Katrina Coverage

(If this post doesn't blow your "sarcasm alarms" out of the water, I don't know what will.)

Well, the "anniversary" of Katrina has come and gone, and the reporting of this "event" was nothing short of absolutely freakin' predictable. But before we get to that:

You remember the "coverage" last year as this tragedy unfolded, don't you? Nothing short of complete hyperbolic reporting, spreading through the majority of the media like a wild strain of herpes. Normally, I don't spend a great deal of time bashing the media...not just because I have worked in various forms of it, but also because I think that it's generally too easy to blame the media. People assign blame, and then they never get to the root causes of a problem.

Now, to this year...the "anniversary"...a chance to finally be responsible, right?

Wrong. Look, I'm no conservative, and I'm not the biggest Bush fan (the President, I mean) in the world, but this "coverage" is puerile and imbecilic (and that's being kind). The Washington Post ran a headline front page article: "President and His Critics Mark Katrina Anniversary." Ah yes, never forget those critics. Lest anyone forget how much this was Bush's fault. We'll put it right there in the headline.

Fine...you want to put the blame on Bush and ignore reality, so be it. You want to pretty much ignore all logic and just say, "It's all President Bush's fault, because he's STUPID, and HATES black people"? Fine. If you're that deluded, let's just go ahead and give you the "Katrina Story" in the manner YOU prefer:

New Orleans was a very clean, politically honest, highly efficient city before Katrina.

The levee boards were NOT comprised of political grifters and scam artists.

Everybody wanted the levees to be built higher.

Nobody EVER thought a hurricane would EVER do this.

Tens of thousands of residents were NEVER told to leave the city, it all caught them by surprise.

The Superdome should have had temporary hot showers, a temporary kitchen, full-sized beds, wi-fi hotspots, video games, daycare, and senior activities set up in 4 days notice to accommodate a crowd of 40,000 plus refugees for a week.

The argument that "if Geraldo could get into New Orleans in a day, why couldn't the buses" is an excellent point. Because dropping Geraldo, his mustache wax, a camera man, and a producer into the city, is no different than getting 500-plus fully gassed up buses with certified drivers and a place to put those 20,000 homeless refugees.

Mayor Ray Nagin did not leave an entire fleet of school buses sitting in a flooded parking lot. That photo you saw? It was doctored, plain and simple.

Governor Kathleen Blanco was in complete command. She only cried to show how much she cared about the devastation. Once the cameras were off, she went right back to kicking ass and taking names.

The New Orleans Police Department really shined. It was perhaps their finest hour.

The media thoroughly vetted the accuracy of every one of their sensational stories they ran with, like the ones about families having to eat floating corpses, or serial gang-rapes in the back of the Convention Center.

The fact that the ENTIRE city hasn't been TOTALLY re-built after ONE FULL YEAR is an outrage, and a national disgrace. The tsunami victims had their straw huts back up and running in about 6 months.

Global warming will continue to produce more of these monster storms if we don't DO SOMETHING right away. After all, it's a proven fact that smokestacks cause hurricanes, right? Didn't you see the movie?

Come on, everybody! You know all this is true. And I know all this is true. Stop hiding behind your lame excuses! It's all Bush's fault...

...and oh by the way, he's stupid, and hates black people.

Happy now?