resisted editorial comment. The focus needed to be on the efforts to save the stranded — even the internet's meager powers were correctly devoted to telling the stories of the twin disasters, natural... and government-made.

But now, at least, it is has stopped getting exponentially worse in Mississippi and Alabama and New Orleans and Louisiana (the state, not the city). And, having given our leaders what we know now is the week or so they need to get their act together, that period of editorial silence I mentioned, should come to an end.

No one is suggesting that mayors or governors in the afflicted areas, nor the federal government, should be able to stop hurricanes. Lord knows, no one is suggesting that we should ever prioritize levee improvement for a below-sea-level city, ahead of $454 million worth of trophy bridges for the politicians of Alaska.

But, nationally, these are leaders who won re-election last year largely by portraying their opponents as incapable of keeping the country safe. These are leaders who regularly pressure the news media in this country to report the reopening of a school or a power station in Iraq, and defies its citizens not to stand up and cheer. Yet they couldn't even keep one school or power station from being devastated by infrastructure collapse in New Orleans — even though the government had heard all the "chatter" from the scientists and city planners and hurricane centers and some group whose purposes the government couldn't quite discern... a group called The U.S. Army Corps of Engineers.

And most chillingly of all, this is the Law and Order and Terror government. It promised protection — or at least amelioration — against all threats: conventional, radiological, or biological.

It has just proved that it cannot save its citizens from a biological weapon called standing water.

Mr. Bush has now twice insisted that, "we are not satisfied," with the response to the manifold tragedies along the Gulf Coast. I wonder which "we" he thinks he's speaking for on this point. Perhaps it's the administration, although we still don't know where some of them are. Anybody seen the Vice President lately? The man whose message this time last year was, 'I'll Protect You, The Other Guy Will Let You Die'?

I don't know which 'we' Mr. Bush meant.

For many of this country's citizens, the mantra has been — as we were taught in Social Studies it should always be — whether or not I voted for this President — he is still my President. I suspect anybody who had to give him that benefit of the doubt stopped doing so last week. I suspect a lot of his supporters, looking ahead to '08, are wondering how they can distance themselves from the two words which will define his government — our government — "New Orleans."

For him, it is a shame — in all senses of the word. A few changes of pronouns in there, and he might not have looked so much like a 21st Century Marie Antoinette. All that was needed was just a quick "I'm not satisfied with my government's response." Instead of hiding behind phrases like "no one could have foreseen," had he only remembered Winston Churchill's quote from the 1930's. "The responsibility," of government, Churchill told the British Parliament "for the public safety is absolute and requires no mandate. It is in fact, the prime object for which governments come into existence."

In forgetting that, the current administration did not merely damage itself — it damaged our confidence in our ability to rely on whoever is in the White House.

As we emphasized to you here all last week, the realities of the region are such that New Orleans is going to be largely uninhabitable for a lot longer than anybody is yet willing to recognize. Lord knows when the last body will be found, or the last artifact of the levee break, dug up. Could be next March. Could be 2100. By then, in the muck and toxic mire of New Orleans, they may even find our government's credibility.

Somewhere, in the City of Louisiana.

2 comments:

Anonymous said...

Again, we find ourselves in an awful situation that we had no control over. (RE: 9/11) One that was anticipated, but nonetheless very overwhelming. Still, I haven't heard an answer about what the process really was/is or a better way to solve what went wrong, should this happen again in the future (and it will happen again). All I have heard is blame. And it is sad. Is this the America I live in? People who don’t have any answers, who don’t have the slightest inkling of what it is like to actually be responsible for human lives, blaming others. Death is the ultimate playing card and people are using the dead in New Orleans to push political agendas. I also see people using race and class to push political agendas. I see people dividing our country even further when race and class don’t make a difference here. These people are our brothers and sisters. I see them with nothing and it hurts. But, I also see Harry Connick, Jr. covering a naked man with his own shirt and putting him in an empty boat and taking him out of town. (An EMPTY boat, Sean.) That tells me that SOMEBODY gets it. Somebody understands that the town and its people are in need and it is going to take somebody getting out of the boat and helping people to dry ground. All this finger pointing and blame makes me so sad and only divides the country, the state, even our city of Memphis even further. Red state or blue state, whatever your political agenda, sex, race, sexual orientation, creed, religion, class - GET OUT OF THE BOAT AND HELP! We are America – doesn’t anybody see that? We have the answers if we would stop blaming and bitching about who did what wrong and when what should have been done… (And I like Keith, too – but he still adds to the confusion by pushing the bridge in Alaska over the levee improvements as an issue. Is it the fault of our friends in D.C. that the bridge was built or the fault of the elected few from LA that they didn’t make a strong enough case? And it’s not the standing water that the government can’t protect us from. It is the 150+mph wind that came with the 35 ft. swells that no one, Dem. Or Rep., can protect us from. Let the games begin…)

Where does the buck stop? I want to know where it begins. And I think it could begin at my doorstep… I am proud to be part of a church and a community that has extended the welcome mat. I am glad I have a chance to make a difference. I am glad I have a chance to practice what I believe. I am glad that I belong to a church that gives me that opportunity. I am glad that St. John’s is going to “get out of the boat” and help someone.

Anonymous said...

Excellent points, Chris. I seem to recall after 9/11 the focus was totally on rescue and recovery. We licked our wounds and made a future. Yes, there were inquiries and commissions, but they didn't start as our firefighters pulled people from the rubble.

I seem to even recall after 9/11 there were several "surprising" politicians standing on the steps of the capitol singing "God Bless America"... now they all sing "I'll Bless America"...

Interesting...

Rich
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