Published in September '09-An Ideology Responsible for the Katrina Debacle Deserves No Second Chances!

The response to Hurricane Katrina still matters and it is an act of moral cowardice to rationalize recent history for ideological reasons.
Should we be held responsible for our actions?

I know I am. As an everyday taxpayer/citizen/homeowner, if I assault someone or someone assaults me, there will certainly be legal and financial repercussions. Should I lie or slander someone there is damage to my credibility and quite possibly legal and financial repercussions to that as well. If I buy or partake of the wrong substance in the privacy of my own home, social conservatives have built a cruel invasive system where I stand to lose everything I've worked for. Should that happen, I will no doubt hear the word "responsibility" repeated ad nauseum as the State strips my possessions from me.

So shouldn't an ideology that is very pervasive in this country be held responsible for the harm it causes? Mind you that's an ideology, not a person. All of those who respond to criticism of the Executive Branch's actions for the past 8 years with "You just hate Bush!" please take note, I am not blaming Bush. I don't respect him and I never have. But I'm not hanging the Katrina response on him as much as I hang it on the shared ideology that got him appointed to the Presidency. He's just one man. And, in all fairness, I will readily admit that the sinister machinery he wielded is now the sinister machinery wielded by someone with a D behind his name.

But I don't wish to discuss that sinister machinery but the ideology that recently wielded it which caused us to ignore domestic problems at the expense of our money, our territory and our citizen's lives and properties. Mainly because if we are set to replay the 1990s and this ideology is empowered again, we can expect more of the same the next time it worms its way into power.

For the record, I have to groan every time I hear the rhetorical trick of using "Our Country" or "Our Homeland" or "Our Nation" when a speaker approves of the agenda and "The Feds" or "Big Government" when the same speaker disapproves of the agenda! It usually depends on whether advocates of whatever is being proposed have an R or a D next to their name. It's the same entity. And that entity may one day usurp our beloved Constitution regardless of whether an R or a D is in the Oval Office.

When FEMA was first launched, back in 1979 (that was Carter-he had a D behind his name), it was secretly dedicated to the COG (Continuance of Government) program not disaster recovery. There were and still are plans to exploit a disaster and ignore the Constitution that have been in effect since FEMA was formed. They were expanded in the 1980's (that was Reagan/Bush I-they had Rs behind their names) to usurp the order of succession ordered by the Constitution. And as a byproduct of this despicable power grab, FEMA was unable to deal with real emergencies when Hurricanes Hugo and Andrew hit.

But wait, doesn't this mean Big Government was the problem not the solution? Well, kind of. If FEMA was a sincere effort to deal with disasters and not a cover for the COG, that might be the case. In 1993, the Clinton Administration (They had a D behind their name) allocated resources away from the COG and towards actual disaster preparedness. I applaud that improvement. But the COG was not eliminated entirely! It was a short-lived transition.

FEMA was absorbed into the Dept of Homeland Security during 2002-2003(These folks had Rs behind their name). Because FEMA was considered a "Big Government" program, it was eligible to have its budget cut and funds for state disaster preparedness redirected to Israeli Security firms. Meryl Chartoff, wife of the future DHS chief was in charge of this.

And history repeated itself when Katrina hit. FEMA was unable to deal with the aftermath when 53 levee breaches left our fellow citizens helpless before rioters, rapists, thieves and feces soaked water.

I count that as ceding territory. I may be alone, but the "Nation" or the "Government" or whatever you want to call it was unable to help those people for about a week and a half. The 256th Infantry of the Louisiana National Guard was either in Iraq or had just been released from active duty after their tour in Iraq. The response to Hurricane Katrina was an inexcusable failure. And as much as it has Bush's ideological fingerprints all over it, it goes beyond that. All of those who share this ideology share the blame whether it's a D or R beside their name when they go on TV.

The Army Corp of Engineers had known since 1986 that those levees were vulnerable.

Are we supposed to believe that not one Congressional budget passed from 1986 to 2005 could have spared money to repair those levees? We could afford plenty of presents to the Pentagon, including two wars. And the main reason that money went where it went and didn't go where it was supposed to go was ideological.

Only someone blinded by ideology or avarice would think Israeli security trumped that of a US city. Only someone blinded by ideology or avarice would think that exploiting a catastrophe in order to seize power was a good thing. Only someone blinded by ideology or avarice would think that it was a valid use of the 256th Infantry of the Louisiana National Guard to station them in Baghdad instead of Louisiana where they were needed to insure the safety of our citizens and safety of our property and territory.

The Katrina response still matters. The same ideology responsible for it has regrouped, embraced McCarthyism and is set to repeat these fiascoes if they don't adjust their beliefs to reality.

If you are like me, you see that long-term solutions to these matters go beyond the D and the R beside politician's names. Until we see beyond that and hold these people and the ideologies they espouse responsible for the predictable consequences of their actions, the stage is set to repeat the Katrina debacle and/or something even worse, have someone exploit a disaster at the expense of our Constitution.

This could be a time for Republicans to reinvent themselves and give a chance for Ron Paul's brand of conservatism, but it's being squandered on an ideology that's turning into a mutation of McCarthyism. And Democrats should put pressure on Obama, and Reid and Pelosi to officially kill the unconstitutional COG program before the small group of zealots using the Republican Party regain power and it's too late. I'm not optimistic about that happeniing, but it's still the right thing to do.

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P.S. During the time it took between notes and a final draft of this piece, the pro-military spending pro-privatization ideology of the aforementioned zealots (I'm not going to insult Conservatives by labeling this Conservatism, I don't think that's accurate or fair) had another incredibly embarrassing incident hit the headlines. Private contractors in charge of Security in Kabul, Afghanistan were exposed hazing, demanding homosexual favors for choice assignments, and getting drunk while on duty. I can't act shocked because it's not like I respect them, but I can say with confidence that our soldiers could have done a better job securing our embassy with more transparency, more respect in the eyes of Afghanis we need to win over and more accountability!