I got the following email in my box this morning. I won’t shame the guy by posting his name.

Date: Aug 31, 2005 1:05 AM
Subject: do you plan on writing anything about the hurricane?

Not as important as voter fraud or Cindy Sheehan?

Glad to see you have things in perspective. When you can't gas up your Hummer you might change your tune

Actually, I had tried a couple of times to write about the hurricane. But as often happens in times of overwhelming tragedy, I find that mere words just are not sufficient. So I’ve refrained from posting rather than post some cliché-ridden item about the horror of it all and wailing “Oh, the humanity!� Others have done a significantly better job of addressing the subject – especially Michelle Malkin. Their words have not failed them, while mine have.

So instead I’ve written about stories that I find important that I think could be missed in the crush of Katrina coverage. If that strikes others as uncaring, too bad.

Ultimately, I think this writer is a bit confused. Does the presence or absence of a post about the hurricane on this blog determine what is or is not important? Is RHYMES WITH RIGHT the standard by which the importance of a story is judged? If it is, no one has told me. So either this guy vastly over-estimates my importance as a media source, or I vastly under-estimate that importance.

And while I may not be writing about the hurricane and its devastating impact that does not mean that I am doing nothing. The writer doesn’t know whether I am sending money or to whom it is going. He has no way of ascertaining whether or not I am doing anything for the refugees that have fled into my own community in the face of this disaster. No, he chooses to interpret silence as apathy.

Now I’ve not played politics with the storm. I’ve not asked why Cindy Sheehan and her fellow terrorist-backers are not down in New Orleans instead of traveling the country to undermine the war effort (Did you know that while everyone else travels by bus, Cindy hops a plane to the next destination? Orwell was right about some animals being more equal than others.) Doesn’t she care about the devastation? I’ve not heard her address the crisis with her “unquestionable moral authority�. Why doesn’t this writer hold her to the same standard that he wants to hold me? Heck, what about the fuel being eaten up by the buses and the planes used in her anti-American endeavor?

And we won’t get into the question of one of the writer’s favorite haunts, Americablog, where the owner has played politics with the decision by the president to stay in Crawford and continue with some speaking engagements instead of returning to Washington immediately – and would have played politics by criticizing a decision to return to Washington immediately if he had. The writing there about the disaster has been so incredibly insincere – as have been the comments posted there by my email-critic.

As for the issue of my car and gas prices – I’m a teacher in an 80% minority urban school district with a high poverty rate. What out-of-touch planet does this liberal fool live on if he believes I drive a Hummer? My car is seven years old and gets 30+ MPG. I need it to, because I drive 20+ miles each way to school. I’d love to know what he is driving and what he does for a living/how much he makes. I’m guessing he is a trust-fund baby who is seeking to assuage his liberal guilt by attacking conservative rather than giving away the money that feeds his lifestyle..