09.06.05
Current History - Too Much to Keep Up With
Hurricane Katrina is still top of the news as the relief effort very slowly gets underway and the finger pointing goes into full tilt boogie. Both President Bush and Congress have vowed to investigate what went wrong. Meanwhile, water is now being pumped back into Lake Ponchatrain and people were bused out of New Orleans to Houston and are making do in the AstroDome while everyone tries to figure out how to get lives on any sort of track.
Kadhimiya - Meant to mention this last week when it happened but got too caught up in other things, real life and Katrina included. Nearly 1,000 Shi’a pilgrims were killed last week during a stampede started when someone yelled out there was a suicide bomber in the crowd. People were crushed, or drowned when they jumped over the bridge into the water without knowing how to swim. The pictures of the piles of shoes left behind by the pilgrims were grim reminders of the tension in the Middle East. Immediately after the death count started, fingers were being pointed at the Sunni.
William Rehnquist died over Labour Day weekend of thyroid cancer. This leaves not only the gap the Sandra Day O’Connor left when she resigned, but the Chief Justice’s spot as well. President Bush has made the unprecedented move of nominating John Roberts, who was already going through the process for Justice, to fill the Chief Justice’s spot.
Bush’s popularity is really low right now, the Republicans are embarrassed over the slowness of the Hurricane Katrina rescue efforts. The next few weeks will be devastatingly entertaining in the realm of US politics.