Democrats & Liberals: Archives

Nice article and two very worthy ideas, Paul. And yes, I agree, it’s definitely time to make the wealthy cough up some tax dollars to pay for it (for a change).

Never a problem that putting more taxes on the rich won’t cure huh?
Problem is, your definition of rich is anyone with a job.

I think it is absurd that people blame the President—one man—for the situation in Louisianna.In response to you stating the President passed the blame let me enlighten you to a few points you may have overlooked:

1) People were given more than a significant amount of time and warning to leave…true?

2) Is it the federal governments responsibility to have aid and soldiers on hand in a crisis like this? How many times/year do hurricanes strike Florida? How many times do tornados sweep across Kansas and the plains? Is there aid on hand for these states? There is when it is asked for, which leads me to my next point…

3) Is it true that the Govenor of the particular state the crisis is happening in has to ask the federal government to intervene…was that asked in the first four days, I think not.

4) How easy do you think it is to deploy more than 20,000 troups to a particular area? How long do you think it takes to put aid packages together? I am glad I am not on your timeclock because it seems you are the type that wants it NOW no matter what the price. NOW, NOW, NOW…

Maybe one should learn that patience is a virtue.

What I think you may have failed to overlook is that you have unqualified people in prestigious positions such as the mayor of New Orleans, and the Govenor of Lousianna. Who were not ready to handle the devistation.

There is a simple truth to all of this. I don’t think that anybody thought, President or otherwise, that there would be as much devastation as there was. Maybe you should run for President because I am sure you would have been much more prepared for the present crisis.

I think it is absurd that people blame the President—one man—for the situation in Louisianna.In response to you stating the President passed the blame let me enlighten you to a few points you may have overlooked:

1) People were given more than a significant amount of time and warning to leave…true?

2) Is it the federal governments responsibility to have aid and soldiers on hand in a crisis like this? How many times/year do hurricanes strike Florida? How many times do tornados sweep across Kansas and the plains? Is there aid on hand for these states? There is when it is asked for, which leads me to my next point…

3) Is it true that the Govenor of the particular state the crisis is happening in has to ask the federal government to intervene…was that asked in the first four days, I think not.

4) How easy do you think it is to deploy more than 20,000 troups to a particular area? How long do you think it takes to put aid packages together? I am glad I am not on your timeclock because it seems you are the type that wants it NOW no matter what the price. NOW, NOW, NOW…

Maybe one should learn that patience is a virtue.

What I think you may have failed to overlook is that you have unqualified people in prestigious positions such as the mayor of New Orleans, and the Govenor of Lousianna. Who were not ready to handle the devistation.

There is a simple truth to all of this. I don’t think that anybody thought, President or otherwise, that there would be as much devastation as there was. Maybe you should run for President because I am sure you would have been much more prepared for the present crisis.

Paul,

So everything is Bush’s fault? Regardless of what local officials did or did not do?

Lets take a look at a few things that shed a little light on the situation.

Below is a portion of an interview of Major Garrett concerning the lack of aid to the evacuees in the Superdome.

Thursday, September 08, 2005 on Fox News

SEN. PATRICK LEAHY (D), VERMONT: The press could get in and out of there, could bring in their TV trucks and everything else, why the hell couldn’t a truckload of water, a truckload of medicine, a busload of physicians, why couldn’t they get through?
BRIT HUME, HOST: An indignant Senator Leahy asking a question no doubt asked by many others. FOX News correspondent Major Garrett has been looking for answers to some of those questions. He joins me now.

HUME: But look, I mean, they’re down there. The Red Cross, for example, is there.

GARRETT: Standing by, ready.

HUME: Standing by, ready. Why didn’t FEMA send the Red Cross into New Orleans when we had all of those people there on that bridge overpass and elsewhere?

GARRETT: At the Superdome, at the convention center…

HUME: Lack of water, right. Why not?

GARRETT: First of all, no jurisdiction. FEMA works with the Red Cross, the Salvation Army, and other organizations, but it has no direct control to order them to go one place or the other.

Secondarily, the Red Cross was ready. I just got off the phone with one of their officials. They had a vanguard, Brit, of trucks with water, food, hygiene equipment, all sorts of things ready to go, where? To the Superdome and the convention center.

Why weren’t they there? The Louisiana Department of Homeland Security told them they could not go.

HUME: Now, this is the Louisiana — this isn’t the Louisiana branch of the federal Homeland Security? This is…

GARRETT: The state’s own agency devoted to the state’s homeland security. They told them, “You cannot go there.”

Why? The Red Cross tells me that state agency in Louisiana said, “Look, we do not want to create a magnet for more to come to the Superdome or the convention center. We want to get them out.”

