Barbara Bush as Marie Antoinette
Friday, September 9, 2005
I do not typically post politically partisan Tips but this one I cannot resist.
To the Editor of The New York Times:
While touring the Astrodome in Texas, which is being used as a relocation site, Barbara Bush, the president’s mother, made a comment that rivals “Let them eat cake” in its arrogant and clueless insensitivity. “And so many of the people in the arena here, you know, were underprivileged anyway,” she said, “so this is working very well for them” (news article, Sept. 7).
The remark is a revealing insight into the sort of aristocratic and detached “family values” held by the Bush family. It helps explain the gut-level sympathy that seemed missing in the president’s response to a catastrophe that fell hardest on our most vulnerable citizens.
Janice Gewirtz
Mountain Lakes, N.J., Sept. 7, 2005
