...this time, from Tim McGraw and Faith Hill, whom some call the reigning King and Queen of Country Music. We'll leave aside how sad a commentary that is on the state of mainstream Nashville "country" music, and just look at their comments. From ABC News:
"To me, there's a lot of politics being played and a lot of people trying to put people in bad positions in order to further their agendas," McGraw, a 38-year-old native of Delhi, La., said after ABC News Radio's Dan Gordon asked about Katrina.
"When you have people dying because they're poor and black or poor and white, or because of whatever they are — if that's a number on a political scale — then that is the most wrong thing. That erases everything that's great about our country."
Now what does one say to this? Me, I say Timmy Boy is full of what comes out of the bull's posterior end. The people in New Orleans didn't die because of their color or socioeconomic status. They died for lack of preparation, on their part and the part of the LOCAL and STATE governments. No doubt many of you have seen the infamous pictures of what's come to be known as the Ray Nagin Memorial Motor Pool -- some 400-500 Orleans Parish school buses, unused school buses, sitting in I don't know how many feet of water. I guess when you get to make as much money as someone like Tim McGraw does, and you're married to somebody like Faith Hill -- who, despite my intense dislike of her music after the Faith cd, I will admit, is pretty good-lookin' -- you tend to forget that bad things happen. But despite what Timmy Boy and his wife think, bad things are continuing to happen. Yes, I am a member of Bill Whittle's Grey Tribe, and I make no apologies for that. I've come to accept that bad things happen and are sometimes beyond my control, and, as the peerless Mr. Whittle describes the philosophy of the Grey Tribe, "...beyond the control of the smartest and best people we have, even beyond the awesome, subtle and unlimited control of the simpering, sub-human village idiot from Texas." Tim McGraw apparently doesn't agree with the last part of that philosophy, though...
McGraw specifically criticized President Bush. "There's no reason why someone can't go down there who's supposed to be the leader of the free world … and say, 'I'm giving you a job to do and I'm not leaving here until it's done. And you're held accountable, and you're held accountable, and you're held accountable."'This is what I've given you to do, and if it's not done by the time I get back on my plane, then you're fired and someone else will be in your place. '"
Well, that all sounds fine and dandy, but there's one little kink in that hose -- actually, it's a really big kink. The cluster-copulation that post-Katrina New Orleans became was largely, if not overwhelmingly, due to the stupefying incompetence, corruption and malfeasance of the local and state governments. New Orleans, and you could probably say Southeastern Louisiana in general, was more or less a huge mess government-wise long before Hurricane Katrina came rolling in last August, and these overpaid stars can talk all day long about the racial and social inequalities that Lady Katrina exposed -- but it's patently dishonest and morally and intellectually bankrupt to point the finger at President Bush and not point at least as many, if not more, fingers at the corrupt individuals the people of New Orleans chose to lead them. Whether New Orleans will live or die has yet to be seen, and there are things the federales can do, but whether New Orleans' fate is just a reprieve or a phoenix-like rise from the ashes is going to depend 100% on the people of New Orleans and the people they elect to lead them. Such is the nature of the beast of federalist system. I guess Tim was just daydreaming the day they taught the concept of federalism in government class.
And the idiocy doesn't stop there. From Mrs. Tim McGraw...
"I fear for our country if we can't handle our people [during] a natural disaster."
Hey, um, Faith? Guess what? There was another real big natural disaster that hit just down the coast from New Orleans barely four weeks after Katrina. Rita? Does that ring a bell? Judas Priest, I know celebrities are by and large not intellectuals, but this level of airheadedness is just astonishing. You wanna know why the gov. is so damned inefficient, Faith and Tim? It's because over the years it's gotten so big because of all the goodies it gives people that you seem to think they're entitled to! In fact, I saw an article just today in the Beaumont Enterprise on the difficulty businesses are having getting adequate staffing.
Owners and salesman of The Boat Ramp in Port Neches are trying to install motors and electronics. Parts people are doing mechanic work, said Colleen Mitchell, the parts supervisor.
"The one mechanic we got is stretched to the limit," she said.
They're down three people and nobody wants to come in for an interview, she said.
The response she's getting from candidates is "I'm enjoying not working now."
Enjoying not working now? Far be it from me to say that all these folks are living on the dole, but it's more than a little difficult for me not to believe that more than a few of them are. (We all remember from our childhoods how easy it was spending other people's money...) I remember well my own post-Rita experiences...I had my last paycheck from my job before the storm, and the FEMA money and some assistance from my employer. And I won't lie -- I did enjoy the break from work. But I still watched my finances and went back to work as soon as I could. I know everyone's situation is different, but somebody needs to tell the people who are capable of working to get off their derrieres and go to work. As I write this it's been almost 6 months since Rita hit. Time to go back to work, folks, and support yourselves like you did before Rita rolled through...but I am gettin' off track here...
As far as "handl[ing] our people during a natural disaster"...I don't remember the exact number right offhand, but I think around 5,000,000 people evacuated the upper Texas coast -- from Beaumont-Port Arthur to Port Lavaca, and that includes Houston-Galveston, the 10th-largest metropolitan area in this great land -- in anticipation of Rita's landfall. Unless my memory fails me, less than 100 people died due to Hurricane Rita in Texas and Louisiana, and that figure includes the elderly Houston-area assisted-living facility residents who perished in the bus explosion south of Dallas. No widespread looting, no raping, no BLATANTLY UNCONSTITUTIONAL confiscation of firearms from law-abiding citizens by the very people SWORN to uphold that document...in other words, everything was pretty much under control. And furthermore, the people didn't have to be handled, because they pretty much controlled themselves. It's not the president's fault that post-Katrina New Orleans became the disaster it did. And we here in Southeast Texas don't owe our resilience and rebuilding to President Bush. We're taking care of business ourselves.
Once again, readers, this is one more reason I love people like George Strait and Alan Jackson...I hate it, HATE it, when stars use their fame as a bully pulpit to spout off on things they know little to nothing about. Shut up and sing, damn you!
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