Natural Disasters Are Not Photo-Ops

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Federal response to the floods in Louisiana has been pretty good, by all accounts. That much destruction is going to be painful, and housing is going to be an issue for some time. But according to The Advocate of Baton Rouge, the federal response to the current flooding is light years ahead of what happened after Hurricane Katrina.

The governor of Lousiana, John Bel Edwards, advised against a presidential visit right now (President Obama will visit next week), citing concerns about the motorcade and security and the press corps and whatever while people still needed rescuing. So the President has stayed away, and so has Hillary Clinton.

Naturally, Donald Trump and Mike Pence showed up today, and did so without bothering to advise the governor.  Gov. Edwards was not pleased —

“Donald Trump hasn’t called the governor to inform him of his visit,” a spokesman for Edwards’ office said in a statement Thursday evening. “We welcome him to LA but not for a photo-op. Instead we hope he’ll consider volunteering or making a sizable donation to the LA Flood Relief Fund to help the victims of the storm.”

So Trump toured Baton Rouge today, telling residents he was “here to help.” As near as I can tell the only thing anybody actually got from him was his autograph. I, for one, will not be holding my breath waiting for Trump to donate anything to the LA Flood Relief Fund.

Update: I spoke too soon; it turns out Trump spent all of 49 seconds unloading toys off a truck. Well, never mind.

7 thoughts on “Natural Disasters Are Not Photo-Ops”

  2. I’m not even going to give credence to the latest consrvative idiot’s criricisms.

    Just compare and contrast Dumbaya showing up after a week of doing jack-fucking shit, and compare snd contrast what Obama is doing now!

    “Brownie, you ain’t doing jack-shit anymore!”

    JAYZOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO!!!!!

  3. I saw Trump and Pence doing a photo-op unload of stuff OTHER PEOPLE had donated. What a joke! Sorta like Ryan’s fake dishwashing a couple of years back.

  5. Well, to be fair, since Trump expects to make more than most of us make our entire lives on an average weekday morning, he would have to bill at least 250K for that 49 seconds. If you include the travel costs, and the use of the “Trump brand,” the actual value donated by Trump to the flood victims would be much higher.

    That 49 seconds of physical labor was a fairly taxing experience for “the Donald.” He nearly broke into a sweat and had to retire to his plane for a well deserved nap and his favorite KFC luncheon. I expect he’ll be able to apply for some fees as a consultant, given his expertise in disaster relief and floods. So, the morning won’t be a total loss.

  6. But the floated Republican media meme is that ‘at least W flew over after Katrina; Obama is on vacation and can’t be bothered…’

    You can’t make this stuff up. Republicanism is a mental disease.

    Don’t get me started about how ‘the media treats Obama as though he can do no wrong.’

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