So at the same time local officials were screaming, “Where is the food? Where is the water?” The Red Cross was standing by ready. The Louisiana Department of Homeland Security said, “You can’t go.”

HUME: What about this evacuation problem? That clearly was something that New Orleans knew it faced to some extent.

GARRETT: And the city of Louisiana. They have a whole plan that contemplates dealing with an evacuation in the effect of a hurricane three, four or five. Their own plan says, “One hundred thousand residents minimum from the New Orleans area will have to be evacuated.” This plan makes it clear…

HUME: You mean, that can’t get out on their own?
GARRETT: That these people will not have their own vehicles. Not only that, it stipulates that these people are disproportionately poor, sick, and in need of special transportation assistance.

FEMA was not the roadblock mentioned multiple times in the left hand column, it was the state agency.

For all of you who will be screaming that you can’t trust anything those lying SOB’s on Fox say, the Red Cross confirms this story on the FAQ section of their website.

www.redcross.org

Hurricane Katrina: Why is the Red Cross not in New Orleans?
Acess to New Orleans is controlled by the National Guard and local authorities and while we are in constant contact with them, we simply cannot enter New Orleans against their orders.

The state Homeland Security Department had requested—and continues to request—that the American Red Cross not come back into New Orleans following the hurricane. Our presence would keep people from evacuating and encourage others to come into the city.

The Red Cross has been meeting the needs of thousands of New Orleans residents in some 90 shelters throughout the state of Louisiana and elsewhere since before landfall. All told, the Red Cross is today operating 149 shelters for almost 93,000 residents.

Nagin also points to the Govenor as the stumbling bolck in getting FEMA and Federal Agencies on scene and takign charge.

Aired September 5, 2005 - 07:00 ET CNN American Morning

S. O’BRIEN: What has Secretary Chertoff promised you? What has Donald Rumsfeld given you and promised you?
NAGIN: Look, I’ve gotten promises to — I can’t stand anymore promises. I don’t want to hear anymore promises. I want to see stuff done. And that’s why I’m so happy that the president came down here, because I think they were feeding him a line of bull also. And they were telling him things weren’t as bad as it was.

He came down and saw it, and he put a general on the field. His name is General Honore. And when he hit the field, we started to see action.

And what the state was doing, I don’t frigging know. But I tell you, I am pissed. It wasn’t adequate.

And then, the president and the governor sat down. We were in Air Force One. I said, ‘Mr. President, Madam Governor, you two have to get in sync. If you don’t get in sync, more people are going to die.’

S. O’BRIEN: What date was this? When did you say that? When did you say…

NAGIN: Whenever air Force One was here.

S. O’BRIEN: OK.

NAGIN: And this was after I called him on the telephone two days earlier. And I said, ‘Mr. President, Madam Governor, you two need to get together on the same page, because of the lack of coordination, people are dying in my city.’

S. O’BRIEN: That’s two days ago.

NAGIN: They both shook — I don’t know the exact date. They both shook their head and said yes. I said, ‘Great.’ I said, ‘Everybody in this room is getting ready to leave.’ There was senators and his cabinet people, you name it, they were there. Generals. I said, ‘Everybody right now, we’re leaving. These two people need to sit in a room together and make a doggone decision right now.’

S. O’BRIEN: And was that done?

NAGIN: The president looked at me. I think he was a little surprised. He said, “No, you guys stay here. We’re going to another section of the plane, and we’re going to make a decision.”

He called me in that office after that. And he said, “Mr. Mayor, I offered two options to the governor.” I said — and I don’t remember exactly what. There were two options. I was ready to move today. The governor said she needed 24 hours to make a decision.

S. O’BRIEN: You’re telling me the president told you the governor said she needed 24 hours to make a decision?

NAGIN: Yes.

S. O’BRIEN: Regarding what? Bringing troops in?

NAGIN: Whatever they had discussed. As far as what the — I was abdicating a clear chain of command, so that we could get resources flowing in the right places.

S. O’BRIEN: And the governor said no.

NAGIN: She said that she needed 24 hours to make a decision. It would have been great if we could of left Air Force One, walked outside, and told the world that we had this all worked out. It didn’t happen, and more people died.

The administration offered to FEMA assistance and the govenor had to think about it for 24 hours?

Finally, there have been many claiming that Bush cut funding for the Corp of Engineers and levees. Wrong again.

September 8, 2005 Washington Post

In Katrina’s wake, Louisiana politicians and other critics have complained about paltry funding for the Army Corps in general and Louisiana projects in particular. But over the five years of President Bush’s administration, Louisiana has received far more money for Corps civil works projects than any other state, about $1.9 billion; California was a distant second with less than $1.4 billion, even though its population is more than seven times as large.
Highest funded state for Corp programs!

