It is sad. We've got the biggest dope in a family full of dopes sitting in the Oval Office.

But not all is lost, Jack.

Americans have already donated a record $404 million for the victims of Katrina.
http://www.philanthropy.com/free/update/2005/09/2005090201.htm

And private citizens have helped evacuate people.
http://www.herald-sun.com/durham/4-643298.html

I'm sure others are doing the same. Money quote:

"We found it absolutely incredible that the authorities had no way to get there for four or five days, that they didn't go in and help these people, and we made it in a two-wheel-drive Hyundai," said Hans Buder, who made the trip with his roommate Byrd and another student, David Hankla.

I just read this on Yahoo and was about to send you the link. Absolutely unbelievable and unfeeling. The entire Bush family needs to be lobotomized.

There's apparently not much gray matter left there to destroy.

Reminds me of the time Bush Sr. displayed just how out of touch he was when he goggled in amazement at those newfangled bar scanners at the checkout stand in the grocery store...

Or the time Bush Sr. stood up in front of the veterans and got halfway through a campaign speech on "Today is Pearl Harbor Day, a day that will live in infamy, blah blah" when it dawned on him that he was months off. He got elected anyway. America the Stupid.

Let me say on behalf of anyone who has ever run for public office: Let he (or she) among you who would like a reporter to stick a microphone in your mother's face and see what comes out cast the first stone.

My mom has never lied to try to make me look good...

C'mon, if you read what she is quoted as saying, she was obviously playing up the hospitality of her fellow Texans; it had nothing to do with her son.

I agree that the comments were insensitive but your reading of them is way out of line. I'm worried about you, Jack; I'm afraid you're morphing into Paul Krugman (another Democrat I respected before his anti-Bush obsession rendered him unbearable).

That's the problem with the Bushes. People are dying, corpses are rotting, little kids are having their throats cut, and they're busy playing "good old boy" with their "howdy" cr*p. "Trent Lott's front porch will be good as new"? My God. I'm sorry, people this dumb should not be running a 7-11, much less a country.

On national issues, I'm proud to be like Krugman. Bush is a disaster that no FEMA could ever fix.

On the local front, however, I believe I am maintaining my sanity...

I beg to differ, Jack. Your personal feelings about growth in this town color your philosophy, to such an extent that your selective critique plays most favorably with a crowd that is quick to find bad things to say about any effort to make government a positive actor.

The primary voices on your blog are anti-government. That's the common thread.

PP, you're violating the comments policy. You get to jump into only one thread a day. Next violation, you're out of here.

To address your somewhat off-topic point: I'm not anti-government; I'm anti-bad government. At the state and federal levels, we are currently close to, if not at, an all-time low. Locally, some good things are happening, but there's a lot of waste, a lot of basics that are being neglected, and at least until recently, some very fishy-smelling relationships.

There's only one voice "on" my blog, mine. The comments section is for other people's voices, many of whom I disagree with, often vehemently. I read the comments and appreciate them, but I don't control who is moved enough to leave them.

I'm sorry, Jack; I wasn't aware of that aspect of the policy. I will respect the rules. They make sense.

On this subject, I didn't say that you were anti-government; I said you were anti-growth, at least in Portland. That's okay.

My observation pertains to your level of frustration caused by the collision between your feelings on growth and what's happened here in Portland in the last x years. In voicing this frustration, I think you hit an emotional chord that resonates with the anti-government crowd, and by virtue of that, attract those voices.

It's a nuance, but I believe an important one, as you consistently demonstrate a level of humanity that isn't always matched by your biggest fans.

Respek.