Posted on 09/02/2005 11:15:03 AM PDT by coffee260
One of the many markers distinguishing civilized from primitive and traditional societies is that the former possess the concept of luck, both good and bad, while the latter do not.
There is no word for luck in the language of many American Indian tribes such as the Navaho, African tribes such as the Azande, Amazon tribes such as the Yanomamo, or New Guinea tribes such as the Dobu. The concept is absent, literally inconceivable, in their thinking about the way the world works.
How could something, anything, happen out of sheer blind chance? Whatever happens to anybody, good or bad, it was caused by spirits placated to be benevolent or goaded to be malevolent. Man is always the toy of demons. Thats a primitive mind at work.
Thus the primitive compulsion to find someone to blame for misfortune. Since there really is no such thing as sheer misfortune, tragedies must always be someones fault, the someone who incurred the anger of the spirits and brought down their punishment suffered by all.
So the primitive mentalities of leftist intellectuals and politicians within hours of the horror of Katrina began a chorus of blame, pointing their spiteful superstitious fingers at President Bush.
So RFKs son Bobby Jr. announced that Katrina was the fault of GWs not signing the Kyoto global warming treaty, and Sydney Blumenthal wrote that New Orleans is underwater because Bush spent money on the war in Iraq instead of increasing the Army Corps of Engineers research budget.
The primitive howling of the left has only begun, and it is the obligation of conservatives to tell them to shut up, abandon blame, accept the bad luck of Katrina, and get to work along with other Americans to help however they can.
So heres a confession. Anyones heart has to go out to the folks you see on television who have lost everything they possess but the person my heart goes out the most to is George W. Bush.
No president in modern memory has been subjected to more calumny, lies, and slander than him. After the Democrats do everything they can to steal his election in 2000 then have the brass to claim he stole it from them, eight months into his first term there is the worst terrorist attack in the nations history, and he has to wage a war against an enemy of insanely depraved evil.
He does so with incredible determination and fortitude, and is hated and vilified for it.
Then in his second term there is the worst natural disaster in US history. Either one would be an extraordinary historical challenge for a president. Only a man of enormous faith and ability could be willing and able to take one on. To ask him to take on both is asking him to be superhuman.
He is not, of course, but we are asking him to be. All we can offer in return is our gratitude. And our contempt for New York Times-Moveon.org-Cindy Sheehan America-hating scum.
Actually, we could give President Bush a lot more than gratitude. We could encourage him to seize the opportunity the tragedy of Katrina provides to achieve true energy independence for America.
This morning (Thursday, Sept. 1), he went on ABC News and asked us all to conserve energy use. This is a Jimmy Carter approach. We dont need to conserve, we need to produce, produce lots more oil so our economy can grow and we can be free of Saudi crude.
Our failure to produce more and be more free, our energy problem, is almost entirely political. Which means it can be fixed politically mostly by getting the EPA out of the way.
An obvious requirement for energy independence would be to increase our refining capacity that is, build more oil refineries. There hasnt been a single new refinery built in the US in 30 years. One reason is that it has to comply with a half million federal environmental regulations every year.
Theres a brainless buffoon in the Senate from Florida named Bill Nelson who actually called today for a repeat of Richard Nixons disastrous freeze on gas prices and swore he would prevent any attempt to drill for oil off Floridas coast.
The way to get around such folk and tap into the immense oil reserves off the coasts of California, Georgia, and Florida is for the President to press Congress to eliminate the federal prohibition to extract oil and gas from 80% of the nations coast, and to give the states most of the federal royalty money for continental shelf production.
The prospect of billions of dollars in oil royalties for their states will sweep away the concerns of many a Congressman and Senator.
Then my personal fantasy: for Mr. Bush in his next major media interview to announce: Were going to drill ANWR. Were going to get as much oil out of Alaska as we can because our economy is more important than caribou. Deal with it.
Beyond all of this has to be the public realization that we are not running out of oil, that it is not true that America has only three percent of the worlds oil while consuming a quarter of its production. There has got to be a widespread recognition that America has far, far more oil than Saudi Arabia, and combined with western Canada far, far more oil than all of the Middle East.
The Green River Formation in Wyoming, Utah, and Colorado contains 1.2 trillion (with a t) barrels of oil in deposits known as oil shale. The extraction and refining costs from oil shale are rapidly becoming commercially viable. A scientist friend of mine, for example, has developed a process he estimates could produce, from one particular deposit, five million barrels a day, plus one million barrels of distilled water and 100 % of the worlds production of aluminum for 50 years with a 22% ROI at an oil price of $45 a barrel.
The Athabaska and Peace River Oil Sands in Alberta, Canada contain well over a trillion barrels and again, extraction costs are dropping. There are scores of billions of barrels more in the western US.
But try to get a drop of any of it out of the ground and into your gas tank and the environmentalists go berserk. Theyll deluge Congress with demands for blocking legislation, the EPA for blocking regulations, and the courts with every imaginable lawsuit to prevent it.
Theyll also do their best to hamstring and slow down reconstruction along the obliterated Gulf Coast,
So while you cant blame anyone for a natural disaster like Katrina, if you feel like screaming in rage next time you fill up your cars gas tank and need some folks to blame: choose the enviros. Get them out of the way and not only will that tankful cost so much less, but it will be gas that America produced itself.
Let the President know and send him your prayers.
Jack Wheeler, always a voice of reason.
Instead, Bush just let them get ruined in the flood.
It's all Bush's fault!
Dr. Wheeler has a lot of good ideas, but he's naive. Little of this is going to happen. We've had "W" for how many years? And you think he's just gonna make this happen now?
Amen
Yes, lately I've been saying several prayers a day for Dubya. He needs a lot of courage and strength at this time.
PresBush has disappointed some folks on the right when it comes to several key issues. But his handling of the war in Iraq remains remarkable, in my humble opinion.
The level of endless whining, complaining and lying rhetoric coming from the liberal establishment over the aftermath of hurricane Katrina, is a total outrage. Some people are taking advantage of a natural disaster to advance a political agenda that attempts to undermine the very foundation of our civilized society. Shameful, contemptuous behavior.
This goes in the file entitled, "No Good Deed Goes Unpunished."
Ih just that picture frame alone, I see the means of at least 12,000 people riding high and dry and out of Nawlins before the storm even hit...
Amazing isn't it...
I sometimes wonder if this is why W's not more forceful in enacting his agenda and leading. He's got to be tired of this insane bu!!$h!t.
and he has to wage a war against an enemy of insanely depraved evil.
Not sure if he's talking about Al Qaeda, or the Democrats here.
Karl Rove allows the Dems to get ahead on nearly every issue and project their lies until they become fact. The bunker mentality is working any longer.
Amen!
Just walked through the Holocaust Museum with Mrs. Liberty. "Never forget" is the expression. I had to remark on the way out the it's been forgotten already.
It boils me the way the pacifists ran amok in the late '30's...look at the lives they cost. Then...consider how many more they want to lose now.
Thanks for posting! In light of the Mayor's psycho rant of blame I can't get enough of this picture.
I know, that picture cuts through the lies, and assigns the blame where it belongs.
btt
bttt
That buses under water picture is worth a thousand lies coming from Nagin & Blanco.........good article.....BTTT
Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.