"Integrity failures" & arrogance may have forced departure of Kansas minister Terry Fox

By Diane Silver

Possible failures of integrity, arrogance toward his own congregation, frequent absences and an obsession with politics may be the issues that prompted Rev. Terry Fox' departure from Wichita's Immanuel Baptist Church. He reportedly walked out just as the church deacons were preparing to confront him.

That's the word today from two deacons of the church who spoke to Joe Rodriguez of The Wichita Eagle.

The deacons also gave a detailed account of how Fox came to resign abruptly on Aug. 6, stunning the congregation he had lead for 10 years. Also discussed is the conflict between Immanuel and a new church Fox is starting in a Wichita wild west theme park. That new venue, called Summit Church, is being launched tomorrow with a service at the same time as Immanuel's 10:30 service.

Fox called most of the deacon's comments "rumors."

The Eagle reports:

The leaders of Immanuel have said little officially about why Fox left. But two Immanuel deacons, who asked to remain anonymous, said congregational leaders were upset with Fox's frequent trips away from the church, his "arrogant" attitude toward the congregation, "the appearance of integrity failures," and his constant references to political and social issues, such as abortion, from the pulpit.

"You don't need to tell me that every Sunday for 52 Sundays in a row," one deacon said in reference to Fox's opposition to abortion.

The entire article is well worth reading. Kudos to reporter Joe Rodriguez for staying on the story.

The next thing Wichita needs is for someone from Immanuel to speak on the record. For a man as politically and spiritually powerful as Fox, possible lapses in judgment should be completely and publicly explained. If Fox is the equivalent of a snake-oil salesman, his new congregation deserves to know.

Fox gained fame statewide last year as one of the movers and shakers behind the push that successfully banned same-sex marriage, civil union and any other legal rights for lesbian or gay couples. Those rights could include the ability to visit a dying spouse in a hospital.

I am one of many people who fought hard to defeat Fox. I continue to oppose his political campaigns. Foolish me, though. I always thought Fox merely had a different point of view than I did. I never imagined there might be other issues

The problem,of course, is that without someone from Immanuel speaking on the record, we will not know for certain what Fox did.

Here is In This Moment's coverage of Terry Fox' strange, unfinished odyssey.

• Anti-gay minister Terry Fox to lead new church after abruptly resigning from his old post
• Kansas anti-gay pastor's exit probably wasn't "all love and understanding"
• Anti-Gay Pastor Terry Fox abruptly walks away from his Kansas church

Labor Day Reading: Fighting to fly the rainbow flag in outback Kansas

For those Americans not frolicking in the last long weekend of summer and for those many readers from other countries, here are some bits of commentary and news from In This Moment's most recent hot topics.

First up on the list of most-read posts is the battle over the right of the owners of the Lakeway Hotel to fly a symbol of gay rights, the rainbow flag, in tiny Meade, Kansas. The town of 1,600 is located in the southwestern part of the state that is known for wide open ranches and the Dalton Gang outlaws of the old west.

The controversy has included visits from the funeral-picketing Westboro Baptist Church, bricks thrown through a window and a myriad of other events. Here are some of our latest posts.

• A note about Fred Phelps & the REAL Kansas
• Investigate incident in Meade, Kansas, as a hate crime
• Fighting for the "right to coexist"
• Westboro Baptist Church teaches Meade, Kansas, about "despicable"
• It all comes together tomorrow in Meade, Kansas
• Saga of the Rainbow Flag: Kansas Equality Coalition's state board to meet Sunday in Meade
• A small-town solution to Kansas vandalism & a revolutionary bit of good news
• Phelps folds while Kansas Equality Coalition meets in Meade
• Despite broken window & threats, hotel's flag is flying
• Kansas Equality Coalition condemns incident at Lakeway Hotel
• Block hurled through window of Kansas hotel
• Bed & Breakfast in Meade, Kan., fights on

Taking Back Kansas: The Great & Invisible Republican running for governor

By Diane Silver

This is part of a continuing series on the campaign to bleach the red out of red-state icon Kansas and to loosen the Religious Right's stranglehold on the state.

Today's topic: The odd race for governor.

The campaign for governor pits the one bright spot for progressive and moderate Kansas -- Democratic Gov. Kathleen Sebelius -- against a no-name Republican.

And why is no-name state Sen. Jim Barnett of Emporia the GOP candidate in a GOP state? It's very simple. All of the name candidates were scared off by Sebelius' high approval ratings.

What's the status of the race today?

