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Audacity of Truth
Spinsational:
"We were so busy just getting stuff done and dealing with the immediate crises that were in front of us that I think we lost some of that sense of speaking directly to the American people about what their core values are and why we have to make sure those institutions are matching up with those values."
-Obama, explaining recent Democrat losses, 1/20/10
Velvet Lair- The sexiness of winning the battle of good versus evil January 26, 2010
- Ever wonder why? January 12, 2010
- The decision to bench Peyton Manning: Right or wrong? December 28, 2009
- Is my dad turning into a metrosexual? November 24, 2009
- My “Things To Do For Christmas” list November 23, 2009
Landrieu threatens to “throw a punch”
Senator Mary Landrieu, the Democrat of Louisiana (whose father was a mayor of New Orleans), appears to have finally found her voice after offering only cautious criticism of the federal relief effort in the hurriance catastrophe earlier in the week. Today she promised to literally "punch" anyone, "including the president," who contnued to question the local response to the tragedy, considering the gross federal misconduct.
Appearing on ABC’s "The Week" TV program this morning, Senator Landrieu still appeared to be smarting from President Bush’s comments, during his national radio address, that state and local bore a fair share of blame for the slow response. On a copter tour of the area, Landrieu said that if she heard any more criticism from federal officials, particularly about the evacuation of New Orleans, she might lose control.
"If one person criticizes them or says one more thing – including the president of the United States – he will hear from me," she said on the ABC program. "One more word about it after this show airs and I might likely have to punch him. Literally."
Hey Landrieu, why don’t you pick on someone your own size … like me. We can settle this man to man or, er, you know what I mean. The prez is kinda busy right now, so I’ll gladly step in for him 
Hat tip: Bryan Preston, blogging over at Michelle Malkin’s blog.
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This kind of behavior is just very disturbing. I know she’s under great stress, but lots of people are depending on her, and she needs to remember that emoting is less important than action.
So many things over the last week have reminded me of the way many French politicians acted during the German attack of 1940: a focus on internal political conflict rather than on the external enemy.
Link
Wow ST!!!! Didn’t realize you were such a combatant. Must be that you are frustrated with, and fed up with the silliness of the yahoos who want to misplace the blame for the severity of human loss and discomfort. Senator Landrieu obviously must be feeling the pinch of the black mark of blame for not minimizing the human loss and suffering in New Orleans that has been branded upon her friends and cronies and may fall upon her own doorstep soon. What’s up with that Mary??????
Hearing the truth sometimes hurts; especially those (e.g., Landrieu, Nagin, Blanco) who would rather play CYA by blaming anyone else in site. If the congressional GOP leadership emerges from the defensive, gutless game plan it has employed for too many years, the coming hearings will distribute accountability (aka, blame!) where it belongs. There is enough to go ’round.
Hey, if the Senator wants to make this a national discussion about the miserable leadership of elected officials in Louisiana, then all I have to say is, “Bring it on!”
And all this time I thought threatening a federal official was against federal law! Well, perhaps Senator Landrieu considers herself above the law. She wouldn’t be the only federal official who does.
Why so defensive of the locals Mary? Is it more than a knee jerk Democratic reaction.
Could it be that the Lt. Governor of LA, is your brother, Mitch Landrieu?
No need for the tin-foil hat to put together this cover-up.
Mr. Foster,
I wholeheartedly agree with your comparison of political tactics then and now.
But it is tremendously unrealistic to believe that France could have ever held back the Germans in 1940. They were so far behind technologically that they really stood no chance. Our American defense plan mirrors the lessons learned from the uprising of German agression during WWII. And this is why we have and always will have the most modern, and deadly weapons systems in the world.
I was happy to see on that blog that my old buddy Karl Zinsmeister from the AEI was mentioned. If you buy his any of his books from the AEI. He will personally sign them for you if you ask. Some of his books are an awesome introspective into life on the ground from a soldiers perspective in Iraq. He’s pretty cool and he’s really intense.
