MAUREEN CALLAHAN: Where IS our President? In the ashes of Hawaii, 96 are dead ... trends now
Where's the president?
It's been nearly a week since the apocalyptic Maui wildfires, leaving the historic town of Lahaina our own version of Pompeii — leveled to dust and ashes, the ground still so scorching that cadaver dogs work in short bursts to keep their paws from burning. The death toll stands at 96 and climbing; over 1,300 people remain missing. Cell phones are ringing inside body bags. Burnt out cars line roadways, tires melted into asphalt. Recovered human remains are unidentifiable and falling apart.
Yet President Joe Biden — whose so-called brand is empathy amid tragedy — just had to have his beach weekend in Delaware.
'No comment', he said when asked about Maui on Sunday.
NO COMMENT?!?
It was the same a few hours earlier, Biden dismissing reporters while bike riding near his beach home.
'We're looking at it,' he said.
What's to look at? Nothing, quite literally, is left.
It's the summer of 'Oppenheimer', and comparisons have aptly been made to Hiroshima. This is a crisis that demands a primetime presidential address, the immediate deployment of Navy ships to provide shelter, food and medical care, and a presidential visit to the disaster site.
Yet President Joe Biden — whose so-called brand is empathy amid tragedy — just had to have his beach weekend in Delaware. 'No comment', he said when asked about Maui on Sunday.
It's been nearly a week since the apocalyptic Maui wildfires, leaving the historic town of Lahaina our own version of Pompeii — leveled to dust and ashes, the ground still so scorching that cadaver dogs work in short bursts to keep their paws from burning.
Instead, Biden's off to fancy Lake Tahoe on Friday, taking yet another vacation.
What a disgrace. What a dereliction of duty.
One could generously assume that Biden, age 80 and increasingly frail, is storing his energy for the 2024 campaign.
If that's true — and argument enough for Biden to step aside — there's still an obvious solution here: Why not send Barack Obama, Hawaii's favorite and most famous son, whose own Winter White House was based in Hawaii?
Speaking of: Where is Barack Obama? Why hasn't he made a visit?
Obama, it seems, would rather not have his summer disrupted either. Instead, he's done the least he could do: releasing a video promoting a Red Cross telethon and tweeting thoughts and prayers from one of his multi-million dollar homes on Martha's Vineyard or Chicago or D.C. or whatever super-yacht he may be on, calling the images out of Hawaii 'tough to see.'
Talk about an understatement.
Here's Obama in his 2020 presidential memoir, 'A Promised Land', on being a US Senator during Hurricane Katrina in 2005:
'I stayed up half the night watching the news coverage, stunned . . . There were floating corpses, elderly patients trapped in hospitals, gunfire and looting, refugees huddled and losing hope. To see such suffering was bad enough; to see the slow government response, the vulnerability of so many poor and working-class people, made me ashamed.'
Guess what's happening in Maui now? Looting, gunpoint robberies and invasions of existing homes.
Is Joe Biden ashamed?
'Where is the support?' local bar owner Matt Robb asked Insider. 'I don't think our government or our leaders, at this point, know how to handle it or what to do.'
That Barack Obama, the one who was eyeing a presidential run, was on site within days, meeting with survivors and hearing their stories and taking note of what they needed, immediately and in the future.
'I was reminded,' he wrote, 'that no matter how my circumstances had changed, theirs had not . . . Forgotten people and forgotten voices remained everywhere, neglected by a government that often appeared blind or indifferent to their needs.'
To which a weary nation says: Same as it ever was. How does Joe Biden appear now if not 'blind and indifferent'?
Why not send Barack Obama, Hawaii's favorite and most famous son, whose own Winter White House was based in Hawaii? Speaking of: Where is Barack Obama? Why hasn't he made a visit? (Above) Obama in Hawaii in December 2020
It was the same a few hours earlier, Biden dismissing reporters while bike riding near his beach home. 'We're looking at it,' he said. What's to look at? Nothing, quite literally, is left.
It's the summer of 'Oppenheimer', and comparisons have aptly been made to Hiroshima. (Above) Aerial view of the wildfire aftermath in Lahaina on Maui, Hawaii on August 11, 2023
The mainstream media all but called then-president George W. Bush a racist for his delayed response to Katrina — and when Bush finally caved, he only flew over New Orleans rather than touch down.
That decision, Bush wrote in his memoir, tarnished his legacy, rightly so.
'Huge mistake,' he later admitted. The infamous photo of Bush looking down from Air Force One left the impression, he said, that he was 'detached and uncaring, no question about it . . . It was my fault.'
No such worries, it seems, for President Biden. Nor Hawaii's own Obama.
One could argue that it's customary for former presidents to keep a low profile,
