I have heard a lot of self-serving Republican excuses for the failure of federal government response to Hurricane Katrina. Many of them start with the statement “No one could have foreseen…”
Pure defensive bullshit. There is nothing that has happened on the Gulf Coast or to New Orleans that was not foreseen!
Everyone knew there would be a big hurricane. Everyone knew that if it hit New Orleans the city was likely to flood and that evacuation would be difficult at best. The only thing no one knew was when.
Preparation for the hurricane was like insuring for death. Everyone dies, the only uncertainty is when. Hurricanes in the Gulf Coast are the same. The question is never if. It’s when.
An effective government would have had plans and supplies in place and would have tested them in exercises, then funded the needed command structure, prepositioned equipment and kept a list of available people and resources. These people have been winging it because none of this was done.
What we have seen is mostly a failure of planning and funding at the federal level, command structure, a lack of professionalism in FEMA, and a resulting lack of coordination and mutual support among the various federal, state, county/parish and local governments.
This federal government decided that they could gamble that no hurricane would hit – on their watch – so they could cut taxes and invade foreign countries the were no threat to us. Funding Hurricane preparation didn’t win the next election, so Rove ignored it. Funding Hurricane preparation took money away from Cheney’s unnecessary war. Bush himself delegates all work to whatever political supporter has contributed the most money and he is too lazy to waste energy evaluating the job his appointees do. Too busy being on vacation and riding his bike. Got to keep his life in balance, you know.
Bush/Rove/Cheney have given us very bad government. Ask the people on the Gulf Coast.
As a young Army officer I stayed up nights concerned that something would happen that I had not anticipated or prepared for. I assigned people to do tasks to accomplish the job of my unit, and they were each responsble to me for those tasks. But I was responsible for accomplishing the job given me from my commander. What had I overlooked? What was I unaware of? What if I had failed to anticipate something that had to be done to accomplish my mission? What did I not know?
As a commander I was responsible for the successful accomplishment of the jobs my unit was assigned, as well as for everything my troops did or failed to do. That means I was responsible for the unknown and unanticipated as well as what I was told to do. Ladies and gentlemen, that is what leadership is.
That’s what Harry Truman meant when he said “The Buck stops here.”
Bush hasn’t shown leadership.
Katrina: What a disaster! What a catastrophe! What an excuse!!!
Let’s see now. We can invade Venezuela or Iran. We can build emergency housing centers and then all we’ll have to do is put some fences around them and we’ll have detention centers. We’ll need them after we make it a crime to boo the president. We can privatize FEMA and cut taxes some more. We can force everyone to pray to Jesus this doesn’t happen again.
Oh, what fun!
Tell me how I can sharpen the message in this story.
This is the difference between Democrats and Republicans, modernists versus anti-modernists. That, I think, is the cultural battle being fought in America today.
I really think the key is to make both Democrats and progressives recognize that they are fighting for modernism, and that the enemy is reaction every element of modern (Enlightenment-inspired) life. They want to go back to a life that never existed and cannot be recreated. But they are willing to stop all efforts towards rational society and life in the name of “fundamentalism” Christianity (which is a heresy on real Christianity) and some strange form of Laissez faire economic ideology – a capitalist heresy on Liberalism.)
Good stuff. I started writing my post below when there were no comments here — so its nice to see we’re on the same wavelength regarding the ‘lite’ version of pre-processed theology (economic and religious) these folks follow.
How to sharpen it? Don’t know if I really have any good advice. But living in MN and seeing the Ventura Surprise, after seeing the budding (and failed) Perot factor, I can ramble in a general direction.
Who’s your audience?
Traditionally, its come down to:
Democrats: who haven’t articulated a clear vision for America since… FDR? As much as I really do admire Carter (good heart) and Clinton (good intentions), I believe they were both elected as reactions to bad Republican presidencies.. they were elected as “not the other guy”. I think Rove figured that out too, which is why its always been more important to discredit the Democratic candidate than espouse a ‘moderate, big tent’ message.