Ric Anderson of the Topeka Capital-Journal accurately assesses the situation when he notes:

Say what you will about Gov. Kathleen Sebelius' school finance ads -- and "dopey" really is a word, in case you were wondering -- but at least she's getting herself out there.

Where is Jim Barnett? That's a question many Kansans might be asking if not for one thing: They"d first have to ask, "Who is Jim Barnett?"

So far the campaign has consisted of Sebelius airing TV ads (three so far), and Barnett and other assorted Republicans complaining about the ads' content.

Barnett appears to be dialing for dollars in the hopes of raising money to pay for his own ads. Anderson reports that Barnett is supposed to begin running ads after Labor Day. At least one Sebelius ad has run since the middle of summer.

Meanwhile, one anonymous blog is claiming that Barnett is going to remove his far-right running mate Susan Wagle from the campaign. (This blog -- Kansas Governors Race -- appears to be Republican run. Its comments during the primary leaned towards one of Barnett's opponents, Ken Canfield. However, no one knows for sure who is posting on the blog.)

The really big news for Barnett is that some mainstream Republicans have endorsed him. The fact that is even news illustrates the deep split in the party between moderates and the Religious Right.

The question in the minds of some Democrats is whether Karl Rove and company will descend on Kansas. Some feel the national GOP might want to damage Sebelius, even if they can't defeat her, because of her potential to jump from governor to senator or beyond.

Although Kansas does have a tradition of electing Democratic governors, Sebelius seems to be the odd one out. She leans left and is pro-choice in the reddest of red state. She maintains a 63 percent approval rating and even gets 59 percent approval from pro-life Kansans.

Coming Soon: A post on the enigma of Sebelius.

Fool me once, shame on you; fool me twice...

By Nancy Jane Moore

Bush is at it again. In the first of a series of speeches designed to terrify us all into re-electing the idiots in Congress who have let him get away with starting unnecessary wars and dismantling the Constitution, he repeated the lie that invading Iraq was a necessary part in his "war on terror."

The Los Angeles Times says he suggested "a new version of the discredited domino theory ... that if the United States left Iraq before that country was secure in its democracy, the battle against terrorism would eventually be fought on American streets."

Of course, the odds of making Iraq secure in any way -- much less making it a democracy -- lie somewhere between slim and none after the way Rumsfeld and his cronies have mangled the situation. I wonder why these people always raise the domino theory at times when things have spun so far out of control that there is no hope of a good outcome. Another parallel to Vietnam.

Bush even used an updated version of the tired old trick of tying Iraq to Sept. 11. The Washington Post quoted Bush as saying that pulling the troops out would

be handing Iraq over to our worst enemies: Saddam's former henchmen, armed groups with ties to Iran and al-Qaeda terrorists from all over the world who would suddenly have a base of operations far more valuable than Afghanistan under the Taliban.

Would someone please explain to the man that any influence wielded in Iraq by either Iran or al Qaeda is the direct result of our invasion? He should also know that Iran and al Qaeda are not on the same side, even if neither of them is on "our" side.

The LA Times also said Bush compared the situation to World War II and called it "the decisive ideological struggle of the 21st century." Gosh, we're what, five years into the 21st Century? Somehow I suspect there are some other ideological struggles to come. Right now my money's on a conflict between religious fundamentalism (in all religions, but particularly Christian and Muslim), and science.

But like I said, the century's still young. Global warming could end up making even religious conflict irrelevant.

The New York Times says Bush "scoffed at his critics' charges that the American-led campaign in Iraq is a distraction from the real struggle against Al Qaeda terrorists." Let's see: we're throwing money down the drain and losing soldiers left and right in a vain effort to keep the peace in a civil war that started because of our invasion. Meanwhile Osama bin Ladin is still running around and people are apparently planning terrorist attacks. The Iraqi civil war sure looks like a distraction to me.

According to the LA Times, Bush told his friendly audience in Salt Lake City:

The security of the civilized world depends on victory in the war on terror, and that depends on victory in Iraq.

If our security really depends on victory in Iraq -- a very unlikely occurrence, no matter how many more years we hang in there -- we're in very big trouble.

I say the security of the civilized world depends on getting Bush out of power as soon as possible. Ending up with enough new faces in Congress to impeach him is probably a pipe dream, but if we want this country to survive much longer we better at least end up with a majority of senators and representatives who are willing to tell him no.

We can't afford to get fooled again.

