recent guests

A whole new phenomenon has cropped up: evacuee envy. At 2:30 am on September 5, two busses role into the Scout camp I work with and drop off 85 evacuees. We’ve got an eighty-bed training facility with motel style lodging and dining/kitchen facilities to feed 250. We had advanced notice of this so we mobilized about 30 folks to assist. We bought a mountain of toiletry items. We stocked the kitchen for a week's worth of meals. We cleaned the place so our guests would be as comfortable as possible. Many took vacation leave so they could help. All did so willingly and were cheerful during the process.

Upon their arrival we got names and addresses for all of them. We also got lists of loved ones they had been separated from. We did a cursory medical check to see if there were any problems that needed to be addresses immediately. They got showers and into some clothes we’d scrounged for them: lots of Boy Scout event t-shirts. We fed them a big meal. For some, it was the first real food they had had in a week. We put them to bed.

The next day it was decided to transport them about 20 miles to the south to a local hospital to get a real medical screening and medications for those who needed them. We had one bus at our disposal so we loaded up the first group and sent them on their way. We told them they would receive treatment and come back so we could get the second batch on their way for their screenings.

When the bus got back it was escorted by a sheriff’s deputies who told us the county sheriff wanted all the evacuees at camp to be housed in his town. Men with guns were hijacking our evacuees. Who were we to argue? So we loaded our remaining guests on the bus and followed them to town with the meager belongings of the first busload and the remainder of the mountain of toiletry items and groceries. One of the folks at the new shelter joked that this was the first batch of evacuees that showed up clean, fed, with paperwork, and with mountain of toiletry items and groceries.

I guess the county sheriff needed the FEMA reimbursement check worse than we did. We’re glad to have helped.

the malaise

I’ve developed a lingering malaise. I look at what’s going on in my country and it depresses me.

Congress is poised on the brink of making permanent millions and millions of dollars of tax breaks to the wealthiest citizens in the country by voting to totally do away with the inheritance tax. My own senators (both of whom will personally reap the financial windfall) are posturing toward voting for the cut.

Simultaneously, we’re pouring billions of dollars down the rat hole that Iraq has become. The Iraqis don’t want us there. Over 50% of Americans don’t want us there. The mothers of hundreds of young men and women who’ve been killed in Iraq don’t want us there. Only your puppet president and the corporations behind him want us there.

Your president is searching for candidates to the Supreme Court who will be able to change the way we live for many years to come. Possibly, irrevocably so. There seems to be no voice of reason in this debate. The Federalist Society is chipping away and winning the battle one bench at a time. They won’t be happy until our courts are interpreting the constitution as a tool to protect the wealthy, powerful corporations who are already dictating government policy through the Bush puppet administration. They’re trying to take the courts back to the days before Theodore Roosevelt was president.

The oil companies are practicing econ 101 supply and demand theory and proving once and for all that the lemmings will indeed jump off the cliff because that’s what they’ve always done. Until we’re ready to change our lifestyles and reduce our dependence on their petroleum products we’re stuck. The Europeans are laughing at us and reminding us daily that they’ve been paying higher amounts for gas for years. They’re correct. They also have access to something that’s virtually nonexistent here except in huge metropolitan areas: mass transit. They have choices. We don’t. There is no mass transit where I live. I don’t have a choice. Your president’s puppeteers control the production, distribution, and supply of gas. They can charge whatever they want as long as we pull up to the pump and fill ‘er up.

A recent report told us that the numbers of Americans living below the poverty level had increased to 12.7 percent. Line up eight Americans and have one raise her hand. She’s part of the 12.7 percent. One out of eight. She’s also probably a child.

And then there’s Katrina. It took two days for our navy to provide assistance to tsunami survivors in Banda Ache. How many days did it take to get help to the survivors along the Gulf coast? The biggest job the political hack hired by your president to manage FEMA had ever had before was ensuring that there were ethical judges at horse shows. Since FEMA has fallen under the umbrella of Homeland Security, puppet president Bush has gutted its finances and personnel., funneling much needed funding to the “war on terrorism” (I’m not even going to ask where the WMD’s in Iraq are). Meanwhile the puppet in chief is flying around looking for photo-ops, asking us to send cash so he can keep funneling “his” to subsidiaries of Halliburton, and praising his FEMA idiot. Once again, the Europeans are laughing at our national ineptitude.

The one thing that seems to lift my malaise is my ability, all be it limited, to help those so terribly effected by Katrina. This leads me to believe that most of my depression is no more than feeling sorry for myself. All I really need is for my friend Joyce to kick me in the butt and tell me to, “Quit being a whiny butt!” She’s good about that and her timing is usually excellent. So I’ve gone to the store and loaded up with essentials for the relief effort and taken it to be delivered. The Scout camp I work with has accepted 80 evacuees and I’m collecting stuff from those I work with to deliver to them. I probably end up volunteering to help in the kitchen.

Being able to help makes me feel better and saddens me at the same time. Is there a part of me that’s only happy when I know there are others much worse off then me? I guess that’s what separates me from the puppet in chief: I think about it.