Criminal

"But to focus on Bush's personal failings as a leader--to dwell on how he played a guitar as people drowned, or the unbelievable hubris of his photo-op leadership, or his complete inability to call for meaningful, shared national sacrifice in response to a tragedy of biblical scale--is to miss something more important. These are not the failings of one man. In the reaction to this disaster we see the worst elements of the Republican Party writ large--an obscene combination of incompetence, contempt for informed opinion (some might say reality) and a mad, corrupt libertarianism that assumes things will simply take care of themselves without the interference of government.

Northern Command stood by helplessly awaiting permission to attend the desperate and dying for the same reasons the American military was ordered to stand by as Baghdad was destroyed. Anyone who still fails to understand why Iraqis who are neither Baathists nor Al-Qaeda sympathizers have taken up arms has only to draw the line between New Orleans and the Iraqi capital. In the one case as in the other, conservatives who attempt to excuse the inexcusable only heap shame on themselves. This is criminal negligence, and there must be accountability. "