Republicans & Conservatives: Archives

The criticisms of the government, especially the Federal government, are very well placed.

Before the storm, the Federal government repeatedly ignored warning from experts that the levees were not strong enough. Then, the levess they had built that were supposed to be Category 3 were unable to withstand the overflow equal to direct hit from a Category 1 storm, perhaps a weak 2. But thats not the governments fault.

After the storm hit, it was full five days before there was any meaningful federal response. Mayor Nagin issued a mandatory evacuation, the first in the city’s history, on Saturday. The storm hit on Monday. That was all he could do.

Governor Blanco informed King George days before the storm exactly what the situation could be and was told she would have federal support, This is videotaped. You can see the King’s mouth move, you can hear his words.

Then came the waiting. FEMA was useless. An agency that had been praised as the best emergency response organization in the world, that had performed so amazingly during earthquakes, tornadoes and hurricanes in the past, was so immasculated by being lumped into the Homeland Security behemoth they couldn’t even dial the phone without Chertoff’s approval. Let alone getting food, water or rescue teams to the city. On the fifth day, Soledad O’Brien at CNN knew more about the situation in New Orleans than Michael Brown did. You can see the videotape of that, too.

How can this country of endless wealth justify the response that was made? How ban anyone in America have any faith that when they are faced with a crisis, they will be saved? How can we cheer our response to the Tsunami and tolerate our failure during Katrina?

And then you say not to rebuild. Not only should you be totally ashamed of yourself, but I can only pray that you are struck by a tornado, hurricane, earthquake, blizzard or drought. No one is totally safe from natural disaster, and to feel as though you are is not only foolish, it is playing right into the false sense of security the King has been selling for the last 5 years.

At the very least, Katrina illustrated why we want experts running vital government agencies. Widely respected in the ’90s for being run by emergency management experts, the Bush crew installed political hacks. After being put under the Homeland Security umbrella, it saw its funding cut every year.

I’m extremely concerned that the ability of our nation to prepare for and respond to disasters has been sharply eroded,” former FEMA director James Lee Witt told Congress in March 2004. Witt, who led FEMA through the 1990s, is widely credited with turning around the agency, which previously had enjoyed a reputation as a haven for White House cronies and incompetents. “One state emergency manager told me, ‘It’s like a stake has been driven in the heart of the emergency management of this nation,’ ” Witt told the congressional panel.

Of the many lessons here, a primary one is that when we put incompetents in charge, we all suffer.

http://www.govexec.com/dailyfed/0905/092805j1.htm

Arrrgghh. I count on the reader to mentally fix the dangling participle in the second sentence.

Has there been any steps taken to get FEMA back on track, or have we just traded political hacks?

David S

That’s pretty amazing. It usually takes longer than 1 year before the revisionists start on history.

The President asked Blanco to evacuate the city on Saturday. she did nothing until sunday night. Nagin is the one that threw the evacuation plan into the toilet. He told people to go to the Superdome, despite the fact that that was never part of the plan. He let the trains leave empty. He left the 400 school busses in the lot instead of using them to get people out of town.

No federal response: What do you call the Coast Guard, they were there the first day, getting the people who did not evacuate.

THE FEDERAL GOVERNMENT IS NOT A FIRST RESPONDER. The blame goes this way. First, the individual, then the city, then the state and last the federal government.

And yes maybe we should rethink rebuilding a city that is on a gulf and in a major hurricane zone and is 70 feet below sea level.

Keith,
That is just an embarrassing comment, accusing others of revisionism, and then throwing out gross inaccuracies.

First, New Orleans is NOT up to 70 feet below sea level. Here is a color graphic.
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/graphic/2005/08/29/GR2005082900046.html

Keith, I was in New Orleans for Katrina. My wife and I participated in the evacuation.

We drove by the Superdome that Saturday. It was the refuge of last resort for people like ourselves, who were visiting from out of town. Just looking at it made me think my wife and I would have been better off riding out the storm where we were staying.

President Bush declared a state of emergency for Alabama, MS, & LA. I believe that was done Saturday. People left voluntarily on Saturday, but it made no sense to order a mandatory evacuation at that point. There was enough uncertainty about the course and strength to prevent anyone from making that determination. However, preparations were made for the region on Saturday.

The mandatory evacuation was made Sunday morning. I know. We left about 30 minutes before it was mandatory. Policeman came around door to door, making sure everyone got the word. That was quite a sight.

Unfortunately for NO, Katrina hit while school was out. There were no bus drivers who could be reached in late August. This was poor planning, but by the time the local government realized this, it was too late.

It was one of the largest evacuations of people in American history. Most people did, in fact, leave. Some did not. For example, among the people I was with, there was a mother & daughter who were supposed to leave with another guy. Later I found out something went wrong, and the mother and daughter never hooked up with him for a ride. They ended up in the Superdome. I heard second-hand that it was very bad.

The Coast Guard was consistently awesome.

Due to incompetency, FEMA failed to respond for five days. Local & state resources were overwhelmed, so it was up to the feds, and they failed. Communication was very, very difficult, I know for a fact, so I am not at all surprised that the locals & state could not function. To communicate with another couple who loaned us their car- we were strangers, they laoned it to us & another family on trust- to communicate, we had to call a mutual acquaintence in Chicago & pass on messages.

The federal government failed us, Keith. FEMA failed. No one has the kind of resources available which the feds possess, no one. Bush spent Monday morning giving a speech in San Diego about an unrelated topic. It was an appalling lapse of leadership.

In the past year, we have spent over $250 million per day on Iraq.

I do not want to hear any crap about why America cannot repair New Orleans. If we spent $250 million per day on New Orleans instead of Iraq, we could have encased the city in Kryptonite by now.

Yes and 1000’s died and people were raped and murdered in the Superdome…

A couple of facts:

The Coast Guard did what they did on their own. That’s how they operate. You can’t credit Fema or the government with what they did.

80% of the New Orleans population evacuated which is unprecedented.

phx8

Maybe it’s time for the federal government to get back to it’s constitional mandate, interstate commerce. foreign affairs and the military. Everything else is the responsibilities of the states. Then the states would hove more of their own money to take care of things like emergency responses.

Jack, it is not the limits of government that were exposed. It was the limits of a particular set of politicians in government that were exposed.

In 4 months, we are going exceed our involvement in fighting WWII, in Iraq. That is a limitation of the politicians, not the government. In 1945 we won an entire World War against 3 nations. Today, we can’t find a way out of a little civil war in Iraq in the same amount of time.

That, Jack, is not a limitation of government. That is a limitation of the people elected to it.

David

I guess you forget that that war was being fought for a few years before we entered the fray.

Sorry

And also it was not fought as a politically correct war, where every civilian and military casualty were scrutinized in the press.

DavidS, Trent, good posts.

Keith, phx8 is right, you really don’t know what you’re talking about. You need to read this:
Timeline of Events.

On the Train: Nagin claims he never heard a word about the trains that were supposedly offered by Amtrak. Only he knows whether he is telling the truth about that, although to me the man did sound pretty desperate to get help for the people of his city.

On the schoolbuses: “The [Orleans Parish school] district owns 324 buses but 70 are broken down.” [New Orleans Times-Picayune, 9/5/05]
Add to this a few important facts (aside from the ones that phx8 gave): There are only a few paths in and out of NO. Those who were experienced at driving those schoolbuses were worrying about themselves and their own families. Therefore, these mass evacuations of people would have had to have begun a very long time in advance of Katrina, or they, like everyone else, would have been stuck on those few traffic-jammed roads in the path of the approaching hurricane.
Also, speaking of buses, here’s a little know fact:
“On Sunday, the day before the storm, the Louisiana National Guard asked FEMA for 700 buses to evacuate people. It received only 100.” [Boston Globe, 9/11/05]

Personally, I found myself wondering why FEMA wasn’t commandeering everything they could put their hands on: buses, trains — even small commuter planes might have been utilized for evacuation purposes.

Could disaster have been avoided? No, not a chance, but: here is a link that tells us that it might not have needed to be as bad as it was.
Bush had been severely slashing funding to the Army Corp of Engineers. While a storm with the strength of Katrina would have spelled disaster for the city no matter what, it’s very likely it wouldn’t have been quite as devastating as it was had the levees not given way.

Jack,
I think your article is almost completely bunk from begginning to end. Katrina was a MASSIVE FAILURE on the part of the Bush administration —and it proved that when it comes to disasters (whether natural or unnatural, ie. terrorism) the GOP knows how to pay lip service to the safety and security talk, but not truly walk the walk.
(Even though Condi was buying shoes at the time.)

On top of that, we now know that a whole bunch of schemes and scams and bureaucratic corruption is related to the official federal aid for Katrina, and that it’s now cost American taxpayers at least two billion dollars. There are reports of nearly half a billion dollars worth of mobile homes that are still sitting empty. We hear about renovations on a shelter at a former Alabama Army base that ended up costing 416,000 per evacuee. And then there the bogus assistance claims that have totalled 1.4 billion dollars — spent on all kinds of stuff, like vacations to Hawaii, season football tickets, a divorce lawyer — even a sex change operation!
Oh, your party is doing simply a “heck of job” for the city of New Orleans and all of America!

