Posted by
Shogrensus on Wednesday, April 18, 2007 12:35:41 AM
President and Laura Bush attended the memorial service for the victims of the shooting. For some reason, this was problematic for Rosie. She felt the need to compare the victims of the shooting to the people in Louisiana who faced Hurricane Katrina.
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Rosie: … and I also think after 9/11 after Katrina you know it was interesting to me President Bush is flying to Virginia Tech today and it took him a week to get to Virginia , to Katrina to visit the victims.
Joy: Don’t you think he learned a lesson?
Rosie: To me, and I am not trying to cast aspersions on President Bush in the middle of this crisis, but I am trying to say is you can’t pretend that it’s the same. How many people died in Katrina? How many people were on roofs for weeks?
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Rosie is trying to cast aspersions on President Bush and she is being disingenuous to suggest anything different. If Bush had decided not to attend the memorial service Rosie would have criticized him for not caring about the students.
Since she brought it up, at some point people should begin to wonder why the President should be required to travel around the country, examining natural disasters. Why does this make people feel better? Isn’t this what Governors are for? Can’t the people at FEMA report to the President? It is an incredible waste of time and resources to send the President and his entourage (whether Democrat or Republican) to view these natural disasters.
And yes it is true that more people died as a result of Hurricane Katrina than as a result of this shooting, but had people paid attention to warnings, many of those people would not have died. There were people on rooftops in the first couple of days following the storm but to suggest that many people lived on their rooftops for weeks is at least a bit of an exaggeration. Again, had these people listened to weather forecasters for the week leading up to the hurricane, they could have left town to go inland.
The people of New Orleans elected their incompetent mayor. The people of Louisiana elected their Governor. The people of Louisiana failed to ensure that their elected officials had prepared their state for a hurricane like Katrina. This is a bit like 55 year old people complaining that Social Security is going bust.
The kids and the teachers who were killed did not have 5 days to decide whether or not to leave the building they were in. The victims of this crime had no control over the actions of the shooter.
President Bush had 32 good reasons to go to the service. Rosie may be upset, but she should try to remain accurate and she should be fair.