Feline Warrior

Is it gonna rain on our parade?
Is your soul as light as a feather?
Or am I flat out going insane?

What’s that you say when the rain won’t go away?
What’s that you do when no one’s looking at you?
Where’s that you go after the show?
What’s that you say?
-OAR (”About Mr. Brown”)

Brown Shifts Blame for Katrina Response
By LARA JAKES JORDAN, Associated Press Writer

Excerpt:

WASHINGTON - Former FEMA director Michael Brown blamed others for most government failures in responding to Hurricane Katrina on Tuesday, especially Louisiana Gov. Kathleen Blanco and New Orleans Mayor Ray Nagin. He aggressively defended his own role.

His efforts to shift blame drew sharp criticism from Democratic and Republican lawmakers alike.

“I’m happy you left,” said Rep. Christopher Shays (bio, voting record), R-Conn. “That kind of look in the lights like a deer tells me you weren’t capable of doing that job.”

According to his bio at FEMA, Mr. Brown served as FEMA’s Deputy Director and the agency’s General Counsel. Shortly after the September 11th terrorist attacks, Mr. Brown served on the President’s Consequence Management Principal’s Committee, which acted as the White House’s policy coordination group for the federal domestic response to the attacks. Then Dubya asked him “to head the Consequence Management Working Group to identify and resolve key issues regarding the federal response plan.” And In August 2002, President Bush appointed him to the Transition Planning Office for the new Department of Homeland Security, serving as the transition leader for the EP&R Division.

…Mr. Brown holds a bachelor’s degree in Public Administration/Political Science from Central State University, Oklahoma. He received his J.D. from Oklahoma City University’s School of Law.

Okay, so the dude’s a lawyer and his undergrad degree is a combo of Public Admin and PoliSci. Add to that his later experiences working on ethics committees and such, you’d think he would have said, way before Katrina, “Hey, Dubya… I think I’m in over my head. Better get Cheney on this one.” Or something. I mean, did he really think he had what it takes to deal with a major catastrosphic event? Go check out the full bio and tell me if the part about him directing “the National Disaster Medical System and the Nuclear Incident Response Team” doesn’t cause you to pee in your pants.

Did Mr. Brown see Dubya naked at some point? Or maybe he has compromising pictures of Laura Bush? What on earth could have inspired Dubya to put this guy into the job of Under Secretary of Emergency Preparedness and Response? Oh, right… we’re talking about Dubya. I’m just sayin’!

First of all, let’s please have more of this

and less of this

Lynndie England guilty of Iraq abuse - Yahoo! News

Favorite quotes: “She was a follower, she was an individual who was smitten with [Charles] Graner,” [Capt. Jonathan] Crisp said. “She just did whatever he wanted her to do.” [Graner has been called the “abuse ringleader” and is the father of England’s 11-month-old child.]

And: “The defense argued that England suffered from depression and that she has an overly compliant personality, making her a heedless participant in the abuse.”

Bah!

Now this business, this Lynndie England being found guilty - who is surprised? Don’t be shy - raise your hands! HEY, you in the back! No, Lynndie, you don’t get to vote on this one. See? Nobody is surprised.

Am I supposed to be a Lynndie supporter because I live in WV and she’s from WV? I don’t think so. I’m a supporter of personal responsibility, though, and that’s my stance on this whole thing.

Further, when this whole scandal broke, a friend with whom I normally agree on most things political said, “Awe, why are they making such a big deal out of this?” I believe I wrote on this months ago, but I’ll say it again: We started this thing (invasion of Iraq) and it’s our baby. We are being watched by the international community. Everyone sees what the US does in Iraq. Our own soldiers are abusing prisoners? It doesn’t matter what the prisoners allegedly did, it only matters what the rest of the world sees us do. (And for the record, it makes me queasy to have to say “us” in this situation - I’d prefer to distance myself, frankly.)

It’s shameful. Lynndie England deserves to go to prison. If she’s depressed, I hope they treat it. If she’s got an “overly compliant personality,” well, maybe therapy will help. Hell, the poor dog will probably become infatuated with another prisoner and participate in more horrible stuff, to impress her. It’s all sad.

And now, to lighten our little chat, I’ve found a great page for your entertainment: Bad Gas. Heck, it’s even got a great name! Now you head on over there for a little good-natured fun! No, really, I mean it… Get outta here, kid, you’re botherin’ me!

EDIT: Okay, wait. I said something that I didn’t entirely mean. I said that “it only matters what the rest of the world sees us do,” and that’s not true. That is important, yes, because others react to what we do and how we do it. American soldiers abusing Iraqi prisoners gives permission, in a sick way, to insurgents to do violent stuff, too. Retaliation.

It’s important to remember that Iraqi culture is not American culture; values are different - greatly different. While American men, if piled naked one-atop another, would be humiliated and perhaps their “manhood” threatened, there are other implications when that same thing is done to Iraqi men. (Not that doing this stuff to ANYONE is good, mind you.) The abuses to the Iraqi prisoners touch the same issues (humiliation and manhood) but also very deep religious beliefs. That’s at the core of it, I think. This is not a culture that promotes nudity the way American culture does. (And ours, even, posts it all over the place, but of course we punish women who bare “too much” skin by calling them sluts, for example. Ours is a culture of mixed messages in terms of sex and sexuality.)

I digress. What I’m saying here is that the ONLY thing that matters is NOT that the whole world saw what some soldiers did in Abu Ghraib to prisoners. That the whole world saw it is hideous and embarrassing, yes. That it was done is horrific and went beyond pure humiliation, it dug deep into a belief system that has been around longer than America, I’m willing to guess.

Am I saying that any of the people who were kidnapped and subsequently killed deserved it? No, I’m not saying that. I’m not an eye-for-an-eye girl. At the same time, when we show no respect for the people of a country, how on earth can we expect any semblance of respect from them? Or anyone?

Oh, this whole thing goes so deep. I’m too sleepy to get my thoughts out right, I think. Hopefully this makes at least a bit of sense. Mostly I just wanted to correct myself, to redirect what I’d said was the most important thing to what I believe is the root issue. And now I release you from this post!

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Dance picture from Here