{"id":800,"date":"2005-09-13T12:06:51","date_gmt":"2005-09-13T17:06:51","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.virushead.net\/vhrandom\/2005\/09\/13\/bush-sorta-kinda-takes-responsibility\/"},"modified":"2005-09-13T15:54:23","modified_gmt":"2005-09-13T20:54:23","slug":"bush-kinda-sorta-takes-responsibility","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.virushead.net\/vhrandom\/2005\/09\/bush-kinda-sorta-takes-responsibility\/","title":{"rendered":"Bush Kinda Sorta Takes Responsibility"},"content":{"rendered":"

CNN.com – Bush: ‘I take responsibility’ for U.S. failures – Sep 13, 2005<\/a><\/p>\n

The headline is clearcut, but not the actual statement.<\/p>\n

“Katrina exposed serious problems in our response capability at all levels of government and to the extent the federal government didn’t fully do its job right, I take responsibility.”<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

Well, I’m really really glad to see that that, you know, to the extent that “the federal government” didn’t, um, FULLY do its job RIGHT – Bush is willing to accept some degree of responsibility. Since he makes sure to limit the terrain to the “reponse capability” and includes “all levels of government,” we’ll just have to wait and see how much responsibility he’s agreeable to assuming.<\/p>\n

The admit-no-mistake, take-no-responsibility president must have gotten some decent advice. They looked at the news, the editorials, but most of all the polls – and decided he had better make some gesture. This kinda sorta provisional admission is the least he could do. The least is what we’re used to, and it’s sad to see how gratefully it seems to be received.<\/p>\n

The magic phrase is “take responsibility.”<\/p>\n

Unfortunately it is couched in the usual language of deniability and deferral. It might be enough for much of America to snuggle back into him, though, especially if he has a great speech written for him to deliver on Thursday night, full of heroic efforts and anecdotes and lots and lots of numbers.<\/p>\n

Bush said he wants to know what went right and what went wrong so that he can determine whether the United States was prepared for another storm, or an attack.<\/p>\n

“I’m not going to defend the process going in, but I am going to defend the people who are on the front line of saving lives,” Bush said.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

Immediate misdirection. He can’t resist. <\/p>\n

He knows very well what went wrong – it has a history. He gutted FEMA and put people with no experience in charge of disaster relief. He cut the Army Corp of Engineers funding for years in a row. He didn’t take the declaration of a state of emergency (26th) seriously. So on and so on. So I suppose that what he’ll do is focus on some mistakes that aren’t actually relevant to his reponsibility? That’s my best guess.<\/p>\n

Then – this is so typical – ” I am going to defend the people who are on the front line of saving lives.” <\/p>\n

The people who were on the front lines, saving people, didn’t have your backing, Mr. President. No-one is attacking them. No-one. The one responsible for the misplaced priorities, the corruption, and the deadly slothfulness is you, Mr. President. You lack compassion. It is an improvement that you have brought yourself to the point where you can kinda sorta say the words, but it would be so much better if they rang true. The people of New Orleans will just have to be satisfied with that, huh? <\/p>\n

A government which robs Peter to pay Paul can always depend on the support of Paul.” \u00e2\u20ac\u201d George Bernard Shaw<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

Now the far right, some of whom might even have experienced temporary dissonance, can get back to the business of one order, one party, one religion – with injustice for most, and with worship to profits for the (morally and biologically superior?) ultra-rich.<\/p>\n

“Mistakes, scandals, and failures no longer signal catastrophe. The crucial thing is that they be made credible, and that the public be made aware of the efforts being expended in that direction. The “marketing” immunity of governments is similar to that of the major brands of washing powder.” – Jean Baudrillard <\/p><\/blockquote>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

CNN.com – Bush: ‘I take responsibility’ for U.S. failures – Sep 13, 2005 The headline is clearcut, but not the actual statement. “Katrina exposed serious problems in our response capability at all levels of government and to the extent the federal government didn’t fully do its job right, I take responsibility.” Well, I’m really really glad to see that that, you know, to the extent that “the federal government” didn’t, um, FULLY do its job RIGHT – Bush is willing…<\/p>\n

Read More Read More<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[17,5,10,3],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-800","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-alien-nation","category-culture","category-human-rights","category-politics"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.virushead.net\/vhrandom\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/800","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.virushead.net\/vhrandom\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.virushead.net\/vhrandom\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.virushead.net\/vhrandom\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.virushead.net\/vhrandom\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=800"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.virushead.net\/vhrandom\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/800\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.virushead.net\/vhrandom\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=800"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.virushead.net\/vhrandom\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=800"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.virushead.net\/vhrandom\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=800"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}