Bow Your Heads...

So, when Dubbya called for September 16th to be a National Day of Prayer for the victims of hurricane Katrina, I couldn't help but laugh and think about Led Zeppelin and the song "When The Levee Breaks" on Zep IV:

If it keeps on rainin’, levee’s goin’ to break,
If it keeps on rainin’, levee’s goin’ to break,
When the levee breaks I’ll have no place to stay.
Mean old levee taught me to weep and moan,
Lord, mean old levee taught me to weep and moan,
Got what it takes to make a mountain man leave his home,
Oh, well, oh, well, oh, well.
Don’t it make you feel bad
When you’re tryin’ to find your way home,
You don’t know which way to go?
If you’re goin’ down south
They got no work to do,
If you don’t know about chicago.
Cryin’ won’t help you, prayin’ won’t do you no good,
Now, cryin’ won’t help you, prayin’ won’t do you no good,
When the levee breaks, mama, you got to move.
All last night sat on the levee and moaned,
All last night sat on the levee and moaned,
Thinkin’ ’bout me baby and my happy home.
Going, go’n’ to chicago,Go’n’ to chicago,
Sorry but I can’t take you.
Going down, going down now, going down.

So Georgie, while I'm sure a lot of folks down on the Gulf Coast appreciated your thoughts and prayers, at the end of the day, it won't do them no good, so do us all a favor and quit it with the empty symbolic gestures!

Perdu Done It

In case anyone is wondering where Perdu went, my blogmate is in Brookhaven, MS helping out folks from New Orleans with the Red Cross at a local shelter. Here's to you my friend (raises Reed's ginger beer bottle)!

Let Them Eat Cake!

So, I've been out of commission for a little while (long Labor Day weekend and then insane work schedule the following week), and so much has happened since I last was able to read the news, it's hard to know where to begin. I guess I'll go the easy route with my favorite quote so far from the whole Katrina tragedy/fiasco.

For those of you who still think that wealthy politicians and their families care about the low income folks of this country, Barbara Bush, in her usual Marie-Antoinette style, reminded us that at the end of the day, we're just peasants to her.

Here's what her majesty said:

"What I'm hearing, which is sort of scary, is they all want to stay in Texas. Everyone is so overwhelmed by the hospitality. … And so many of the people in the arena here, you know, were underprivileged anyway, so this is working very well for them."
-- Former first lady Barbara Bush about Katrina evacuees housed in the Houston Astrodome

Yeah. This whole hurricane/flood/destruction/starvation/death thing has been working *really* well for those folks...

Sigh.

Life Imitates Art

Gareth Keenan, assistant to the regional manager

Michael Brown, assistant to the city manager

Gareth Keenan: "I'm the assistant regional manager."

David Brent: "Assistant to the regional manager."

- BBC Series "The Office," 2001.

Time magazine reported that FEMA chief Michael Brown's official bio described his only stint in emergency management as "assistant city manager" in Edmond, Okla. But a city official told Time that the FEMA chief had been "an assistant to the city manager."

- Maureen Dowd, NYT, 11 September, 2005