President Bush recently suggested he was the one to bridge the racial divide in the post-Hurricane Katrina United States. Did he speak correctly? If he were truly in earnest, his bridge would have to be really big.
A recent poll by NBC and The Wall Street Journal puts Bush's approval rating at a dismal 2 percent among the black community. This rating comes at a time when Bush's general approval is at 39 percent, the lowest of his presidential career.
Hurricane Katrina raised a lot of social issues, many of which were racial. For Bush to be despised among blacks shouldn't be surprising considering the significant number of impoverished blacks living in New Orleans when Katrina hit. Bush's apathetic response is the prime reason for his already dwindling pre-Katrina approval rating to dive into the single digits.
There are a number of other reasons I can think of to explain why blacks appreciate Bush even less than the French do. When outspoken Rapper Kanye West said, "George Bush doesn't care about black people," during a Sept. 2 live concert fundraiser for Hurricane Katrina relief, according to Billboard magazine, he voiced an opinion that is well reflected by many blacks.
I disagree to a point: Bush just doesn't like poor people - of any color.
Bush's disinterest with America's poor was poignantly exhibited when he capitalized on Hurricane Katrina as a means of political potential and public appearances in the wake of the destruction. Tearing himself away from yet another vacation, he began traveling to areas that were in no way impacted by the disaster.
I was actually in Coronado, Calif. when Bush visited the North Island Naval Air Station earlier this month. The president only mentioned Katrina as an asterisk, eclipsing the issue by choosing to rally support for his wars instead.
Another potential cause for Bush's "ebon-unpopularity" is his repeated snubbing of the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People. During his term as president, Bush has not once accepted an invitation to the NAACP Annual Convention, making him the first president since Herbert Hoover not to oblige them with attendance.
Bush also maintains the cheerful legacy of presiding as governor of Texas, the state with the fifth-highest level of poverty in the country and the highest level of black executions.
Additionally, the NAACP has not been very fond of Bush ever since he failed to sufficiently condemn the killing of Texan James Byrd Jr. by white supremacists, and as governor of Texas blocked the hate crimes bill named after Byrd in 2000. But it wasn't such a big deal that a man was dragged to his death behind a pickup truck, right?
Whatever Bush's real attitude toward the NAACP may be, consistently blowing it off does nothing to prove critics, such as West, wrong.
Economically speaking, Bush has added nothing to his appeal in the eyes of blacks. His tax cuts for the rich naturally create an imbalance that has affected scores of minority families. There has been an increase of 5 million people living in poverty since Bush first took office in 2000. Moreover, under the Bush administration the proportion of black Americans living in poverty rose to 24.7 percent - almost twice as high as the overall rate for all other races , according to Reuters.
If bridging the racial gap is what Bush intends, construction is severely behind schedule.
-Kris Petersen is a political science and music senior.
-This column does not necessarily reflect the opinion of The Daily Aztec. Send e-mail to letters@thedailyaztec.com. Anonymous letters will not be printed - include your full name, major and year in school.
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