Lessons from Katrina?

Finally, some clear-headed thinking about Katrina.

This sense of victimhood and entitlement brings us to the other mainstream media claim about Katrina: that it unmasked America's institutionalized racism and showed, as one rapper proclaimed, that "George Bush doesn't care about black people." (It could be argued, incidentally, that "rap music" is itself the most insidious form of institutionalized racism today, peddling a debased view of blacks as thugs and whores that exceeds the wildest slanders of Ku Klux Klan propaganda.) But what are the actual facts about Katrina and race? The Coast Guard and National Guard toiled relentlessly for four days to rescue thousands of people from their roofs, saving as many as 50,000 people--most of them black. And an analysis of deaths from the hurricane showed that mortality rates were slightly higher for whites than for blacks. So much for the myth of the racist hurricane.

But that doesn't mean race was not an issue. Katrina exposed the virulent racism of many blacks, who are raised on a culture of victimhood and grievance and think the rest of the nation owes them a prosperous living. On September 10, for example, Fox News Channel broadcast a live interview with a Katrina evacuee in Houston, a self-parody of the Angry Young Black Man who demanded a $20,000 debit card from FEMA and shouted at the camera: "We didn't ask to come on that bus.... It's like a slave ship. It's just like, you know, back in history, you know, they put us on a slave ship.... Just give us what the f--- we deserve."

What was he describing as a "slave ship"? The buses sent to rescue people from New Orleans--the same buses whose absence in the first days after the flood were considered evidence of nationally institutionalized racism. There is certainly prejudice involved here; this young man has prejudged America as guilty, and he simply grabs at any rationalization that will confirm his bigotry.

A masterpiece of an article....