Posted on 09/01/2010 5:43:59 AM PDT by Kaslin
The fifth anniversary of Hurricane Katrina recalls a horror show on two levels. There's the actual disaster, which killed hundreds of people, and then there's the media smear job on the Bush administration and first responders. No one should forget pompous grandstanders like "NBC Nightly News" anchor Brian Williams signing off three months after the floods from the Lower Ninth Ward: "This is a neighborhood that's been left to die."
How those network anchors loved hurricane hyperbole! Williams, for one, lectured the nation that the hurricane should "necessitate a national discussion on race, on oil, politics, class, infrastructure, the environment and more." He underlined that a top local radio station decided not to air President Bush's remarks from the city since "nothing he could say could ever help them deal with the dire situation unfolding live in the streets of New Orleans, where people were still dying during his visit."
It never mattered to these nattering nabobs that, as Popular Mechanics magazine documented, Katrina spurred by far the largest and fastest rescue effort in American history, with nearly 100,000 emergency personnel arriving on the scene within three days of the storm's landfall, rescuing an estimated 50,000 residents.
Not content to attack Bush on just his own program, Williams took to comedy shows to unload more spin. He lectured to Jon Stewart on how cities less black than New Orleans would have seen a lot more helicopter rescues. Williams proudly took that attack directly to Bush three months after the storm. "After the tragedy, I heard someone ask rhetorically, 'What if this had been Nantucket, Mass., or Inner Harbor Baltimore, or Chicago or Houston?' Are you convinced the response would have been the same? Was there any social or class or race aspect to the response?"
On the first anniversary of Katrina, Williams repeated the mudslinging, citing radical-left black professor Michael Eric Dyson in Bush's face: "A lot of Americans are always going to believe that that weekend, that week, you were watching something on television other than what they were seeing, and Professor Dyson from the University of Pennsylvania said on our broadcast last night it was because of your patrician upbringing, that it's a class issue."
Bush shot back: "Dyson doesn't know. I don't know Dyson, and Dyson doesn't know me."
But Williams didn't care. His cartoon was perfect.
Williams later appeared on PBS and boasted, "You can't give distance. I don't mean that in a Jets vs. Sharks way. I'm not an adversary." That's laughable. He insisted Bush "appreciates the swordfight of a crackling good conversation."
Now watch Williams "swordfight" with Barack Obama. He's gone from musketeer to Mouseketeer. On the fifth anniversary of the hurricane, Williams deferred to the statesman before him by asking about the lack of a national conversation: "Katrina was about so many things. It was about class and race and government and the environment. Whatever happened to that national conversation we were supposed to have about it?"
Is that all the toughness Williams could muster? That's how he "crackles" now? See his crackling swordfight over the BP oil spill and Obama's lack of effort: "It's getting baked in a little bit in the media that BP was President Obama's Katrina. And it's also getting baked in that the administration was slow off the mark. Is that unfair?"
What about our disastrous economy? Surely Williams would challenge Obama here. "Do you have anything new on the economy?"
Instead of tough questions, Williams felt Obama's pain that too many Americans misunderstand his religious faith: "Mr. President, you're an American-born Christian, and yet increasing and now significant numbers of Americans in polls, upwards of a fifth of respondents, are claiming you are neither. A fifth of the people, just about, believe you're a Muslim. ... This has to be troubling to you. This is, of course, all-new territory for an American president."
That's not even a question! But it's all in a day's shoeshine for Brian Williams. He loved slinging "racist, classist" mud on Bush, but he was so distraught by Obama's-a-Muslim rumors that he replayed the poor-Barry exchange a second time the next night.
Why is this arrogant partisan the leading evening-news anchor in America? He drew 7.2 million viewers last week, as the ratings continue to decline. That's not unexpected when an anchorman can't be bothered to ask tougher questions to this president than his makeup artist would.
The notion of objectivity in the press is ridiculous.
Evidently Brian believes that the rest of the country (not him, of course), JUST DOESN'T CARE.
We are so fortunate to have such superior human beings as Brian considers himself to be walking among us.
The Ever-lying pRes_ _ent Imam Hussein Obama
(Unable to say the truth or even 'yes' to the obvious falsehood):
"Uh-huh."
Did BW bow AGAIN to Imam obama similar to his WH “interview” last year?
Any sane citizen realizes that a hurricane is a natural force and is not at the control of any president.
If Earl slams into North Carolina, that hurricane is not the fault of Barck Obama.
Yet, that is exactly what the media sold to America and America believed about GWBush. They blamed Pres Bush for a hurricane and its effects on the region it struck.
In retrospect, compared to Obama’s inability to react in less than a month to the Gulf Oil Spill, the nation had responders into the Katrina area within days, once the local governors and mayors gave the go-ahead.
I can’t stand “Whinin’ Brian”...that pathetic voice makes me barf after only a few seconds.
The network news is irrelevant. I have never watched any more than a couple seconds of Brian Williams in the entire time he’s been anchor. And the few seconds I watch have been because I have been surfing channels and can’t switch away from him quick enough. He is radioactive—as soon as I see him I switch away.
Five years after Katrina and the media still hammers Bush.
So Brian Williams, where is your outrage for Mayor Nagin disappearing act during the hurricane and the severely lackluster response for the Louisiana governor???
1) The left wingers do nothing, nothing to resolve any of America's problems. They only point fingers and ridicule the right. They love to stir up emotions and make people hate Republicans and, especially, diss those on opposite sides in the media. But they, who are supposed to be such lovers of humanity, never help.
2) But, the right-wing commentators do help. They express their opinions...but, more importantly, they actually participate in advancing the status of the less fortunate. Beck, of course, is the prime example. Look at the funds he just raised for the SOWF. But Hannity, O'Reilly, Rush, and many others have funded, and continue to raise funds for charities and they use their voice and influence in positive ways to fund groups that truly do good.
Have you ever heard of Williams, Olberman, Matthews, et al among the liberals ever working hard to really help anyone? The ones in the media's liberal camp are lazy, hate-filled, and jealous. And they are earning a lot of money by being antagonizes and whiners. But they do not lift one finger to "spread the wealth" themselves, do they? (Well, maybe some few, like Geraldo, I believe helps some charities) but mostly the angriest of liberal spinners just spew hate and then go home to their cushy lives while pretending to be concerned about the suffering of others.
Ramirez bump! :)
The buffoon Nagin didn’t stop running until he hit Houston! A white mayor would have been indicted for manslaughter.
The Gov. was nothing more than a drunk.
Great line.
There is no limit to the absurdity of human delusions.
There is no limit to the absurdity of human delusions.
I agree with every word you said.
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