But overall, the Bush administration’s funding requests for the key New Orleans flood-control projects for the past five years were slightly higher than the Clinton administration’s for its past five years. Lt. Gen. Carl Strock, the chief of the Corps, has said that in any event, more money would not have prevented the drowning of the city, since its levees were designed to protect against a Category 3 storm, and the levees that failed were already completed projects.
It is clear why libs don’t want to wait for the facts to come out. Doing so will lessen the public impact of their Witch Hunt.

Slow down folks, there will be enough blame to go around for the Federal, State and Local governments here.

Paul,

One question concerning the WPA plan. How is the Democratic party going to get their number one constituency the Unions to sign off on anything coming close to a WPA?

All WPA type workers will be rewuired to join and pay dues to a select list of approved unions prior to startiing work?

While the country mourns the loss of life and one of our cities, while aid workers and federal, state and local autorities scramble to save lifes and help those in need, Democrats are licking their chops and looking at the Katrina disaster as “an opportunity.”

Look at the title of this thread—a very clear window into the soul of the modern Democratic party.

Nathan,

1)People were given more than a significant amount of time and warning to leave…true?

…yet no provision was given to those without the means to leave, and no where to go.

2)Is it the federal governments responsibility to have aid and soldiers on hand in a crisis like this? How many times/year do hurricanes strike Florida? How many times do tornados sweep across Kansas and the plains? Is there aid on hand for these states? There is when it is asked for, which leads me to my next point…

… Yes it is/there is aid for any State that incurs a Federal State of Emergency, which leads me to my next reply…

3)Is it true that the Govenor of the particular state the crisis is happening in has to ask the federal government to intervene…was that asked in the first four days, I think not.

…No it is not required, but this governor did ask Bush on the 26th to Declare a Federal State of Emergency in Louisiana. On the 27th the White House responded, making it a Federal State of Emergency “Specifically, FEMA is authorized to identify, mobilize, and provide at its discretion, equipment and resources necessary to alleviate the impacts of the emergency”. Then the feds waited (I suppose on their discretion)… the 29th proved deadly.

4) How easy do you think it is to deploy more than 20,000 troupes to a particular area? How long do you think it takes to put aid packages together? I am glad I am not on your timeclock because it seems you are the type that wants it NOW no matter what the price. NOW, NOW, NOW…

…I find this to be a little too callous, “no matter what the price”. I tell you what i find too high a price, up to 10,000 dead Americans! We had about 2 days that SOMETHING could have started to happen. Assemble troops in nearby areas, start organizing recuse operations and volunteers, set out hospital ships to have ready off the coast, build up water supplies and water treatment equipment, get rescue equipment to nearby areas, etc. What did the Feds do? Nothing! On the day of landfall (the 29th), FEMA’s head (Michael Brown) requests that the DHS send 1,000 Employees to the region, and gives them two day’s to arrive. That was their initial rescue response. To quote AP, “Part of the mission, according to the documents obtained by The Associated Press, was to “convey a positive image” about the government’s response for victims.”

It wasn’t until the 31st that Bush organized a task force to coordinate the federal response. Surely, this task force could have been set up BEFORE a firkin category 5 Hurricane hits the mainland.

Problem is, your definition of rich is anyone with a job.

Ron Brown, could you back up that idiotic statement with some data?

How is the Democratic party going to get their number one constituency the Unions to sign off on anything coming close to a WPA?

Kirk, the Democratic Party’s number one constituency is the people.

Excellent post, Paul. It’s great to see Democrats are focused on solutions rather than ass-covering.

Contrary to current belief by the red column, it is possible for the president to achieve broad approval. As proof, there was broad approval of his speeches after 9/11.

But when his first speeches after Katrina include lines like “no-one could have predicted the levee’s would break” and “insurance fraud will not be tolerated” he is not saying what people want to hear. And that’s most of politics - saying what people want to hear.

Patrick,

Funny, unless your name is Paul Siegal I don’t remember addressing those questions to you.

1)People were given more than a significant amount of time and warning to leave…true?

…yet no provision was given to those without the means to leave, and no where to go

Answer the question…IS IT TRUE? You know it is. And who’s responsibility would it then be to arrange transportation? LOCAL and STATE…not federal…using the nowhere to go comment is a cop out and you know it. Everyone else found places to go.

