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The day was September 8, 2005. Ben Marble wasn't looking for fame, he only wanted to get to his house in Gulfport, Mississippi. Of course, this was no normal day in the life of this 35 year old doctor, who also dabbles in music and painting. His house was destroyed on August 29th when Hurricane Katrina tore through the Gulf Coast. Blockaded from his house, a motorcade of black limos carrying Vice President Dick Cheney drove past him, and his truck ran out of gas. Fed up with the slow response from FEMA, and the frustration of fighting the wrong war in Iraq, Ben, already familiar with Cheney's arrogance - Dick belittled Senator Leahy (D-VT) on record in Congress by telling him to "fuck yourself" - Ben decided this was his time to express his disapproval. With his friend holding a video camera, Ben made his way close to the spot where Cheney was making a speech about the government's prompt efforts after the hurricane and he was reportedly enthused to meet the locals. During the speech, which was broadcast live on cable news from coast to coast, Ben made his one fleeting gesture of disapproval that he could that day. He yelled over the Vice President's speech and told Dick to "Go Fuck Yourself, Mr. Cheney". Gaining more courage and living off the adrenaline rush, he reiterated his
request, "Go Fuck Yourself, Asshole."
What is even more refreshing and exciting is actually being able to read about and talk to Ben Marble, the man himself. Down to earth, grounded with realistic viewpoints that leans left but avoids the extremes, he was kind enough to answer some questions sent to him from SCHLIEFKEVISION after he was named "Hero of the Year'. 1. You've been named as my website's hero of the year. As small an accolade as that is, how does it feel and how has the overall reaction to your comments to Cheney been received? Well on the local level other than my co-workers hardly anyone seems to know about what I did, i.e. it received zero local press coverage because the local media is owned by BUSHEEP. However on a national level, my wife and I just returned this past Saturday from a much needed vacation. We went to Hollywood mostly for pleasure but also a little business. Everywhere I went it seemed people knew who I was and wanted to shake my hand or give me a 'high five'. We were given VIP passes to the red carpet premiere of Jennifer Anniston's latest movie "Rumor Has It" which debuted at Graumann's Chinese Theatre so all the paparazzi and celebs were there. The next night we had VIP passes to some celebs only party at the Tropicana bar so that was cool but also kind of weird.
Sadly the USA is dominated by a two party system and neither side is willing to compromise and so I think things will get much worse before they get better because we still have 3 years of Dubya Gump. Sure would be nice if there was a viable 3rd party and that is why I conceptualized "The Real Party". 5. How did you react to Kanye West's statements after Katrina? I thought the courage he had to make his statement was incredible - his voice cracking, unsure of having the courage of his actions - as he delivered a wild bit of rhetoric. Kanye should have said "Dubya Gump is incompetent and should resign ASAP." But instead he took the low road and whipped out the 'race card' when racism had very little to do with the problem. For example, the problem was absolute incompetence. (The only racism i saw was from the MEDIA in their coverage of the event and so perhaps that is why Kanye believed racism was a legitimate cause of the problem?). You know New Orleans was 67% black so of course a majority of those affected by the storm were black but Dubya Gump has no control of the weather and the people were warned in the strongest terms to leave. Now of course Mayor Nagin got the buses out for election day so why didn't he get the people out when EVERYONE knew a Cat. 5 storm was coming? Then the storm hit and everyone breathed a collective sigh of relief that it 'missed New Orleans' then 2 days later REALITY hit. So after the levees broke what should have happened is the government should have done some air drops of food/water along with some guys with machine guns to make sure it was distributed fairly. And of course what would have prevented basically all of the damage done in the New Orleans area is if the politicians had fixed the levee that everyone knew was broke prior to Katrina instead of lining their pockets (everyone knows New Orleans politicians are some of the most corrupt on the planet). 6. Austin received over 3,000 evacuees from New Orleans, and more than half are expected to stay. How has the Gulf Coast changed, how much of any amount of reconstruction has happened? Well in Harrison County everything south of the train tracks was destroyed. In Hancock county everything all the way 5 miles north up to Interstate 10 and beyond was destroyed. Jackson county also received pretty massive devastation as well. One thing that I know frustrates many locals is that the mainstream media coverage seemingly always focuses on New Orleans when in reality the direct damage from the winds/storm surge on the Mississippi Gulf Coast was far worse than New Orleans. The damage in the New Orleans area was almost entirely due to the levee failure which happened two days after the storm had passed. Now of course more lives were lost in New Orleans and we certainly sympathize with our friends over there but the most severe damage occurred along the Mississippi Gulf Coast NOT Louisiana. So yeah Katrina basically destroyed a 90 mile stretch from the New Orleans area all the way to Pascagoula. Since the storm, Dubya Gump repealed the Davis Bacon act requiring minimum wage and so there was a massive influx of illegal aliens to the area. Now they are here to help rebuild so yeah it is kind of weird that it seems like illegal aliens are helping more than FEMA but at the same time there is something I don't like about people who break the law as soon as they set foot on US soil - legal immigration is wonderful but illegal is not fair.
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