It's the economy, stupid

By Nancy Jane Moore

You know that working people in the US are in trouble when even the National Association of Manufacturers admits (PDF) that real hourly wages are falling even though productivity is way up.

NAM tries to spin the numbers, of course, blaming the decline in real wages on the cost of oil. They also point out that total compensation is up -- because the cost of employee benefits such as health insurance is skyrocketing, not because employers are providing more benefits.

But the fact remains: productivity is up 2.4 percent in the last year, but workers are effectively earning less than they did the year before.

As a detailed analysis piece by Steven Greenhouse and David Leonhardt in the Aug. 28 New York Times explains:

[T]he current expansion has a chance to become the first sustained period of economic growth since World War II that fails to offer a prolonged increase in real wages for most workers.

Here's the nitty-gritty of their report:

Worker productivity rose 16.6 percent from 2000 to 2005, while total compensation for the median worker rose 7.2 percent, according to Labor Department statistics analyzed by the Economic Policy Institute, a liberal research group. Benefits accounted for most of the increase.

Again, don't forget that it's the cost of benefits that has gone up, not the actual benefits themselves.

This decline in wages for the people who do the actual work is in sharp contrast to the increased wealth for investors. As Greenhouse and Leonhardt observe:

As a result, wages and salaries now make up the lowest share of the nation's gross domestic product since the government began recording the data in 1947, while corporate profits have climbed to their highest share since the 1960's. UBS, the investment bank, recently described the current period as "the golden era of profitability."

The rich are getting richer, the workers are losing ground, and the poor remain stuck. 37 million people still live below the poverty line in the US -- that's about 12 percent of the population. That number and most of the data in the newspaper articles I've mentioned comes from a Census Bureau report (PDF).

A New York Times story on the Census report points out that the level of income for defining poverty for a family of four was $19,971; for a family of two, it was $12,755. The last time the poverty rate dipped in the US was in 2000.

It's always interesting to see how news reports can slice and dice data such as that in the Census report. For example, The Washington Post put the following headline on its Census Bureau story:

D.C. Suburbs Top List Of Richest Counties

The subhead was more to the point:

Nationwide Data on Health Coverage Bleak

After bragging about how rich our suburbs are, The Post conceded:

The new figures showed that a record number of Americans lack access to health insurance.

The Times also lead with a positive spin on the Census news, headling its story:

Census Reports Slight Increase in '05 Incomes

But the story quickly got to the real facts: Incomes are up because people are working second jobs or earning money besides wages. "[B]oth men and women earned less in 2005 than 2004," the article reported. It went on to observe:

Nationally, the small uptick in median household income reported yesterday, 1.1 percent, was not enough to offset a longer-term drop in median household income -- the annual income at which half of the country's households make more and half make less.

That figure fell 5.9 percent between the 2000 census and 2005, to $46,242 from $49,133, according to an analysis of the data conducted for The New York Times by the sociology department of Queens College.

The Times minced no words on its editorial page. It quoted President Bush as telling reporters, "Things are good for American workers," and then observed:

The comment is preposterous.

Washington Post columnist Harold Meyerson was even harsher. In an Aug. 30 op-ed, he pointed out:

From 1947 through 1973, American productivity rose by a whopping 104 percent, and median family income rose by the very same 104 percent. More Americans bought homes and new cars and sent their kids to college than ever before. . . .

That America is as dead as the dodo. Ours is the age of the Great Upward Redistribution.

And he provides a good explanation:

According to a report by Goldman Sachs economists, "the most important contributor to higher profit margins over the past five years has been a decline in labor's share of national income."

That is, those who actually do the work in our society aren't getting the benefit of economic growth. In addition, the only wage earners who actually do see some benefit from economic growth are the people at the top. The Greenhouse/Leonhardt article points out:

In 2004, the top 1 percent of earners -- a group that includes many chief executives -- received 11.2 percent of all wage income, up from 8.7 percent a decade earlier and less than 6 percent three decades ago, according to Emmanuel Saez and Thomas Piketty, economists who analyzed the tax data.

The Post article on the Census report puts the inequity in simple terms:

Between 2004 and last year, earnings increased by an average of nearly $1,200 for people with incomes in the top 10 percent, compared with $17 for those in the bottom 10 percent.

Happy Labor Day.

Jimmy Carter blasts fundamentalists in Spiegal magazine

This is old news, but I've recently noticed that people are still searching for our coverage and commentary on Jimmy Carter's amazing interview in Spiegel magazine. In the interview, Carter talks tough and true about Christianity and fundamentalism, among other things.