It seems that you are blaming Bush for 10,000 deaths (even though any simp would know that this is not a valid argument because there is not a death toll yet)

next…

)Is it the federal governments responsibility to have aid and soldiers on hand in a crisis like this? How many times/year do hurricanes strike Florida? How many times do tornados sweep across Kansas and the plains? Is there aid on hand for these states? There is when it is asked for, which leads me to my next point…

… Yes it is/there is aid for any State that incurs a Federal State of Emergency, which leads me to my next reply…

The 26th to the 29th is how many days? 3! You expect our government (which is full of beauraucrats) to have 20,000+ troops ready to go? And where were all these boats supposed to dock? The coast of Louisianna or Florida.

You didn’t even mention the rest of that paragraph…which stated,

“How many times/year do hurricanes strike Florida? How many times do tornados sweep across Kansas and the plains? Is there aid on hand for these states? There is when it is asked for”.

Let me take apart your response peice by peice now as you did mine,

We had about 2 days that SOMETHING could have started to happen (we? what did you do?). Assemble troops in nearby areas, (where?) start organizing recuse operations and volunteers, (for what! Nothing had happened yet!) set out hospital ships to have ready off the coast, build up water supplies and water treatment equipment, get rescue equipment to nearby areas, etc. What did the Feds do? Nothing! On the day of landfall (the 29th), FEMA’s head (Michael Brown) requests that the DHS send 1,000 Employees to the region, and gives them two day’s to arrive. That was their initial rescue response. To quote AP, “Part of the mission, according to the documents obtained by The Associated Press, was to “convey a positive image” about the government’s response for victims.”

It wasn’t until the 31st that Bush organized a task force to coordinate the federal response. Surely, this task force could have been set up BEFORE a firkin category 5 Hurricane hits the mainland (I didn’t know you were a meteoroligist, maybe next time you should let everyone know just how severe the hurricane will be)

Like I have stated before in other posts chain of caommand is local, state, federal. People need to start at the beginning to find breakdowns. Republicans and Democrats alike are so quick to blame the President Republican or Democrat). Yet there are so many others that are involved. It is not just a one man show. Our government does not work together until after it is too late. If Bush would have asked congress before the crisis for money to help build up the leavy and to secure Lousianna I am sure that Democrats (and some Republicans) would have found a reason to bitch about that too. Like I stated to Cohen originally, if you think you can do such a better job then go run for office because it sounds like you are a pretty smart guy with pretty smart ideas. I am sure that none of the ideas you listed were thought of by anyone. You are a genius. I’ll tell you what, next time there is an election you can have my vote because you are so smart.

I said in my post that mistakes were made by many. My major point is that Bush, via the guy in charge, should have been ready with a system of coordination that would have prevented many of the mistakes made by local and state officials. Bush must take the blame.

Regardless of blame, now we must help rebuild not only New Orleans, but also the infrastructure throughout the country in order to lessen future hardships due to disasters.

AP
How about every time the liberials raise taxes the working class gets hit the hardest?
If you don’t believe it wait until they get the chance to raise the income tax and compare you pay stub with the one just before the increase.

Nathan,

Yes that is/was funny. I forgot myself for a second. Why would I enter into a conversation on an open political message board? Thank you for putting me back in my place. Message received, I will only speak when I’m spoken to… but since you did address me…

1)Yes, there was time to mount an evacuation. And yes the local and state governments should have been involved. It is kind of strange to me because you seem to be saying that the Feds had nothing to do with it. What is really strange about this is because the Feds assumed control of this emergency. The White House put out directives taking over the obligation ”The President’s action authorizes the Department of Homeland Security, Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA), to coordinate all disaster relief efforts which have the purpose of alleviating the hardship and suffering caused by the emergency on the local population…”. FEMA was cleared to go, and COORDINATE ALL DISASTER relief efforts. They chose not to.

About my “cop out”… You seem to be saying theres no such thing as poor people. Not everyone can afford a car. Not everyone can afford to fill a gas tank enough to get themselves out of harms way. Not everyone can afford to stay in a Hotel while the floods occur. I don’t know if you realize this, but the majority of the victims who were left to suffer the floods were impoverished and working poor. I think to say “Everyone else found places to go” is a true cop out.

Oh yes, least this simp forgets, about the 10,000 dead comment, believe it or not, I can read (quite a challenge for a simp), and many news sources were reporting that the “death toll” could be as high as 10,000. So it’s fair of me to say up to 10,000. I’m not saying you don’t read, or follow the news, but it seems odd that you were not aware of that.

2)Yes, the Feds should have had more troops, and provisions ready to go. I watched Fridays Dateline on NBC, apparently i wasn’t the only one to believe that the Feds would be prepared.

We had done what FEMA told us to be prepared for. We were ready to sustain ourselves for 48 to 60 hours. And we did that, we did that. We were basically told to hang on by our fingernails for those 60 hours or so and we’ll be there, we’ll come and get you. It didn’t happen.

