Americablog has a great entry on today's Washington Post column by Donna Brazile, wherein she embarrasses herself with praise for Bush's speech and a humiliating display of her aching desire to be a part of the powerbrokers in Washington. Americablog labels it "Stockholm Syndrome." However you want to explain Brazile's behavior, it is clear that she is shilling for Bush. The fact that she has a position within the Democratic Party is inexplicable.
She is from New Orleans -- so my sympathies to her. But what she wrote today was dense and unforgivable. And, frankly, disturbing.
Read the whole thing and try to keep your lunch down. But here's my favoritest part:
The president called on every American to reach out to my neighbors in New Orleans and throughout the Gulf Coast. The great people of this country have already opened their hearts in the immediate aftermath of the storm, and their tremendous generosity has done more than just provide extra comfort -- it has saved lives. Now the crisis of survival is over. But the task of rebuilding remains, and the president made it clear that every single one of us has a role to play.
Each of us belongs to some group -- a church, a union or a fraternal organization, or even a book club -- that can make a difference. It is those groups that can pool resources and then reach out to their counterparts in the stricken states and ask, "What can we do?" Schools, Girl Scout troops, Rotary clubs -- this is the time for every community group to step forward to lend a helping hand. We need it.
This is an enraging pair of paragraphs. While praising the President and urging the rest of us to pull together behind him, she actually has the gall to remind UNIONS to do their share. Donna, I remember the aftermath -- the immediate aftermath -- of 9/11. I'm talking minutes and hours after the Towers collapsed. Who was marching straight into the debris, having dropped everything they were doing to help? UNION IRONWORKERS -- with the skills to cut through all of that steel and concrete to find survivors. They did it for free. They were pulling together.
Since then, the Bush Administration has heaped one injury after another onto unions -- taking away collective bargaining rights of DHS employees, graduate students, and disabled workers, cutting overtime requirements, and so on.
Union workers and the unions themselves have been on the scene in the Gulf Coast volunteering their time and labor and resources to help save people and get them help. They ARE "stepping forward," Donna.
And while unions have been stepping forward to help with relief efforts, what's the first thing Bush does in the aftermath of Katrina? He suspends Davis-Bacon prevailing wage requirements -- to cut workers' wages in the Gulf Coast, put union contractors out of business in the Gulf Coast, and enrich non-union contractors. All at a time when these people have lost everything. (For good measure, the Bush Administration has also waived affirmative action requirements for federal supply and service contracts -- and is threatening to suspend prevailing wage rates for service contracts.)
So, Donna, don't lecture the labor movement about pulling together. We already have. Hearing pleas from Bush to pull together and get behind him and his plan to enrich contractors is bad enough. Hearing Donna Brazile praise Bush and urge unions to do their part, when they already are and when Bush is doing his level-headed, Norquist-inspired best to crush them in the process, crosses all lines of decency.
Donna Brazile should be ashamed of herself.
Why does she continue to work for the Democratic Party? Maybe she could go join the workers of the Gulf Coast who ARE pulling together, but now, thanks to the President, will be earning substandard, non-living wages as they work in toxic muck without proper protective gear. While they will be making these sacrifices, Donna has earned her next invite to a Karl Rove cocktail hour.