GBA…thanks for the comment. I don’t think France was as far behind technologically as is often asserted. The problems were more a matter of strategy and deployment: ie, lots of tanks, and reasonably decent ones, but divided among infantry divisions rather than concentrated into armored divisions. There was a disparity in the air in that the best fighter, the Dewoitine, had been made in relatively small numbers (and could have been made in much larger #s had production contracts been let in the US–another political problem), but even the obsolescent Morane Saulnier aircraft producted a remarkably good record.
A great book on the 1940 campaign is “To Lose a Battle” by Alastair Horne.
Also let us not forget that the French didn’t learn their lesson from WWI. They trusted their allies to the northeast abit too much. The German military just rolled over the Neatherlands which “took” the French by surprise, interestingly enough.
As far as these name calling finger pointing bullies go. I have always believed that those who start finger pointing and name calling are the ones trying to deflect attention. But those that resort to violence are the ones that are most guilty everytime. God I so intensely dispise cowardly people. Especially cowardly leadership.
Mr. Foster,
We are still talking about country that was still using the Chauchat as its primary light automatic weapon in 1939? Aren’t we?
Nobody in the world had tank superiority over the Tigers and the Panthers except the Soviets in early 1944. While some tanks had similar weapons, nobody had that kind of armor, speed and fire control. The Charrons were easy prey for the Wermacht. And the French Infantry was not nearly has heavily armed as the Germans who had excellent weapons and were well provisioned with exellent supply chain management.
Lets not forget the Stuka which was far more effective that our own Dauntless dive bomber.
Then there is the psychological terror of the Paris Gun.
Please remember the French actually thought the Germans would be dumb enough to attack the ridiculous Maginot Line.
Also at that time the ME109 and the HE111 was unchallenged until mid 1940 in speed and in shear numerical superiority.
http://www.tgplanes.com/planfile.asp?idplane=142
http://www.tgplanes.com/query.asp?action=quicklist
The manufacture of the Dewotine was not really a political issue so much as it was not nearly as good as the X51 (later P51 OCT.40)that was superior in speed and armament. It was really a so-so aircraft. And the Brits needed every Spitfire they had.
And as for the Morane Saulnier. You must be joking. Even if they had 10,000 of them it would just be a slaughter given its light armament and lack of speed and maneuverability. Like fish in a barrel.
But the French did not fight the good fight. And it’s politicians certainly did throw there hands up more or less.The lack of courageous leadership at that time. That I will agree on. But an “outcome was by no means inevitable.” I just don’t buy that. It’s just wishful thinking, fantastic optimism.
Thanks for the comments everyone! I was kinda making a funny with Landrieu with my little challenge but I hope everyone realizes I know the serious issues that are being faced there (a couple of people sent me emails asking me how I could “joke” at a time like this – sigh).
Let’s just say that a “right” hook is meaner than a “left” hook anyday
France 1940: Let’s not hijack the thread here, but I’m hoping to do an extensive post on this whole thing when I get time. Just one more thought here: it’s often been claimed that the French just ran away, but in fact there were on the order of 100,000 French casualties (killed) in this brief campaign, which certainly argues against widespread cowardice.
The outcome wasn’t inevitable; the interesting question is how far back the leadership would have had to have behaved differently to change the outcome. Was May 1940 too late? Probably. January 1936? Probably not.
Mr. Foster.
Just listen to yourself.
I agree with your supposition that acting sooner would have aided France.
But please remember it was a situation very similar to Iraq. Where the Allies hurled the Germans in to poverty and famine for nearly a decade under the treaty of Versailles. Millions of women and children died of malnutrition and curable disease in Germany.Do you remember that famous picture of the old lady with a wheelbarrow full of German Marks, standing in line to buy a couple of loaves of bread. The world stood by and did nothing to end this atrocity. Actually they sanctioned this atrocity. Our sanctions then were tantamount to genocide. It’s just like we did in Iraq after the Desert Storm. Millions of Iraqi women and children also died of malnutrition and curable disease until the oil for food program was implemented. And although that program was rampant( as most relief efforts are) with corruption. It did help bring the death toll down considerably.
