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Other related messages found in our database Bill might want to check Urban Legend next time. Claim: Condoleezza Rice was upbraided by a shopper for buying expensive shoes just after Hurricane Katrina.
Example:[Collected via e-mail, 2005]
Is it true that shortly after Hurrican Katrina, Secretary of State Condoleeza Rice was seen buying thousands of dollars worth of shoes in an upscale Manhattan shoe store; and that the Secretary was accosted by an angry customer for doing so?
Origins: The rumor about Dr. Condoleeza Rice, the U.S. Secretary of State, going on a shoe-shopping spree while on vacation in New York immediately after Hurricane Katrina struck the Gulf Coast has appeared on some gossip sites and was reported by the New York Daily News:
Yesterday, Rice went shopping at Ferragamo on Fifth Ave. According to the Web site www.Gawker.com, the 50-year-old bought several thousand dollars' worth of shoes at the pricey leather-goods boutique.
A fellow shopper shouted, How dare you shop for shoes while thousands are dying and homeless! — presumably referring to Louisiana and Mississippi.
The woman expressing her First Amendment rights was promptly removed from the store. A Ferragamo store manager confirmed to us that Rice did shop there yesterday, but refused to answer questions about whether the protester was removed, and whether by his own security or the Secret Service.
We don't know how much truth there is to this rumor, but it has undoubtedly spread because it expresses a fiddling while Rome burns frustration many Americans have felt at the federal government's slow response in providing aid to victims of the disastrous damage and flooding in New Orleans and other parts of the Gulf Coast caused by Hurricane Katrina.
As many other readers have pointed out, although one might direct criticism towards government officials such as the President of the United States, the Secretary of Homeland Security, and the Under Secretary of Homeland Security for Emergency Preparedness and Response for failing to coordinate adequate response to large-scale emergencies within the U.S., such efforts are largely outside the purview of the Secretary of State. Dr. Rice's primary duties are advising the President in the determination and execution of U.S. foreign policy, conducting negotiations with foreign representatives, and providing instructions to U.S. ministers and consuls abroad, little of which directly bears on coordinating disaster relief within the U.S.
The implication embedded with this rumor is that if Dr. Rice had only been shopping for sensible shoes (instead of expensive leather ones), that would have been acceptable — a point that indicates there's perhaps more political subtext to this piece, especially since the purported outraged comments came from a fellow shopper.
Last updated: 2 September 2005
The URL for this page is http://www.snopes.com/katrina/politics/rice.asp
I heard last night about these firefighters who were all given tests and the object was to allow the top scorers to get promotions. All the firefighters were given the same material, same amount of study time, and the same exact tests. After the tests were done, it was noted that minorities scored lower on the test and so they basically threw the tests out. Some of these guys who scored high are calling it discrimination because they studied, worked hard, and had higher scores and were denied promotions.
I am so sick and tired of skilled people not getting jobs because we have to fill so many spots with minorities. If a minority is skilled for the job, by all means....give them the promotion and/or hire them. But to pick a minority who had low test scores over someone who had high test scores.....to me that is picking someone for the job based on race and I think that is wrong. I understand that minorities want equal rights and equal pay and all that jazz and I'm totally for that.....but earn it. Don't just expect it. Study, work hard, learn skills. For us to hire people just because we have a minority quota is just wrong. We are rewarding mediocrity.
Can you just imagine if this was the other way around. Just imagine if it were the minorities that scored higher and they threw the test scores out. Talk about a major law suit that they would win in a heart beat.
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