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It Affects You
If the present situation were reversed, if such clear and inexcusable mistakes were made during a Democratic administration, we know exactly how Conservatives would respond. They would not merely criticize Democrats for failing to do x, y, and z. The message would be that Liberals cannot be trusted to protect America, and x, y, and z would be used as examples of that. In other words, they would treat the mistakes made not as the errors of a few elected and appointed officials, but rather as the inevitable consequence of liberalism.
That is exactly what we must do. The difference is, unlike with Conservative arguments, ours happen to be correct. The errors which compounded this disaster were not simply the result of having flawed individuals in crucial offices - though that certainly contributed. It was the inevitable result of modern Conservatism.
If we focus our criticism primarily on the specific series of mistakes (the symptoms of the flawed ideology), Conservatives can give lip service to fixing those symptoms without ever having to address the root cause. If we point out that National Guard troops were not deployed as quickly as they should have been, Conservatives can counter with talk of a plan to deploy them quicker next time. If we talk about a lack of funding for the levees, Conservatives can throw money at a Halliburton subsidiary to fix the problem. If we criticize the lack of clearing up chain of command issues before a disaster strikes, they can work out some token plan. Maybe in some cases they will actually be able to effect positive solutions -- and that's great -- but it still amounts to applying a band-aide. Fixing these problems with government is against the modern Conservative nature, and that is the problem.
Obviously we need to address these flaws and more - American lives literally depend on it and there isn't a moment to lose in getting started. But we have to fix these problems once and for all and not allow Conservatives to apply solutions designed to fix their public image as much as they are designed to address real problems of everyday Americans. When we discuss why the National Guard were not sent in earlier, we can and should discuss the almost unconscionable lack of preparation and foresight by Conservative leaders, but we must also talk about how it is an inevitable symptom of Conservative philosophy. This accident did not happen in a vacuum. As George Lakoff wrote, it's the difference between Every citizen is entitled to protection and You're only entitled to what you can afford. Conservative thinkers oppose large government. The smaller they can shrink it, the better. So it comes as no surprise they could not imagine a government solution to a problem like Katrina. They could not even imagine the need for a government solution such a problem, and that's why there was a lack of an organized government response. That is why it took days to grasp the depth of the problems and begin to offer assistance. We can apply similar Conservative values to the delaying of lifesaving upgrades to the levee system and most other problems related to Katrina.
It is entirely possible the Conservative run FEMA and DHS may learn from this mistake and apply some fixes going forward, but this sort of problem will manifest itself again and again. The need to build and strengthen government agencies is against the nature of modern conservatism. Whether it is Conservative appointees running minimalist federal agencies or GOP congressmen looking to slash away as much of the government as possible, Conservatives will continue to undermine the very institutions Americans need and depend on in situations such as Katrina. And they will undermine the institutions Americans need to help prevent the next Katrina before it happens.
Put simply, right-wing Conservatives are not well suited to protecting America. If god forbid there is a major earthquake or a terrorist attack or another large scale disaster, we will once again run up against Conservative opposition to steps which could have prevented (or lessened the impact of) the disaster in the first place and steps which could mitigate it afterward.
From It Affects You