Hurricane Reality vs. Right-Wing Ideology

From AlterNet:

While Katrina didn't have any direct impact on the debate, images are more visceral than statistics. It's hard to sit in a comfortable, dry place watching the abandoned poor fight for their lives, and argue that the growing class divide in this country is a figment of the left's imagination, or that our current socio-economic arrangements are the best we can do.

Directly related to class is the idea of social cohesion. "United we stand" is a central tenet of the American narrative. Whatever your background, your status, your ideology, we pull together when the chips are down. But in New Orleans it became clear just how transparent that fiction is. Our sense of community -- if the ideal ever truly existed -- has now deteriorated to such a degree that only the threat of deadly violence holds the whole show together.

Click here for the rest.

I posted another essay hitting on this topic recently, a picture, too, but it's a message that bears repeating: neither "small government," nor the private sector is capable of dealing with a disaster like Katrina. Actually, there are about a billion problems with which "small government" and business cannot deal, but Katrina is vividly fresh in everybody's minds, and serves as a terrifying illustration of what conservatives want America to be. That is, I don't really think that conservatives actually wanted a disaster like what hit New Orleans to happen, but their anti-government, pro-wealthy policies ultimately amount to that--it's all very much about ignoring what you don't like to hear. Conservatives insist that the only way to a prosperous and healthy nation is by this maxim: "The government which governs least governs best." That means no intervention for the poor. That means allowing big business to do whatever it wants. That means ending virtually all social services and forcing citizens to fend for themselves.

Well, oftentimes people are indeed quite capable of fending for themselves. But not always. Any ideology that overemphasizes "rugged individualism" is off in fantasy land. And that's where many American conservatives are right now.

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