George W. Bush: Worse Than Racist?

I'll stop being cynical when life gives me a reason.

I'm seeing a lot of polling and talk about how President Bush's lame response to Hurricane Katrina was racially motivated, but I really don't think that's it. I think his lame response was simply a reflection of his innate lack of seriousness and engagement, and his inability to understand the concept that he is Ultimately Reponsible For Stuff, and can't just twiddle his thumbs and wait for the grown-ups to take care of it.

Seriously, if New Orleans had been populated exclusively by white people who were not oil billionaires and/or assorted Pioneers and Rangers, I believe that Bush's "response" would have been absolutely identical.

In fact, I would argue that accusations of racism actually let Bush off the hook for his bone-deep incompetence, by making it appear to be a matter of choice. This allows his base to continue believing that he could and would take care of them if disaster struck. It may even advance the Republican's deeply evil "Southern Strategy," by allowing the most racist troglodyte elements of the party to admire the bold and decisive way he sat back and let Mother Nature take care of all them damn nigras, unlike all those other fancy-pants Washington Republicans who just throw around weaselly code words without ever lifting a finger to do anything about The Negro Problem.

Our message should not be that Bush won't save black people from disaster because he's a stone-cold racist, it should be that he can't save anyone from disaster because he's a stone-cold fuckup. The beauty of it is that it attacks Bush on one of his supposed strengths (CEO president, my ass), and deprives the Republicans of another cherished opportunity to paint us as shrill, race-card-playing hippies with alarmingly large penises.