Fwd: Bob Herbert: A Failure of Leadership

Go to Original     A Failure of Leadership     By Bob Herbert     The New York Times     Monday 05 September 2005     "Bush to New Orleans: Drop Dead"     Neither the death of the chief justice nor the frantic efforts of panicked White House political advisers can conceal the magnitude of the president's failure of leadership last week. The catastrophe in New Orleans billowed up like the howling winds of hell and was carried live and in color on television screens across the U.S. and around the world.     The Big Easy had turned into the Big Hurt, and the colossal failure of George W. Bush to intervene powerfully and immediately to rescue tens of thousands of American citizens who were suffering horribly and dying in agony was there for all the world to see.     Hospitals with deathly ill patients were left without power, with ventilators that didn't work, with floodwaters rising on the lower floors and with corpses rotting in the corridors and stairwells. People unable to breathe on their own, or with cancer or heart disease or kidney failure, slipped into comas and sank into their final sleep in front of helpless doctors and relatives. These were Americans in desperate trouble.     The president didn't seem to notice.     Death and the stink of decay were all over the city. Corpses were propped up in wheelchairs and on lawn furniture, or left to decompose on sunbaked sidewalks. Some floated by in water fouled by human feces.     Degenerates roamed the city, shooting at rescue workers, beating and robbing distraught residents and tourists, raping women and girls. The president of the richest, most powerful country in the history of the world didn't seem to notice.     Viewers could watch diabetics go into insulin shock on national television, and you could see babies with the pale, vacant look of hunger that we're more used to seeing in dispatches from the third world. You could see their mothers, dirty and hungry themselves, weeping.     Old, critically ill people were left to soil themselves and in some cases die like stray animals on the floor of an airport triage center. For days the president of the United States didn't seem to notice.     He would have noticed if the majority of these stricken folks had been white and prosperous. But they weren't. Most were black and poor, and thus, to the George W. Bush administration, still invisible.     After days of withering criticism from white and black Americans, from conservatives as well as liberals, from Republicans and Democrats, the president finally felt compelled to act, however feebly. (The chorus of criticism from nearly all quarters demanding that the president do something tells me that the nation as a whole is so much better than this administration.)     Mr. Bush flew south on Friday and proved (as if more proof were needed) that he didn't get it. Instead of urgently focusing on the people who were stranded, hungry, sick and dying, he engaged in small talk, reminiscing at one point about the days when he used to party in New Orleans, and mentioning that Trent Lott had lost one of his houses but that it would be replaced with "a fantastic house - and I'm looking forward to sitting on the porch."     Mr. Bush's performance last week will rank as one of the worst ever by a president during a dire national emergency. What we witnessed, as clearly as the overwhelming agony of the city of New Orleans, was the dangerous incompetence and the staggering indifference to human suffering of the president and his administration.     And it is this incompetence and indifference to suffering (yes, the carnage continues to mount in Iraq) that makes it so hard to be optimistic about the prospects for the United States over the next few years. At a time when effective, innovative leadership is desperately needed to cope with matters of war and peace, terrorism and domestic security, the economic imperatives of globalization and the rising competition for oil, the United States is being led by a man who seems oblivious to the reality of his awesome responsibilities.     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.

You can go to their home page and sign up for thier free newsletters. -Bob

http://www.truthout.org/docs_2005/printer_090505X.shtml

Go to Original

A Failure of Leadership
By Bob Herbert
The New York Times

Monday 05 September 2005

"Bush to New Orleans: Drop Dead"

Neither the death of the chief justice nor the frantic efforts of panicked
White House political advisers can conceal the magnitude of the president's
failure of leadership last week. The catastrophe in New Orleans billowed up
like the howling winds of hell and was carried live and in color on television
screens across the U.S. and around the world.

The Big Easy had turned into the Big Hurt, and the colossal failure of
George W. Bush to intervene powerfully and immediately to rescue tens of
thousands of American citizens who were suffering horribly and dying in agony
was there for all the world to see.

Hospitals with deathly ill patients were left without power, with
ventilators that didn't work, with floodwaters rising on the lower floors and
with corpses rotting in the corridors and stairwells. People unable to breathe
on their own, or with cancer or heart disease or kidney failure, slipped into
comas and sank into their final sleep in front of helpless doctors and
relatives. These were Americans in desperate trouble.

The president didn't seem to notice.

Death and the stink of decay were all over the city. Corpses were propped up
in wheelchairs and on lawn furniture, or left to decompose on sunbaked
sidewalks. Some floated by in water fouled by human feces.

Degenerates roamed the city, shooting at rescue workers, beating and robbing
distraught residents and tourists, raping women and girls. The president of the
richest, most powerful country in the history of the world didn't seem to
notice.

Viewers could watch diabetics go into insulin shock on national television,
and you could see babies with the pale, vacant look of hunger that we're more
used to seeing in dispatches from the third world. You could see their mothers,
dirty and hungry themselves, weeping.

Old, critically ill people were left to soil themselves and in some cases
die like stray animals on the floor of an airport triage center. For days the
president of the United States didn't seem to notice.

He would have noticed if the majority of these stricken folks had been white
and prosperous. But they weren't. Most were black and poor, and thus, to the
George W. Bush administration, still invisible.

After days of withering criticism from white and black Americans, from
conservatives as well as liberals, from Republicans and Democrats, the
president finally felt compelled to act, however feebly. (The chorus of
criticism from nearly all quarters demanding that the president do something
tells me that the nation as a whole is so much better than this
administration.)

Mr. Bush flew south on Friday and proved (as if more proof were needed) that
he didn't get it. Instead of urgently focusing on the people who were stranded,
hungry, sick and dying, he engaged in small talk, reminiscing at one point
about the days when he used to party in New Orleans, and mentioning that Trent
Lott had lost one of his houses but that it would be replaced with "a fantastic
house - and I'm looking forward to sitting on the porch."

Mr. Bush's performance last week will rank as one of the worst ever by a
president during a dire national emergency. What we witnessed, as clearly as
the overwhelming agony of the city of New Orleans, was the dangerous
incompetence and the staggering indifference to human suffering of the
president and his administration.

And it is this incompetence and indifference to suffering (yes, the carnage
continues to mount in Iraq) that makes it so hard to be optimistic about the
prospects for the United States over the next few years. At a time when
effective, innovative leadership is desperately needed to cope with matters of
war and peace, terrorism and domestic security, the economic imperatives of
globalization and the rising competition for oil, the United States is being
led by a man who seems oblivious to the reality of his awesome
responsibilities.

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.