who killed the little people?

In the past two weeks we have been bombarded (almost on the hour) with news of the havoc wreaked on the homeland by successive typhoons ondoy (ketsana) and pepeng (parma), resulting in devastation death and destruction. The images of trajedy and helplessness tell so much.
And i am angry!
I want to know a few things and i want some answers. And so do the little people: the victms, the dead, the dispossessed, the sufferers. They are our family our neighbours our friends. They are not people of a lesser God.
We demand answers.
Where are the advance warnings?
Tides can be predicted years in advance
And if huge typhoons are imminent.
Even two hours would suffice to get to higher ground.
Or to seek shelter under more stable buildings.
5-7 day weather forecasts are now possible.
So where are the precautionary warnings?

Who killed the very poor,
Why an' what's the reason for?
"Not I," says la presidente,
"Don't point your finger at me.
I could not stop the typhoon’s fury
Who says i did not lift a finger to aid
I even opened the palace gate
It's too bad they had to die,
No, you can't blame me at all."

Who drownded the very poor,
Why an' what's the reason for?
"Not us," say the newspapers,
editorialising on their high chairs.
and calling for a national commission
To undertake the reconstruction
proposing candidates to the commission
It wasn't us that made them fall.
No, you can't blame us at all."

Who killed the very poor,
Why an' what's the reason for?
"Not us," says the Pagasa,
weather forecasting is an imperfect science you know,
it’s human nature to find someone to blame
our brand new radar was in the testing stage
and we got no support from government
It wasn't us to make the call.
No, you can't find hope with us at all."

Who buried the poor alive
Why an' what's the reason for?
"Not us," say the congress,
We’re worried about the budget
The legislators need their campaigns met
And we should allow for inflation
(or corruption as one reporter wrote),
the ruling coalition has borne the brunt of the disasters,
and has been found terribly wanting
so it’s our turn at the till
It was mother nature, it was God's will.

Who killed the very poor,
Why an' what's the reason for?

(apologies to Bob Dylan and Davey Moore)

play it again sam!

The last two lines of Sam Cooke's song 'a change is gonna come' goes:
It's been a long time coming
But I know a change is gonna come.

It has brother. The change is come!
Barack Obama take a bow. America take a bow.
I believe you have elected Obama and judged him at the ballot box, not by the color of his skin, but by the content of his character, by what you saw in him, by what he had to offer...
and that is no mean feat.
that is one big leap for mankind.
oh yes my faith is restored - reason will always prevail over prejudice.

Full credit to Obama for his gracious acknowledgement and acceptance of the burden of leading America to its next phase, hopefully to a brighter and better world.
Hopefully he will lead the American nation to achieve what Dr King implored so many years ago - to rise up and live out the true meaning of its creed: "We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal."
And indeed:
From every mountainside, let freedom ring!
Okay yes I include Mt Cotton in that

Credit also to Sen McCain for similar grace in conceding defeat and accepting the verdict of the American people.
If there's one thing that stands out to me about McCain during the campaign, it was when this woman supporter of McCain at a town hall rally said:
"I've heard that Sen. Obama is an Arab."
McCain respectfully cut the woman off and said:
"No, ma'am. He's a decent family man and citizen"
That says a lot about McCain and he can stand proud for standing up to the low tactics of his supporters.
I wish him well.

Barracking for Mccain

bar·rack Australian To shout support for a player or team.

A few days out from the US presidential elections and thoughts are swirling around my head.
12 months ago during the nominations I felt that Americans were not quite ready for an African-American to be their president. That’s why I thought that the Democrats would be better off with Hillary Clinton as their candidate. I was in favor of Obama over Clinton because I believed that Clinton was too far right. Even if Obama was an unknown at the time, he showed a lot of promise, a fresh face and a fresh voice and a fresh message. Nearly a year on and obviously Obama was chosen as the Democratic party‘s standard bearer. Now if Obama was white he would win hands down over McCain. And to me that’s the unknown factor – the race card. The Bradley effect. Should Obama emerge as winner come 4th November, I will applaud America for it will have achieved great strides in its race relations sooner than I expected. If however by some dark twist of fate McCain is elected then that would be a sad day indeed. Sad because by now, in this day and age, I feel humans should be above racial prejudice.
So I urge America on. Go enfranchise yourselves. Go exercise your right to vote and exorcise the worst administration from the white house. America and the world will be so much better off. The worst that could happen is that Obama will turn out like Carter – a lot of promise but not much to show for it. Or he could turn out to match his rhetoric with great achievements as a pragmatic president. And we will be celebrating this point in time as a milestone in history.
Whatever the outcome, ultimately it is your collective prerogative America - down the road towards change or more of the same old same old. I will respect your choice of course whichever way. I will just be either enraptured or sad.