So, laundry lists of issues “clean air, yeah that’s good. And not-global warming. And not oil in ANWR, and be kind to animals, and pay poor people more, and …” are the Democrat’s version of a vision. Why? Hell if I know. Even if your pet issue is on the list, you never feel like they especially care or mean it, right — its just an item on a list.
But Dems are at heart a weird cross of idealism and pragmatism.
Republicans: They’ve been sold snake oil salvation. After decades now of hearing the govt at least mouth the beliefs they’ve come to hold dear (both religious and economic), as long as they have jobs and health care they have no reason to listen to anything you have to say.
They sure as hell aren’t going to want to hear they’ve been duped, or their beliefs are ridiculous. The Dems assume this means you can’t criticize them, or you have to parrot them. Rubbish.
The 3rd way: Ross and Jesse did something very simple — they said what everyone is thinking. Certain comics have made careers out of doing that. Its what attracts most Republicans to being Republican. Tell folks they’re right. If something doesn’t work the way people think it ought to, tell them you’ll fix it. Don’t patronize them and tell them they’re wrong. Just tell them how smart they are, and you can’t figure out why the existing politicians can’t see it too!
Jesse appealed to the idealist “live and let live” Democrats, the angry “govt is broken” Republicans, and the “politics is broken” independents. He didn’t do it by co-opting or parroting one of the existing choices. He did it mostly by mocking and ridiculing the pathetic main-party candidates.
So how do you use that to tell the fossilized “Reagan Democrats” and the easy-salvation Republicans they’ve swallowed a cheap and false theology/economics? Probably not head on.
Car salesmen generally won’t knock a competing car brand, even if you lead them a little. They won’t disagree with your criticisms, but they’ll seldom offer their own. They will note your criticisms and explain how their product is better, doesn’t share the same failings, or offers something the others don’t.
As commercialized as politics has become, maybe that’s not such a bad approach.
But how to sharpen your message? Depends on your intended audience.
I really think you have something here.
How do you run for office saying “Government works and I can do it better.”? Someone opposing you can always pull out a government failure to dicredit you with and clima to be able to to better.
The thing I see about Ross and the third way is that they don’t like the Republican positions, but refuse to move all the way to the Democratic positions. This is a real problem in a system of government set up to permit only two parties.
You describe the Republicans beautifuly. How do you break through that mindset?
So you have set the situation up very nicely. Now, how do we get decent government out of the current situation?
Keep going. We are getting somewhere.
So I’ll chime in too…
the third way…I was just talking with my mom about this over the weekend — any third party is going to have to lay out its positions as a mix between Green, Libertatiran and maybe even Socialist (without naming any of those, of course) — start with the audience that comprises people outside of the two party hardcore — those people who feel like they’ve been voting for the “least awful” all their lives (I count myself as one of those), also the diaffected who don’t vote, and the people who call themselves some sort of thrid party but are not religious about it — if you can reach that group of people, you have a majority — the hardcore base of demos and repubs have been weakened considerably in the past couple of decades.
Start with: government IS a bloated buerauracy, but that DOESN’T mean we drown it in the bathtub, that means we optimize it and make it do what it is intended to do effeciently, we demand accountability and comeptence and we have methods in place to easily trim the fat and the useless.
Govenment exisit for one purpose and one purpose only; to serve the people. Get rid, immediately of the idiotic idea of corporate personhood. Coporations are not persons.
PUBLIC (i.e., citizen audits) government accountability systems everywhere from local systems to the federal governement — citizen corps of auditors. Pull apart the OMB, the appropriation committees, etc. etc. piece by piece and make visible every freaking process there is — expose the system to the light of day. Then the people can decide if they are working for them.
Recall procedures in place for all elected officials — an election should be viewed as a CONTRACT with the people (if the politicians need it written down, so be it, let’s fucking write it down and make them sign it at their swearing in) — if that contract is broken, officeholders are liable. None of this bullshit that we have “an accountability moment” every four years and politicains run rampant in the meantime. No more. Every moment you spend in office drawing a paycheck from public funds is an accountability moment.