That coverage has gotten a bit buried, so here are the links again.

Jimmy Carter shows you can be a good Christian while rejecting right-wing fundamentalism

Carter talks about Bush's un-Americanism, Israel's mistakes and fundamentalist's flaws

Red State Politics: Get involved in the continuing Kansas battle over evolution

Red State Rabble reminds us this morning that the fight for the future of evolution, science and education in Kansas isn't finished.

The yo-yo swing of the Kansas Board of Education between the anti-evolution Religious Right and the voices of moderation may not end until one side wins a commanding majority. Pro-science moderates have a chance to do that on Nov. 7.

Rabble details how you can get involved, even if you don't live in Kansas.

For more In This Moment coverage of the election, see The Kansas Evolution Election: It isn't over yet

Red State Politics: Could ultra-conservative Jim Ryun finally be defeated?

By Diane Silver

Yet another darling of the Religious right -- Rep. Jim Ryun -- might be vulnerable this year. It's a long shot, but stranger things have happened.

Once thought unbeatable, Ryun has gotten some attention from MyDD, one of the most well-connected liberal blogs. David Kowalski writes:

Ex-miler Jim was held to 56%, three points behind Bush in this district. Kansas Republicans are splintering with prominent moderates fleeing to the Democrats. Kathleen Sebelius is a strong favorite to repeat as Governor and GOP anti-evolution candidates are finding open opposition not only from Democrats but from Republicans sworn to defeat them. Nancy Boyda makes a repeat run with lower expectations but a great environment (at least for a Kansas Democrat).

Josh at Thoughts From Kansas is also high on Boyda.

Personally, I fall into the anybody-but-Ryun camp on this race. I'm not an enthusiastic supporter of Boyda. She may well be a hold-your-nose choice.

The last time she ran Boyda appeared to be anti-gay, at least in public. Right now Boyda seems to be staying far away from any statement having to do with same-sex marriage or fair laws for all. That, of course, might help her in this conservative district.

The other criticism heard around the district was from political sources. The rap was that Boyda ran an awful, fairly amateur campaign last time. Let's hope she has learned from her past mistakes.

Boyda can't possibly be worse than Ryun, though. I was present at the birth of Ryun's political career in Lawrence in the late 1980s. His first big issue? Opposition to a local ordinance protecting queers against discrimination in housing and employment.

During that fight, Ryun and his wife showed up one night on the porch of the lesbian couple leading the campaign for the anti-discrimination ordinance. The Ryuns were reportedly there to "save" them from their life of sin. The lesbians told the Ryuns to leave, and apparently the only thing that was saved was Ryun's political career.

Female presence at Supreme Court declines -- and not just on the bench

By Nancy Jane Moore

The New York Times reports that the current Supreme Court justices have hired only seven women to serve as law clerks for the coming term -- out of 37 total clerkships.

This is less than half the number in the last term, when there were 14 women originally and a fifteenth was added after Samuel Alito was confirmed. It's also the first year since 1994 that there were fewer than 10 women clerks.

Not only that, but this drop comes at a time when the number of women law school graduates is just below 50 percent. It also comes after the retirement of Justice Sandra Day O'Connor, the first woman to ever serve on the Supreme Court.

Supreme Court clerkships are considered a major career-building move in the legal profession. Several of the current justices were once clerks and The Times reports that law firms are offering $200,000 bonuses to former clerks.

According to The Times, the court's sole female justice, Ruth Bader Ginsburg -- who hired two women and two men as clerks -- was already aware of the situation and had mentioned it in a recent speech. Other justices dismissed the situation as a "random variation," The Times said.

Some observers speculated that there were fewer women clerks in the federal circuit courts of appeal, which is a source for Supreme Court clerks. I recently examined the list of judges on the circuit courts and found that a clear majority of them were appointed by Republican presidents. I'd also note that the most conservative member of the Supreme Court -- Antonin Scalia -- has hired only 2 women clerks in the last seven years, out of a total of 28.

Draw your own conclusions as to whether there's any correlation between the political leanings of the justices and lower court judges and who they hire. There are, of course, some very prominent right wing women on the circuit court bench. It would be interesting to know how many women clerks they've hired.

The Times didn't provide any figures on the racial make up of the new crop of clerks, except to observe that "the clerkship cadre remains overwhelmingly white." Women may be underrepresented in the top echelons of the legal profession, but minorities make up an even tinier percentage of those in powerful positions.

