The Washington Informer: Opinions/Editorials

Maybe the President would once again say to the source of Katrina, what he said to the Taliban and Al-Qaeda at Ground Zero: “You will hear from us!”

While that was not to be, it was a picture perfect morning in the Rose Garden. Blue skies. Bright sun. The temperature was 74 degrees Fahrenheit with low humidity. The hum of the cicadas in the trees rose and fell the way it does in late summer mornings in this Potomac basin, even as the President, flanked by his national security inner circle, walked to the podium.

He had the right team with him. To his immediate right, Donald Rumsfeld, his Secretary of Defense. To his right, Gen. Richard Meyers, Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff. And standing to the President’s left was Michael Chertoff, Secretary of Homeland Defense. No caregivers in this bunch. No health, no human services.

But Mr. Bush may not have noticed the pleasant weather because he was surrounded by dark political storm clouds which threaten to inundate his presidency the way Terrorist Katrina decimated Alabama, Louisiana, and Mississippi.

Who lost New Orleans? The White pundits demanded to know.

Is it Darfur yet? I wondered aloud to all the Black folks I saw inside the compound.

I wanted the President to “feel me,” so I stood in my purple, West African polished cotton shirt, right in the center of the front row. I was determined to look him straight in the eye and read his soul, then stare him down. I stood there and listened attentively.

There had been a monumental failure of the government to live up to its “Prime Directive”–security to its citizens–in the wake of Terrorist Katrina’s strike. The White House, the Department of Homeland Security and the Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA), all dropped the ball, and those fumbles contributed directly to the loss of life and prolonged the suffering of those nothing but Black survivors and victims in New Orleans.

The ordeal was ghastly to watch. Ironically, television networks were able to get in and broadcast pictures, but neither the National Guard, nor active-duty service members of the “world’s mightiest military” were able to get in to deliver any relief to those suffering masses of Black Americans for five days, six days, seven days!

Members of the Congressional Black Caucus could barely conceal their rage at a Friday news conference. “We cannot allow it to be said by history, that the difference between those who lived and those who died in this great storm and flood of 2005, was nothing more than poverty, age or skin color,” Rep. Elijah Cummings (D-Md.) told reporters.

Poor Black folks and other poor folks had gotten left behind by those with the means to evacuate the city. Then they were mauled by the storm, then abandoned by their government, so by now I figured the President was going to say “A little sum’pin, sum’pin” about how he was moving Heaven and Earth to get relief to those suffering Black folks, and that he was “feeling our pain.” Sorry Congressman, that was not to be.

“Our priorities are clear,” said Mr. Bush. “We will complete the evacuation as quickly and safely as possible. We will not let criminals prey on the vulnerable, and we will not allow bureaucracy to get in the way of saving lives.”

I dropped my head. I had intended to stare him down, but when he said that, I just reflexively dropped my head in disbelilef. I hoped he didn’t see me, because by staring him down I wanted to show him a firm face, full of moral outrage on behalf of all Black people. So I hoped he didn’t see me blink when he recited that knee-jerk Ku Klux Klan-scripted-reply: “First comes Law & Order, on Our Terms.”

Maybe it’s time for the U.N. Security Council to step in. Because it looks to me like White American politicians who were so put-out about “looters,” were blinded by race when they saw looting in New Orleans after Terrorist Katrina. Instead of punishing the perpetrator, they decided to punish the victims. I think they mistook Black Americans for members of the Al-Qaeda Cell in the Crescent City.

In fact, the typical White politician today remains blinded by that same KKK vision of undeserving Negroes that now afflicts Mr. Bush–the vision of welfare queens driving Cadillacs–that haunted the political discourse in this country a generation ago.

That little problem is beginning to affect your professional judgment and demeanor, Mr. White Bureaucrat, especially when it comes to dealing with Black people.

Hey Mr. or Ms. Bureaucrat! Hey Mr. or Ms. Congress Member! The “looters” we saw on the screens? They’re not “enemy combatants” and this is no Patriot Act-scenario.

Those unsightly Black evacuees aren’t illegal aliens. They are not members of Katrina’s Terror Cell. In fact, their sons-daughters, fathers-mothers, are members of the U.S. military at this very moment, fighting in Iraq and Afghanistan. How do you think those troops must feel?

These looters can’t just be deported back to their places of origin, remember? They are descendants of Crispus Attucks, not Osama bin-Laden.