NYT op-ed: Waiting for a Leader

["David Farber" <dave () farber net>]

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From: "Paul Saffo"<psaffo () iftf org>
Sent: 01/09/05 10:34:34 AM
To: "Dave Farber"<dave () farber net>
Subject: NYT op-ed: Waiting for a Leader

New York Times Editorials
September 1, 2005
Waiting for a Leader

George W. Bush gave one of the worst speeches of his life yesterday,  
especially given the level of national distress and the need for  
words of consolation and wisdom. In what seems to be a ritual in this  
administration, the president appeared a day later than he was  
needed. He then read an address of a quality more appropriate for an  
Arbor Day celebration: a long laundry list of pounds of ice,  
generators and blankets delivered to the stricken Gulf Coast. He  
advised the public that anybody who wanted to help should send cash,  
grinned, and promised that everything would work out in the end.

We will, of course, endure, and the city of New Orleans must come  
back. But looking at the pictures on television yesterday of a place  
abandoned to the forces of flood, fire and looting, it was hard not  
to wonder exactly how that is going to come to pass. Right now,  
hundreds of thousands of American refugees need our national concern  
and care. Thousands of people still need to be rescued from imminent  
peril. Public health threats must be controlled in New Orleans and  
throughout southern Mississippi. Drivers must be given confidence  
that gasoline will be available, and profiteering must be brought  
under control at a moment when television has been showing long lines  
at some pumps and spot prices approaching $4 a gallon have been  
reported.

Sacrifices may be necessary to make sure that all these things happen  
in an orderly, efficient way. But this administration has never been  
one to counsel sacrifice. And nothing about the president's demeanor  
yesterday - which seemed casual to the point of carelessness -  
suggested that he understood the depth of the current crisis.

While our attention must now be on the Gulf Coast's most immediate  
needs, the nation will soon ask why New Orleans's levees remained so  
inadequate. Publications from the local newspaper to National  
Geographic have fulminated about the bad state of flood protection in  
this beloved city, which is below sea level. Why were developers  
permitted to destroy wetlands and barrier islands that could have  
held back the hurricane's surge? Why was Congress, before it wandered  
off to vacation, engaged in slashing the budget for correcting some  
of the gaping holes in the area's flood protection?

It would be some comfort to think that, as Mr. Bush cheerily  
announced, America "will be a stronger place" for enduring this  
crisis. Complacency will no longer suffice, especially if experts are  
right in warning that global warming may increase the intensity of  
future hurricanes. But since this administration won't acknowledge  
that global warming exists, the chances of leadership seem minimal.

http://www.nytimes.com/2005/09/01/opinion/01thu1.html

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