McCain said

[infrogmation]

"We must also prepare, far better than we have, to respond quickly and effectively to a natural calamity. When Americans confront a catastrophe they have a right to expect basic competence from their government. Firemen and policemen should be able to communicate with each other in an emergency. We should be able to deliver bottled water to

Comments

[yellowdoggrl]

It's a sad evening when there is more to applaud in McCain's speech than Clinton's.

But...

[jdquintette]

...is not the Coastguard a federal agency.

The Mississippi Gulf Coast, which took the burnt of Katrina, responded well (or at least much much better) than the complete ineptitude shown by the City of New Orleans and State of Louisiana.

Apples and oranges. Much smaller population base affected (ie no big cities) and a different kind of damage (as in mostly wind, not flood).

Ultimiately, the question is of government efficacy, not necessarily political philosophyPrecisely. But which party's political philosophy, since the start of the first Reagan administration, has been that government is by it's very nature the enemy? It's the perfect Gingrichian strategy, insist that government is innefficient then, when elected, cut programs and appoint clueless bumblers to positions of authority until this becomes a self-fullfilling proficy

Re: But...

[jdquintette]

Getting a new license required four different trips to the DMV, about 12-15 hours, and a few hundred dollars. If you think that the ineffectiveness of government is a myth or a republican-crafted set of affiars, I would suggest a trip to the Department of Motor Vehicles.

Interesting. When I moved from British Columbia to Ontario in Canada in 1988, replacing my B.C. licence with an Ontario one required one trip the the DMV involving standing in line for 20 minutes and a fee of $30 dollars.

Secondly, the big government, welfare state approach has worked so well in Europe that both France and Germany now possess center-right governments committed to reforming and partially dismantling it. Gordon Brown is still hanging on, but by his fingernails, and "New Labor" isn't exactly Harold Wilson, if you know that I mean.Sure. Governments that are so 'center-right' that all three countries continue to provide state-subsidized, universal healthcare, massively subsidized, universally available daycare, and affordible public housing options

[jdquintette]

I saw the speech. He actually did say "hot bottled water."

He also stood there blinking and fumbling and sweating like a deer in the headlights. It was such a sad-sack, clueless, low-energy doddering-old-fool performance that I'm actually starting to become cautiously optimistic about the election. Maybe they won't actually be able to sell this dolt.

Of course, I was convinced they'd never sell us W. either.

[infrogmation]

The Republicans could have run McCain 8 years ago when he was sharper. Heck, they could have gone with Colin Powell. Instead, we got stuck with W.

[jdquintette]

Arriana Huffington (a McCain supporter in 2000) wrote a great piece on Huffingtonpost about McBush. I can't remember the title offhand, but the gist of it was that McCain was, in those bygone days, actually a man of principals (principals that I mostly disagreed with, but principles nonetheless).

Since then, according to her, he has experienced a fall of Shakespearian proportions, because he will do absolutely anything, say anything, kiss the ring of whatever crazed religious zealot (see pastor Hagee) kiss the ass of a man who slandered him in the lowest possible way (see Bush, George W., and Rove, Karl) and reverse any position, take any stand, spout whatever gibberish it takes to become president.