It would appear that Kanye West doesn't care about Hendersonville people.
If the levies burst and Hendersonville were under water, would Kanye West lift his little toe to save all those innocent Hendersonvillians? (A purely academic question, I know, since Hendersonville, it's founders having been competent to select construction sites, doesn't require levies to protect it, and, if it did, those levies would be maintained properly and well-built to begin with, and even if they weren't, Hendersonvillians would leave once it became clear that the cat-5 monster hurricane was bearing down on Hendersonville, and even if they didn't, the mayor and governor would have some sort of plan in place to save lives, instead of doing nothing and blaming it all on Kanye West.)Before rushing the stage, Mr. West and his girlfriend, Mr. Clean, were seen partaking of some liquid courage, as the prospect of speaking truth to Taylor Swift was apparently making them nervous.
It's interesting to note that Kanye had no particular desire to confront some other country music performers like Toby Keith, Mr. Keith having some well-publicized views about what constitutes the American Way.
The president, similarly averse to letting a crisis go by without barging in and wrestling the mic away, delivered a stinging public rebuke to Kanye, calling him a "jackass" or "knucklehead" or some other such weak epithet that doesn't even begin to cover it, but not before this little bit of unpleasantness took place:
Oh Mr. Clean. Poor Taylor Swift, I can't name even one of her songs (or Kanye's), but she looked so sad and confused.
ReplyDeleteSo, Hendersonville is home to Taylor and Twitty? Interesting. Perhaps I will become a fan now. At least Beyonce was classy about it.
The Prez may have called Kanye "jackass" or "knucklehead", but at least he had the presence of mind not to accuse the singer of "acting foolishly". How many rose garden beer parties are in the budget anyway?
ReplyDeleteThe President has been choosing his words wisely of late. That way he can take umbrage at being called a liar during a speech wherein he called his opposition (who were expected to remain seated upon their own hands) deceitful and cynical. He also sneaked in the word "lie", but no one seems to have noticed.
Civility isn't dead. It's just doesn't fare well in some places.
He can just take some beer money out of TARP, then he can throw as many beer parties as he wants. Or he could order up some kegs, invite all contending parties eveywhere, and bring about world peace in one sitting.
ReplyDeleteAre you really blaming the citizens and local gov't of New Orleans for what happened down there? Good grief, you do realize that Bush's administration were the ones to cut the funding designed to strengthen the levees? He even admitted this and apologized for it. Not that that does any good now, of course.
ReplyDeleteTo answer your question, Anonymous: Yes.
ReplyDeleteYour assumption that the people of New Orleans are serfs or helpless children is false as well as extremely troubling. They may have convinced themselves--or the ruling elite may have convinced them--that they are incapable of acting in their own interests. They may have accepted a relationship with government that left them so dependent that they were robbed of their very instinct for self-preservation, but that's just it: they accepted it. They chose that relationship with their votes, again and again.
And I'm glad you stopped by again, Anonymous. I really am. But your conception of the way government is supposed to work in this country is so tragic that I can't stop laughing at it. Do you really think that the U.S. president bears responsibility for local disaster planning and local public safety? Are you really telling me that the executive branch is ultimately responsible for funding anything?
And I'll give you this for lagniappe(which is New Orleanian for "a lil' somthin' extra"): The long-standing tradition in New Orleans is to take whatever funding is supposed to go to levies and create byzantine and self-defeating levels of bureaucracy. At worst, that cut in funding meant that somebody's useless nephew didn't get a no-show levy inspection job. At best, it meant that a whole lot of useless bureaucrats had to find honest work. And a presidential apology means absolutely nothing. Have you ever had to apologize for someone else's failure in order to get people who don't know what they're talking about to leave you alone? I'd wager you have. Guilt doesn't follow from an apology.