I am sorry about the Burma hurricane. I am sad that its leaders are so paranoid as to refuse aid from the world. I am saddened that so little aid is getting into the affected region and that people are dieing needlessly.
But still…
When I read complaints from our government about the failure to allow aid it’s like someone rubbing a balloon before popping it and laughing in my face.
Is it that way to you?
This morning on TV Cindy McCain was complaining bitterly of the Burmese peoples’ plight. I have no doubt she felt sincere. But I kept switching back to that picture of her husband, the day Katrina hit New Orleans, standing with our leader, and a birthday cake.
Crocodile tears.
When I see Secretary of State Rice demanding that Burma allow aid in, all I can think of is what she was doing when Katrina hit New Orleans. Shopping for shoes.
When I read about U.S. diplomats bemoaning the destruction of Burmese rice fields, I think about how all they cared about after Katrina was getting the casinos back into operation, and how we’re now benefiting from higher rice prices.
I try to imagine the terrors today in the Irrawaddy Delta, but all I can see is the picture of a wheelchair, holding a dead woman, outside the Morial Convention Center, on September 1, 2005.
I know I should be more sympathetic to the cries of people far away, but the soundtrack in my head is that of Shepherd Smith and Geraldo Rivera, begging Sean Hannity to please listen to them, from downtown New Orleans, surrounded by death and disease. And Hannity yelling back at them, telling them to get back on message.
Heckuva job, Brownie indeed.
When I view the Armageddon over there, I keep flashing back to the one over here. And my fingers clench, my throat gets tight, I get so mad I could scream.
And in that moment I feel as impotent as those people in Burma do.
When a government chooses not to listen, when a government chooses death rather than aid, it’s a terrifying thing. When it’s your government, and that government remains in power, years later, using the full force of the government to cover up its many crimes, what can you do?
Barack Obama tells me to turn the page. Start over. Change. But when change does come, what happens to the crimes of this era. Not just Katrina, but Abu Ghraib, the politicization of justice, of basic science, the hundreds-and-hundreds of billions stolen by Cheney’s cronies and his military industrial complex?
Do we just let it all go?
Can we? The better angels of my nature demand it, but those angels are bathed in sorrow, choked with rage, and I’m not Jesus Christ, nor am I Gandhi. I am just a writer, lost in impotent fury over crimes he can do nothing about.
Maybe some music might help…
