While it is playing a prominent role in my thinking today, I only have a few disjointed and incomplete thoughts on the nightmare in Louisiana.
It's a freakishly horrid disaster. But not without warning. The place was like a raw egg balanced on a chopstick. Guess what? The egg fell off.
It is SO easy to berate the emergency responders for not getting help to these people sooner. But would YOU fly the helicopter full of water into a war zone?
I don't know a word bad enough to use for describing the thugs, looters, rapists and murderers who are adding to the devastation and horror.
I have heard a lot of talk about how f---- up the government is in their handling of this massive disaster. But I gotta tell you, what would things on the ground look like if every one of those people who hauled off a tv or pile of clothes, or shot at a policeman, instead was helping a neighbor?
The babbling critics blame government first. But funny, they also look to that same government to save them.
The difference between them and me is that I don't mistake the government for God.
More than usual, today I need to hear the words of Rabbi Nachman of Breslov:
"Losing hope
is like losing your freedom,
like losing your self."