THE DOG DID NOT EAT GEORGE’S HOMEWORK, BUT, IF IT DID, IT’S REALLY THE FAULT OF HILLARY AND THE MEDIA
Ben Stein is a piece of human redundancy who wrote speeches for Richard Nixon, a novel about Quaaludes, did a bit of acting, and then hosted a quiz show. He also lives in LA and will be crying like a baby for FEMA and rescue when the next 7.4 hits us. Here, from The American Spectator, he does us a favor in 12-step tabulating all the standard arguments that will be used by Bush supporters and rightwing gum-flappers in the coming days, so we can all anticipate the mind-boggling bullshit in store. Over to the wholly ludicrous Ben Stein...

"A few truths, for those who have ears and eyes and care to know the truth:
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.
7.) George Bush is the least racist President in mind and soul there has ever been and this is shown in his appointments over and over. To say otherwise is scandalously untrue.
8.) George Bush is rushing every bit of help he can to New Orleans and Mississippi and Alabama as soon as he can. He is not a magician. It takes time to organize huge convoys of food and now they are starting to arrive. That they get in at all considering the lawlessness of the city is a miracle of bravery and organization.
9.) There is not the slightest evidence at all that the war in Iraq has diminished the response of the government to the emergency. To say otherwise is pure slander.
10.) If the energy the news media puts into blaming Bush for an Act of God worsened by stupendous incompetence by the New Orleans city authorities and the malevolence of the criminals of the city were directed to helping the morale of the nation, we would all be a lot better off.
11.) New Orleans is a great city with many great people. It will recover and be greater than ever. Sticking pins into an effigy of George Bush that does not resemble him in the slightest will not speed the process by one day.
12.) The entire episode is a dramatic lesson in the breathtaking callousness of government officials at the ground level. Imagine if Hillary Clinton had gotten her way and they were in charge of your health care.God bless all of those dear people who are suffering so much, and God bless those helping them, starting with George Bush."

Below is something of a rebuttal from Michael Moore, although I really don’t think it’s worth bothering to debate the Stein doctrine. If someone starts spouting this crap at you, and is within easy reach, my best advice is to simply punch them hard between the eyes and be done with. If violence, even in the face of extreme provocation, cannot be considered an option for moral, religious, health, or gender reasons, simply and clearly enunciate the words "Shut the fuck up you abject cretin" and spit in their drink. Here’s Michael Moore...

"There is much to be said and done about the manmade annihilation of New Orleans, caused NOT by a hurricane but by the very specific decisions made by the Bush administration in the past four and a half years. Do not listen to anyone who says we can discuss all this later. No, we can't. Our country is in an immediate state of vulnerability. More hurricanes and other disasters are on the way, and a lazy bunch of self-satisfied lunatics are still running the show."

The secret word is Abdicate

CRYPTIQUE – The threat level is stuck on stupid.

FALANGIST FUNNIES
For a long time I have wished people would stop using the word conservative when they mean neo-Nazi psychopaths. The lethal debacle on the Gulf Coast does, however, seem to be separating the sheep from the gauleiters. The Katrina deathtoll has even moved the pitbull Robert Novak to question Bush competence in today’s edition of his syndicated column...

"The common complaint is that the president has let the lawyers take over. Chertoff, a former federal judge and assistant attorney general, is a quintessential lawyer who has surrounded himself at Homeland Security with more lawyers. Michael D. Brown, who as head of the Federal Emergency Management Agency is Chertoff's subordinate, is also a lawyer. Neither Chertoff nor Brown was experienced in politics or large-scale management before joining the Bush administration."

Unfortunately Novak doesn’t go on to say the Bush seems fucking incapable of appointing any public officials except by the criteria of graft, cronyism, and deliberate incompetence when put in charge of stuff the necons don’t like – as in FEMA and anything to do with peace or poor people. But it is major turnround. Out on the fringes, though, it’s rabid storm trooping as usual like this clip sent over by some girl by some character called Michael Calderon at David Horowitz's Frontpage Magazine. I guess this is what passes for humor among fascists...

"Expect heavily armed and infuriated conservatives to launch a cleansing war against the traitors. The armed will mow down the mostly unarmed segments, especially those elements that devoted 40-plus years to anti-American hatred to destroy this country. Should the likes of Noam Chomsky, Howard Zinn, Michael Parenti, Michael Moore, Ward Churchill, Dennis Raimondo [sic], et al. act out their sedition ... expect their bodies to be found shot full of holes ... Leftist professors will be strung up. It will be every man, woman, and child for themselves."

