I have always liked Ben Stein. I think I'd have some fun conversations with him, were I to run into him with us both having some time to blow. :)

I'm just sick of the blaming-Bush that seems to happen with every bad thing. I don't seem to recall this /ever/ happening with any other President, and it's gotten... just, well, old.

He may not be perfect. He may not be able to speak sentences without mangling words. But dammitall, he's doing the job he was given in a purely Presidential fashion... hampered by government as every President is.

This does not mean he is doing everything right... but ye gads, it's gotten old.

Martin has a really good theory that, especially in Fark, EVERYTHING will eventually be blamed on GWB by someone. Somewhere someone deeply believes that George Bush is the reason someone ran over their foot last week...

You know, as much as I personally dislike Bush as President, at the same time it urks me that, like you said, there are people who sincerely believe he was the reason their foot got run over last week.

I don't like him or what he stands for, but that doesn't mean he's behind everything from Hurricane Katrina to your aunt Mabel's gangrenous toe. GWB doesn't have any power whatsoever over nature, and the blithering idiots who try to insist that he somehow made this happen or made it worse or what-the-hell-ever sicken me as much as their opposition. (IE, extremists of any nature are equally as irritating and ridiculous, regardless of whose 'side' I'm on.)

The thing is, GWB had little to do with the way things were handled in New Orleans. There are people assigned to all manner of offices who are responsible for that. Sure, he puts those people there, and sure, he gives the go-ahead, but the President isn't Fate. He isn't responsible for every single individual and every single decision that's made while he's in Office. I wish people would get it through their thick skulls that scapegoating by any other name is just as stoopid. They're blaming him because he's the figurehead, but they're not actually looking to the real problem. They're just hating on the most convenient target, and it sucks.

Maybe if people would concentrate on where the problems really started, rather than gnashing teeth and taking swipes at whoever makes the best mark (or gets the most laughs at a party), things would actually get done and disasters like what's happening in New Orleans wouldn't happen in the first place.

Yeah, trying to find out what went wrong so you can fix it is a good thing, but if you just glom onto the reason you like most and not REALLY look at the problem, you'll never solve it. Those who don't study history (even recent history) are comdemned to repeat it. I understand hating someone to the point where you want everything to be their fault (*cough*michaelmoore*cough) but to finger point to the exclusion of solving anything is just dangerous in cases like this.....

It's very dangerous because, as you said: the history thing. What are we going to learn if we just go OMG HURRICANE! WHAT WILL THAT BUSH FELLOW DO NEXT?! I mean, we all have people we love to hate. If it were up to me, I'd blame the hurricane on the Hanson brothers, but you know what? It's clearly as much their fault as it is GWB's or Michael Moore's.

Nobody controls the weather, at least to my knowledge, and so nobody is to blame for the hurricane itself. The aftermath is the product of a state and country ill-prepared for such a catastrophe. So when are people going to remove their GWB hatesticks from their arses and address the PROBLEM... which is the fact that nobody knows what to do in a situation like this because this sort of thing doesn't happen often enough for us to have a set protocol! That's the only way things are going to get done.

Scapegoating is like the opposite of hero-worship, and equally damaging. In one case, a person blames someone who isn't as bad as they imagine, while in the other, the person admires someone who isn't as great as they imagine. Either way, we're not focusing on the event but on the person that we think deserves credit for it. Humans are capable of so much more than that; it makes me sad to think that perfectly rational human beings can be so easily swept away by either of those things.

It's all so cult of personality, even in reverse. I blame the media. And as for the katrina problem, I also blame the mayor...

Yeah, the mayor played a huge part in it as well, because there was so much more he could have done. But once again, the country, state, and individual cities didn't really know what they were doing. There were safety measures in place for a level 3 hurricane, and Katrina was a 4. It would have taken a decade to get level 4 precautions in place, and then what would have happened it Kat had been a level 5?

