Plastic Turkeys

The president now admits problems with the handling of the Katrina disaster.
He blames local and state agencies, making the plastic turkey that much more
indigestible.

"Why should we hear about body bags and deaths...? It's not relevant. So why should I waste my beautiful mind on something like that?" Barbara Bush

Perhaps "Mom" Bush's quote when asked about our troops dying in the Iraq war should have warned us George Bush's cavalier attitude wasn't just the result of being born with a silver spoon embedded in some bodily orifice. No, perhaps some of his callousness was gleaned from his parents during his formative years.

It's difficult to imagine Papa Bush is co-directing, along with Bill Clinton, flood aid efforts. It was Papa Bush who said after a 1989 U.S. shoot down of an Iranian airliner that killed all 290 of its passengers, "I will never apologize for the United States of America - I don't care what the facts are." How much easier the New Orleans' and gulf coast disaster must be to deal with for someone who feels no remorse for victims.

If we can appreciate his upbringing, perhaps we can better understand Bush's insouciance for the ravages of war and the wrath of Nature. It's all "plastic turkey" to him. His contrived concern manifests in front of staged backdrops. To appear tough he turns an aircraft carrier around and lands on its deck in a flight suit to announce his "Mission Accomplished". To show appreciation, he flies to Iraq to present the troops a plastic Thanksgiving turkey.

So it should not surprise us in the wake of the misery and death heaped upon Katrina's victims, our enhanced post-9/11 government agencies sit on their thumbs and, two days after the disaster struck, the president seizes the moment, cuts his vacation short and turns his attention to the decimated gulf.

Seated comfortably in Air Force One 1,700 feet above those dying below, Bush posed for the cameras and bemoaned, "It’s devastating. It’s got to be doubly devastating on the ground." A day or two later Bush toured the destruction.

Rest assured when I say this: the president or his Turd Blosom, Karl Rove, orchestrated the availability of two young Afro-American girls, survivors of the ravaging storm, for Bush to walk through the rubble with, arms around each. As he kissed one on the head with all the compassion of a plastic turkey, the memory of his post-9/11 embrace of the retired fireman atop the World Trade Center rubble reared its head.

Later, in a hangar before carefully arranged Coast Guard rescue helicopters, Bush reassured us once more. He was on top of it.

Then it was on to New Orleans where Bush this time spoke to us in front of a "repaired" levee that wasn't. Rescue helicopters were placed in stand down while the president overflew the dying in his. Meanwhile, hungry evacuees at a Red Cross shelter waited in line for a hot lunch gone cold. A lunch that wouldn't be served until Laura Bush finished and left. More plastic turkeys!

We should all be more than angered by thousands who have needlessly died for lack of government response while our president, FEMA and Homeland Agencies assured us everything that could be done, was. We should all be extremely pissed!

People suffering and dying in New Orleans are not victims so much as they are props on the stage of Bush's plastic offerings. For Bush, it's all photo op. Should those images of him reassuring us, "Help is on the way!" make us feel better? Hell no. They should scare the shit out of all of us.

The real American government has been gutted and its incompetence laid open for all to see. And not to just its citizens, but to people around the world. It's all plastic turkey, despite the president's best efforts to paint it differently with his staged photo ops.

Contemplate your fate should you become a victim of a national disaster or terrorist attack. Your chances for rescue may be enhanced if you are white and middle class, but know you could end up dying in the background of a Bush photo-op stage set. Thousands know the experience. They have "lived" it.

America's national symbol is not an eagle. It's a turkey. A huge plastic one.