Katrina Blanket
August 29th, 2007 | by Sumo | Published in Corruption in Govt, Environment, Politics | 6 Comments
A flag is many things to many people. In the aftermath of Katrina this blanket of the American flag is her comfort. Little did she know that help wasn’t on the way. An old woman now…probably worked hard all of her life as someone’s maid or housekeeper. She had old age to look forward to and a country that offered its citizens a pension for their old years. Of course it isn’t enough for a mouse to subsist on…but no matter. This is America…where she has freedom and democracy. This is America… where her people are disenfranchised from what the Constitution equally bestowed upon its nation’s people.
This is America where the haves have it all. They have food and water…they have toilets and beds…they have clean clothes and the comfort of closing their doors at night and locking out the world. They cloak themselves in their flags and bake-sales for their churches…cloak themselves in the knowledge that they are on the right side of freedom and democracy. They cloak themselves into believing in an administration that bought and sold them. They have thrown the cloak over their head and will not look out.
So…this old woman seeking refuge under this blanket sits there waiting for what will not come. The America she trusted and loved isn’t coming to her aid. She is being left out in the heat of the day and the cool of the night…for days and nights to come. All around her are babies and children that she wishes she could get out of her chair to help…they’re babies for goodness sakes…they need HER help. She gets tired. She gets hungry…and she knows she’ll eventually soil herself. Where is America? These old folks and children will die if we don’t get some help here she says. She wraps the flag blanket closer…it’s becoming night again…and she waits another night for her America that she worked all her life for…facing the night in her chair again… cloaked in her blanket flag of America. The America that has assured her freedom and democracy.
cross-posted from September 4, 2005
Sphere: Related Content
August 29th, 2007at 3:16 pm(#)
sumo, this was one of the most touching pictures of the disgrace that Bush’s response to Katrina and the loss of a great American city.
The Bush White House has made inaction a government initiative of the highest order in the Gulf Coast. With Michael Chertoff leading the Administration’s charge to nothing doing. The political implications of Katrina are clear. It moves Louisiana from purple to red. Does anyone think that this fact escaped the minds of Rover and Bush?
They don’t want NEW ORLEANS to ever return to what it once was- a warehouse for democratic votes.
Better to have those democrats scattered among red states where their votes will all be buried.
August 29th, 2007at 4:05 pm(#)
Exactly! It’s criminal how these people think the way they do. To deliberately disenfranchise their own people is beyond me. I hope this comes back to bit them on their collective butts.
August 29th, 2007at 4:27 pm(#)
Great post, Sumo. Was this taken inside the Superdome, perchance? Looks like it.
I have to say, though, that chances are no black woman of her age in New Orleans probably had any illusions about what America had done so for her, or held out much hope that the state of affairs would change. But that doesn’t excuse what happened next (or more precisely DIDN’T happen).
You are, 1st & foremost, a humane soul. Would that others will follow the exammple you set.
Echo what Earl says above. When a leader allows, & indeed facilitates, any part of his country’s descent into unlivable 3rd world conditions as Bush did in Katrina’s aftermath (instead exploting it for purposes of photo ops) he should be tried for treason & hung & quartered from the nearest telephone pole still standing.
August 29th, 2007at 6:29 pm(#)
Demon, that telephone pole gig for Bush sounds just about right. I’d pay to see it…sigh…
August 30th, 2007at 6:36 pm(#)
Demon and sumo lets suggest it for pay-for-view. Millions around the world would pay to see Dubya’s day of judgemebt.
August 31st, 2007at 10:26 am(#)
Echo. WHY is this bozo still in office (rhetorical question).