[Oe List ...] letter from Michael Moore

[Del Morrill]

  Friday, September 2nd, 2005

  Dear Mr. Bush:

  Any idea where all our helicopters are? It's Day 5 of Hurricane Katrina
and thousands remain stranded in New Orleans and need to be airlifted. Where
on earth could you have misplaced all our military choppers? Do you need
help finding them? I once lost my car in a Sears parking lot. Man, was that
a drag.

Also, any idea where all our national guard soldiers are? We could really
use them right now for the type of thing they signed up to do like helping
with national disasters. How come they weren't there to begin with?

Last Thursday I was in south Florida and sat outside while the eye of
Hurricane Katrina passed over my head. It was only a Category 1 then but it
was pretty nasty. Eleven people died and, as of today, there were still
homes without power. That night the weatherman said this storm was on its
way to New Orleans. That was Thursday!
 Did anybody tell you? I know you didn't want to interrupt your
vacation and I know how you don't like to get bad news. Plus, you
had fundraisers to go to and mothers of dead soldiers to ignore and smear.
You sure showed her!

I especially like how, the day after the hurricane, instead of
flying to Louisiana, you flew to San Diego to party with your
business peeps. Don't let people criticize you for this -- after
 all, the hurricane was over and what the heck could you do, put
your finger in the dike?

And don't listen to those who, in the coming days, will reveal how
you specifically reduced the Army Corps of Engineers' budget for New Orleans
this summer for the third year in a row. You just tell them that even if you
hadn't cut the money to fix those levees, there weren't going to be any Army
engineers to fix them anyway because you had a much more important
construction job for them --
 BUILDING DEMOCRACY IN IRAQ!

On Day 3, when you finally left your vacation home, I have to say
I was moved by how you had your Air Force One pilot descend from the clouds
as you flew over New Orleans so you could catch a quick look of the
disaster. Hey, I know you couldn't stop and grab a bullhorn and stand on
some rubble and act like a commander in chief. Been there done that.

There will be those who will try to politicize this tragedy and
try to use it against you. Just have your people keep pointing that out.
Respond to nothing. Even those pesky scientists who predicted this would
happen because the water in the Gulf of Mexico is getting hotter and hotter
making a storm like this inevitable.
 Ignore them and all their global warming Chicken Littles. There is nothing
unusual about a hurricane that was so wide it would be like having one F-4
tornado that stretched from New York to Cleveland.

 No, Mr. Bush, you just stay the course. It's not your fault that
 30 percent of New Orleans lives in poverty or that tens of
 thousands had no transportation to get out of town. C'mon, they're black! I
mean, it's not like this happened to Kennebunkport. Can you imagine leaving
white people on their roofs for five days?
 Don't make me laugh! Race has nothing -- NOTHING -- to do with this!
  You hang in there, Mr. Bush. Just try to find a few of our Army
helicopters and send them there. Pretend the people of New Orleans and the
Gulf Coast are near Tikrit.

  Yours,

  Michael Moore
 MMFlint at aol.com
 www.MichaelMoore.com

 P.S. That annoying mother, Cindy Sheehan, is no longer at your
 ranch. She and dozens of other relatives of the Iraqi War dead are now
driving across the country, stopping in many cities along the way. Maybe you
can catch up with them before they get to DC on September 21st.