Outlaw lobbyists as they now exist. Put in place new communication systems so that every citizen has meaningful access to their representative — demand actual representation. (and since I am laying out my vision of the way things would work if I ran the world, anyone who is thinking of running for office, must live as the least of their consituents live for at least 6 months…)
Do away with party structures and machinations as they now exist — free up the system to accomodate thrid, fourth and fifth parties — give them all equal access to the media and events like debates.
While I’m at it, we must have public ownership of media or a least deconsolidation accross the board. Media would be held accountable as well.
Ok, that’s enough for now — I’m sure there is lots to argue with here … let’s hear it!
Thanks for starting this conversation.
Hey!
I crashed last night before I got to see you and Rick respond. I even broke my rule and tried to log in from work to respond, but ‘luckily’ I couldn’t remember my password.
I think you’re on to something with the 3rd party thinking. The one thing Jesse had going for him is he was only asking us to do stuff we already felt we should be doing. We need to balance budgets. That’s so simple, and its something we all do in our own lives, that its easily a ‘duh’ realization. Otherwise, he didn’t ask for any real sacrifice. He was going to crush lobbyists and their special-interests, stick up for the common man, and yada yada.
Now, he did succeed, in a competitive 3 way race. Then the other two parties (with the gleeful assistance of the press) crushed him. He was a neophyte, and made mistakes (not bush league, but the typical irrelevant embarrasing stuff — his son partying in the governors mansion, his wife preferring their normal home, his TV gigs, etc). And after he bowed out, his party folded as the citizens returned to their normal disillusioned state (and we got our Republican gov Pawlenty — the head Republican in the legislature that sabotaged Ventura by freezing him out of budget negotiations — fixing the budget shortfall “republican style” by borrowing).
So, what’s that mean to what you’ve written?
A 3rd party could work, but mostly as a refutation of the other two parties. So obviously, a Republican Lite approach won’t work (duh, thankfully). And both parties will do everything they can to destroy it (unless it caucuses with the Dems and thereby gives them power).
And it’ll need both a compelling story and a magnetic personality. Which means it’d have to be personal — which means the Republican smear machine will slay it with glee.
You’ve got the right theme tho
You’re right about the corporations, too. It’d be nice to give them rights/tax brackets/influence directly commensurate with the number of American Citizens they employ. In other words, politically they’d have to be represented just like unions are.
I like the accountability measures too — openness is good. But I also see where some things do need to remain secret from the public (weapon systems? Area 51? (j/k)). Still, how hard would it be to declare those sorts of things would have to be fully disclosed to say 10 members of each party, or some fair non-partisan or multi-partisan oversight.
I’m not as sure about the recall thing. Thinking on a local level, whenever our county commissioners have to address unpopular but right things like public restaurant smoking bans, the fringes love to bluster about revenge at the next election. Give them a recall, and it’ll become a threat on every unpopular vote. Imagine pushing through the civil rights legislation over the threat of recall. Yes, a President who royal messes up in year 5 of his term, or a Senator who Zell’s out 2 years into a 6 year term should face some intermediate checkpoint, but I see the potential for abuse and don’t know what to do about it.
Lobbyists have power because they can reward “public servants”. I’d love to get rid of them, but for every oil and tobacco asshole you’ve got a Planned Parenthood or teacher’s union lobbiest, too.
How about: You can never work for a corporation who operates a business you once dealt with as a public official. Or if that’s too harsh, no equity compensation (stock or considerations), and a cap on regular salary to 100% of the current salary for that position — but you forfeit any govt retirement / pension benefits. Basically, you can do the work, but you can’t ever get rich off of it.
I’m not sure if we need to get rid of the party structures. I think a new party could get a real far way using the original intent of those structures.
Its just bizarre to me that we need databases and technology to interact with voters and know what party they’re affiliated with. What happened to talking to each other?