As for Spike Lee’s documentary, I’m not surprised you don’t approve of his viewpoint or message.
Anyway, here’s an alternate opinion if anyone wants to read it: The City That Care Forgot: Spike Lee and the ‘New’ New Orleans Blues

Keith, I didn’t forget a thing. WWII was not our war until the Japanese attacked Pearl Harbor. My statement remains absolutely accurate and correct. In 4 months we will have been involved in the Iraq War longer than our involvement in WWII. It is an incontrovertible fact. Live with it.

Some people clearly have become too dependent on big brother. What did they expect?

This is why the conservative party should not be in charge. When you guys screw up, you say, “What did you expect, we’re the government and we’re inherently ineffective!” That’s like telling your boss, “It’s not just me who’s lazy and incompetent, it’s my entire occupation!” I think I would hire someone who doesn’t think they are predestined to failure.

The only thing that should have been different is that people should have left New Orleans, which is something all those people stuck at the Superdome could have done anyway.

How? Walk? Not everyone had a car.

To put Hurrican Katrina in perspective, look at the federal response to the San Francisco earthquake and fire. This was a hundred years ago, when the federal government was a lot smaller. The earthquake happened on April 18th, 1906, at 5 am. By noon on that day, there were federal boots on the ground. On April 20th, TWO DAYS LATER, the first federal appropriation was passed.

The lesson here isn’t that the federal government is ineffective, it’s that corrupt idiots shouldn’t be in charge.

Re earlier comments on Amtrak: Amtrak is not a large system. It would have been a drop in the bucket anyway.

In 4 months, we are going exceed our involvement in fighting WWII, in Iraq. That is a limitation of the politicians, not the government. In 1945 we won an entire World War against 3 nations. Today, we can find a way out of a little civil war in Iraq in the same amount of time.

The Greatest Generation and their leaders did a heckuva job in WWII. Just as our current military (and our leaders — c’mon, say it Libs — Bush & Rummy too) did a heckuva job defeating Iraq in a few weeks with ‘only’ 135(?) casualties.

We have since been staying in Germany and other European WWII countries for an additional 60 years (now 17 years after the Wall fell). Germans had many 100,000+ person anti-American protests through the ’80s and are still quite anti-American now — how about we GET OUT AND STOP HELPING THEIR ECONOMY??

We have been in Japan for 60 years since WWII, and in some areas (e.g. Okinawa) the Japanese are overwhelmingly against our presence. We were also in the Philippines about 40 years until, under public pressure, we were instructed to leave.

We have stayed in S.Korea for 50 years (S.Koreans have also been quite anti-American in their many protests, and they often have had polls showing most S.Koreans want us out).

We (now others) have stayed in former Yugoslavia for ~8 years.

And why is Americans fighting insurrections in Afghanistan OK, whereas we must set a timetable to leave Iraq where we have not been quite as long?

Yes, I also would like to see us get out of Iraq ASAP. It is a mess, and has been handled poorly in many ways (though honestly quite well in some ways, too).

HOWEVER, I see those who have not a word about all the other places we currently are (**FAR** longer, and in areas that are not nearly as tied to current national priorities) as maybe MORE THAN A LITTLE TWO-FACED.

Are you:
- intellectually dishonest political sharks who smell political blood?
- or do you want to see the US lose?
- or do you hate any US casualties anytime / ever (albeit the trend has been great the last ~5 months, yes?)
- or am I missing something seminal??

Brian,

What you are missing is that the soldiers in Iraq are in combat, getting killed. The biggest danger the soldiers serving in Germany during the Cold War was catching a social disease.

There are many other differences I can see, but that is the most obvious one. Also, keeping soldiers in Iraq is quite expensive because of the conditions they are working in. I doubt keeping soldiers in Europe is that much more expensive than keeping them here.

I am curious. Does anyone have pointers to inflation-adjusted total & current spending in other nations’ economies from our foreign military deployments since WWII?

…and responding to Jack’s post (instead of another’s response):

People should be allowed to live wherever they want. HOWEVER, there should be explicitly ZERO governmental help to rebuild or help in ANY way to those living in designated high risk areas. E.g.:
- Below sea level
- Wildfire Areas
- Flood plains or Hurricane zones
- Earthquake zones
- Cliffhouses, etc.

You want to live there? Buy your own insurance (or let a community self insure).

I don’t want to pay for you (and don’t expect you to pay for me).

Fair?

Phx8 is not right on this one. As usual.

I guess the federal government should spend all its assets protecting your assets, and not protecting the country as it is supposed to do. There will be no country to protect if radical Islam is not wiped out. PERIOD. Get it? Sorry for your loss. Your fault. Not the federal governments. They did not force you to live there, or antwhere. It is not their job to care for your day to day needs. Get over it.

I forgot to add that it was all Bush’s fault. Isn’t everything the fault of the President? (Only if he is a republican)

Woody

You are right to a point about conservatives and government. My government philosophy is that if anyone else can and will do something, the Feds should stay out. That effects how I would allocate resources. I believe in a safety net, not a comfortable floor. In the Katrina situation, I saw many failures on all levels of government. Some were mistakes and incompetence, but a lot were just limits of government. And after the storm, we were (are) asking the Federal government to do more than I think they should re rebuilding and housing. Anybody who still needs direct Federal assistance a year later is asking too much.

Read a little more deeply into the SF thing. That was a different time. People expected less and got less from government and government responded with a lot more force to keep order than we tolerate today. They also covered up a lot of damage. It was the style of the times to be tougher. We can learn from our own history, but you and I would probably take different lessons.

I said this before, that the fault is spread out among everyone from the individual,local,state, federal government. But it is the individual who decided to stay is probably most cupable. They knew the hurricane was coming, was given ample warning that they should leave and decided to stay. N.O. should have used the school buses to get those that did not have transportation out. Fed’s should have responded earlier.

The ones that had no choice are those that were bed ridden in hospital/nursing homes, or those that had no one to help them.

The Katrina Fiasco blame can be spread all over

Rehash it if you will, but it is over and fingers have already been pointed.
We on the Mississippi Gulf Coast are not living in the past, but looking to the future. We were hit harder than new orleans in all respects. The hurricane hit Mississippi not new orleans. They were played up by the media because the rain broke the levies. No major wind damage and no 35 foot water serge. Take a trip to new orleans and to Mississippi and make up your own mind. We had over 50 miles of coastal cites destroyed. Notice the american flags of those in trailers that are rebuilding. We have a plan and it is working right now. No bickering and fighting for taxpayers money.
So, forget what happened and look to the future.
Ken

There is no safe place to build in America. The Midwest must deal with floods, winter storms, lake-effect snows, and the Damocles sword of the New Madrid Fault System. Given all the death and destruction that could create, doesn’t it make sense to abandon the midwest?

And what about The Pacific? El Nino often brings rains and mudslide. Earthquakes along the San Andreas, and along the Cascades Subduction zones. Several of the big volcanoes, including that spectacular media hog Mt. St. Helens exist there. Seattle could be drowned in a sea of mud, other places could buried in ash or burned in pyroclastic flows.

Then you got the mountains and the basin and range regions. Earthquakes, storms coming off the mountains, flash floods, water shortages, etc, etc.

Gulf Coast. Do I have to say it? Much as perfectionists would like to keep everything away from the water, there’s this little think called international shipping that doesn’t exactly work without large bodies of sea water nearby. Many places are sinking, because of the taking of oil and water from beneathe surface, and the wedges of sediment that make up the gulf coast are naturally compressing, faulting and sinking towards the gulf.

The East Coast isn’t much better off. Hurricanes strike there too, and even if you don’t get the brunt of the ones in the gulf, you get the water. Earthquakes are possible, because of faultblock mountain ranges, and you also get snowstorms, flooding, and all that nice stuff.

Okay, so now that we’ve eliminated the continental US, lets go to Hawaii. It would be awful crowded, but the good news is that the real estate is so cheap it practically creates itself. Oh, dear. I forgot. Hawaii is exposed to Pacific Typhoons, Tsunamis, and of course is a VOLCANIC island chain. That’s it, we’re packing up our bags.

Alaska’s the place. Largest state in the union. Not always warm, but global warming is insuring that things are thawing out there. Unfortunately, Alaska has quite a few volcanoes, and is tectonically active as hell. One of the most powerful Earthquakes of all tiem struck there. The Clay-rich soils in certain places liquifacted and amplified shaking.

We also have to add all the storm conditions this most arctic of our possessions represents.

So just what do we have to do to be safe? Not be born.

What we can do, realistically, is regulate out the more risky practices of builders and planners, pay attention to how things happen, and mitigate the disasters immediately, rather than wait for the bad to settle into worse. All excuses aside, Katrina did not have to be the fiasco it was. Republicans can make excuses about the limits of big government and about this being the best they could do, but in the end, the verdict is likely to be that they forget the lessons of many past disasters in their corruption and incompetence, and replaced being economic and efficient with being cheap and ineffective.

