In case the arrogance of the Bush elite and their cronies isn’t clear — Republicans are actually presenting the fact that Bush’s advisers were attending a wedding in Greece and Condi Rice was watching Spamalot and buying Ferragamo shoes as excuses — here’s the former First Lady of this nation, being interviewed on TV after touring the evacuee centers in Houston:

In a segment at the top of the show on the surge of evacuees to the Texas city, Barbara Bush said: “Almost everyone I’ve talked to says we’re going to move to Houston.”

Then she added: “What I’m hearing which is sort of scary is they all want to stay in Texas. Everyone is so overwhelmed by the hospitality.

“And so many of the people in the arena here, you know, were underprivileged anyway, so this — this (she chuckles slightly) is working very well for them.”

I mean, this is just unbelievable. I don’t think even Imelda Marcos ever said anything so crass (okay, she probably has).

As a former student said today, “the smoke is clearing” — that the Bush aristocracy’s relentless war on the poor, whether in the form of tax cuts, or as cannon fodder, is slowly being revealed.

“The Aristocrats” also happens to be the title of a hilarious documentary about the filthiest joke in the world, the unfunny punch line being “The Aristocrats!” But now the joke’s over: guess who was screwing and shitting on and pissing on the poor all along?

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Just to put some of Kanye West’s comments in context:

We already realize a lot of the people that could help are at war right now, fighting another way.

From the St. Louis-Dispatch (reprinted in the San Luis Obispo Tribune, via Daily Kos):

Currently, members of the Guard and Reserves make up four of every 10 military personnel in Iraq. It’s the largest long-term deployment of the nation’s reserves in 50 years. And their casualties reflect that.

Men and women who just months ago held jobs such as truck driver, accountant and teacher now make up nearly one of every four servicemen and women being killed in the war.

…

In no state have those deaths registered more than in Louisiana. Louisiana, along with New York, has lost more guardsmen and reservists — 23 as of July 24 — than any state in the nation, and all but one of those deaths have come in the last eight months.

And posted August 1, from ABC News 26 in New Orleans:

When members of the Louisiana National Guard left for Iraq in October, they took a lot [of] equipment with them. Dozens of high water vehicles, humvees, refuelers and generators are now abroad, and in the event of a major natural disaster that, could be a problem.

“The National Guard needs that equipment back home to support the homeland security mission,” said Lt. Colonel Pete Schneider with the LA National Guard.

Col. Schneider says the state has enough equipment to get by, and if Louisiana were to get hit by a major hurricane, the neighboring states of Mississippi, Alabama and Florida have all agreed to help.

Kanye again:

And now they’ve given them permission to go down and shoot us.

You just have to love this Brigadier-General Gary Jones, who clearly knows how to talk to the press:

“This place is going to look like Little Somalia,” Brig. Gen. Gary Jones, commander of the Louisiana National Guard’s Joint Task Force told Army Times Friday as hundreds of armed troops under his charge prepared to launch a massive citywide security mission from a staging area outside the Louisiana Superdome. “We’re going to go out and take this city back. This will be a combat operation to get this city under control.”

They were, after all, given “shoot-to-kill” orders.

[Update: More on Bush's tour of New Orleans as a massive photo opportunity. There's also a link to the apparently now-infamous Geraldo Rivera / Shepard Smith video where they lose it on air on Fox News -- yes, on Fox News.]

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In “recent years:”

In recent years, Bush repeatedly sought to slice the Army Corps of Engineers’ funding requests to improve the levees holding back Lake Pontchartrain, which Katrina smashed through, flooding New Orleans. In 2005, Bush asked for $3.9 million, a small fraction of the request the corps made in internal administration deliberations. Under pressure from Congress, Bush ultimately agreed to spend $5.7 million. Since coming to office, Bush has essentially frozen spending on the Corps of Engineers, which is responsible for protecting the coastlines, waterways and other areas susceptible to natural disaster, at around $4.7 billion.