Humans will never triumph over nature, we just have to learn how to work around her. I mean, the people who built up New Orleans into the huge city she is are partly to blame for this mess because they built her on wetlands! Land that is below water level and very much accustomed to being wet and swampy! Truth be told, New Orleans never should have expanded past the French Quarter, but it did. And this is what happened when Nature said "Bitch PLEASE."

So yeah, there are a lot of people to blame, and GWB and Michael Moore and the Hanson sisters and the media all play their part, but their parts are so miniscule that it doesn't do anyone any good to point any fingers at them. All this energy that's going into pointing fingers could be used to move those fingers and help the people who are dying, and solve the problem at hand, figure out if any more safety measures could have been put into place and actually put them there, etc. Worrying and blaming and all that shite are as effective as, to quote a famous speech, 'chewing bubble gum to solve an algebra equation'.

Who cares who's fault it is?! Figure that out later. For now, just get those people fresh water and shelter and figure out what to do with all the people who are now homeless and jobless and pretty much shit-outta-luck. The time for finding out where the system went wrong will come, but that time isn't now. For now, people should be thinking more about what, if anything, they can do to help, rather than why this happened or whose fault it is, y'know?

(Sorry, I'm being ranty tonight. :O)

Well put. And ranty is way better than no one commenting at all ^_^

I'm just always so glad that we can agree despite our core beliefs being so different. It's freaking great. Well, core belifs as far as stuff like this is concerned... politics and whatnot. But then, I'm not very political in the first place...

My point is, it's great that I can rant on your journal and not be blocked harder than a 2x4 to the back of the head.

(PS. I absolutely adore that icon. :3)

Yeah, to me that's the mark of a smart person and a good friend, to have completely different beliefs and not argue ^_^ And the icon is up for grabs, you know...

I agree! I mean, debating is one thing, arguing is another, and fighting a third thing entirely. I love debating, and arguing can be fun (though it can also be harmful), but when one of the other two turns into a fight, it really upsets me. Because people are allowed to have differences of opinion, and there's nothing wrong with that! But it seems that too many people are so stuck in their ways that they can't possibly allow someone to disagree with them and still be friends with that person. To them, I say "Phooey"!

And... I already stole the icon. ._. ♥ And credited appropriately, of course. (I love that maggie has an iharthdarth Friends Only banner~♥)

Oh, that's cute, I'd never seen that!

On the liberal-infested news and politics board I frequent for some reason, I told them that the reactions to this crisis are a symptom of America's underlying disease- people who have deluded themselves, or have been deluded, into honestly, sincerely believing that the federal government can prevent any calamity from befalling the populace, and instantly make everything better should one slip by.

I'm always amazed by that belief, that the government should fix every single problem. Don't people realize that if they give away the responsibility for all the negatives in their life that they give away their freedoms as well?

Could GWB and Michael Moore be the same person?

(They've never been in the same room...)

(Admittedly, he'd hvae to be a kinda glutton for punishment...)

',

Wow, that's a heck of an idea. Someone ought to write a scifi story where he IS the same person and the way between the two personas he played the world like a fiddle....

You told Martin, right?

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Yeah, but he seemed less jazzed than I was....

You know, I've been thinking about this topic a whole lot lately. I agree with everything ladypixelsaid in her comment.

The last few days, I've read of people basically blaming President Bush for the hurricane itself, since he did not stay in that treaty to help prevent global warming.

If people want somebody to blame - blame the mayor. Local governments are MUCH more responsible for disaster response/prevention than the federal government is.

An article that I think is really great and goes into detail about the situation in New Orleans is here if you're interested.

Thanks SO much for the link, reposting it, it's very educational.

Oh and I read the article just now after commenting - I love it. Snagging and posting =)

I feel really sorry for GWB sometimes. Think of the number of disasters he's had to deal with in all this time. Even without the war, he's had 9-11 and Katrina. Not a lot of Presidents have this much shit to deal with. Even if I disagreed with more he did I sure as hell wouldn't envy the poor bastard, especially with 85% of the media blaming him for everything.

I love you for this. Seriously.

I love you for your icon ^_^

yay for love!