But you’ve got a point, we could use technology to more directly interact with our reps. Why should they commision polls, for heavens sakes?
And on the media — right on! The media ownership rules seriously need to be reconsidered. A lot of the benefits of consolidation must be achievable through alliances or something. At least make a group of a dozen or so evil CEO’s agree to disagreeable crap, than letting one do it alone behind closed doors.
A little late, but I did want to respond!
I am glad to see you two excited, but I think I need to rain on your parade.
The Republican Party is just an adminstrative element in a larger institution that includes the foundations and instututes (which create, publicize and gets the public to accept conservative ideas) and the right-wing echo chamber (coordinated by, I think, Roger Aisles), much of it subsidized political journals like the American Standard. Tom DeLay and his Whip Blunt have operated the K-Street Project in which the money needed to fund all this flows in while the centrally controlled Republican House provides the legislation in exchange for the Lobbiest-directed money. All of this is coordinated by Karl Rove who directs the government to respond to supporters and provides a lot of the pork that keeps them in line. Ken Mehlman, head of the Republican National Committee is Rove’s protege, and he makes sure that the RNC coordinates with the other elements of the system.
No third party can compete in this national arena. Right now, even the Democrats can’t do it.
Jesse Ventura could win as governor because Minnesota is such a small state. A third party could not even make a dent in Texas, California or Florida. I’m not sure how New York works, but nationally they have essentially Republicans and Democrats.
Frankly, against this kind of centrally coordinated political structure, issues are irrelevant. All that counts is winning elections and gaining power. Surely you don’t think that there are very many intelligent Republicans who really believe all that guff about small government – no taxes, do you? Issues are tools to that machine, not a purpose.
Power matters first. Issues without power are irrelevent.
If you don’t already have the power, you are a supplicant hoping those with power will listen to you, and the Republicans listen only to those who buy the time to be heard. The oil companies have deep pockets and the environmnent is outside the money economy. Guess who they listen to?
Everything you said above requires power to change the institutional structures. Without the power to make the changes, we are stuck with what we have. That’s what the Republicans have, the Democrats forgot, and the Progressives seem never to accept. Idealism is important, but it has to be focused on what can be accomplished to do more than just hope to pass a spark of an idea to later generations. The goal for this generation has to be power and winning elections. Issues have to be secondary to winning.
Which is why the Democrats have to be reformed, not replaced.
as equally as pie-in-the-sky idealist, if not more so, as anything I or Yaright have written — but that’s just me. I wish you luck with your reform efforts, but my energies will be spent elsewhere….
Saying “we’re stuck with it and can’t change it” seems defeatist in the extreme.
And I don’t want to be supporting any organization who says “it’s all about winning and power” — if that’s all it is and will ever be about, then count me out, I’ll make my way elsewhere.
Please read what I wrote. I did NOT write that “it’s all about winning and power.” You have set up a false dichotomy of power versus ideals. What I wrote was that to put your ideals into effect you have to first get the power to do so.
I consider Mahatma Ghandi to be one of my heroes, but he did not consider himself to be a spiritual leader. He considered himself to be a politician.
Nor did I ever say “we are stuck with it and can’t change it.” I see the Democratic Party as very much in disarray and floundering. It WILL change. It’s just that no one right now knows what ways.
What I did say is that creating a new third party is guaranteed failure. A political party is just an administrative mechanism for dealing with elections. It is essential, but by itself no new party can compete with the conservative Republican machine. Teddy Roosevelt didn’t become President again when he created the Bullmoose Party. He just elected Woodrow Wilson.
Ross Perot did not shake up the political system. He was a reaction to dissatisfaction with Reagan/Bush, but the people he attracts, like you, refused to go over to the Democratic Party. That was the failure of the party.
Clinton may have been elected President, but the Democratic Party failed, and it has continued to fail. Clinton had to practice triangulation and play the DLC game because the Democrats were useless. But since he was President, the Democratic Party leaders didn’t see that.
