Ben Stein has some words to say about Hurricane Katrina:
A few truths, for those who have ears and eyes and care to know the truth:He has a six more points and an update. Good stuff to remember as we listen to the all spin on the Mainstream Media...
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.
1. Duh. By the way, did you donate to the American Red Cross?
2. I don't remember anyone saying W CAUSED the hurricane.
3. I don't remember anyone saying W made the HURRICANE worse. As far
as the situation AFTER the hurricane, well. that remains to be seen if
anything could have been done better and faster.
4. There is no absolute evidence that proves anything, for or against.
To debate this issue right now is simply absurd.
5. Maybe there were some people who neglected the mandatory evacuation.
But others simply did not have the means to leave. Why is that so hard for
people to understand? Do you really believe that over 10,000 people decided
to stay home simply because they were confused or too stubborn? Did anyone
come to get the elderly in assisted living homes? NO! SEVERAL DROWNED IN
THEIR OWN ROOMS. They were the ones neglected.
6. No one said W made the gangs do anything. But he didn't do anything
to help secure the city to ensure that they wouldn't. So much for HOMELAND
SECURITY! I wonder how different the situation would be if terrorists blew
up sections of the levee system and pump stations.
7. No one called W a racist. What this tragedy has done is opened (I
hope) our eyes to our nation's GROWING problem of poverty and how it relates
to race and the elderly.
8. We all watched the swiftness of the response during the aftermath of
9/11 and the tsunami in December 2004. Now the world watches as America
falls extremely short of helping some of our most destitute civilians.
9. If this were true, then why are we pulling soldiers out of Iraq who
are native to Louisiana so they can help save their own city?
10. If it weren't for the media pressuring us for the truth, we would be
all oblivious to LIES spewed forth from W's mouth. This is the same
president would laughed and joked about not finding any WMDs in Iraq AFTER
hundreds of soldiers had already paid the ultimate price. I saw it with my
own eyes on CNN. Are you to tell me that it didn't happen?
11. No one is pinning effigies of W, but there will be a commission to
investigate what happened once our great city of New Orleans is well on its
wait to rebuilding and repair.
12. A lot more people would be better off.
13. Ben Stein failed to mention how much he donated to the American Red
Cross. And, so far, I haven't heard of any Ben Stein sightings in New
Orleans of him helping out with the rescue and breathing in the stench of
death and destruction.