There were many in Europe that sympathized with the suffering of the Germans. What was not so widely known was the full scope of the German war machine. Which was realized in late 1939. Scary similarity.
We go to war and kill hundreds of thousands of able bodied men. They surrender. Then we impose sanctions so restrictive that they ensure the death of millions women and children. The difference in Iraq being that during the sanctions we made sure to bomb every food and water processing facility for ten years. We did not want them to live to fight again. Another silent genocide .
The 20th century will go down in history written in blood. At least a dozen or more genocides on a massive scale occurred all over the world.
It is my contention that most of the political posturing in France in the late thirties was fueled by guilt and fear of revenge. I have always believed that this attitude facilitated the genocide against the Jews. If the world was to act, then 1936 was the last year to act. That I agree on. But France did not have the power to act unilaterally ever.
But the analogy that acting sooner is best is spot on. And it directly reflects into many instances in history. And the response and preparation for Hurricane Katrina is a perfect example of the story of complacency and the political fallout that ensues. And just like most of history, it is certainly not the doing of an individual. It took a concert of efforts, poor efforts.
But had those been good efforts we would all be praising our leaders for their courage and forsight.
ST,
Here’s one for you. Because you are so interested in political punching. Personally I would rather politicians punch eachother than see anybody go to war.
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/asia-pacific/3560977.stm
I would have rather seen a cage match between George and Saddam than fifty thousand dead human beings.
GBA wrote, “I would have rather seen a cage match between George and Saddam than fifty thousand dead human beings.”
Oh the utopia. I would’ve rather seen no WW2, and the Japanese surrender than 100,000 dead human beings.
Couldn’t we have just sent Saddam an invitation and had it on pay per view. And maybe the rest of the thugs (Uday and whatever the other guys name was) would’ve abided by the match results. HA!
The Japanese military didn’t want to surrender after the first bomb.
Some people are just so pig headed. But we all just like to write whatever we want from the comfort of our own homes…..
Baklava,
Hey pal. What’s up?
Edited. –ST
I am the kind of person that hides from nothing and nobody. So stop kidding yourself.
Uday and Qusay were punks. Tariq Aziz would have succeeded Saddam….not those two boneheads. And GWB is the most physically fit President in history. So it’s safe to say he would have dealt out a Texas style whooping. BTW do your homework on world war two. That will involve reading. RIF
The one thing I noticed about you is that you never support your arguments with any type of research or facts. What’s that all about?
Is there not enough information available from the submissive media?
You may not like my posts. That’s your business. But the difference between you and me is I do my homework. I support my arguments. And I may indeed at times be wrong. But at least I can prove how I came to that conclusion.
Edited. Please cool it, GBA. –ST
Logic and reasoning as well as facts thank you very much.
You wrote, “So it’s safe to say he would have dealt out a Texas style whooping.”
I wasn’t addressing what Bush would do. I was addressing the utopian feeling that it’s all about either Osama or Saddam or one person just being in a match and then the rest of Iraq will fall in line. I’m not sure the left really understands what might happen if we just pull our troops out immediately. Germany was 10 years and Japan was 7 years of reconstruction/rebuilding. There were a lot of our men killed in both of those countries after WW2 ended.
BTW, no need to get personal. What exactly was I wrong about and I’ll make a correction. I should’ve put a + next to the 100,000 human being killed but my point was larger than that. Don’t get side tracked by the details.
I really do have a point. Armchair first responding isn’t useful. Throwing blame around isn’t productive. That’s been my major point to you. I’m sorry if you feel “attacked” by me, but that’s exactly what you are doing to others (without perspective).
BTW, I’m not questioning your intelligence. Just your actions, words, and perspective.
No need to question mine as I’ve been an avid political/history/economic study since 1991.
Doesn’t convince me your perspective is correct.
No need to question my facts as I’ve been an avid political/history/economic study since 1991. I’d link you to plenty of facts if it was even necessary. It wasn’t necessary as I was addressing your blame Bush attitude.
