Newt Gingrich goes off the deep end

[docwebster]

"How can you have the mess we have in New Orleans, and not have had deep investigations of the federal government, the state government, the city government, and the failure of citizenship in the Ninth Ward, where 22,000 people were so uneducated and so unprepared, they literally couldn't get out of the way of a hurricane." (emphasis mine)

Comments, anybody? I'm just at a total loss for words, here.

Comments

[ceruleanst.livejournal.com]

This is the same noise all the privileged conservatives have been making since Katrina made landfall: If you poor people weren't so lazy and stupid, you would have gone to Yale, gotten into Phi Beta Kappa, landed a good management job, and been able to afford your own car to drive out of New Orleans. Instead, you decided to stay behind and loot. From the point of view of every standard-issue pseudo-libertarian snot, Newt didn't say anything surprising at all.

[idiomagic.livejournal.com]

It speaks very poorly for the people of this country that we have become numb and apathetic to things like this. Being caught in Katrina had nothing to do with poor citizenship, but perhaps our lack of action does.

[ceruleanst.livejournal.com]

The trouble is that it's not simple apathy or numbness. It took more effort to make sure those stranded didn't get any help than it would have to allow some relief to get through, or allow people to escape. What it's really about is that members of the upper class feel a need to believe that they personally earned and deserve everything that life has handed them ("education" is how they launder their privilege into a personal achievement). Their sense of self-worth rests entirely on this belief system, which would logically fall apart without active contempt for the less fortunate.

[idiomagic.livejournal.com]

True...and very well said.