The secret word is Heil

A LETTER TO BOB
Dear Bob,
What is this shit, man? I went along the Victoria’s Secret TV commercial because I’m a guy and I understand. And I’ve stood up for the pencil moustache when friends said it made you look like a Jivaro shrunken head of Vincent Price, and I really did enjoy Masked and Anonymous, but, fuck it, did you have to sell The Times They Are A’Changing to Kaiser Permanente – a fucking HMO, and the reason why, in America, you stay healthy or die? Do I really have to come over and piss on your grave after I’m through with Mick & Pete.
As always,
Mick

WHEN I FIND MYSELF QUOTING CHURCHILL TWICE IN 24 HOURS, I KNOW WE’RE IN TROUBLE
"The responsibility of government for the public safety is absolute and requires no mandate. It is in fact, the prime object for which governments come into existence." – Winston Spencer Churchill

Spin that at your peril, Coulter, Hannity, Malkin, Limbaugh, and the rest of fawning Bush lackeys. Your boy deserves nothing but disgusted contempt. His phoney authority died in the course of last week, somewhere in Jefferson Parish, so shut the fuck up. You only dishonor the dead.

Some girl just sent over a perfect example of how the mainstream is finally getting it, and the cry is not just from a bunch of old veteran freaks...
http://www.latimes.com/business/la-fi-golden5sep05,0,6258105.column

Also from Bob Herbert in the NY Times...
"Like a boy being prepped for a second crack at a failed exam, Mr. Bush has been meeting with his handlers to see what steps can be taken to minimize the political fallout from this latest demonstration of his ineptitude. But this is not about politics. It's about competence. And when the president is so obviously clueless about matters so obviously important, it means that the rest of us, like the people left stranded in New Orleans, are in deep, deep trouble."

I WOULD DRAW THE PRESIDENT'S ATTENTIONN TO THE THREE "R’s" WHICH MAY BE HIS ONLY REMAINING OPTIONS...
Repentance
Resignation
or failing those...
Revolution

None of these words is a secret.

WINSTON CHURCHILL CALLED IT THE BLACK DOG. THE MOMENT OF BLEAK AND WEARY DEPRESSION WHEN IT SEEMS AS THOUGH THE FIGHT IS ENDLESS. SELF-SATISFIED STUPIDITY REIGNS, LOYAL OPPOSITION IS WHOLLY INEFFECTUAL, AND THE DEAD BODIES PILE UP IN MOUNDS. IT HAS RAINED UNTIL SEPTEMBER AND I AM ANOTHER DAY OLDER AND DEEPER IN DEBT. LIKE THE SONGS SAYS, "I COULD SLEEP FOR A THOUSAND YEARS."

BUT TOMORROW IS ANOTHER SCARLET-O’-HARA, FUCKING DAY, AND THE FACT HAS TO BE FACED THAT, AFTER FIVE YEARS OF THIS ADMINISTRATION, AND FIVE YEARS OF THEIR SO-CALLED NEW AMERICAN CENTURY, THE NUCLEAR SUPERPOWER IS AN OUT-OF-CONTROL SHAMBLES. THE BASTARDS HAVE TO GO. AS IN GO NOW. THE CHILDREN MUST BE EVICTED FROM THE NURSERY, THEY CANNOT BE TRUSTED WITH THE TOYS. THE ONLY PERMISSIBLE DEBATE IS OVER THE MANNER OF THEIR DEPARTURE, FOR GO THEY MUST. THE WORLD WILL NOT SURVIVE THREE MORE YEARS OF THIS IDIOCY.

BEYOND ALL EXCUSE OR REASON 1.
The Chicago Tribune reports that the U.S.S. Bataan, "equipped with six operating rooms, hundreds of hospital beds and the ability to produce 100,000 gallons of fresh water a day," has been sitting off the Gulf Coast since last Monday - "without patients."

More to follow...

The secret word is Aghast

THANK GOD FOR WONKETTE
"We have it on good authority that Christopher Hitchens is preparing a ten-point litany explaining why conditions on the grounds in New Orleans are much better than you think." http://www.wonkette.com/

ANNE RICE
Over the years, I have, now and then, been unkind to Anne Rice. Those of us in the vampire business can take on all the bitchiness of a wolf pack at times. In today’s NY Time, though, she contributed an Op Ed piece that seemed to clarify some of the reasons I was finding myself becoming so angrily obsessive about the disaster.
http://www.nytimes.com/2005/09/04/opinion/04rice.html?incamp=article_popular

FRESH LINKS
From guys running a blog from a building in downtown NO, which may tell more than any of the increasingly confused news channels.
http://mgno.com/

And an example (despite all the disingenuous explanations) of the probably unconscious spin that placed on even a small thing like a picture caption.
http://www.snopes.com/photos/katrina/looters.asp

PLUS
This just in from LK in Paris...UPDATE: Good God. Laura Rozen passes along the following report from a Dutch reader:There was a striking dicrepancy between the CNN International report on the Bush visit to the New Orleans disaster zone, yesterday, and reports of the same event by German TV.ZDF News reported that the president's visit was a completely staged event. Their crew witnessed how the open air food distribution point Bush visited in front of the cameras was torn down immediately after the president and the herd of 'news people' had left and that others which were allegedly being set up were abandoned at the same time.