I live in Ms. and we got hit a lot harder than NO. In fact, we took the direct hit. (landfall in Biloxi, taking a path up the center of the state from south to north, hurricane force winds 200 miles from the coast) NO just caught the edge of the storm; La. was barely touched. Alabama was hit harder than La. In NO we watched the horrors of anarchy and lawlessness as incompetent fools blamed everyone but themselves for their plight while waiting for someone else to take care of them. (and still do) In Ms. and Al. people of all races pulled together to help each other and we’re coming back strong.
What’s the difference? Acceptance of personal responsibility and self sufficiency.
The federal gov’t isn’t responsible for the disaster in NO. The people and their local gov’t are. There is a valuable lesson to be learned from the differences between the experiences of NO and Ms. & Al. in responding to the disaster.

Brian-
You have to keep in mind that our presence in many of those areas is minimal, and not very impactful on our overall readiness.

Fact is, Iraq was never intended to go on as long as it did. There was no plan to keep full forces in there later than August of 2003, much less to indefinitely maintain them as long as we have.

The fact that National Guard and Reserve forces are over there, that Marines are being recalled from civilian life to maintain numbers should be an eye-opener for you. These are not things done when folks have planned things out, especially not when you add in stop-loss policies and multiple tours of duty.

All this is grinding at our ability to effectively fight any new war.

This war was unfortunately founded on bad evidence. That we fought this as a pre-emptive war makes it that much worse, because our credibility was on the line. That damage, we can do nothing about. I do favor getting things settled, but I believe we should set a timetable and move towards a goal of withdrawal.

If you really think about it, we have no victory until we’re effectively out of there. If Iraq, as a democracy cannot stand up on its own, we have failed, and if further efforts cannot achieve that stability, if our expensive and ultimately inflammatory efforts cannot stop the chaos, then withdrawal is then as well our best option. There’s no use in letting the debacle in Iraq do more damage to this country than it already has.

The problem here is that folks took policy too personally, and could not see past personal blinders and political theory to understanding what they were doing. This was the Republican’s war to win, and to screw up, and screw it up is what they did. No dissenter or political resistance could have found a foothold except in the poor quality of the management of this war. Had it been a success, the critics would have been pathetic naysayers, and their opinions of little relevance. This was your failure, and the sooner you learn your lessons, the more opportunity you have to not have to learn further ones.

I lived in Houston for 8 years and my house flooded twice. Not because I was stupid enough to buy a house that was subject to flooding, but because the county built a toll road and did not do the proper hydrology studies. They added concrete barriers to both sides of the road and effectively put my neighborhood on the water side of a dam.
It was the county emergency management that evacuated our neighborhood and communicated with us. FEMA came dragging in about 4 weeks after the flood to offer no interest loans that no one in my predomiantly white middle class neighborhood qualified for. This was, by the way, during the “golden” years of the Clinton Administration when nothing bad ever happened and all of the government workers loved me.

I also lived in South Louisiana. When the first hurricane of the season headed toward us, I was greatly surprised to get a phone call from one of my neighbors inviting me to a hurricane party. It seemed that the locals looked a severe weather as an opportunity to “suck heads” and drink beer. So I was not surprised that the people in New Orleans ignored the pleas to evacuate the city. Nor was I surprised at the pictures of flooded school and metro buses that could have evacuated those few that didn’t have cars. A few (true) stories about Huey Long, Edwin Edwards and the New Orleans mafia convinced me that whatever federal money Louisiana did get for flood mitigation went elsewhere.

Lesson one - the federal government takes your money and wastes it. Don’t expect, whether Democrats, Republicans or someting else that they are going to help you.
Lesson two - if you live below sea level with a lake on one side and the Gulf on the other, you get what you get.
Lesson three - it was a stupid idea to build the levees in the first place. It removed a recharge zone that would keep the above sea level New Orleans from flooding. Why be stupid twice?

Jack,

1. Fixing the levees was a part of the budget, but that money was diverted to pay for the war in Iraq.

On June 8, 2004, Walter Maestri, emergency management chief for Jefferson Parish, Louisiana, told the Times-Picayune: “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.”

2. The Republican congress found there was a lack of initiative by the president specifically and federal government in general in evacuating New Orleans.

U.S. Rep. Christopher Shays, a Republican of Connecticut and committee member, said Monday that the report is “very tough on the president, it’s very tough on the Department of Homeland Security. It’s a blistering report. But I think it’s fair.”

3. The expectation that the storm could be weathered was accurate. New Orleans had weathered hurricanes of this type before, but the levees were defective.

Katrina wasn’t what killed all those people and devastated a celebrated city; it was the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers. As the Corps itself admits in its own draft final report on the disaster, “foundation failures occurred prior to water levels reaching the design levels of protection, causing breaching and subsequent massive flooding and extensive losses.â€

4. Whites and blacks died in roughly equal numbers (actually, more whites were killed), so charges of racism are partly incorrect. However, agencies helped the Ninth Ward less than they should have. If you read The New Yorker’s account (this week’s issue) it’s hard to deny that racism and classism didn’t play a part in how the city was evacuated and who got help when.

In fact, white and black, rich and poor, New Orleanians shared equally in the suffering and death. The last published tally I saw showed that whites and blacks died in roughly the same proportion. If that is accurate, given that the population of the city in the last census was only 28-percent white, white New Orleanians died in proportionately higher numbers.

5. New Orleans is not below sea level. Only parts of it are.

After the flooding, New Orleanians were roundly criticized by Congressional leaders for choosing to live in an area below sea level. In fact, only parts of New Orleans are below sea level. My house, for example, is a foot above sea level, and it still received four feet of floodwater. We were hardly as foolish as Americans living in earthquake zones like San Francisco and Anchorage are. After all, we had assurances from the Corps of Engineers that we would be safe in a hurricane of Katrina’s strength. If we were foolish, it was in believing our government.

The facts don’t jibe with your account of Katrina, but let’s say you’re right. Even if you are right, the government response to the disaster was slow, poorly executed, and generally inept, directly because of the president’s inaction and his reorganization (destruction) of FEMA. One irony is that Clinton’s building up of FEMA was in response to a very similar Hurricane related devastation that happened in Florida during Bush Senior’s watch.

In any case, imagine if this had been a terrorist related attack? Just what has Bush been working on if not evacuation planning? Let’s face it, he put all his eggs in Iraq and we’re left less secure than we were when he started. I’m not very impressed by the graft and incredible corruption that’s been part and parcel of the rebuilding effort effort either.

1) the busses were not used because they could not find any bus drivers. Sorry, folks, but if that bus was my only way out, I WOULD DRIVE IT MYSELF…even though I’m not a licensed bus driver.

2) Amtrak may have only been able to evacuate “a drop in the bucket” of the people, but if I was one of the ones given the opportunity to leave by train, I would have been grateful. Just because you cannot evacuate EVERYONE by train, then there is no sense in evacuation ANYONE by train? Nonsense. You take everything you can get. Unfortunately for Nagin, he is NOT the only one who knows the truth about Amtrak’s offer….the Amtrak official knows, too.

3) Nagin was desperate because he had no idea what to do…even though the City of NO had an evacuation plan. I recall him asking for 500 greyhounds and cruise ships. Imagine that!! Evacuating people to a SHIP in the middle of a HURRICANE!! What a dumbass. When asking for cruise ships and greyhounds, he indicated that he was more concerned with “luxury” than “practicality”. Yes, he did use the word “luxurious” when asking for the ships. School buses would have done the job just as well, but with less luxury, as greyhounds.

4) Jack did not say that NO should not be rebuilt. He said “We need not rebuild New Orleans and the Gulf Coast as it was. We can do better.” Taking half of a sentence and repeating it out of context is intellectually dishonest.

5) The timeline that Ad furnihsed a link to is interesting. The way I read it, Bush did everything that Blanco requested prior to the storm. Why did Nagin wait until 20 hours before landfall to MANDATE an evacuation. The local and state officials had just as much information on the approaching storm as the feds had. Why didn’t Nagin & Blanco do more before the storm hit? Oh, yeah, because they were more concerned with fighting each other than solving the problem. Remember when Blanco went on TV complaining that Nagin had no authority to mandate evacuations because that authority belonged to the governor? She never did order an evacuation, from what I could determine.

Could things have been done differently and better? Absolutely. Was the federal response weak? Absolutely. Should all of the blame fall on the federal government and FEMA? Absolutely NOT. Nagin and Blanco should lose their jobs because of their failures, just as Brown did.

BTW, criticising Rice for “buying shoes during Katrina” or Bush for reading a story to elementary students during 9/11 is scumbag politics. Grow up.

Also, this is off-topic, but I’m not an editor here and would like to share this (to me) amazing video witht the community. It’s a Bush press conference where he outlines why he believes the NSA wiretapping is legal. What’s amazing to me is how inarticulate he is. If Clinton ever gave a press conference like this it would be international news and everyone would be speculating that he smokes crack cocaine. Watch this and tell me you want Bush in charge of anything. I wouldn’t want this guy in charge of flipping my burgers.

