RWB cannot have been the only one watching with a growing sense of disbelief as Mayor Ray Nagin was cheerleading the return of thousands of New Orleans’ residents to a city without drinkable water, without functioning hospitals, without a working 911 system – and to a city with toxic slime everywhere and with weakened and uncertain levees. And doing all this against the express wishes of the federal authorities to whom he had previously happily deferred when it came to the job of saving his consituents lives.

Well, yes, as I write, he has said, effectively, “nevermind – if you’re on your way, turn back, and if you’re here already, you better leave again!” This, he says, due to the risk from Hurricane Rita.

Earlier in the day he had made a crack about Vice Admiral Allen, who is leading the federal effort in the region, saying he was acting like “the newly crowned federal mayor of New Orleans.”

Point being, obviously, that it is Nagin’s view that New Orleans can only have one mayor at a time.

Ahem.

Tell it to the people who were piled into the Superdome and the Convention Center without adequate water, let alone food, to last even a few days. Tell them New Orleans can only have one mayor at a time.

Tell it to the children who watched as people died in those putrid conditions and were left out in the open to rot. Tell them New Orleans can only have one mayor at a time.

Tell it to all those who lost everything because of the mismanagement of funds that should have spent on making the levees impregnable, down through all these years of corruption by hack local politicians. Tell them New Orleans can only have one mayor at a time.

And yeah, while you’re at it … tell it to Snowball too.

It’s unbelievable, it’s fancy-free,
So interchangeable, so delightful to see.
Turn your back, wash your hands,
There’s always someone who understands
It don’t matter no more what you got to say
It’s unbelievable it would go down this way.

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