I think there are two lessons we need to take away from the Katrina fiasco:
First, the people we saw rioting in New Orleans are America's flotsam, and they exist in every society. Other than the physically disabled, young children and seniors 80 years old and up, the people we saw holed up in the Superdome and elsewhere are the perfect demonstration of what happens to people who choose (yes, choose) to lead third-world lives in a capitalist society.They were accustomed to living off a government check every month, accustomed to subsidized housing, accustomed to food paid for by food stamps. They've elected politicians like Mayor Ray Nagin and Gov. Kathleen Blanco to make them comfortable in that third-world existence, and now they have neither the resources nor the political leadership to survive in a time of crisis. Such has been the case throughout history for people who don't take charge of their lives.
When I started reading this, I thought to myself here goes another redneck, but then I realized Billingsly is himself black…God is he pitiful or what? I guess these are the kind of people Cynthia called Negroes.
I got one question for this moron though…what "rioting"?
Billingsly says "the people we saw rioting in New Orleans are America's flotsam..." but the only New Orleans people I saw on TV were the old people sitting patiently in their wheelchairs in front of the Convention Centre. And the mothers carrying two or three children, calling for help. Oh, and I saw the same footage over and over of a few dozen people carrying TVs and armfuls of clothes out of a couple of stores.
I have to admit that I skipped most of the article. Black Republicans bore me. The one comment that stuck with me was the 'flotsam' comment. Of all the harmful stereotypes, the 'they are all on welfare and food stamps' is the most harmful. We have a lot of poor people in this country, more of them white than black, and most of them contribute more in taxes than they receive in services. Yes, 'the poor will always be with us' but, we don't have to have a society that is actively hostile to poor people's interests.