Article and video.

Just wanted to share. Apologize for the derail.

Ken & Traveller,
The population of Biloxi was 71,000. The population of Gulfport was 50,000. The population of the New Orleans metropolitan area was 1.3 million.

Liberty,
A natural disaster like Katrina is a perfect example of why federal intervention is so necessary. A region crossing several states suffered terrible damage and loss of life. the hurricane destroyed much of the infrastructure necessary for response. This is precisely the sort of situation where the federal government is suited to help, in the aftermath of a natural disaster.

I was wrong about one thing. We spend an average of $257 million per day in Iraq, not $250 million. Please pardon the inaccuracy.

Ken,
It is not “scumbag politics” to criticize leadership for failure to respond in an emergency. In the case of Bush, this has been a consistent pattern: after 9/11, and the tsunami, and after Katrina, Bush failed to react in a timely fashion.

Max,
The recent press conference showed Bush doing the same thing. He sounds like a person with brain damage. Personally, I think he is wearing a wire and repeating what he is told to say. That explains the repetition of stock cliches in inappropriate contexts, the same ones year after year; it explains the hesitations, the meaningless phrases between stock answers.

Woody,

The same things were going on in Germany following WWII.

From the History Channel

In the months and years following the end of the World War Two, Allied forces faced a series of bombings and attacks in occupied Germany.

Nazi loyalists attempted to derail the rebuilding process by killing any Germans collaborating with the enemy. And the mysterious SS-Werewolves underground organization boasted of the coming rebirth of the Party.

Today, little is known about the activities of the Werewolves and other groups who opposed the Allied forces during this postwar period. And while the Nazi resistance effort did eventually fail, many of its methods and the harsh Allied response to them have real world implications for the present situation in Iraq.

“The Last Nazis” will explore how the SS-Werewolves terrorized military and civilian targets behind enemy lines such as industrial plants, fuel depots, supply lines, and stray soldiers.

We’ll hear from a former Werewolf as he describes his motivation and role in the guerilla movement. In addition we’ll travel to Aachen, where Werewolves assassinated the pro-Allied mayor, and Penzberg, the site of the “Night of Murder” - a senseless rampage aimed at preventing any German collaboration in which more than a dozen German civilians were killed.

We’ll also explore the Allied attempt to purge Germany’s Nazi past through denazification tribunals - an increasingly unpopular set of trials that was hit by a wave of bombings.

Jack;

Sorry, I got into this thread late. Have not taken time to read all the posts here, and will not, (for lack of time). However, I am sure that what I am about to say has been echoed by others here, thus far.

As usual, you are way off base. That is because your politics are way off base. You say that we should learn by our mistakes. Well then, why is it that you do not expect our President to learn by his mistakes? Only “us”.

Katrina was predicted. The exercise of “Pam” was preformed one year before and came up lacking. Money to finish the levys was turned down in 2003, and the ACOE worked almost one year on their own after federal funds ran out, to try to finish the job on their own. The EPA, and OCEA both warned of the pending Gulf Coast Disaster at least one year before Katrina. Yet, Bush did nothing. (Sorry, he did come on T.V. 4 days after the fact, and asked the U.S. Citizens to give “to the Red Cross”. - All the while, as FEMA blocked aid and assistance to the area).

Even volenteers from Canada got to St. Benards Perish 3 days before FEMA, to help victims.

It is fitting that this is an election year. Our choice (America), is clear. Vote for a party that collects our taxes and then says, “Your on your own if tradgety strikes”, or vote for the opposition that thinks that running this government is: (truly)

A PUBLIC TRUST!

PS: And in case you and the Government of the United States has forgotten:

WE, WE THE PEOPLE OF THE UNITED STATES OF AMERICA ….

We, are the “Public”.

Keith-

I lived in New Orleans for five years. I have friends and family who still live there. Luckily, they had the means to evacuate well before the storm hit. The fact is that many of the population of that city do not. It has always been the case that people who cannot leave the city go to the Superdome and convention center. I spent three days in the Superdome in the Fall of 1998, waiting for a hurricane that never hit. Both of the major universities (Loyola and Tulane) evacuated their students there. This was a tried and true shelter. The problem was not that the dome or convention center were inadequate shelters, because they were perfectly adequate. The problem is that people were left there for fice days in 100 degree heat with little food, water or medical staff. Post-storm reponse such as emergency rescue, ideal evacuation and supplies are the responsibility of FEMA. There is no arguing this. That is the entire reason for their existence. They failed so incredibly miserably that I question whether they even cared. Charges should be brought.

Your complete failure to understand the magnitude of what happened in New Orleans is scary. Katrina was worse than 9/11 in many ways. Where 9/11 was an amazing example of what this country is capable of when tested, Katrina was the exact opposite. It was a failure on every level, but especially FEMA.

PHX8
I know what that stands for even if others don’t. Appropriate. Where is your degree from Harvard and Yale? Do you fly fighter jets as well? Not so smart now are you?
Since you think the U.S. is wasting money on the global terror war answer this:

“Aside from defense, where should government cut back?”

Deafening silence from the libs. It’s all about defense. You will get it when the next attack comes. Of course you will blame Bush for his lack of public speaking skills. Is that all you’ve got? How in the world did he crush Anne Richards and everyone else he debated? They thought it would be a cake walk. Wrong. Oh wait he was wired with the answers! He is an automaton! That’s it! Someone feeds him the answers! He can’t even speak without being told what to say! ha ha Your responses are tiresome and a waste of the readers time. Run along and keep your head in the sand with the other delusional posters who think we are not involved in WW3. I guess you long for the days when an appropriate response would be to escort the intern from the office and then act upset by biting the lower lip. Those certainly were timely responses. Maybe you don’t understand the words state’s rights and seperation of powers.
It is no ones fault but those that ignored the warnings to leave before Katrina. That and the welfare state the Dems created there. What a system/ You should be proud.

phx8,

“The population of Biloxi was 71,000. The population of Gulfport was 50,000. The population of the New Orleans metropolitan area was 1.3 million.”

What’s your point? The area of Ms. destroyed (1/3 of the state) by Katrina (NO wasn’t destroyed by the storm; south Ms. was-many towns were completely obliterated) has a population of over 1 1/2 million spread out over hundreds of square miles. I know people who were living in tents 6 months after the storm. (and they weren’t whining about having to take care of themselves)

I basically agree with Keith. The government cannot prevent every tragedy. There was a National Geographic special broadcast on TV a year before this happened showing exactly what would happen in the event of a category 5 to NO. Comparing the event to the SF earthquake of 1906 is In 1906, the army was given clear orders to shoot all looters on sight. Imagine if that order had been given last year! People didn’t blame the government in SF for the tragedy. Also, do you realize not a single piece of US Mail was lost in the SF tragedy? With the attitude of many postal employees today, they would have used it as an excuse to burn bags of mail! NO is a city completely run by Democrats who preach big government so they can line their freezers with cash.

Max:
“What’s amazing to me is how inarticulate he is. If Clinton ever gave a press conference like this it would be international news and everyone would be speculating that he smokes crack cocaine. Watch this and tell me you want Bush in charge of anything.”

phx8:
“The recent press conference showed Bush doing the same thing. He sounds like a person with brain damage. Personally, I think he is wearing a wire and repeating what he is told to say. That explains the repetition of stock cliches in inappropriate contexts, the same ones year after year; it explains the hesitations, the meaningless phrases between stock answers.”

phx8 and Max, I see Bush as a man who was always in over his head for the job of president — but who didn’t know it (happens to a lot of spoiled rich kids whose influential parents don’t know how raise them right). He was never smart enough — all he had was his studied and inarticulate folksiness, his arrogance and ambitions, and a great many connections within a very powerful political machine. When I watch him speaking now, all I can think of is that his many failures piled up one on top of the other have lead to what we are seeing today.
While he’s lost much of the inner confidence he once had, he’s still a very arrogant guy. Someone who just isn’t man enough to admit to his mistakes and try to learn anything from them. He and all his cronies are guys that have all these big ambititons and goals, but they always shoot from the hip (they like call it “trusting their instincts”) — because they just aren’t patient or wise enough to do their homework, or study cause and effect.
So, when things fail (which they are always bound to do when people don’t do their homework or try to understand and determine how, why, and what went wrong) they try to deflect blame and cover for themselves with glib catchphrases and empty excuses. The Bush administration has raised this to a truly absurd artform.
I wouldn’t be a bit surprised if Bush did wear a wire sometimes — cheating also fits right in with the MO.

Btw, don’t know if you’ve seen this already, but you might want to check this out: Your President, the Visionary Genius
Bob Harris over at Huffington Post took an AP shot of Bush’s notes from his recent press conference and Photoshopped it to see what was written there — the results probably won’t come as much of a surprise to either of you — they certainly didn’t to me.

