Critics fiddle as Gulf Coast drowns
Boston Herald ^ | September 1, 2005 | Editorial
It must be nice for Robert F. Kennedy Jr. to have a dry, air-conditioned office in which to pen a navel-gazing think piece blaming Republicans for the devastation wrought by Hurricane Katrina.
As dead bodies floated in the flood waters of Louisiana and Mississippi and tens of thousands of people sat in humid shelters wondering how to piece their lives back together – or just hoping for a drink of water – Kennedy saw an opportunity to wax eloquent about . . . global warming.
And the environmental activist took it one shameful step further – blaming Mississippi Gov. Haley Barbour and his views on global warming for, essentially, bringing the hurricane down on his own people.
This from Kennedy, on a memo the Republican Barbour wrote to President Bush questioning the Kyoto protocol:
``In 1998, Republican icon Pat Robertson warned that hurricanes were likely to hit communities that offended God,'' Kennedy wrote. ``Perhaps it was Barbour's memo that caused Katrina, at the last moment, to spare New Orleans and save its worst flailings for the Mississippi coast.''
Kennedy's screed was posted on a Web site Monday. Let's hope that like the rest of us, he had yet to realize the full force of Katrina – the dozens of deaths, the billions in damage, the survivors left in utter, unspeakable despair.
But as insensitive and opportunistic as his piece was, Kennedy isn't the only one to see in Katrina an opportunity to sharpen his sword for a political duel.
An opinion piece in Tuesday's Boston Globe echoes Kennedy's hand-wringing over the (disputed) role of global warming in strengthening hurricanes.
After dubbing Katrina ``Nature's Revenge'' on Tuesday, The New York Times backtracked yesterday, calling it the ``wrong moment to dwell on fault-finding.'' Still, they managed a cheap shot at President Bush, noting that it took Katrina to ``pry (him) out of his vacation.''
Meanwhile, the media echo chamber is reverberating with talk of whether and when (criticism implied) the president should tour the affected area. He'll get there, folks. Think they should find a place to land the plane, first?
The recovery from Katrina will take years, and there will be plenty of time for Robert Kennedy and his friends to play the blame game.
Could we at least get the bodies counted before they start?
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Vultures, same as the looters. |