Wednesday:

On his way to Washington, Bush had Air Force One fly low over the hurricane-ravaged area. His plane flew over New Orleans at about 2,500, and it descended even further, to about 1,700 feet, over Mississippi. Bush surveyed the damage from a couch near the left front of the plane.

The plane flew over New Orleans and saw the Superdome, downtown areas and outlying neighborhoods, then traveled along the coast to Mobile before turning north toward Washington.

White House spokesman Scott McClellan quoted Bush as saying, “It’s devastating, it’s got to be doubly devastating on the ground.” Among other things, the president saw an amusement park with the tops of wrecked rides protruding over bridges covered by water.

Today:

We’ve got a lot of rebuilding to do. First, we’re going to save lives and stabilize the situation. And then we’re going to help these communities rebuild. The good news is — and it’s hard for some to see it now — that out of this chaos is going to come a fantastic Gulf Coast, like it was before. Out of the rubbles of Trent Lott’s house — he’s lost his entire house — there’s going to be a fantastic house. And I’m looking forward to sitting on the porch. (Laughter.)

You all have heard, I hope, the 15-minute interview with the mayor of New Orleans — as damning a condemnation from a public official as anything I’ve heard recently. It’s on the New York Times website, in the Multimedia sidebar. (There’s a transcript here, but the audio interview drives the point better — it’s uncensored, for starters.)

(I should have taken a screen clipping of how the webpage originally looked — it was to the right of another sidebar that had Bush’s photo on it with the caption, “‘Hang in there,’ he told refugees.”)

But folks, all criticisms above aside — anything will help: 1500 blogs (now 1501) are participating in Blog Relief Days. There’s more information at Instapundit’s roundup page and the TTLB Katrina Relief page. I recommend the American Red Cross, and, if you want log your contribution here.

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From the Waco Tribune:

“But whether it be here or in Washington or anywhere else, there’s somebody who has got something to say to the president, that’s part of the job,” Bush said on the ranch. “And I think it’s important for me to be thoughtful and sensitive to those who have got something to say.”

“But,” he added, “I think it’s also important for me to go on with my life, to keep a balanced life.”

And so he does:

In addition to the two-hour bike ride, Bush’s Saturday schedule included an evening Little League Baseball playoff game, a lunch meeting with Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice, a nap, some fishing and some reading.

Asked Jon Stewart: “How did reading sneak in there?”

(And if you haven’t yet read Cindy Sheehan’s moving essay, go check it out.)

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Thought I should make a direct link to the Homeland Security Racism report from the CFFSC here. In addition, there is a working paper by Dylan Rodriguez on the Bagong Diwa Prison Massacre — more information on the Collective website.

I was going to write snarky comments like these:

I also wanted to draw my readers’ attention to the comment left here and how it succinctly, if perhaps unwittingly, summarizes “imperialist” logic. The report linked above makes the argument, among others, that the American empire’s military and mercantilist practices overseas are mirrored in its domestic surveillance methods — at least, as manifested in the PATRIOT Act, control over subjects perceived as threats, particularly in the form of incarceration and deportation.

The blog comments — which I’ll reductively rephrase as “If you don’t like it here, leave” — exemplify the Bush administration’s increasingly invidious attempts to stifle dissent and criticism. Unfortunately, sir, Filipinos are already being deported in worrying numbers, so your hopes about America-haters just might come true. Lucky you.

The majority of the people who signed the letter are American citizens, and so “going home” to the Philippines isn’t literally correct — but I, not an “America-hater,” felt personally stung, since I am one of those people that is a “mere” immigrant to this country and could indeed, all practicalities aside (but there are many), return to the Philippines.

(This was the same kind of tactic the Marcos regime used to (arguably) effectively discredit its Filipino opposition — both its conservative and radical left components — overseas.)

I’ll have to mull this over for a lengthier response.

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