Liberty1,
That is a pretty funny comment. I did not go to Harvard or Yale. MY MBA is not from those either. However, I did go to one of the top ten universities in the country, and I was not a legacy, I paid half of my own education at what was also one of the ten most expensive schools in the country.

I was not a pilot. I was a B-52 bombardier. At the time, the Navy offered me an opportunity to fly F-14’s off carriers immediately. The Air Force wanted me to wait a year to become a pilot. I went with the Air Force, since I never particularly cared about flying one way or another.

Where should we cut back? A good start would be pay-as-you-go, which the liberals will re-institute. Earmarks should be eliminated. Gosh, Liberty1, spending restraints & pork really are a topic for another post.

Perhaps I do not understand what you mean by “States Rights.” Usually, when right wingers use that phrase, it is code for discrimination.

Traveller,
You write: “I know people who were living in tents 6 months after the storm. (and they weren’t whining about having to take care of themselves).”

That is not an example of admirable self-sufficiency. That is just sad. There is no way Americans should live like that, like destitute regugees. It is just wrong. Americans can & should band together through the power of the federal government to help others in time of need, not as a matter of political theory, but because it is the right thing to do.

I gotta ask. Why do school bus drivers have to be available to use them?

They are simple to drive. If you have rented a big truck before, you can drive them. They are ALL automatics, and are all user-friendly. I have driven one before. The only excuse would be if there were no fuel. I don’t buy the “School was out” excuse. When your are in dire need, you do something about it.

Jon L-

Let me tear apart every one of your mistakes one at a time.

The government cannot prevent every tragedy.

No expects the government to prevent hurricanes, just to respond after they happen.

There was a National Geographic special broadcast on TV a year before this happened showing exactly what would happen in the event of a category 5 to NO.

New Orleans wasn’t hit by a Cat 5. It was missed by a Cat 5. The effect on New Orleans was equal to direct hit by Cat 1, maybe a weak 2.

Comparing the event to the SF earthquake of 1906

The federal government, without the benefit of computers, e-mail, cell phones, airplanes, cars or highways managed to get to SF the day after the earthquake. Why, with all those modern advances, would it take 5 days to get to New Orleans?

Also, do you realize not a single piece of US Mail was lost in the SF tragedy?

Who cares?

NO is a city completely run by Democrats who preach big government so they can line their freezers with cash.

You better have some cash in the freezer, otherwise when a hurricane comes you’re screwed!!!

In all reality, there is no justification for the way the Bush administartion handled Katrina. It is a far bigger failure than the Iraq war. Too mnay people died, needlessly, simply waiting for help. Thats all. Americans, with no resources available to them, sat for five days and died slow deaths, just waiting for the government to respond, the way the government had always responded in the past. Five days. How anyone with any remnant of a human conscience can stomach that baffles me.

phx8

“Americans can & should band together to help others in time of need, not as a matter of political theory, but because it is the right thing to do.”

If you would have written it like this I would be in full agreement with you.

phx8, well said as usual. DavidS, you too.
New Orleans and the rest of America deserves more compassion and better leadership, it’s that simple.

Jack,

We’ve gone over this for a year now. Katrina did not require “perfect prescience” or too much responsibility taken by “Big brother” government. Jack you are imagining it is a issue of wanting to much care to be supplied by government than what government is capable of or even should be responsible for and yet it is the DEMOCRATS and not the republicans who have a track record of shrinking the size and expense of government…and they did so while actually accomplishing MORE not less. Now we have a republican administration and a republican congress and the government been expanded to a greater expense, larger and faster than in the previous 200 HUNDRED+ YEARS COMBINED!!!! THAT’S RIGHT JACK, COMBINED!!!! Your straw man argument is in reality, a mirror, Jack.

Worse yet, this exponentially more expensive and larger and more government we are fostering is actually LESS capable of accomplishing anything.

The response to katrina ignored poorer neighborhoods in favor of those who owned cars and lived in places that were more affluent. Aid aimed at the hardest hit areas was mis-re-directed to those who were in less need. Such aid was re-directed to aid centers where evacuees who owned cars had escaped to while busses bound for evacuation efforts to help those trapped in areas without water or food were taken over by FEMA and parked…FOR WEEKS!!! Trailers that were meant to go to places where homes had been wrecked ARE STILL PARKED IN ARKANSAS TO THIS DAY!!!

…and a class-5 direct hit on New Orleans was planned for as long ago as the early seventies when FEMA (run by real people and not fired horse show personnel) began to run drills on how to deal with a direct hit on New Orleans by a class 5 hurricaine…’perfect prescience,’ Jack? GET REAL!

Then there is the private sector BS facilitated and encouraged by the government response: Insurence denials for those seeking claims based on no coverage for flooding contained in their hurricaine policies, insurers and other oportunists moving in to begin adversely possessing properties in effected areas while the evacuees who owned them cannot return, contracting firms with deals to hire teams for the clean-up and “re-build” refusing to hire the locals who have lost everything and are in the greatest need for the work while they advertise to hire help from all over the rest of the country. There are even development firms taking advantage of the hurricaine and excercising the new re-defined power of emmanent domaine through through gov in order to take advantage of opportunities in neighborhoods WHERE THERE ARE STILL UNSETTLED CLAIMS BEING ARGUED AND NEGOTIATED! The result is more chaos and loss even a year after the storm.

You have sculpted this into a rather predictable attack on your mis-conception of liberals and ‘big-government.’ It is a twisting of the truth to an extreme and it is deceptive and I dare say even malignant. I call it malignant because it is an effort to distort and ‘malign’ based on a deception. I cannot comment on whether you are deceived or intentionally trying to deceive when you actually know better. That is a question for you to ask within your own soul.

From the attitudes of republicans in power to the attitudes of those vote and support them, the republican party is proving itself unfit to govern. Harm is being done by shallow callousness that is the result of a failure to analize or understand problems such as Katrina and the economic realities of American citizens
living in places like Jefferson Parish. The republican party does not represent them….hell, the republican party doesn’t even understand them.

I recall a tirade on this very blog a few months ago that cited to an article and accused the Katrina evacuees of causing a rise in the crime rate in Houston. I looked up the article and discovered the ‘malignant’ deception: THE EVACUEES WERE THE VICTIMS! …not the criminals. What blew me away about the exchange of blogs then was that the rabid republican who offered it must surely have KNOWN (assuming he/she actually read the article they were tirading about).

I got nothing more to say here. I’m exhausted to the point of disgust with all the republican efforts to decieve and manipulate. This crap has got to stop.

I find it interesting that the ones that are bashing Bush for the way things were handled after Katrina are defending Mayor Idiot for not taking action before Katrina hit. But then that’s partisan politics for ya.
The folks that were to lazy to get their butts out of NO when evacuation became mandatory shows just how stupid and lazy they are. I have are hard time feeling sorry for someone that won’t do for themselves.
Nagin could have and should have ordered the buses used to evacuate the city. The fact that he didn’t shows his incompetence.
The fact that it was late August and school was out doesn’t hold water. It’s late August now and I can get a hold of just about every school bus driver the our district has. School bus drivers don’t migrate to the North Pole or something when school lets out for the Summer. I’m sure Nagin could have gotten a hold of at least 90% of them. That would have been 360 buses and 21,600 folks moved out of the storms way. Then there are the transit buses. How many of them does NO own. And their drivers weren’t up in the North Pole for the Summer.
Governor Blanco should have ordered the buses used when it became apparent that Nagin was to big an idiot to do it. The fact that she didn’t shows either her incompetence or lack of concern.
Both Blanco and Nagin share the blame in this area.
Then the storm hit. Nothing could be done while it was around.
After the storm both Blanco and Nagin should have been getting local aid into the area. But they waited for the Feds to come.
The Feds were slow in getting in. There could be good reasons for it but I doubt that it was anything that would take 5 days. This is the fault of any number of folks from the guy in charge on the scene all the up to George Bush himself. So much went wrong that ya could most likely find blame all the way up the line.
So no Bush aint off the hook either. As President he has to take the ultimate responsibility for the Government’s failure.
The only folks left in NO to ride the storm out I feel sorry for are the folks that were in the hospitals and/or were physically unable to get themselves out. Those that could’ve have gotten themselves out, and that’s most of them, and were to lazy to I don’t have the least bit of sympathy for.

Theoretically, it’s good advice not to expect help from the government, and to plan for things as self-sufficiently as possible, but the unpredictable nature of disasters, and the mind-boggling, complicated effects of a catastrophic disaster are often beyond local and state authorities to handle alone.

We cannot let theory become the enemy of practices. Katrina, no matter how bad, should not have caught us as off-guard as it is. We could have done far better than this, and it’s to the right-wing’s shame that they say this is the best their party could do in power.

What I can’t understand is how anyone, Republicans included, can support this president. Katrina represents just one of many failures. The size of government has ballooned during the Bush years; procurement spending has mushroomed in incredibly wasteful ways, we’re heavily mortgaging our children’s future.

