republicans rebut charges of racism in Katrina response

Karen Hughes: "It's offensive to me to suggest that somehow, as I've seen some headlines and some reports do, that people, that Americans weren't helped because they are poor or because of their race. That is anti-American. That is not what our country is about… It is unfortunate that this natural disaster disproportionately affected people of one race and one income level." (NYT)

First Lady: "I think all of those remarks are disgusting, to be perfectly frank, because of course President Bush cares about everyone in our country." (Yahoo news)

Rep. Richard Baker (R-LA) of Baton Rouge, (Wall Street Journal): "We finally cleaned up public housing in New Orleans. We couldn't do it, but God did."

Rick Santorum: (R–PA)“…you have people who don't heed those warnings and then put people at risk as a result of not heeding those warnings. There may be a need to look at tougher penalties on those who decide to ride it out and understand that there are consequences to not leaving.” (TV somewhere)

Associated Press: 20% of Victims Had No Cars to Evacuate. “Two in 10 households in the disaster area had no car, compared with 1 in 10 in nationwide.” FromTheRoots

Jon Kyl (R-AZ): “the question is if people know year after year after year a natural disaster occurs in a particular place and people continue to build there and want to live there, should they bear the responsibility of buying insurance or should everyone else bear the responsibility?” (AZ Republic 9-4-05 - also found on FromtheRoots)

Mark Williams: .."they didn't have the necessary brains and common sense to get out of the way of a Cat 5 Hurricane and then when it hit them- stood on the side of the convention Center expiring while reporters were coming and going.." from Crooks and liars

And of course, Rush Limbaugh chimes in with a spot of racist wordplay...

Pew Research Center:
Seven-in-ten blacks (71%) say the disaster shows that racial inequality remains a major problem in the country; a majority of whites (56%) say this was not a particularly important lesson…as many as 70% of African Americans say they have felt angry, compared with 46% of whites… Blacks are twice as likely as whites to know people directly affected by the hurricane and are generally much more critical of the government’s response to the crisis…More than eight-in-ten blacks (85%) say Bush could have done more to get relief efforts going quickly, compared with 63% of whites.

…Oh, science... why do you tempt me with your logic…

Mr. Reiss, some rich guy in New Orleans: "Those who want to see this city rebuilt want to see it done in a completely different way: demographically, geographically and politically. I'm not just speaking for myself here. The way we've been living is not going to happen again, or we're out."(WSJ)

Don’t let the levee hit you in the ass on the way out, Mr. Reiss…