Posted on 09/12/2005 2:52:23 AM PDT by Crackingham
From the political perspective of the White House, Hurricane Katrina destroyed more than an enormous swath of the Gulf Coast. The storm also appears to have damaged the carefully laid plans of Karl Rove, President Bush's political adviser, to make inroads among black voters and expand the reach of the Republican Party for decades to come.
Many African-Americans across the country said they seethed as they watched the television pictures of the largely poor and black victims of Hurricane Katrina dying for food and water in the New Orleans Superdome and the convention center. A poll released last week by the nonpartisan Pew Research Center bore out that reaction as well as a deep racial divide: Two-thirds of African-Americans said the government's response to the crisis would have been faster if most of the victims had been white, while 77 percent of whites disagreed.
The anger has invigorated the president's critics. Kanye West, the rap star, raged off-script at a televised benefit for storm victims that "George Bush doesn't care about black people." Howard Dean, the chairman of the Democratic National Committee, said in Miami last week that Americans "have to come to terms with the ugly truth that skin color, age and economics played a significant role in who survived and who did not."
At the White House, the public response has been to denounce the critics as unseemly and unfair. "I think all of those remarks were disgusting, to be perfectly frank," Laura Bush said in an interview with the American Urban Radio Network, when asked about the comments of Mr. West and Mr. Dean. "Of course President Bush cares about everyone in our country."
(Excerpt) Read more at nytimes.com ...
Restaurant owner follows heart, takes in evacuees By Scott McCabe Palm Beach Post Staff Writer
Saturday, September 10, 2005
WEST PALM BEACH — Jenetha Smith felt helpless watching the aftermath of Hurricane Katrina with so many people stranded with no place to go and seemingly no help on the way.
"I wanted to just reach through the TV screen and pull everybody out to help them," said Smith, who runs the World Famous Restaurant, with her mother Yvonne Peterman. "We cried for days. It was so overwhelming."
The only way to stop crying, she decided, was to help at least two families, get them out of the dreary shelters and find them a permanent place to stay.
So she made a phone call to County Commissioner Addie Greene. That led to more phone calls and eventually to Bishop Thomas Masters, who was in Houston volunteering at the Astrodome.
Several evacuees were willing to move to Palm Beach County, Masters told her, including one young mother from New Orleans who saved her two toddlers by putting them on an inflated inner tube and pushing them through chest-deep water to the Superdome.
Now, the young mother had nowhere to go.
Meanwhile, phone calls started to pour back Smith's way, from churches, businesses, apartments and other people who wanted to help. Smith had to learn how to set up a non-profit.
Late Thursday night, 12 evacuees arrived with Masters at the restaurant where shortly after midnight they got their first hot meal in nearly two weeks. They were black and white and young and ready to start a new life.
The survivors began talking about what they came through — including one story of a man in New Orleans who shot his wife and daughter before taking his own life.
On Friday, the 12 rested, too tired to attend the afternoon press conference at the restaurant.
But they have a new family waiting for them. Smith and her helpers plan to provide housing and health care for one year.
"We're going to keep them," said her mother, Peterman. "They're babies."
An account has been set up at Washington Mutual for the African-American Hurricane Relief Fund, and contributions can be deposited during normal business hours. Smith is also accepting food, water, baby care, first aid, and personal hygiene items at the restaurant, 417 Northwood Road. For more information, contact Smith at (561) 833-3377.
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Quote my remark accurately and I will reply. Quote it incorrectly and I'll ignore you.
BTW - I do hope your community inherits some of the fine upstanding persons I am talking about. You seem to need a taste of the persons that make New Orleans the murder capital of the U.S.
On a purely Christian chord - Do you think the U.S. federal government or any other will be able to rescue humanity from the plagues and pestilences God has in store for us?
Actually, we would gladly offer our home to these evacuees (most of them don't want to come this far north, though a small group have come to Ohio).
As for your (bizarre?) last question, you have proven that you can't be taken seriously, so I shall presume that your question.......whatever you mean by it.....is completely disingenuous, and any further discourse with you would be a total waste of my time.
Racism is an ugly thing and hurts you as much as it hurts those you look down on. Maybe you should try to get rid of it before you sink any further into its grasp. You're looking pretty ugly already.
This article is a crock. Bush's status couldn't take a hit becuase he never had any in the black community. 95% of us are taught from birth to hate republicans and most of us are still being taught to dislike white people. Very, very few of us rise above this.
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