The End of an Era

Tonight is our last night at 130 Holly Court. The Whisman Bruisers Varsity Yoga team is disbanding. We've dreamed up rock bands and book clubs, food free dinner parties, croquet tourneys, escandalos, and mathematical constants in this sliver of suburbia. Jung, Dave and I hosted guests from across the nation--exalted principals, mincing Republicans, babies, toddlers, and school aged children. We lost our lunch money to CKE in poker and we're still waiting for Shani to pick up her sleeping bag. Road weary commuters have slept on our couches and Joyce left her shampoo here. Kat knew where to house her all wheel drive safely and securely. Things happened at Whisman. We saved the universe, for the second time, in two days flat. "My name is Jason. What's your name again?"

At 130 Holly skipping, singing, and dance dance revolution were the rule rather than the exception.

Dave's at the hospital, saving lives or perhaps sleeping and Jung and I just did our final walk through. We lit candles and walked from room to room solemnly singing, "Loving you, is easy 'cause you're beautiful." We lit the fire place for the first time since the great toiletry melting of 2004. It's over. We're moving on.

3.14159265358979323846264338327950288419716939937510....dammit Dave!!! You can't just keep going on your own!

Happy Birthday Donna Jean!!!

Today, well actually yesterday because it's after midnight, is my friend Donna's birthday. She's really something special. She remembers everyone's birthday, even the kids she knew back in elementary school at St. Isaac Jode's (I don't think I spelled that quite right, but hey, I didn't go to elementary there.) Anywho, ("anywho"--I picked up that word from Donna back in grad school at Ohio State.) Donna's the bomb diggity. Happy birthday to ya! I hope you got my voice mail--Jung Dave and I were singing and skipping in Target today just for you!

Raider Nation

Jung, Dave and I just got back from a long day in the Raider Nation. The Raiders took on the Kansas City Chiefs and we took on drinking copious amounts in the parking lot before the game. The tailgating was easily the highlight of the day--we grilled coconut shrimp skewers and pineapple slices and made cocktails out of root beer and Skyy Vanilla. We aspire to the level of citizenship of neighboring gaitors--one guy had on a Raiders chef hat and apron and was cooking an extensive meal for 20 on a propane grill. A 14-piece band was playing a couple of rows over. Good times were had by all. I think the Raiders lost.

A quick comment for Mr. Cheney...

One man speaks for many and tells the Veep to go fuck himself.

Aaron Broussard indicts FEMA

I've seen snippets of the Jefferson Parrish president replayed on CNN, but not the entire clip. Watch it here:

http://www.BradBlog.com/archives/00001798.htm

From the paper of record

A Can't-Do Government

By PAUL KRUGMAN

Published: September 2, 2005

I couldn't have said it better myself. It's exactly what we get when the right wing cuts taxes and dismantles government. Bastards.

Kanye West on the Hurricane Relief Concert...

Live TV kicks ass. Kanye West just said, and I quote, "George Bush doesn't care about black people."

He had a script and a teleprompter and Mike Myers standing next to him looking puzzled but after a brief tirade that was clearly improvised, but he quickly honed in on the truth. It was like he couldn't help himself. He just blurted it out: "George Bush doesn't care about black people."

They cut to Chris Tucker backstage, long enough to get Kanye and Mike un-mic'd and away from the camera. A few minutes of Aaron Neville swinging sweetly and then a quick fade back to the tragic photos, soothing yet urgent voice over, and Hallmark music.

You'll have to watch this online, because as NBC rebroadcasts the concert, they leave in the initial tirade, but display a full screen "Concert for Hurricane Relief" logo and gentle harmonics over Kanye's declaration that "George Bush doesn't care about black people."

Watch the unedited version here.

I gotta go buy his new record.

Michael Moore's open letter to Bush

Read the whole thing here.