Sometimes it seems you confuse what I’m saying with what your thinking. Who said the boats had to dock, why can’t they anchor? Let me tell you about a ship named USS Bataan. This ship’s length is 844 feet. It has doctors aboard, water, helicopters, food, water, medicine, and more water (it can make up to 100,000 gallons a day). This ship was in the gulf of Mexico already. Yet, the Feds didn’t order it to do… well anything. Not to fill it’s 600 hospital beds, not to send 1,200 sailors ashore via their landing craft, and helicopters. Now I can only imagine your reaction to all this.. Why didn’t the Mayor, or even the Governor take command of that Navy ship, and… Oh yes, that’s right, silly simp me, the Mayor or Governor can’t take command of a Navy ship… What to do what to do… If only they established some sort of Presidential directive giving the Feds the authorization to coordinate the rescue, drat!

And by the by, I did address the rest of your paragraph by simply stating that if a State is declared to be a FEDERAL state of emergency, that State will receive aid. Florida got all kinds of aid. About your tornadoes, I’m not aware of any Federal states of emergency declared, but if that were ever the case, yes aid would get there.

4)(where did 3 go?) You are very correct to assume that I did not do anything to prepare for the hurricane - you got me. Then again, I’m not FEMA. You say “for what! Nothing had happened yet!” The States prepared their guard troops. Recuse personal gathered to volunteer, doctors assembled to be at the ready, and supplies were packed. As best I can guess, they must have heard something, perhaps that’s why all these people started to take action, and were “doing something”. What was FEMA doing is a better question.

I will now like to take this time to declare that I’m NOT a meteorologist. That was hard to admit. Thanks again for exposing me for the obvious fraud I was. Helps to keep me honest. Funny thing though, i don’t believe it’s to hard to turn on CNN or the weather channel every once in a while. Maybe, check in on that looming disaster. If that’s too much trouble, there’s always NOAA and the National Weather Service doing the leg work and informing the White House, DHS and FEMA of the status of the Hurricane.

Final notes,

Bush didn’t ask for money to build up the levies. It’s not a secret why…

It appears that the money has been moved in the president’s budget to handle homeland security and the war in Iraq, and I suppose that’s the price we pay. Nobody locally is happy that the levees can’t be finished, and we are doing everything we can to make the case that this is a security issue for us.

We all can see there is plenty of blame to go around. What most people can agree on is that the Federal response was incompetently slow, and it doesn’t take a genius to see it.

In Canada I have been watching CNN coverage of the Katrina disaster and listening to the Demorcrats in Congress blame the Republicans about who should have done what, where and when. I honestly think the State Govenor and Local governments in Lousianna (Re: Mayor of New Orleans)need to be held more accountable for what went wrong during and after the disaster. The Democratic Govenor of Lousianna seems very inadequate and weak to run a State and her public image comes across as her being “completely unaware or out of it”. She is quoted on CNN as saying “….I know what a hurricane can do to my State …” so why was her administration so completely unprepared? By the way, in the last week or so I have not seen any public interviews by either of the Govenors of Lousianna or Mississippi and it seems that all of a sudden they have gone silent since the first couple of days during and after the hurricane. Why isn’t CNN interviewing and questioning them or are they both just completely oblivious to the ongoing crises in their states? If State and Civil governments are going to keep building and populating sinking areas of land along the coastline why are they not at the same time putting into place the proper resources and protective infrastructure in large cities like New Orleans and surrounding areas to support the growth. Wouldn’t it be more logical to rebuild the suburbs or parishes further inland away from the coast? As for Haley Barbour he is just another example of a rich white American who is capitalizing on the corrupt gaming economy he allows to flourish in Mississippi. I believe FEMA’s response should have been more timely and organized butI also think State and Civil governments need to accept responsibilty for the safety and well being of their citizens. Frankly, besides Michael Brown being fired, I also think Chertoff, Head of Homeland Security needs to go also. His explanations in various interviews and way of handling things so far as leader of such an important Federal department does not impress me at all. Hind sight is always 20/20 but maybe now people and all levels of government will realize that perhaps it is not such a good idea to rebuild a large city like New Orleans on polluted sinking land??? Also, I think Senator Edwards of the Carolinas is the only Gov’t official to date who has made any sensible comments on the disaster situation and his views on the discrepancy between rich and poor in the U.S.A. which has been ongoing for decades are accurate. However, just how much better would the Democrats have handled the situation before and after hurricane Katrina?? So far, the Democratic Govenor of Lousianna sucks but the people there elected her to run their State???