Economies expand and contract, of course; that’s just the way of it. But Bush’s tax cuts, if made permanent and which, of course, heavily favor the upperclass and demonstrably widen the rich/poor gap, will cost $3.3 trillion over the next decade. Servicing the national debt already accounts for nearly 20 percent of the national budget. Republicans love to claim these kind of favor the rich tax cuts improve the economy, but that’s more an ideological position than a factually demonstrable one.

Bush is a reactionary, not a conservative. After 9/11, he swung from isolationism to a hubristic attempt to reshape the middle east. As an apostate, he did what many apostates do; he reacted with incredible zeal — and in the process, violated the Constitution. After Katrina, he pledged massive amounts for reconstruction, but failed to understand that managing the money is crucial.

And what I love, just love, is advocates using the current administration’s incompetence as an argument against government, itself.

I long for old style conservatives. I might disagree with them, but they weren’t bonkers.

Huh. Just got an “editor must approve before commenting” notice. Only thing I did different was to preview and correct before posting. Common problem?

Ron Brown-

You’re ignoring the realities of the situation. Geographically, New Orleans is a tiny city. You can easily get around the city on bicycle, and many people rely on public transportation or taxis. Imagine if a great disaster were to wipe out New York. So many people there rely on subways and taxis that a true mass evacuation is simply not possible. New Orleans is the same, and the contingency plan, the Superdome, has worked in the past.

Now, for the buses. This is not a feasible plan for a city or state agency to enact. The one person in a leadership role that can hold his head high, General Honore, needed a trained military in order to organize the evacuation from three main points: Superdome, convention center and I-10 overpass. Imagine if Nagin, with the resources of an incredibly poor city, had tried to evacuate thousands of people by bus from points around the city. There was simply no time. By the time everyone was at the superdome or convention center, it was too late for buses. The city was flooded.

Then there’s Blanco. A governor’s first response in this situation should have been to send in the National Guard. Unfortunately, the National Guard was busy in Iraq. Most notably, all of the high-water vehicles from Jackson Barracks in New Orleans has been deployed overseas and were unavailable to Gov Blanco. Remember the video of Honore rolling in with those vehicles full of supplies? New Orleans had twelve of thos evehicles stationed there for the exact reason they were needed during Katrina. How much flooding have we had to deal with in Iraq?

And no matter how you slice it, in every natural disaster of the last 100 years, FEMA has been in charge of the recovery. Once the event is over, FEMA is supposed to move in. Why didn’t this happen? Why? Can anyone even hazard a guess? I am trying not to believe in the reasons of racism, classism, or worst of all, partisanship. I have pretty well settled on incompetence. Brown, Chertoff, Bush. Thats the federal chain of command, and they all failed miserably.

phx8,

The people I know who lived in tents for several months weren’t destitute. They went to work or volunteered in the cleanup effort to EARN the food and other help they were given. That’s an example not only of self sufficiency, but also of self respect.
They took responsibility for themselves and didn’t expect someone else to do for them what they can do for themselves. Having such an outlook in the face of the adversity they went through is an example of good character.
They set up a tent city on the property of a man whose house was destroyed, at his invitation. They banded together to help each other with the day to day necessities as well as the unusual needs of living in a disaster area. That’s an example of being a good neighbor and an asset to your community.
All this and more was done without the direction of bureaucrats from Washington. It isn’t the responsibility of the federal gov’t to take care of us. It’s our responsibility.
People have banded together to help their neighbors in their time of need. We don’t need bureaucrats getting in the way, like they did in the weeks after Katrina hit. I was involved in the recovery effort after the storm and the most common complaint was that FEMA and the Red Cross were in the way.

Ron Brown,

You are deceived and that’s unfortuneate. But, you are passing that deception off as knowledge and that is irresponsible. New Orleans is/was a walking city. Many residents lived without cars of any kind. The city is surrounded by water: The Mississippi, Lake Ponchartrain, The Gulf. Even before Katrina made landfall, roads were closed into and out of the city for safety reasons. They were the roads that are easily submerged in tropical storms let alone hurricaines. To suggest that any mayor would have sufficient control in this situation is silly. Of course he didn’t. Mayor Nagin only has authority of any kind with respect to New Orleans. He was hamstrung by not having submarines, not by not having busses. He was also hamstrung by not having authority to do anything about the busses that were being commandeered at FEMA checkpoints well out of range of his New Orleans specific authority. What busses were made available immediately after the storm and before the levies broke, were actually comandeered by FEMA and parked. They were not allowed to assisst in the way that the private entities who arranged for them had intended in order to help those most in need.

You offer the observation that you believe that most of them could have got out on their own. You don’t know New Orleans. You understand people who live without cars. You are wrong. Most especially, you are wrong about those in places like Jefferson Parish…any many of them owned their own homes!

Traveller-

People in some areas have been able to do that, and thats great. I spent two weeks in New Orleans helping friends gut houses, and they took the initiative to improve their situation. Some people realized that there was nothing for them to go back to in NOLA and simply stayed wherever they had been evacuated to. That is a responsible, if regrettable, decision. Some others stayed away for months, waiting for money to move back, a job to move back to or for the ability to go back to their property. Some are still waiting.

But beyond the reality of their situations, which the overwhelming majority have chosen to make the best of, is the reality of our situation as a nation that will allow this to happen. We go to work, go home to our families and loved ones, with all of our posessions and a roof over our heads, and you have the nerve to expect your fellow Americans to live in tents and be happy about it? Not for a few weeks, but for A YEAR. Six months after the storm, the city was so bankrupt that trash collections were happening every three-four weeks. This is SIX MONTHS after the the storm. People were piling disgusting, mold ridden carpeting, dry wall and furniture on the side of the road and it was sitting there for weeks, not to mention the normal garbage a city produces. This is no way for humans in the richest nation in the world to live, but they did, because they had no other options.

Hey, Jack - If a tornado rips through your house and kills your family - and you knew the tornado was coming - your self-righteous, hyperbolic, selfish logic would dictate that the Compassionate Conservative government you cling to like a cancer should do nothing for you.

I coudn’t agree more.

Logic dictates if you are in the path of a freight train you get out of the way. Katrina was that freight train to New Orleans. People who live in Florida board up and get out if the storm is going to be devastating. This isn’t the first time New Orleans got hit. I guess they didn’t learn from those other times. I feel bad for the people who lost their posessions and those who lost their lives, but as I said in the beginning “IF YOUR IN THE PATH OF A FREIGHT TRAIN GET OUT OF THE WAY”

Keith

If a tornado rips through my house, I expect the Federal government to do NOTHING for me, whether or not I knew the tornado was coming. The same thing goes if my house burns down, is flooded or hit by a meteor.

Do you really think a problem like that should be a Federal case, or even a state or local case?

It’s VOODOO Politics straight from NOLA. Nagin and Blanco are just two of the incompetent politicos hagin’ around the political soup kitchen, milkin’ the trough for what they can get. Sen Landrieu is also in that group. Suckin’ up what they can from the tax payers and callin’ it “Helpin’ the Po Folk”. Or as President Reagan said about government help and its dangers—-“Hi, I’m from the government and I’m here to help you.”

As far as the feds and the free ride most of the victims expect. NO WAY. Low intrest loans or even no intrest loans. YES

As far as some of the victims expecting the feds to give them a free ride. NO WAY!!! Low intrest or even no intrest loans would be the way.

KAP:
“This isn’t the first time New Orleans got hit. I guess they didn’t learn from those other times.”

It’s true. There were very many people in NO and Mississippi who had lived through Hurricane Camille in 1969 — which hit the Gulf coast in the exact same areas, but made landfall as a Category 5 hurricane with winds up to 190 miles an hour. Since Katrina, I’ve heard it written about more than once that because NO and Mississippi didn’t experience massive flooding with Camille, and because the storm surge in 1969 actually made Lake Pontchartrain’s water recede, rather than rise (even though it was the strongest tropical cyclone ever recorded), people believed they knew what the very worst could be like.
This was a tragically wrong belief — because Katrina, while weaker than Camille, actually covered a larger amount of territory and had a bigger storm surge.
Just goes to show all of us that experience sometimes isn’t the best teacher. And, this is also why (IMO) people shouldn’t always be so damn judgmental and so quick to get up on their high horse when other people make such a grave and unwise decision.

Jack,

I was going to yell at you until I realized that there is a left Keith as opposed to me the right Keith. I guess I’ll change my handle.

Adrienne
The gulf coast lucked out on camille. They didn’t fair to good with katrina. The next might be even more devistating. Florida gets blasted every year. People have to learn mother nature could be one mean b—-h when she wants to be.

KAP-

Would you have them ride their bikes, with their families on their backs, on up I-10 to Baton Rouge? Maybe they can build a street car line to Texas. These people have no means to get out of the way of anything, so they go to the Superdome like they always have, like they are told to do. The problem is when you have a few thousand people stranded in the Superdome, and the Federal help that was promised and that has always been there in the past doesn’t show up. Grow up and stop looking at these disasters from an idiotically ideological standpoint and realise that the people who could leave, did.

David S
I’d get my family out any way I could even if we had to WALK. I’ve been through huricannes in the Atlantic and the Pacfic Typhons they are no fun.

