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A Joke

September 18, 2005 By pia

What did Bush say when he first heard about the levees?

Roe vs Wade?

Never tell this joke to a group of Upper West Siders while they are eating in a diner unless you want a Linda Blair pea soup type reaction. It was the first honest belly laugh I have had in many a harvest moon.

How does Bush change a lightbulb?

What lightbulb? Did God turn the electricity off? Does the Radical Christian Right want it changed? Then it will be changed.
That lightbulb? The one that helps poor people? Most Blacks? All non Christians?
Hah? Bush doesn’t see it. Therefore it doesn’t exist.
But my light bulb needs changing
Idiots do it yourself.
I can’t reach it
You are not a God fearing American; you have no moral values; you are not one of us.
You don’t deserve to have light illuminate you.

This is how we have been living for almost five years. This is no longer acceptable.

So screw it in all you radical Christian rightists. You have just become the people you have spent so long making fun of. Your days in the light are numbered. You never were real Christians anyway; real Christians are tolerant caring people.

I read an article about lessons we (Bush?) should have learned from 9/11.

If President Bush looks lost in the aftermath of Hurricane Katrina (and the rest of us feel that way), it’s because he has no one to blame for this catastrophe. The apocalypse was brought on not by the forces of evil, but of nature, aided and abetted by the incompetence of Bush’s own administration. As a bitter reader from Fairview, N.J., wrote to us this week: “If we are to believe that President Bush and the Christian Right have been talking directly to God these past six years, then it follows that this is God’s answer to their agenda.”

That’s a cheap shot, to be sure, but it’s also a natural question given the righteous pose of a presidency that’s suspicious of science and utterly intolerant of dissent. The fact is, we may draw on our faith for moral and spiritual strength, but there should never be a place in American policymaking for those who claim they’ve got a direct line to God. Such lunatic certainties are the preserve of the enemy—the Osama bin Ladens, the Eric Rudolphs, the Baruch Goldsteins—who want to replace our freethinking societies with ones ordered by their own narrow-minded righteousness.

I often write about The Christian Right in Bring it on. The above quotes were taken from an article by Christopher Dickey in Newsweek called Beyond Good and Evil Dickey expresses much of what I feel.

I, like the rest of the people in my city, feel very close to the people in New Orleans. Like everybody in the country we have felt horrible, helpless and hopeless for the past three weeks.

This past Sunday should have been a time when we felt some sense of hope and renewal. I tried to; I forced myself to pretend that I felt better about things. By forcing myself to pretend to feel better, I ended up sick. Bush blew it; let’s get that one straight

President George W. Bush has always trusted his gut. He prides himself in ignoring the distracting chatter, the caterwauling of the media elites, the Washington political buzz machine. He has boasted that he doesn’t read the papers. His doggedness is often admirable. It is easy for presidents to overreact to the noise around them.
But it is not clear what President Bush does read or watch, aside from the occasional biography and an hour or two of ESPN here and there. Bush can be petulant about dissent; he equates disagreement with disloyalty. After five years in office, he is surrounded largely by people who agree with him. Bush can ask tough questions, but it’s mostly a one-way street. But it is not clear what President Bush does read or watch, aside from the occasional biography and an hour or two of ESPN here and there. Bush can be petulant about dissent; he equates disagreement with disloyalty.

After five years in office, he is surrounded largely by people who agree with him. Bush can ask tough questions, but it’s mostly a one-way street. Most presidents keep a devil’s advocate around. Lyndon Johnson had George Ball on Vietnam; President Ronald Reagan and Bush’s father, George H.W. Bush, grudgingly listened to the arguments of Budget Director Richard Darman, who told them what they didn’t wish to hear: that they would have to raise taxes. When Hurricane Katrina struck, it appears there was no one to tell President Bush the plain truth: that the state and local governments had been overwhelmed, that the Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA) was not up to the job and that the military, the only institution with the resources to cope, couldn’t act without a declaration from the president overriding all other authority.

Disagrement equals disloyalty? Not in my America.

We have a president who doesn’t read the paper and trusts his gut. I trust my gut; then I read, but I’m just an ordinary citizen.

The above quote was taken from annother article in Newsweek called aptly enough “How Bush blew it.” Read it. I’m purposely not taking quotes from my hometown newspaper, because so many people consider it to be a liberal voice. Newsweek is a voice of the people

Nobody could stop Katrina from happening; our administration led by our President could have stopped things that happened next. When America is a led by a president who won’t tolerate views other than the ones he believes, horrible things can and will happen. When the president listens to nobody but his God and some people who believe in his exact replica of God, what does that say about the leader of the United States of America?

It’s time to unite as a country. We’re not one country under god; we’re one country with a diverse population and guess what? Many of us aren’t Christian; many of us have our own views and believe that we should allowed be express them. But after 9/11 it seemed as if tolerance became a word from the distant past.

Last week I was criticized for saying that the federal government should have been a first responder. If you believe in human decency you understand what I (and so many other people) are saying. It’s our government and they’re supposed to be responsive to all of our needs.

I still believe in America; I believe that we can reclaim it. One nation…with justice and liberty for all. America, the last great hope.

But don’t screw with my country and tell me that I’m unpatriotic. Don’t let this sickness fester.
As I said tonight was the first time I really laughed in a long long time. Maybe because I feel a glimmer of hope.