Hurricane Katrina: A round-up of analysis

The one-year anniversary of Katrina -- and the fact that rebuilding is proceeding at a snail's pace -- has produced some good reporting and opinion pieces, along with some detailed analysis.

The Washington Post reports on the problems local governments affected by the storm have in getting money from FEMA. According to the Post, FEMA has quibbled over paying for everything from removing dead trees to repairing water and sewer systems. The Post sums up the problem:

Current and former officials at all levels blame FEMA workers' inexperience with eligibility rules, weaknesses in U.S. disaster laws and inconsistent treatment by Congress for much of the wrangling. The huge scale of the storm and honest disagreement over whether federal or local taxpayers should pay the tab add to the conflict.

The Post article also adds these observations from David A. Craig, former chief of recovery operations for FEMA who left last October and now consults for New Orleans:

Disasters should be difficult to declare. . . . But once you get them, FEMA should not worry about cutting costs. . . . Public entities are eligible for everything they have lost due to the disaster. It is not up to FEMA to cut corners or makes sure money is saved.

Craig is just one of the many experienced people who have left FEMA.

NOW President Kim Gandy takes a cynical look at the post-Katrina situation in her regular online column:

Pardon my cynicism, but has it occurred to anyone that Bush's "mismanagement" of the Katrina aftermath actually accomplished longstanding political goals while benefiting his political allies?

Gandy goes on to list the money paid to Halliburton and other major Republican-friendly corporations for disaster work and suggests the Bush administration is using Katrina-related expenses as an excuse to cut other social services programs. She also speculates that the slow recovery works in Republican favor, since it has kept a lot of African Americans from returning home.

As I mentioned in an earlier post, Tom Paine.com has a good wrap up called Katrina: The Continuing Storm. Tom Paine is not a latecomer to the debate -- the first article in their compilation is dated Sept. 1, 2005, and they have been regularly addressing the Katrina problems ever since.

One piece that really caught my eye is by Lester Brown of the Earth Policy Institute. Brown reminds us that Katrina forced a major evacuation -- one we might have expected to see in another country, but not in the US:

Hurricane Katrina, which made landfall in late August 2005, forced a million people from New Orleans and the small towns on the Mississippi and Louisiana coasts to move inland either within their state or to neighboring states, such as Texas and Arkansas. Although nearly all planned to return, many have not.

And he suggests that this is an omen of future population shifts due to climate problems.

Brown's article led me to a special analysis (PDF) by the Brookings Institution, which provides an excellent overview of the current situation. The conclusion summarizes:

One year after the storm, New Orleans is showing signs of early promise. The housing market is beginning to turn. Half of the major hospitals in the city are now seeing patients and more public schools, including a spate of new charter schools, are slated for opening this fall. Business and visitor travel to the region are fast approaching pre-Katrina levels, helping to bolster the region's tax base and economy.

But the majority of the indicators are troubling. The level of basic city services and infrastructure remain thin, does not cover all neighborhoods, and has yet to strengthen overall in the past six months. Affordable, rental housing is critical for workers, and the employers who rely on them, and yet that seems increasingly out of reach. Job growth has inched upward but so has the unemployment rate, sending mixed signals about worker security.

Red-State Politics: Taking Kansas away from the Religious Right

By Diane Silver

Kansas' Nov. 7 election offers a good chance to judge the political strength of the Religious Right -- not only in the state, but possibly in the nation.

As Thomas Frank showed in his book What's The Matter With Kansas, the Religious Right's toehold in this reddest of red states grew to a stranglehold in the 1990s. Frank argued that the events in Kansas provided a model for other states.

I agree. It's also important to watch Kansas because if the Religious Right can be defeated here, it can be defeated almost anywhere. That's why this year's election in Kansas is important for folks who have never done more than fly over the Plains.

Of course for those of us who actually live here, this election represents the "minor" matters of our future and our freedom.

The good news is that some interesting trends may well have been emerging in the last five years in Kansas politics. We've seen the first signs that the Religious Right's hold on Kansas could be slipping.

For example, voters ousted the anti-evolution majority on the Kansas Board of Education in the Aug. 1 primary. That vote marked the first chance voters had to change the makeup of the controversial board, and Kansans didn't hesitate to switch two seats from ultra-conservative to moderate.

Meanwhile, a handful of Republican leaders defected to the Democratic Party this year. They include a former state GOP chairman who has signed on as the running mate of popular Democratic Gov. Kathleen Sebelius.