David S
I’d get my family out any way I could even if we had to WALK. I’ve been through huricannes in the Atlantic and the Pacfic Typhons they are no fun.

Jack,

You are missing the point. You keep harping on the notion that those hurt by Katrina are unfairly asking for handouts. The point is that the government put them in the position they are in. It was government who cut corners on the levies when they were constructed in a manner that was sub-par and contrary to the recommendations of the Army Corps of Engineers, among others. It was the government who commandeered busses and medical aid that was headed for New Orleans in the wake of the storm (from private sources) and it is the government who is facilitating those who are taking advantage of tragedy by wrongfully denying coverage, capitalizing on long drawn out coverage and rebuilding disputes with insureres to use emmanent domain to forcibly re-develop neighborhoods into profitable developments.

You are somehow trying to sell the idea that Liberals are about big government and that Katrina is about a bunch of low-rent liberal minorities who just want their handouts. You are WRONG, Jack…way wrong.

The true horrors of Katrina are the result of big-government…republican big government that was the product of the kind cronyism that put inexperienced leaders in places where they actually could not implement or even understand the practiced responses of an organization that had been running ‘what if scenarios’ ever since Camille in ‘69. Those of us on the left are not saying that the victims of Katrina should be made whole by FEMA…but surely you can understand that FEMA was actually the biggest element of the problem. They had been rehearsing for how to respond to a class 5 hit on New Orleans for 30 years or more and yet all FEMA could do was be a PART OF THE PROBLEM?

The straw man arguments about liberls and big government are getting REAL tired Jack. It is the republicans who are making and have always made the government bigger, more expensive and less effective or efficient at doing ANYTHING positive. Try as you might to argue against that reality, it is undeniable FACT, Jack…Or in the words of Bill Murray: “That’s a fact, Jack!”

KAP,

I grew up on the Texas Gulf Coast. You don’t go walking your family through gulf coast swampland during a storm or following a storm. Are you suggesting that thousands of people who just lost everything should traipse their families through the Atchafalaya swamp on their way to ‘safety?’ Have you ever seen the Atchafalaya? Do you know what an alligator is? Ever seen one?
Get real. All you republicans seem to have a significant problem with understanding reality.

DavidS,
I’ve been up to my eyeballs in Katrina relief (now recovery) for the past year. I drove countless truckloads of relief supplies to the coast, and I’ve been helping to provide manpower for reconstruction since the storm. I’ve made many trips to the coast and NO for meetings and to work on cleanup. For the first few months reports hit my desk daily, now it’s weekly. I have friends, family and coworkers on the coast and in NO. One family member was literally blown out of his house by the storm surge. (he survived) I’ve seen with my own eyes the obstacles gov’t at all levels is putting in the way of recovery. I’ve heard with my own ears the excuses and blame shifting of the incompetent boobs who turned a disaster into a tragedy. I know in intimate detail what the aftermath of Katrina is.
The amount of storm debris in south Ms. was estimated at 60 tons per acre. I don’t have an estimate for NO but I’m sure the number would be staggering. That much crap can’t be cleaned up in 6 months.
The estimate I’ve seen for the time frame for recovery is 10 years+-if we don’t get hit again.
We as a nation didn’t allow this to happen. It is a natural disaster of unprecedented scope in our country. Disaster turned to tragedy in NO because of the incompetence of local and state gov’t and the liberal mindset of “it’s not your fault, Uncle Sugar will take care of you” that’s been ingrained in a large segment of the population for a couple of generations.
I started working on disaster relief 5 days after the storm. The reason it took 5 days is because I live in a small rural community and that’s how long it took us, without outside help, to clear the roads so we could get out. Small communities like mine were low priority for restoration of power and services, a decision I agree with. Hospitals, emergency services and grocery stores needed to be put back in service first.
We were on our own and had to rely on ourselves and each other. There’s nothing sad about that. What’s sad is, as we saw in NO, many people are incapable of taking care of themselves and each other.

There is this Stephen King story, nothing special, about a doctor on a deserted island, who slowly cannibalizes himself to survive.

This is what the Republican Party’s general attitude towards disaster relief seems to be. Such emphasis is put on the abstracts of ideology, that when the time comes and help doesn’t, they excuse failures of policy as being big government’s inability to do anything right (with no plans to do anything about it), they excuse lives lost by blaming the victims for being in the way of the disaster, and they use Market-Oriented excuses to explain away anemic relief efforts, failure to take care of those caught in humanitarian crises, and slow to absent rebuilding.

The result is, things are allowed to settle into dysfunction, with the Gulf Coast no doubt suffering crippling economic effects because of the lackadaisical, laissez faire approach.

Stitches in time, people. This mirrors precisely the problems in Iraq, where there, before Katrina, the Bush administration failed to react to a problem before it became more aggravated. In fact, I think that’s part of how Bush lost so much popularity over his response to Katrina: he demonstrated that Iraq was not simply some fluke, that this indeed was the way this administration did business: fatally bubbled away, rife with corruption, not intellectually agile enough to rearrange their approaches to problems to improve their batting average on solutions.

The mark of an amateur is the inability to depart from theory or translate that theory into effective, beneficial practice.

The thing Republicans should consider is whether more people are having to look for assistance and be a burden on society, because the Bush administration didn’t clear up the problem soon enough to repair the engines of economy and because they didn’t prime the economy with the requisite aid and relief.

Maybe people should become more self-sufficient, but in places where cooperation and infrastructure are crucial parts of life, not just conveniences (most urban and suburban areas), the interdependence is not only to be tolerated, but its ressurection is to be made a priority.

Traveller,

I deeply respect your efforts and your experiences with regard to the clean up and recovery….HOWEVER, this preposterous accusation against liberals about relying on “Uncle Sugar” holds no water at all. Not even as much water as the sub-standard levies along the Ponchartrain after Katrina hit them. Please refer to the posts I made above. It was never about “Uncle Sugar” coming to save…it was about Uncle Sugar NOT coming to rob! It is about homeowners who were disregarded for either classist or racist reasons. Ultimately, those two things are the same, anyway. The one begets the other.

David S, RGF
So let me get this straight. It’s wasn’t feasible for folks that get around by bus all the time to get on one to get out of town before the hurricane hit. Very interesting.
But then I reckon it’s anything to put all the blame on someone y’all hate and keep it off that idiot mayor. Typical partisanship.
Like I said there’s plenty of blame to go around. I’m not letting anyone off the hook. The whole damn heap of them screwed the pooch on this one.

tomh
“Hi, I’m from the government and I’m here to help you.â€

That lie goes right along with “The check is in the mail”.

Ron Brown,

Exactly when do you imagine that the busses should have been hauling people out prior to Katrine making landfall?

I think it safe to bet that you have no experience of hurricaines whatsoever.

Just the same, I must admit that it would have better if New Orleans could have completely evacuated prior to Katrina’s landfall. Do you have any idea how long that would have taken? Can you imagine where the hurricaine was at the time New Orleans SHOULD have begun evacuating if it was going to actually get EVERYONE out?

It’s an understanding of reality issue yet again and you republicans just aren’t very good at it.

RGF

I agree that we should never have built levees to make dry land of what by nature is below sea level swamp. We should correct that mistake by NOT rebuilding houses and businesses in the same place. Nature really wants it back; give it to her.

RE the people with handouts. People have some responsibility to take care of themselves, no matter what the ultimate cause of their malady. If I rent a place from you and you promise to stock a week’s worth of supplies, but you don’t, should I just starve and blame you, or should I maybe take some other action?

The response from many in New Orleans was literally childish. I taught my kids a long time ago to do better.

ANd what are we talking about here. NOT most people. Most people in New Orleans and elsewhere are rebuilding, have rebuilt or moved on. If you are still in dire peril a year after the peril has passed, you might look in the mirror for the person to blame.

I’m truly sick of being lectured by the Conservative Right about what I should not be expecting from my government. Very few of us actually lack enough pride to want a free ride from the government. Most of us just want somewhat easier lives.

We don’t want to be sick and have no good options for treatment. We don’t want to take a medicine, fearing that common side-effects may include detonating livers or something like that.

If we invest, we’re not asking for unearned success. We’re asking not to be taken for a ride We don’t want to have to lose retirement or other fortunes in the process so the market can teach people lessons. We want the government to teach them lessons before it ever comes to that. We want stockbrokers working for their investors, CEOs and other leaders working for the benefit of the investors, and accountants auditing and consulting separately and ethically in both cases.

We want the government to acknowledge scientific consensus, instead of trying to create a false picture of uncertainty because the mainstream theory threatens wealthy interests. The free market does not function well when deception takes the place of meaningful information.

And when we face a catastrophic disaster of epic proportions, the last thing we need to hear are excuses. Ideally, everybody would be self sufficient, local plans would go off without a hitch, and nobody would need relief.