The Supreme Court “steal” of the 2000 election and Nadar’s grandstanding allowed the Democrats to continue – as we used to say during the Viet Nam Era – “Diddy-bopping down the middle of the road fat, dumb and happy.” The inside the beltway boys still had excuses not to change their ways. Like alcoholics, they need to either hit rock bottom or die (politically) to learn. Maybe now that the lobbyists don’t return their phoned calls or hire them anymore maybe they are getting the message.
But the structure is still there. Same as for the Republicans after 1964. The Republicans were not a conservative party then, but the conservatives and religious right took over the structure and used it to batter the Democrats out of power nationally and in a number of states.
Anyone who is going to defeat the Republicans is going to have to do that same thing with the Democratic Party.
The dilemma I see is that too many Democrats still think that the Republicans are doing such a rotten job that all the Democrats have to do is let the Republicans destroy themselves and the voters will have to elect Democrats. Ross Perot and Ralph Nadar showed that the voters DON’T have to elect Democrats (except by accident), but they also showed that a third party in this country can’t be sustained.
So forgive me if I am unwilling to wait to go to heaven to get the power to see my ideals put back into government. I am looking for a practical, workable and reasonably quick way to replace the Republicans with someone who understands American political ideals and knows how to run a government. That means reform the Democrats.
Bush’s only discernable talent for the presidency seems to be delivering spontaneous one-liners and carefully prepared and canned speeches. That’s it.
The man has fierce loyalty to those who are loyal to him. Its a great defensive strategy — otherwise those same people might just say what’s really going on, and tank him. That’s his only ‘admirable’ personality trait.
Republican’s don’t like Govt. I don’t think they’ve exactly made that a secret. They do love business. I think they’ve been quite open about that as well.
This one came right out and said he’d run the country like a business. Damn, that sounded nice. Of course, the only companies that are run better than govt are:
If a business isn’t in one of those two categories, it will be bloated and inefficient, simply because there is no motivation for it not to be so. And that’s ignoring the simple fact that citizens aren’t just consumers and employees of Corporation USA, they’re really the damn stock-holders. Maximizing shareholder value isn’t about dollars and cents, its about accomplishments and obligations.
Hell, even Republicans if they were honest would remember during their “free market” blather that free markets supposedly work because competition forces them to be efficient. Because supply will rise to meet demand if other companies can enter the market. If there are barriers to collusion. If the demand is truly elastic (cars, clothing, electronics), and not fixed (water, electricity, medical care).
In other words, Republicans are typically as knowledgable and honest about “free markets” as Conservative Christians are about their watered down ‘riches are blessing by god himself’ Sunday-school theology. They know enough to make themselves happy, and not a drop more.
So what happens when you put a lousy ‘fast buck’ CEO in charge of a big hulking corporation with tons of legacy and fixed costs and no competition like the US Govt?
Answer: The Bush Presidency.
Unfortunately there’s plenty of bad Democratic government, too: Lousiana politics is a current example. “Elect the crook” should not be the Democratic slogan, as it was a few years ago there. And the “cloth coat Republicans” represented good populist government when the excesses of the Democratic machine elite were in full swing in places like Boston and NYC and Chicago.
So there are problems on both sides. I would frame the argument as “The need for good government” to allow for the rejection of bad governments of either flavor, whether the Bushites or the DLC-ites.
It is time America faced up to the fact that the Bush administration has failed us from the very start. The failures of the Bush administration to heed the warnings of 9/11, to capture bin Laden, to maintain America’s infrastructure (including the New Orleans levees) or to prepare for disaster when a category 5 hurricane is bearing down on our nation show just how incompetant this administration is. From the deficit to the lack of supplies for our troops to the lack of response to Katrina, the Bush administration has presided over nothing but a long string of failures. The media has by and large failed to report anything beyond the excuses and lies of the Bush administration. Why did it take something as horrific as the destruction of New Orleans for the media to wake up to the inadequacies of the Bush administration? It is long past time for us all to wake up and recognize that the Bush administration has failed America.