The fact that Sebelius was even elected to one term also shows the limits of the Religious Right's power. In 2002 her opponent was a darling of the ultra conservatives. Sebelius, meanwhile, has a 63 percent approval rating.

Over the next two months, In This Moment will be taking a close look at this year's key races for governor, attorney general and the state House of Representatives. We'll also be watching the four Congressional races in Kansas with particular attention to attempts to unseat the state's only Democratic incumbent, Dennis Moore, and to defeat Republican incumbents Jim Ryun and Todd Tiahrt. The two Republicans are to the right of Atilla the Hun.

Stay tuned. The fun is only beginning.

Hurricane Katrina: It's time to change how we deal with disaster

By Nancy Jane Moore

I grew up 35 miles inland from the Gulf of Mexico in a little town outside of Houston. Hurricane country. I remember riding out Hurricane Carla in 1961 and getting ready for any number of smaller storms over the years. And I've seen the kind of damage floods can do, even from much less serious storms.

I lived for awhile in Wichita Falls, Texas -- part of that wide swath of the Great Plains known as Tornado Alley. I was there in 1979 for the last really bad one, the mile-wide tornado that took out 20 percent of the housing in town and left all of us without electricity.

I was still there the next year when a heat wave roared across the country -- in Wichita Falls the average high for 45 days in a row was 110.

I've seen the damage caused by earthquakes in Guatemala -- and felt the earth move because the nearby volcanoes were erupting. I've seen deep enough snow in Washington, D.C., to convince me that I don't want to live anywhere likely to suffer a real blizzard.

I have friends who managed to protect their home from the Southern California fires of a few years ago because they spent a lot of money and brainpower designing an effective water system. Most of their neighbors were wiped out.

Hurricanes, tornadoes, floods, fires, earthquakes, volcanoes, heat waves, blizzards -- not to mention fog, high winds, heavy rainfall, drought, dust storms -- all of these things happen all over the Earth on a regular basis. Global warming is already making some of them worse; others have even more obvious human causes.

But even if the human race was doing a superb job of taking care of our planet, we'd still be faced with dangerous and destructive weather. It's a fact of planetary life. And while there's still a lot we can learn, we aren't ignorant about these weather patterns.

We know hurricanes are going to hit the Gulf Coast. We know tornadoes are going to hit the Great Plains. We know volcanoes are going to erupt and tectonic plates are going to shift. We know it's going to snow. We know heat waves happen. We know fires will break out in certain areas.

And yet, we run our lives as if none of these things will happen. We let people build on barrier islands, fill in wetlands, construct inadequate levees, and just hope the hurricane doesn't hit. We put up major cities along active fault lines. We allow too many people to live in an area with too little water. We allow people to farm areas that should never have been tilled. Our plans for excessive cold or hot weather often fail to protect our frailer neighbors.

We can't stop hurricanes and tornadoes and earthquakes and all the other "acts of God" that hit the Earth each year, but we can start planning our lives as if they were likely to hit. We can do land use planning that protects the natural barriers that protect us -- including prohibiting building in certain areas. We can have adequate evacuation and disaster relief plans in place. We can make sure to allocate appropriate amounts of tax dollars to address disasters of all kinds -- enough money to make it possible for most people to rebuild their lives. We can require certain minimum insurance on homes -- including flood insurance -- the same way we require automobile insurance. We can make sure our infrastructure -- roads, power lines, levees, and the like -- is strong enough to withstand the problems we're most likely to face.

Everyone knew a big hurricane was going to hit New Orleans. A quick look at history suggests the Big Easy is likely to get a bad storm every 30 years or so. Yet the only concession to this were the levees -- levees that weren't built to withstand a significant storm. Nobody prepared, even though everyone knew it was coming.

I, like Diane, remain appalled at the incompetence of the Bush administration. Here we are, a year later, and people are still displaced, still unable to rebuild, still fighting with bureaucracy. Billions have been allocated, but much of the money hasn't been spent -- FEMA can't even get available money to people. A Washington Post report filed from Biloxi, Mississippi, says:

Fewer than 5 percent of the thousands of destroyed homes are being rebuilt, local [Mississippi] officials said. Most of the affected homeowners in Mississippi and Louisiana have yet to see any of the billions in federal money approved to help them get back home.

But the overall problem is bigger than Bush's failures. While it's outrageous that the richest country in the world can't do a better job of picking up the pieces after a disaster, it's equally outrageous that we're not taking the common sense steps to minimize the effects of disasters that are going to happen.