We are an incredible people borne out of the most diverse population. We’re amazing; look at our reaction. We care; we do. Does our government? Not the one we have now.

I’m voting straight Democratic in the November election.

Together we can begin turning our country around. It can once again be the place people want to move to because it will once again be the freest country on earth.

I will be back to the story telling so many of you read me for later this week. I thank you for reading my stories. Part of what makes me a good story teller is my passion; and my passion about this began building a long time before the levees burst.

Maybe the levees are a metaphor for our country. We had to have massive floods before we could stick our finger into the dykes (Hans Brinker and The Silver Skates, a Dutch children’s book) and begin to put it back together.

True patriotism entails dissent. True patriotism entails action. True patriotism entails compassion and so much more.

Impeach Bush And while we’re at that can we begin investigating Karl Rove? That’s a personal vendetta for what he’s said about my city. We’re not supposed to say anything at all against the administration but Rove can make “the liberals therapy for terrorists” remark after he probably committed a treasonous act. What a message to send out to the people

But we’re smarter than them. We represent the true America. I’m so proud of the people of my city, and my country. For once I might just tear up out of happiness. But I won’t. I will learn to belly laugh again. Yes we’re taking back our country. One laugh, and one good deed at a time.

Filed Under: 9/11, New York Stories Tagged With: 9/11, New York Stories

« Blame it on Katrina
Irrational »

Comments

  1. SisterAbbye says

    September 18, 2005 at 2:12 pm

    Honestly, this entire horror has proven that not only will American citizens unite to kick ass on a hijacked airplane, we also unite to do whatever needs to be done to help our brothers and sisters in times of crisis. When we can’t count on our own Homeland Insecurity to help in times of catastrophe, we can count on our fellow Americans.

    I am also proud of us. When was the last time we were this united and determined to take on whatever challenges and devastation ourselves? This last horror proves that we are prepared for unexpected terror…whether by humankind or nature.

    American citizens rock. We are ready more than the government we pay to be ready.

    Way to go America! Let’s keep it up…help our fellow citizens regroup and recover, and kick government involvement out unless we have written confirmation that their “aid” will be unconditional and unbureaucratic.

    We have proven that we don’t need Homeland Security. We ARE Homeland Security.

    I love this country!

    And I love this blog…great job.

  2. dan says

    September 18, 2005 at 10:07 pm

    dammit! Abbye beat me to saying it.

    I love my neighbors.

  3. edgar says

    September 18, 2005 at 11:49 pm

    Roe vs. Wade…classic!

  4. Belthasar says

    September 20, 2005 at 6:39 am

    I’m scared of these 700 clubbers but I’m just as scared of the hippie liberals.

    Why can’t we all just be moderate.

  5. Library Lady says

    September 20, 2005 at 7:06 am

    At least the hippie liberals won’t try to stop the 700 Clubbers from living their lives the way they want to–they’ll just stop them from trying to take basic rights away from the rest of us!

    Well said, Abbye. Americans are truly remarkable people. Self-absorbed, self-righteous, just plain selfish as we may be, there are few of us who will not drop what we’re doing to help those in need. As long as we see them, that is…………

  6. SisterAbbye says

    September 20, 2005 at 9:58 am

    library lady…I hear you.

    You know…when this all first started, I thought of the media as nothing but attention hogs. They were all there with their hair blowing in the wind…

    but as it turns out, they ended up being a saving grace for a lot of the people down south. FEMA isn’t there (still), the government, be it local, state or federal is sparse. Who is taking care? Ordinary citizens.

    BTW…did you see the piece that Anderson Cooper did on Kenner, Louisiana? People are still living with mold creeping up the walls of their living rooms. Why won’t they leave? Because they actually have jobs in Kenner. What would they do elsewhere with no jobs?

    And as far as helping as long as we see them…I totally agree.

    The US is so incredibly absorbed in visual stimulation (and melodrama) that it takes seeing it live to have it sink in. And for some, that isn’t even enough.

    This is a good reminder that there are many people in the world going through even worse situations, who need our help and support.

    My support for American “how-to” is simply that…we are spoiled…and as unfortunate as this current situation is, it’s something we need to know as others know the same, if not worse, kind of suffering.

    I guess that my view is that we need to help and respect our neighbors. And our American “know-how” needs to supercede the pathetic response of our government.

    Whether it’s money or actual aid, whatever we can give, we need to do it.

    And…we need to remember this plight when other parts of the world go through the same thing.

    We are all here to help each other. And we are the wealthiest country in the world.

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About Me

I live in the South, not South Florida, a few blocks from the ocean, and two blocks from the main street. It's called Main Street. Amazes me too.

I'm from New York. I mostly lived in the Mid-Upper East Side, and the heart of the Upper West Side. It amazes me when people talk about how scared they were of Times Square in the 1970's and 1980's.

As my mother said: "know the streets, look out and you'll be fine."

What was scary was the invasion of the crack dens into "good buildings in good 'hoods." And the greedy landlords who did everything they could to get good tenants out of buildings.

I'm a Long Island girl, and proud of it now.
Then I hated everything about the suburbs. Yet somehow I lived in a few great Long Island Sound towns after high school.

Go to archives "August 2004" if you want to begin with the first posts.

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