Since that day my livin’ room’s been more comfortable

I applaud this poor guy for trying to make something out of a bad situation.

Sorry today's post is devoid of the fun and redonkulous links that usually occupy this space. My next post will get back to the good times that you all have to know and love. But for one day we gotta at least deal with this Hurricane, and feel for this poor bastard who is just tryin to sip on some Heineken's while is town vanishes.

Hurricane Katrina is awful beyond words, I cannot even begin to describe the pictures and video I have been looking at in the past couple days.
You could find ways to help, or show sympathy for those who have lost, but instead the “tough-on-crime” and “law-and-order-first” idiots over at the conservative “National Review” are calling for the scalps of the looters. Yes, I believe this is the first evacuation of a major US city since the civil war, but what these clowns seem most worried about are the looters who have grabbed a boombox or bottle of Absolut. Give me a fucking break

The city is a swimming pool, pardon me if I’m not worried about a misdemeanor burglary charge against a poor sap who stole a TV after his entire house and all of his personal belongings are washed away. The city will be un-liveable for months but I am supposed to be concerned about this guy who grabs a six-pack while he waits perched on his roof for a rescue copter to come save him.

Its seems like every conservative commentator on the “prestigious” NRO site has called for the lynching and beheading of the looters. Take a look.

Iain Murry quotes from his “college contemporary” who claims that the people taking jewellry (sic) and electronics “should all be f***ing shot, in my view”

Meanwhile, head-NROer Jonah Goldberg favorably quotes an NRO reader who wishes Brian Williams would “call it as it is” by stating “"There're some looting scum, let's hope theNational Guard shoots them.”

Finally, Rich Lowry forgoes the old “I heard this from a reader/friend trick" and states that he himself applauds the Missippi governor for promising to deal with the looters “ruthlessly,” calling them “sub-human,” and teaching them “a lesson they wouldn't soon forget.”

This is pure idiocy from the leading online-conservative journal (big shocker I know).

These are the same pundits who want to keep our jails packed with non-violent offenders who were caught with a dime bag of marijuana or a single crack rock, instead of offering drug rehab. What a waste of resources and time. Don’t tell me that you have no sympathy for these looters, when we cant even imagine what they are going through right now as their city floats away.



Why don’t we take a look at the guy in the above picture again and imagine his plight, before we decide to shoot him, hang him, or “teach him a lesson.” Many of the people still stranded in New Orleans were told to evacuate days ago, but a bunch these poor stranded folks have no car or 40-ft yacht, and thus could not have very easily evacuate their homes. Also, imagine the plight of those car-less folks who have a sick or elderly person living among the other 10 people in their one bedroom apartment. It certainliy is not easy for those people to simply evacuate at the first news warnings of a flood. As a result, these people are stuck waiting around and hoping it doesnt hit them directly, and WHAM it does.

Now this poor sap in the picture has probably lost all of his possessions, his house, and may be missing a family member and you want to jail (or shoot) him for stealing some beer. Once again, give me a fucking break.

If you are poor your entire life, you live in the ghetto of New Orleans, you have no bank account, and the $500 in your shoebox just washed away in a flood, I personally give you permission to steal a few Heinekens while you ride out the storm. Drink up on me buddy, you have an excuse to swimlift that case of Natural Ice.

Look at his poor guy. He’s got Heinekens everywhere, even in his back pocket - just in case he makes it through all of the busket before the rescue boats come. (“Look man you got a Benz, I got a Busket.... A busket?! Gimme the Busket”) He is going soo bald on top of his head that he has decided to grow some long bushy mess in the back to throw off those who are trying to figure it out. His busket of beer is so heavy that he cant even grab the probably delicious and soggy batch of chocolate chip cookies floating right next to him. Spare me if I don’t want to rebuild the Court and the Jail before the rest of the city, just so that I can try or execute this poor bastard.

Kick it Ice Cube: “Shooters, looters, Now I got a laptop computer.”

UPDATE UPDATE UPDATE -

UPDATE: Headlines like this make it a little tougher write off most of the looters as people just trying to survive.

“Mayor Ray Nagin ordered 1,500 police to leave their search-and-rescue mission Wednesday to stop the increasingly-hostile looting,”

This stuff is bad and needs to stop no questions asked. I still think that MOST of what the media is labeling as looting, is really just people trying to get enough supplies to get through the disaster, but as in every situation, there are those who are taking advantage and need to be stopped. When the looting is actually impeding rescue efforts to such a degree as quoted above, drastic measures need to be taken.

But I still disagree that those drastic measures include shooting at every “looter” coming out of a grocery store with some diet pepsi. The majority of the “looters” are not the ones we should be concerned with, there are just a few criminals who were probably criminals before and after the flood. It just pissed me off this morning, that the right wing websites were advancing idea of shooting all the people trying to get clothing from a sporting goods store or food from a grocery.

Maybe I came out to broadly as a “Defender of the lawless looters.” If you think I did, I apologize -- and I agree people stealing from homes and jewlry stores really need to be stopped, but I just got enraged by actually reading mainstream right-wing whacko websites and their racist calls for the murder of looters.

Dont believe that racisim played a part? check out this cartoon




I found this on a simple search for looting and beer on Technorati. Some racist pile of shit nutjob blogger makes a horrible cartoon and it is immediately linked to favorably by mainstream righties like this guy
who is loved by another big time wingnut Lashawn Barber


and they simply label as a “a Photoshop pic that will probably draw some comment”

No, it is a racist horrible cartoon made by a miserable excuse for a person. I hope whoever made that crap has their house looted tonight

That is the kind of stuff that puts me on the side of people they call "looters"
I certainly don’t want to be the Defender of the people who are actually doing real looting but we just have to be real careful about who we are labeling as "looters" and who is merely getting supplies for their family. Most of the people that rightwingnutjobs call looters are people trying to survive while they get no help from the NAtional Guard (who is mostly in Iraq).

See the difference?