Given how badly we handle predictable disasters like hurricanes and tornadoes, is it any wonder that we're at such a loss for handling more random events like pandemics and terrorist attacks?

For a good roundup on the post-Katrina situation, see Tom Paine.com's series called Katrina: The Continuing Storm.

Hurricane Katrina: Where were you a year ago, Mr. Bush?

By Diane Silver

I've never been to New Oreleans or even driven through any of the other places swamped by Hurrican Katrina. One year after that horrible storm and the even worse response by our government, though, I find myself filled with pain and anger.

I see headlines like the one in The Washington Post about George W. Bush and Democrats flocking to New Orleans, and I wonder: Where were you a year ago when people were dying?

Bush's visit is particularly obscene.

A year ago, he couldn't be bothered. A year ago, his government, his people, his "heckuva job" FEMA director abandoned the Gulf Coast. His response to the storm made what was horrible unthinkable.

I have much more to say, but it's all a jumble inside. Consider this an open thread on Katrina. Where were you a year ago? What do you think now?

Saga of the Rainbow Flag: A note about Fred Phelps & the REAL Kansas

By Diane Silver

To those reporters who were shocked (yes, shocked) that gay rights supporters outnumbered anti-gay protesters in tiny Meade, Kansas, this weekend, here's information you might find useful. The frothing-at-the-mouth anti-gay Westboro Baptist Church is always outnumbered...even in Kansas... even in small-town Kansas.

I felt compelled to post this after reading the following breathless headline at 365Gay.com: "Gay Supporters Outnumber Phelps Clan In Flag Protest." The story said:

If followers of anti-gay pastor Fred Phelps thought they were going to find support in tiny Meade, Kansas they were mistaken. The militant group demonstrated across the street Sunday from a small hotel that stirred up a local hornets nest when it displayed a rainbow flag.

About 30 of Phelp's followers, mostly relatives, held signs saying "God Hates Fags", and "AIDS is God's curse."

Not far away a crowd nearly double in size help up their own signs. "God Loves Fags" read one sign. "Go home" read another.

Given all the recent publicity and the stereotyping about Kansas as a backward, bigoted state, I suppose I can understand the tone of this report. And yes, given that Sunday in Meade was filled with protests and counter protests because of a controversy over a rainbow flag, one might be lead to believe that all Kansans are fools.

But the stereotype of Kansas isn't any more real than any other stereotype. Yup, there are certainly bigots out here. However, pretty much everyone in Kansas is thoroughly and utterly sick of Phelps and his minions.

They are almost always outnumbered, or ignored, when they protest in their home state. That's because even us backward Kansans can see the nastiness and destructiveness of the Phelps clan.

Some of us believe that Phelps has even helped the cause of fairness and basic decency for lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgendered Kansans. He certainly provides a clear example of the hatred we face. I have yet to find anyone except for some (but not all) of his family -- even out here on the blasted Plains -- who embraces Phelps.

What we need to do now is to move beyond Phelps. He is hurtful, but he is largely a joke. The real threat to equality for thousands of Kansans isn't an abusive fool and a handful of his children and grandchildren. The real threat is the nice person who would never think of hurting a soul who repeatedly and blindly votes for laws that destroy people's lives.

These real, nice people can do this because they don't understand the reality of our lives. They don't get it that they are actually hurting families and children by, for example, voting to ban same-sex marriage, civil unions and any other legal rights for lesbian and gay families.

Phelps is a sideshow and a joke. It's the nice people we need to worry about. The good news, though, is that the nice people are sane, yes, even in Kansas. They can be reached.

For more coverage of the events in Meade this weekend, see below and Saga of the Rainbow Flag: Westboro Baptist Church teaches Meade, Kansas, about "despicable"

Saga of the Rainbow Flag: Investigate incident in Meade, Kansas, as a hate crime

Thomas Witt, the chair of the Kansas Equality Coalition, has called for an incident at the Lakeway Hotel to be investigated as a hate crime.

The incident occurred Aug. 11 when a brick, or piece of a block, was thrown through the window of the hotel, which was flying the rainbow flag, a symbol of gay rights. The brick had the word "fag" inked on it. Another brick with the message "get the fuck out of town" was discovered outside the hotel.

The Hutchinson News reported Witt's comments.

"The anti-gay profanity written on the bricks demonstrates this is clearly a hate crime and we insist that it be treated as such," Witt said Sunday at a gathering here of the coalition, which fights discrimination based on sexual orientation.