It ends like this:

No, Mr. Bush, you just stay the course. It's not your fault that 30 percent of New Orleans lives in poverty or that tens of thousands had no transportation to get out of town. C'mon, they're black! I mean, it's not like this happened to Kennebunkport. Can you imagine leaving white people on their roofs for five days? Don't make me laugh! Race has nothing -- NOTHING -- to do with this!

You hang in there, Mr. Bush. Just try to find a few of our Army helicopters and send them there. Pretend the people of New Orleans and the Gulf Coast are near Tikrit.

Yours,

Michael Moore
MMFlint@aol.com
www.MichaelMoore.com

Listen to the Mayor of New Orleans

This is from early Friday morning. The federal response to this disaster has been shameful.

Mayor Ray Nagin lashed out at federal officials, telling George Bush and Governor Blanco to "get off your asses and let's do something, and let's fix the the biggest god damn crisis in the history of this country."

"Keep the animals at bay"

Some bastard on CNN just said, and I quote:

"It was like lighting a fire in the wild, to keep the animals at bay."

He was describing what happened as night fell in New Orleans and they turned on all the lights on their news truck. A man had offered to pay him $30 for a gallon of gasoline so he could get his family out of the city.

What the fuck??

How the hell have news trucks been able to move about the city to utter racist bullshit like that? Why not scoop some of those people up and take them somewhere? Because they are afraid of "the animals?"

A reporter just asked Laura Bush, who is far more articulate than her husband by the way, what the world thinks about the fact that poor blacks were left behind as others were able to flee before the storm. She said, "That's what happens. The poor are the most vulnerable to natural disasters." At least she's honest. Emergency planners in New Orleans gaming "Hurricane Pam" last year estimated that 112,000 people in the city of about a half million don't have cars. That's about 20% of the city. They knew that these people, poor and mostly black, would be unable to evacuate the city in the case of an emergency evacuation. That's what happened. The poor were left to fend for themselves.

Laura just referred to her husband as "The President." I wonder if when she's at home, she says, "Mr. President, could you please pass the salt?"

...we've got to get to Wolf Blitzer in the situation room.

Sydney Blumenthal on BBC World Today

Hey folks,

I was dropping Jung off at the airport and happened to hear former Clinton aid Sydney Blumenthal on the BBC program The World Today. (The September 2nd 06:00 GMT program.) He described a list put together after 9/11 describing the biggest threats to the US. They were:

1. Another terrorist attack on New York City
2. A major earthquake in the Bay Area
3. Flooding of New Orleans due to a hurricane

The threat of hurricane and the threat of a levee breach were widely known by the appropriate government agencies and had been widely reported in the press. The Times-Picuyne, now delivered only online as its presses are under water, apparently did a series of stories about the scope of the threat a while back. But dear Mr. Bush said this morning on ABC that no one could have anticipated the breach of the levee. Idiot.

Blumenthal reported that funds that were earmarked for the Army Corp of Engineers, ostensibly to study and repair levees around New Orleans, were directed to the war efforts in Iraq. I'll post the audio as soon as I can get it. In the mean time, read this article by Blumenthal in a German newspaper:

"A year ago the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers proposed to study how New Orleans could be protected from a catastrophic hurricane, but the Bush administration ordered that the research not be undertaken. After a flood killed six people in 1995, Congress created the Southeast Louisiana Urban Flood Control Project, in which the Corps of Engineers strengthened and renovated levees and pumping stations. In early 2001, the Federal Emergency Management Agency issued a report stating that a hurricane striking New Orleans was one of the three most likely disasters in the U.S., including a terrorist attack on New York City. But by 2003 the federal funding for the flood control project essentially dried up as it was drained into the Iraq war. In 2004, the Bush administration cut funding requested by the New Orleans district of the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers for holding back the waters of Lake Pontchartrain by more than 80 percent. Additional cuts at the beginning of this year (for a total reduction in funding of 44.2 percent since 2001) forced the New Orleans district of the Corps to impose a hiring freeze. The Senate had debated adding funds for fixing New Orleans' levees, but it was too late."

black folks = looting

white folks = eating

This is so fucked up.