But we don’t live in an ideal world, and there are things the federal government can do, or at least do easier than the states or localities can, especially when roads and infrastructure are compromised. When lives are on the line, ideology should take a back seat to pragmatism. People should not have to die to demonstrate a political point, which is sadly what the Republican’s excuses on Katrina amount to.

Jack,

There are some things you don’t seem to be grasping.

New Orleans is slowly sinking. It always has been. That is the nature of the ground it is built on. The levies are NOT there to unnaturally make wet land into dry…they are there to keep dry land dry. Lake Ponchartrain is a natural lake formed by an elbow of the Mississippi after the river skipped out and found new banks. The levies are there to keep it from doing it again and to keep the lake from pouring into the city. Regardless, this natral fact was true of the ground New Orleans was built on long before New Orleans was there. We talk about how silly a city it was until hell freezes over but that does not change the fact that it WAS built there and that the tragedy of Katrina was real. It’s a moot point.

Also, you keep trying to turn this into some kind of argument about people expecting handouts. That is not the reality. Heck, even the scenario you proposed works to illustrate a part of what I’m trying to get through to you, in a way: If you rent from me and as part of the contractual deal I am supposed to stock certain things in the house and I don’t…I have violated our contract and you have cause for legal action against me. You have paid for something you are being robbed of.

In the case of New Orleans, there are tax-paying policy holding insured citizens who are getting robbed. The robbery is being facilitated by various levels og government who are allowing emmanent domain to be excercised privately for profitable re-development in places where there are still ongoing disputes about claims for damages being brought by those who only want to rebuild what they legitimately own while they still own it.

In the aftermath of Katrina, a number a very curious things happened: Aid meant for the areas most in need was stopped, confiscated and diverted. Those that benefitted from that aid were less in need than those it was intended for. Efforts were made to evacuate people still stuck in areas with no food, water, lights…but those efforts were actually stopped by FEMA and the resources re-directed to help nobody or to help those who were considerably less in need. These were largely PRIVATE aid efforts that FEMA commandeered. These were not handouts from the federal government.

To this day, the government is busy helping private entities excercise emmanent domain over properties in areas where these entities are investing in new developments at the cost of those whose property value is tanked as a result of the damage but nonetheless want to rebuild if only the insurers would do right by them and honor the contracts they entered into with these victims.

The only reason I can see for you continuing to try to sculpt this into an issue of people looking for handouts is because that is the tired old paradigm argument the republicans have been levying for ages. Interestingly, the more legitimate the injustice caused by government malfeasance, the more I hear that tired old ax being ground. The reaon you jump to this is that it fits the human-software you stuck in your head when you became a republican. I encourage you to look more closely into this situation and see for yourself. Go to New Orleans. You can’t understand what is going on there from Virginia.

If this right-wing Administration and its followers; feel that it is justice to prosecute Sadam for genocide committed on his own people (the curds) in the 1980s, (today in 2006)?

Then, what year will it be, when a left-wing Administration feels obligated to prosecute this Administration for the genocide on New Orleans, (in 2005)?

And, more importantly how do you, (right-wing supporters), make a distinction between the two?

(Retoricial Question above)
Because there is none.

Jack-

Everything you have said so far shows a frightening lack of compassion. I can only hope your children are ignoring your lessons and learning from someone with some humanity.

Play

To compare an actual genocide to a very bad storm that killed about 1000 people (remember 10 times that many died during unusually hot weather in France)is insulting to genocide victims. Suggest you talk to some people actually affected by genocide and tell them how being trapped in the Superdome is the same as living in a concentration camp or having your relatives gassed.

If you really cannot see the difference, I have no more pearls to cast before you on this subject. You may learn more as your experience grows.

Stephen & RGF

I am not making myself clear. My problem with the levees is primarily environmental. This is not a new thing or a Bush thing. I have been reading about this all my life and seeing documentaries with titles like “Good bye Louisiana”. We have been destroying wetlands and asking for this to happen for nearly 100 years. Parts of New Orleans are above sea level and rebuildable. Most of the parts that we love and are historically important are among them. Yes. Rebuild. Anyplace that still featured large pools of water a month or two later probably should return to a natural state.

We foolishly and arrogantly built where it was not warranted. We now have an opportunity to correct at least part of our mistake. Do it.

Re handouts - the Federal government should build general infrastructure and set general rules. It has no particular business in the individual needs game. The only thing the Feds should be sure to do now (a year later) is NOT to help rebuild the soggy parts of New Orleans.

DavidS

It depends on who is going to do it. I believe in helping people. I do that. I hope you are as generous with your time and money. I do not believe in the Federal government doing those same things because I believe in treating people like adults. I do not see us all as wards of the state, as you imply we are.

If you empower the Feds to do all the things you want done in New Orleans, you empower the Feds to do lots of other things too. Remember that about half the time the Feds will be controlled by people you may not like. Do you want George Bush to have the power to dictate what gets built in local communities in Louisiana? If not, do not ask him to do it. Once you let the Feds in, they are reluctant to leave.

Jack,

Our understanding of wetlands and environmental issues is a very new thing. It was not part of the understanding of either the French or of Jefferson who bought Louisiana from the French 200 years ago.

It is a moot point because it does not address the fact that there were and are people in New Orleans now.

If you are suggesting that we should ignore imjustices and even government orchested theft from Katrina victims in order to revert to some kind of environmentally sustainable wetlands…then you are clearly sending a *message* crazier than any liberal tree hugger I ever met. What you are trying to say is right up there with those homicidal maniacs who spike trees so lumberjacks with big chainsaws will decapitate themselves when the chains break on the spikes!

New Orleans was full of people, Jack. Real people. They owned homes, worked jobs, had kids tought school…
If it is necessary, pay them fair market value for their homes and relocate them out of the environment that is right for them…but don’t rob them and move richer people in just to profit from their loss!

As it stands now, the neighborhoods are being rebuilt but the emmanent domain fair market value is being assessed on their post Katrina value on properties which are in the middle of coverage claims disputes being initiated by people who just want to add value to the property by rebuilding. They are getting robbed by insurers, government, developers etc.

And the people who are taking the homes from them are interested in moving people out of an area to preserve wetlands…they are using government and insurance company wrongdoing to profit themselves and move richer people into the same areas.

Your argument about preservation of wetlands is not even relevant to what is going on, Jack. Whether or not the area should be vacated of people and preserved as a wetland is a pointless argument with respect to Katrina and what is both happening and not happening in Louisiana right now.

Uh…
Add a “NOT”…

And the people who are taking the homes from them are NOT interested in moving people out of an area to preserve wetlands…they are using government and insurance company wrongdoing to profit themselves and move richer people into the same areas.

Jack-

The problem is that the Federal government not only promises those services, taxes us to pay for them, and is readily able to provide them, they also prevent the private sector from doing such things. The “You make your bed, thats where you lie” argument is heartless, but also a very slippery slope. You were smoking in bed and your house caught fire? Sorry, no fire department for you. You didn’t lock your doors and all your things got stolen? You deserve it, no police investigation. You built your house where it might flood? Tough luck, move to Kansas.

RGF
First I’m NOT REPUBLICAN. Republicans are just a liberal as Democrats. In fact some Democrats are more conservative that most Republicans.
They were pretty sure where Katrina was going to hit around Friday. They knew for sure on Saturday. If they had started evacuating then and worked around the clock I’ll be willing to bet that NO would have been a ghost town by Monday morning.
But then I reckon that Mayor Idiot Nagin was waiting for the Federal Government to evacuate the town for him. He’s sure wanting the it to do everything now.
There is no excuse for Nagin’s inaction. And there is no excuse for the slow response by FEMA.

Ron-

Nagin issued a mandatory evacuation on Saturday, the first in the city’s history, and 80% of the population evacuated. That is considered a hugely successful evacuation.

This was a horribly devastating storm. Everyone knew it would be a horribly devastating storm, all the way up the president himself, as seen in that infamous video. I’m not sure what town you live in, but there is no city government capable of handling such a disaster. They simply do not have the resources. The people in this country pay taxes that fund the Federal Emergency Management Agency. FEMA should have had boots on the ground in New Orleans on Monday, Tuesday at the latest. They should have been bringing in supplies for the people at the last resort evacuation centers and working on a plan to get them out. “Managing” the “Emergency”.

http://americandaily.com/article/15244

This says it all

Shocking. Another conservative trying to paint Katrina as a Liberal failure. It was a failure of government, most notably Federal, which happened at the time to be Republican. I wish i could say with confidence it would have been different under a Democrat, but I don’t know it would have.

By the way, with a name like “TruthSeeker”, you should probably stay away from partisan propaganda.

David S
You dispute the FACT that Gorelick is a partisan Hack?

I didn’t think so.

Likewise, the Katrina fiasco ensued as a byproduct of previous and long
standing bureaucratic corruption and incompetence, perpetrated with complete
disregard for the very widely accepted knowledge that a large storm would
eventually strike New Orleans.

“In truth, the storm brought no surprises, except that during the time which
should have been devoted to preparation, the New Orleans government
misdirected funds and indulged itself in every luxury except that of shoring
up its levees and infrastructure.

As a consistent li