Witt differentiated the window incident from the clandestine removal of a rainbow flag from the pole in front of the Lakeway on July 31. The boys who later confessed to taking the flag - which has since been replaced - left no message when they did the deed.

Robin Knight, who runs the Lakeway with her husband, J.R. Knight, agrees the window breaking should be pursued as a hate crime while Meade County Sheriff Michael Cox said only that his office continues to investigate.

Saga of the Rainbow Flag: Fighting for the "right to coexist"

Living without intimidation -- or a brick through the window -- is one of the reasons gay rights supporters came to Meade, Kansas, on Sunday.

Tiny Meade in southwestern Kansas became the focus of the anti-gay and funeral-picketing Westboro Baptist Church, The Kansas Equality Coalition and the media after a controversy over the right of a local hotel to fly the rainbow flag. In the last month, the flag has been cut down and stolen and a brick with the word "fag" was thrown through the window of The Lakeway Hotel.

The Hutchinson News provided good coverage of the day's events and explanation of why the civil rights supporters and the Equality Coalition and its Southwest Kansas Chapter has focused on the town. The News reported:

"We're basically trying to stand up for the right to coexist with others without having a brick thrown through the window," said Dennis Russell, a Wichita State University student sporting a rainbow flag over his shoulders and a rainbow wig on his head.

Sherry Coles of Coldwater, a coalition member whose son died of AIDs, called the Westboro showing "a good opportunity to let people see hate masquerading as religion." She said the Topeka church represents "pure evil" and, in touting the rights of gay people, said "all men are created equal," alluding back to the U.S. Declaration of Independence.

Saga of the Rainbow Flag: Westboro Baptist Church teaches Meade, Kansas, about "despicable"

About 30 supporters of anti-gay minister Fred Phelps protested a symbol of gay rights in tiny Meade on Sunday. The angry sign-toting members of Topeka's Westboro Baptist Church, though, ended up teaching at least one local resident about the true meaning of bigotry.

As always, the Phelps clan brought their children, who picketed, carried signs and shouted about how God hates gays and anyone else who doesn't agree with Phelps' theology. The central principle of his theology appears to be how all people must bow down to an abusive God.

Susan Seybert, who has lived in Meade for 30 years, "stationed herself at St. John Catholic Church to put herself between" the protesters and the church, The Wichita Eagle reported. Seybert told The Wichita Eagle:

"It's just not right," she said, shaking her head while watching children connected with the church chant about homosexuals burning in hell.

"I think it's despicable to start to teach your children at such a young age the word 'hate.' It's just the worst thing you can do," Seybert said.

The Eagle has complete coverage of Sunday's events in Meade where Phelps, the townspeople and the state board of the Kansas' largest gay rights group, The Kansas Equality Coalition, came together for a raucous afternoon.

Meade became the subject of international news in August when a rainbow flag being flown at the Lakeway Hotel in town was cut down. Later a brick with the word "fag" was thrown through the hotel's window.

See an index of In This Moment's coverage at:

Saga of the Rainbow Flag: It all comes together tomorrow in Meade, Kansas

Justice in Alabama: Vote electing out lesbian allowed to stand

Good news out of Alabama this weekend! Democrat Patricia Todd survived a challenge to her election victory. That makes her the first out queer member of the Alabama Legislature.

Patricia Todd won the Democratic primary for a seat in the state House of Representatives. She did not face any Republican opposition in November, but her electoral victory was challenged by some in her own party. They pulled out an obscure rule in an attempt to disqualify her. The problem was that no one else was following the rule either.

Yesterday, the Alabama State Democratic Executive Committee voted 95 to 87 to drop the challenge to Todd's victory.

Here's some of the best coverage.

Eyewitness reports from Birmingham Blues:

More on the SDEC Meeting

A couple of cool stories from yesterday's SDEC meeting

From AMERICAblog:

Patricia Todd is the victor in Alabama -- finally

The Victory Fund also released a statement."Finally, the voters have prevailed."

From Pam's House Blend:

More details on Kathy on the big day for Patricia Todd where Pam, who is black, talks about how the controversay was not about race. Pam wrote:

Yes, people it's not just about race, no matter how many folks try to spin it that way. Black homophobia cannot be ignored as a core part of the problem in this dust up -- it is a serious impediment to progress and dialog within the party when it gets continuously swept under the rug.

Civil rights cannot be defined a race-only matter, and not as a zero-sum game either.

Here at In This Moment, we wrote about the Todd case in:

Alabama Democrats defy democracy by moving to overturn lesbian's election victory