Bill Maher on Hurricane Katrina

Bill Maher became the first of the late-night comedians to take on Hurricane Katrina and the federal government's response to it, or lack thereof. Here's a transcript of his monologue on HBO's "Real Time With Bill Maher," in which he just slams President Bush:

"Finally today convoys of troops and aid started to arrive along the Gulf Coast. Five days after the hurricane hit. Kind of makes you miss the innocent days when Bush only sat on his ass for seven minutes. It only took him four days to make a plan, but finally today he said he had a plan. Unfortunately it's a faith-based plan that involves getting two of every animal onto a big boat.

"He could have started planning on Saturday when the radar showed that a hurricane was going to hit the city, but Bush thinks that the jury is still out on weather forecasting. You know, there's one big difference between George Bush and Marie Antoinette, and that is when Marie Antoinette said 'Let them eat cake,' they had cake…Oh, I kid the president. President Bush was on the ground all day today, you saw him there hugging the starving and touring the devastated area. His quote was 'New Orleans is more devastated than New York on 9/11.' Then he grabbed a bullhorn and vowed that we would get Mother Nature dead or alive.

"By the way, if you want to help the victims hit hardest by hurricane Katrina, Fox news has posted the Web site of the Republican National Committee. Well, taking a page from their tsunami playbook, the White House announced today that former presidents Bush and Bill Clinton will head up the fundraising efforts for the hurricane relief. And you know, Bill Clinton is no stranger to this kind of thing. He was once visiting the French Quarter during a hurricane and got blow behind a dumpster. But hey, it is New Orleans. Watching today, I could tell that this city has not lost its hope. It has not lost its distinctive pluck, because every time rescue teams would toss supplies to people, women flashed their tits."

-Bill Maher on HBO's "Real Time With Bill Maher," Sept. 2, 2005

See Also: Bill Maher on "George of the Bungle"

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