Casting Aspersions and Slinging Louisiana Muck

Over the weekend, like nearly everyone else on the globe with a TV set, I watched more of the Hurricane Katrina aftermath in Louisiana and Mississippi. If you read my last post, you will already know how I feel about the political opportunists who are blaming the inefficiencies and delays in disaster response on racism. I will stipulate that there were mistakes made, many of them, both before the hurricane hit and after. Why should we be surprised? Any activity which requires human thought and action is imperfect. And the more humans are involved, the more imperfect it gets. Add jurisdictional complications and several levels of bureaucracy and the result is? Gridlock. Buck passing. That is the way things are and always will be. It is not good, it is not ideal, but until there are perfect human beings, with no personal axes to grind and able to make perfect decisions every time, things aren't going to change. But what does any of this have to do with racism?

What made my jaw drop while watching television on the weekend was when the ubiquitous Jessie Jackson sniped at the media about something so ridiculous that it was truly worthy of his customary misguided bombast. Jackson railed about the fact that blacks fleeing New Orleans were labeled as refugees and that blacks filmed looting stores and homes were labeled as, well, looters. I think that Jessie Jackson is an embarrassing irrelevancy to any self-respecting black and that he and his utterances should be scorned. He reminds me of the dolts who, with feigned nonchalance, wander behind on-camera television reporters so they can be seen by the world and get their few seconds of exposure. What they don't seem to realize is that they are exposed for what they are: idiots.

Katrina has presented the United States with the largest and most complex natural disaster in recent history. It is an opportunity to show the world how people of every race and religion can work together individually to make up, at least partially, for the errors and inefficiencies of the bureaucrats and politicians who fell down on the job. Name calling and recriminations isn't going to help.

I freely admit that I have no firsthand experience with racism. I just know that I don't know anyone who is racist. I also know that, from my many trips to the American south, including Louisiana, I never once saw anything that might even remotely be characterized as racist. I am not saying that racism doesn't exist. I am merely saying that it is overstated by people like Jackson who have made careers of advocacy against racism, even in circumstances where there is none.

My friend Mark at his Under the Radar blog has more on this and his insights are worth reading.

While thinking about all this over the weekend, the song lyrics below, performed by the Eagles and written by Glen Frey and Don Henley, came to mind. The lyrics fit the situation. Imagine that the song is directed to Jessie Jackson and other professional whiners.


Get Over It

I turn on the tube and what do I see
A whole lotta people cryin’ ’don’t blame me’
They point their crooked little fingers at everybody else
Spend all their time feelin’ sorry for themselves
Victim of this, victim of that
Your momma’s too thin; your daddy’s too fat

Get over it
Get over it
All this whinin’ and cryin’ and pitchin’ a fit
Get over it, get over it

You say you haven’t been the same since you had your little crash
But you might feel better if I gave you some cash
The more I think about it, old Billy was right
Let’s kill all the lawyers, kill ’em tonight
You don’t want to work, you want to live like a king
But the big, bad world doesn’t owe you a thing

Get over it
Get over it
If you don’t want to play, then you might as well split
Get over it, get over it

It’s like going to confession every time I hear you speak
You’re makin’ the most of your losin’ streak
Some call it sick, but I call it weak

You drag it around like a ball and chain
You wallow in the guilt; you wallow in the pain
You wave it like a flag, you wear it like a crown
Got your mind in the gutter, bringin’ everybody down
Complain about the present and blame it on the past
I’d like to find your inner child and kick it’s little ass

Get over it
Get over it
All this bitchin’ and moanin’ and pitchin’ a fit
Get over it, get over it

Get over it
Get over it
It’s gotta stop sometime, so why don’t you quit
Get over it, get over it