Phil's Thinking

Let’s get real. The chaos in the aftermath of Hurricane Katrina isn’t just a problem of logistics or getting food and fresh water to the good people of New Orleans.

It’s a problem of suspenders and zippers, because, once again, the Bush Administration’s been caught with their pants down.

While tens of thousands of National Guard troops linger in the very dry cities of Tikrit and Fallujah, their very presence angering a country tired of occupation, tens of thousands of American citizens languish in Third World conditions because there are so few troops here to help. How is it that we can get a Black Hawk chopper to our wounded GIs in less than five minutes, but it takes four days for FEMA to drop off some Gatorade to poor folks in the heart of The Big Easy?

President Bush, as usual, has awakened from his torpor a day too late. The ever-vacationing President, whose administration year after year cut levee construction and maintenance budgets for Louisiana, has reluctantly hiked up his pants to oversee another disaster. His brave work on the telephone and in cabinet meetings has unleashed the full power of FEMA, whose feverish, around-the-clock planning has resulted in more deaths than a typical day in Baghdad.

Oh, Great Leader, thank you for calling in your daddy to work his fund-raising magic again! What was that? You’re actually going to visit this shell-shocked area? Why the mere presence of you bravely filling a sandbag or handing out bottles of Evian will surely raise the spirits of the nearly-dead and barely-fed. I can see you now, bullhorn in hand, standing on a pile of rubble next to a very large Mississippi State trooper and shouting “We’re gonna get the people responsible for this!” Oh wait, it was God. “We’re gonna get the God responsible for this!” Better bring Pat Robertson along with you.

Ah, but disasters are your bread and butter. If not for 9-11, another tragedy you were totally unprepared for, you’d be watching President John Kerry right now on your big-screen TV in Crawford, marveling at how nice his poofy hair behaves in the heat and humidity of the Deep South. If not for this hurricane, you’d still be beset by that nagging, grieving mother named Cindy.

Oh, disasters have been very good to you. They define your entire presidency. Yes, you are indeed the Disaster President.

As you and Homeland Security Director Michael Chertoff zip up your pants and get down to the hard work of denying negligence and brushing off claims of incompetence, the victims of Katrina will be watching your every move. And it’ll be really easy to do because, once again, you moved way too slowly.