Questioning my facts doesn’t convince me your perspective and attitude is correct.
By the way. I’m sure you’ve seen the following transcript from CNN:
http://transcripts.cnn.com/TRANSCRIPTS/0509/05/ltm.01.html
It has the following:
S. O’BRIEN: There are people who say your evacuation plan, obviously in hindsight, was disastrous.
MAYOR RAY NAGIN, NEW ORLEANS: Which one?
S. O’BRIEN: Your evacuation plan before — when you put people into the Superdome. It wasn’t thought out. You got 20,000 people in there. And that you bear the brunt of the blame for some of this, a large chunk of it.
NAGIN: Look, I’ll take whatever responsibility that I have to take. But let me ask you this question: When you have a city of 500,000 people, and you have a category 5 storm bearing down on you, and you have the best you’ve ever done is evacuate 60 percent of the people out of the city, and you have never issued a mandatory evacuation in the city’s history, a city that is a couple of hundred years old, I did that. I elevated the level of distress to the citizens.
And I don’t know what else I could do, other than to tell them that it’s a mandatory evacuation. And if they stayed, make sure you have a frigging ax in your home, where you can bust out the roof just in case the water starts flowing.
And as a last resort, once this thing is above a category 3, there are no buildings in this city to withstand a category 3, a category 4 or a category 5 storm, other than the Superdome. That’s where we sent people as a shelter of last resort. When that filled up, we sent them to the Convention Center. Now, you tell me what else we could have done.
S. O’BRIEN: What has Secretary Chertoff promised you? What has Donald Rumsfeld given you and promised you?
NAGIN: Look, I’ve gotten promises to — I can’t stand anymore promises. I don’t want to hear anymore promises. I want to see stuff done. And that’s why I’m so happy that the president came down here, because I think they were feeding him a line of bull also. And they were telling him things weren’t as bad as it was.
He came down and saw it, and he put a general on the field. His name is General Honore. And when he hit the field, we started to see action.
And what the state was doing, I don’t frigging know. But I tell you, I am pissed. It wasn’t adequate.
And then, the president and the governor sat down. We were in Air Force One. I said, ‘Mr. President, Madam Governor, you two have to get in sync. If you don’t get in sync, more people are going to die.’
S. O’BRIEN: What date was this? When did you say that? When did you say…
NAGIN: Whenever air Force One was here.
S. O’BRIEN: OK.
NAGIN: And this was after I called him on the telephone two days earlier. And I said, ‘Mr. President, Madam Governor, you two need to get together on the same page, because of the lack of coordination, people are dying in my city.’
S. O’BRIEN: That’s two days ago.
NAGIN: They both shook — I don’t know the exact date. They both shook their head and said yes. I said, ‘Great.’ I said, ‘Everybody in this room is getting ready to leave.’ There was senators and his cabinet people, you name it, they were there. Generals. I said, ‘Everybody right now, we’re leaving. These two people need to sit in a room together and make a doggone decision right now.’
S. O’BRIEN: And was that done?
NAGIN: The president looked at me. I think he was a little surprised. He said, “No, you guys stay here. We’re going to another section of the plane, and we’re going to make a decision.”
He called me in that office after that. And he said, “Mr. Mayor, I offered two options to the governor.” I said — and I don’t remember exactly what. There were two options. I was ready to move today. The governor said she needed 24 hours to make a decision.
S. O’BRIEN: You’re telling me the president told you the governor said she needed 24 hours to make a decision?
NAGIN: Yes.
S. O’BRIEN: Regarding what? Bringing troops in?
NAGIN: Whatever they had discussed. As far as what the — I was abdicating a clear chain of command, so that we could get resources flowing in the right places.
S. O’BRIEN: And the governor said no.
NAGIN: She said that she needed 24 hours to make a decision. It would have been great if we could of left Air Force One, walked outside, and told the world that we had this all worked out. It didn’t happen, and more people died.