You're On Your Own

The Nation's Christian Parenti again proves why he is the premier radical journalist working in America today. His write-up of the New Orlean's tragedy and the conscious and subconscious racism and classism that played disproportionately into the death that followed the broken levees stokes fury and contempt like nothing I've read in awhile. It's worthy of a look.

Here's Parenti's excellent conclusion:

Traditions of racism, exploitation and exclusion are visible in every aspect of this crisis. One also feels the repressive reflexes of the war on drugs and war on terror. Rather than work on rescue and cleanup with the mutual-aid networks, like the distribution efforts of Malik Rahim and his neighbor, the increasingly militarized local, state and federal agencies have defaulted to their worst bureaucratic instincts toward the dispossessed: silence, exclude, control and intimidate. Never mind why or toward what end.

New Orleans provides another jolt to an apathetic public that in this nation of ours... race...class... and politics matter.