The American Spectator

Reader Mail

The Hurricane Continues

9.7.05 @ 12:01AM

RAGE IS IN
Re: George Neumayr's Masques of Death and the "Astonishingly Cruel" letters in Reader Mail's Watch Your Tongue:

Just read "Masques of Death." What planet do you live on, you hateful creatures? Guess Willy Horton isn't dead yet. While we're at it, let's also blame the '60s, abortion, Clinton, and maybe even Chappaquiddick. You wingnuts are beneath contempt.
-- John A. Shutkin
General Counsel
Shearman & Sterling LLP
New York, New York

What a truly repulsive, thoughtless, and poorly reasoned article. So New Orleans has one of the highest murder rates in the country? Well, given that the federal government repeatedly disregarded warnings of natural disaster from a variety of informed sources (including its own), and compounded this criminal negligence with inexcusable and continuing delays in its response to the disaster, I would say that New Orleans has completely reset the bar for murder of its citizens. Although it may be months before we know how high.

Cops neutered by the NAACP and the ACLU? Not based on what I've seen on Bourbon Street. I've never noticed excessive gentleness there.

Currents of chaos and lawlessness have run through New Orleans throughout its history? Agreed. And so it was ripe for collapse? The same could be said of Baltimore, New York City, or Washington, D.C. Are we then due for a hurricane?

And the city's collapse is the result of a "politically correct culture?" I thought it was due to the collapse of the levees. (Although perhaps if vouchers had been approved, all those poor kids could have gone to parochial school, there would have been no looting, Katrina would have hit somewhere else, and they could have patched the dikes with the vouchers after they were processed.) Absolute insanity.

And politically correct? You have obviously never been to New Orleans, as I have many times. Decadent, perhaps. Wild and crazy, sure. Tough and dangerous? Absolutely. I live in the Bronx, so I'm used to a state of urban alertness, and I keep my eyes open when I'm there. But politically correct? I don't think so. Ever been to Mardi Gras? No one I've ever met in NOLA would ever let political correctness get in the way of having a good time.
-- Andy Bassford
Bronx, New York

Re: George Neumayr's "Masques of Death," et al.

While not being surprised by the ad-hominem attacks on President Bush, FEMA, the military, state and local government, the police, etc., I am thoroughly, and sickenly disgusted. There are plenty of lessons to be learned, however, criticisms from the omnipresent popular media are fatuous at best.

Pardon me (not) for observing that all of the media personalities seem to be very well off after spending eight days supposedly "on location". Brian Williams (just to pick on one in particular), seems, every night, to be hygenically hearty, have a perfect coiffure, and be well sated and hydrated. As well, the innumerable outlets always appear to have more than enough power to supply their cameras and microphones to cast critical reproach upon picayunish vitriol.

As soon as the NBCs, CBSs, ABCs, FOXes, Weather Channels, CNNs and the rest of the usual suspects depict scenes of their own helicopters, trucks, and sundry other conveyances laden with relief supplies, especially medicine, I might, just might, think about granting them the opportunity to opine.

SHAME ON ALL OF THEM. I'm more sickened at "the media" than I have been at any other national tragedy in my lifetime of nearly 50 years. May Almighty God spare the suffering as well as those striving to save them, and forgive the rest of the "no-good-doers".
-- Joe Minkiewicz
Winston-Salem, North Carolina

I am glad you found where to place the blame of the Katrina aftermath disaster. All this time I thought that most of the people were looting because they were poor, abandoned and hungry. What would you have done if you were in they're same position, desperate for food, clothing, shelter, and trapped in a dead city that you couldn't leave because you had no money or transportation. I think you would be in the streets stealing food as well. This would have been the situation in any major city that collapsed and was subsequently abandoned for four days. Its not about liberalism or conservatism, it is about how an entire city was let down by its Federal, state and local governments. Democrat and Republican alike are to blame. You should join in the chorus of people demanding accountability rather then insinuating that this disaster of government failure has something to do with New Orleans crime rate and "gangsta rap."
-- Joe Mac Stevens

A confirmation that George Neumayr's piece was spot on is the fact that the left are screaming and screeching against it. Everyone (who has a rational mind) knows that the first step in fixing a problem is that you must first admit the problem and then identify the cause. But for the left, politically correct feelings trump rationality any and every time. This is akin to not treating a drug addict because in doing so, you may offend him by saying he's a drug addict. Oops, now I'll be accused of calling the people of New Orleans a bunch of drug addicts.
-- D.C. Norman
Durham, North Carolina

BEN STEIN'S AMERICA
Re: Ben Stein's Get Off His Back and Reader Mail's Ben Stein, Bush, and Katrina:

Letter to the Editor

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