09.01.05

Seeing pictures of the storm damage is humbling and bizarre. I've spent a lot of time crying. I haven't been through devastation like Katrina. I can't truly know the hell and sorrow that they're going through.

I've got friends there. And there are friends of friends there. Every person there has someone who loves them and is worried about them. I fear for the final toll. My heart aches for relatives and friends who are waiting for news.

The closest I've come to disaster is decades of snow storms, blizzards, and hurricanes--along with the failing infrastructure of DC. I've filled buckets and bathtubs with water when city water went bad, been snowed in for a week, helped friends put up plywood over windows and bag sand, and climbed over mountains of garbage in NYC in the 70s. I've crunched crack vials under my boots. Called the cops and no one showed up. I know that what I've experienced is piss-ant compared to what Louisianans, Mississippians, Floridians, and Alabamans are going through.

The Shrub's delayed response is puzzling. I wonder how often he's going to liken the Gulf's natural disaster to 9/11/2001 as he makes his imperial progress through the city. I wonder how many layers of protection will keep the emperor from realizing that he's got no clothes.

How can this child of privilege understand what's really going on? I can't do it. How could he? This president who refused to talk to one dead soldier's mother is going to cope with an entire region wrecked by storms? How? How is he going to do it? I doubt that he's up to the task.

I hope that I am wrong. I hope that he'll rally and bring in the support that's needed. That he'll show a compassionate, human face to us.

I ain't bankin' on it.

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