As Cheney turned a disaster into a publicity opportunity, some people clearly refused to make him feel welcome. And rightly so.
Watch the video.
The vice president promised continued federal assistance in Gulfport, before heading for New Orleans. He reviewed in private the ongoing efforts at each level of government.
He walked along 2nd Street in Gulfport, and seemed stunned by the havoc.
``But everybody I've met with was upbeat,'' and determined to rebuild, he said. The vice president was not uniformly welcomed in Gulfport. During a press availability in the middle of a street, a young man twice shouted obscenities at him before walking away. (He yelled: ``Go fuck yourself, Mr. Cheney.")
Earlier, as the vice president walked along debris-strewn 2nd Street, a block inland from the Gulf of Mexico, a resident, Lynn Lofton, criticized Cheney's visit as ``a media opportunity that is a complete waste of time and taxpayer money.'' She said: ``They should have been here last week.'' Loften first identified herself as a former Republican and now Democrat, but later changed that to ``libertarian.'' She said the neighborhood was a largely upscale, Republican neighborhood.
No house on the street was undamaged. Some were leveled, with only concrete slabs remaining.
Cheney was accompanied by his wife, Lynne, Atty. Gen. Alberto Gonzales, Rep. Jim McCrery, and White House deputy chief of staff Joe Hagin, who was making his fourth visit to the region. Cheney was joined by Michael Chertoff after Air Force 2 landed here. Gulfport Mayor Brent Warr joined Cheney on the walking tour, as did two local ministers, Sunny Adolph of the first missionary Baptist church and Chuck Register of the First Baptist Church.
Cheney said he had identified an array of issues both in the short and long term. He said current laws prevent federal resources to be used to clean up private property in the absence of its owner.
Cheney and his entourage stopped to chat with residents at three houses on 2nd Street, but none entered a house. At one house, a man emerged as Cheney walked by; the vice president turned back and talked with the man on his porch. At one point, both the vice president and his wife looked inside the door. But that's as far as they went.
Ed Chen
LA Times
