Wednesday in the park with george

Standing in Lafayette park Wednesday afternoon was very chilly. It was a windy 30 degrees, but the cold temperatures did not deter. About 75 transplanted and uprooted Louisianians attended a rally to rebuild New Orleans and the gulf coast.

We gathered with fun protest signs and plenty of spirit. I held my "Katrina blows & FEMA sucks!" sign and bobbed it up and down as we chanted, shouted and generally acted up just behind 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue. I doubt that George W. was listening to us, because he was holed up doing damage control because the New York Times was about to publish the fact that he'd okayed spying on U.S. citizenry without any judicial review.

Mrs. Landrieu laughed at my sign and told me that she agreed with it. Before long, about 15 or 20 reporters appeared. We carefully orchestrated ourselves, making sure camera angles were just so and I had a team of 4 people making sure my hair and makeup was just so. We stood so the cameras would have the White House North lawn right at our backs. After Landrieu spoke, the Lt. Governor gave a brief speech. I had to leave when he started, though, because my lunch break was over!

It was a worthwhile little gathering and I was glad to see people as outraged by the hypocrisy and incompetence of the administration as I had been. The "Save the Wetlands" people were there, also, passing out bumper stickers. Another group had a nice sticker that said simply, "ReNew Orleans." How eloquent. Two or three posters simply had a picture of W himself, in the Jackson Square speech, iconic and yet somehow less than impressive, in front of that Andrew Jackson statue, with a quote of his promise to "do whatever it takes to rebuild New Orleans." That was nice.

Glad I went! I feel like I've officially paid back Louisiana for everything that it's given me.

Strange, but I didn't see very much coverage of the rally beyond this.