Millionaire Pundit Values

Bob Somerby saw someone say this on This Weak:

“I was one of the people who was very angry watching from the safety of my living room and with the New Orleans portion of my family—I have a sister who lives there with her husband and their small daughter—we were all watching it in the safety of my living room but I was furious and disappointed at my government that this looked like Bangladesh or Haiti or somewhere. And if we don’t figure out what went wrong, I don’t know how we can correct the mistakes that were made and let me also say that I think one of the things we have to focus on is those people who don’t have the resources to get out, and I think that all of the officials knew—local, state and national—that there was a significant portion of residents of that area who didn’t have the resources and I have to tell you, I was one of the people who was not aware of that. I’m one of those people—I’m middle class. My sister and her husband are middle class. They had the resources to get out and get to me. And I said, “Why didn’t those people leave?” and my sister said, “You don’t know how many desperately poor people there are in New Orleans.”

Was this George Will? No, it was the “liberal” panelist. And therefore Somerby justifiably blows a gasket:

Perhaps it’s true—that our lives are merely a joke, a mirage, devised by the gods for their endless amusement. How else to explain that statement by Tucker? Just imagine: You’re the African-American editorial page editor of Atlanta’s biggest newspaper. You constantly appear on national TV, asked your opinions on the issues of the day. And when Katrina slams into New Orleans, you have to wait for your sister to tell you that New Orleans (like your own Atlanta) is full of “desperately poor people”—people who couldn’t afford to flee as Katrina bore down on their city! Faced with a statement like that, can sane people fail to ask if Homer was right? Fail to wonder if our lives are a joke, played on us by the immortals, who sit and laugh from the heights of Olympus at the mockeries they produce in our realm?

Let’s say it again: This well-known African-American editorial page editor didn’t know that New Orleans was full of poor people! And let’s understand this too: Tucker is constantly brought on TV, in panel discussions, to express the progressive viewpoint! But so it goes—so it endlessly goes—in our modern millionaire press corps. In the aftermath of a massive disaster, a millionaire host choppers off with a millionaire senator to see how her family’s summer home fared. On the same show, a “middle class” African-American editor says she didn’t know New Orleans was full of poor people—that she had to wait for her sister to tell her! The entire panel sits and listens, expressing no surprise at her statement. Can any sane person fail to ask if our lives are a joke of the gods?

Yep. This Weak was always symbolized by me by the time that Cokie Roberts refused to say the word “condom,” but this tops it. I mean, even Jonah Goldberg is aware that there are a lot of poor people in New Orleans, and that they may be affected differently. He doesn’t care, but he’s aware of it. But how on earth could somebody not even know that there are lots of poor people in New Orleans? And in what depraved world could this person be conisdered a progressive?