Republicans Anonymous

You'd think someone as concerned with human life as Mr. Bush would immediately speak out on the latest tragic school shooting. You would, of course, be wrong:

Native Americans Criticize Bush's Silence
Response to School Shooting Is Contrasted With President's Intervention in Schiavo Case
By Ceci Connolly
Washington Post Staff Writer
Friday, March 25, 2005; Page A06

MINNEAPOLIS, March 24 -- Native Americans across the country -- including tribal leaders, academics and rank-and-file tribe members -- voiced anger and frustration Thursday that President Bush has responded to the second-deadliest school shooting in U.S. history with silence.

Three days after 16-year-old Jeff Weise killed nine members of his Red Lake tribe before taking his own life, grief-stricken American Indians complained that the White House has offered little in the way of sympathy for the tribe situated in the uppermost region of Minnesota.
...

The reaction to Bush's silence was particularly bitter given his high-profile, late-night intervention on behalf of Terri Schiavo, the brain-damaged Florida woman caught in a legal battle over whether her feeding tube should be reinserted.

"The fact that Bush preempted his vacation to say something about Ms. Schiavo and here you have 10 native people gunned down and he can't take time to speak is very telling," said David Wilkins, interim chairman of the Department of American Indian Studies at the University of Minnesota and a member of the North Carolina-based Lumbee tribe.
Source: Washington Post.

Far be it from me to say Mr. Bush exhibits a racist attitude. However, Bush didn't move from his ranch when the tsunami hit Asia, did nothing to save the life of a poor black infant whose life support was withdrawn in Texas, offers no words of condolence to brown-skinned Native Americans - and makes a emergency photo-op trip back to Washington simply to sign a bill to force-feed a brain-dead white woman.

I expect this demonstrates Bush's pandering to his radical-right base more than possible racism. I doubt he cares anything about Ms. Schiavo's tragic circumstances, either - he's just cynically pandering to his radical right base. What this does show is that Mr. Bush has no compassion - he just acts the part when and if Karl Rove tells him to.