Random Web Posts on Katrina

Here are a few posts from Chuck Muth's "News & Views" daily email newsletter:

LESSONS TV TAUGHT US ABOUT KATRINA
1. New Orleans was devastated and no other city or town was affected by the hurricane.
2. The hurricane only hit black families' property.
3. Mississippi is reported to have a tree blown down.
4. New Orleans has no white people.
5. The hurricane blew a limb off a tree in the yard of an Alabama resident.
6. When you are hungry after a hurricane, steal a big screen TV.
7. The hurricane did 23 billion dollars in improvements to New Orleans. Now the city is welfare-, looter-, gang-, and prisoner-free... and they are all now in your city...and you are paying them.
8. White folks don't make good news stories.
9. Don't give thanks to the thousands that came to help rescue you, instead bitch because the government hasn't given you a debit card yet
10. Only black family members got separated in the hurricane rescue efforts.
11. Ignore warnings to evacuate and the white folks will come get you and give you money for being friggin' stupid.
12. Your governor wouldn't let the feds in for four days, but somehow, it's all George Bush's fault.
- Author Unknown

"Among the pictures from New Orleans were lots of heart-rending shots of displaced mothers and children, but few of fathers and husbands. Liberal critics say Hurricane Katrina ripped aside the veil on America's extreme poverty. What it really ripped aside was the veil over the collapse of family, particularly among inner-city blacks, that lies at the heart of poverty."
- Columnist Thomas Bray

"As we hear calls for a 'compassionate' response to the victims of this (Hurricane Katrina) tragedy, it is important to remember that you can't be compassionate with other people's money. This difference is as simple as the difference between my reaching into my pocket for money to help someone in need and my reaching into your pocket for the same purpose. The former is charity -- the latter is not."
- Michael Tanner of the Cato Institute

"...Americans shouldn't filter so much money through Washington. Louisianans don't need Iowa rain forests, and Iowans don't need levees in Louisiana. Maybe the people who want to live in New Orleans should have to pay (through private enterprise or local taxes) the special costs of its exposed location -- or live elsewhere. If all local projects, essential and whimsical, were paid for with local taxes, competition among states and cities would force them to become more efficient."
- ABC's John Stossel in TownHall.com

If (House Majority Leader Tom) DeLay is being honest when he says he will consider offsets in order to pay for hurricane damage, he should start by asking each member to give up just one earmark apiece from the 6,371 'pork' projects in the recent highway bill. Such action may be unprecedented, but so was the bill itself..."There are dozens of other programs and agencies that could be scaled back or eliminated in their entirety with some leadership from Republicans. The billions we spend annually on foreign aid that does little more than enrich corrupt foreign leaders, agriculture subsidies that give wealthy American commodity farmers an unfair advantage over impoverished farmers in the Third World and education spending that has grown faster than the military budget since September 11 are all prime targets.
- John Berthoud of the National Taxpayer's Union