by hilzoy
Does this count?
“Under the command of President Bush’s two senior political advisers, the White House rolled out a plan this weekend to contain the political damage from the administration’s response to Hurricane Katrina.
It orchestrated visits by cabinet members to the region, leading up to an extraordinary return visit by Mr. Bush planned for Monday, directed administration officials not to respond to attacks from Democrats on the relief efforts, and sought to move the blame for the slow response to Louisiana state officials, according to Republicans familiar with the White House plan.
The effort is being directed by Mr. Bush’s chief political adviser, Karl Rove, and his communications director, Dan Bartlett. It began late last week after Congressional Republicans called White House officials to register alarm about what they saw as a feeble response by Mr. Bush to the hurricane, according to Republican Congressional aides. (…)
One Republican with knowledge of the effort said that Mr. Rove had told administration officials not to respond to Democratic attacks on Mr. Bush’s handling of the hurricane in the belief that the president was in a weak moment and that the administration should not appear to be seen now as being blatantly political. As with others in the party, this Republican would discuss the deliberations only on condition of anonymity because of keen White House sensitivity about how the administration and its strategy would be perceived.
In a reflection of what has long been a hallmark of Mr. Rove’s tough political style, the administration is also working to shift the blame away from the White House and toward officials of New Orleans and Louisiana who, as it happens, are Democrats.”
How about this?
“But perhaps the greatest disappointment stands at the breached 17th Street levee. Touring this critical site yesterday with the President, I saw what I believed to be a real and significant effort to get a handle on a major cause of this catastrophe. Flying over this critical spot again this morning, less than 24 hours later, it became apparent that yesterday we witnessed a hastily prepared stage set for a Presidential photo opportunity; and the desperately needed resources we saw were this morning reduced to a single, lonely piece of equipment. “
Or this?
“There was a striking dicrepancy between the CNN International report on the Bush visit to the New Orleans disaster zone, yesterday, and reports of the same event by German TV.
ZDF News reported that the president’s visit was a completely staged event. Their crew witnessed how the open air food distribution point Bush visited in front of the cameras was torn down immediately after the president and the herd of ‘news people’ had left and that others which were allegedly being set up were abandoned at the same time.
The people in the area were once again left to fend for themselves, said ZDF.”
Just trying to get clear on the standards here.
*** UPDATE ***
Rivka at Respectful of Otters corrects the last story. Apparently, what German TV claimed was staged was at Biloxi, not New Orleans. Translation of the relevant bit of the ZDF News broadcast, from RoO, with my italics:
“We talked to people here after the visit: one woman said a symbolic visit like that was better than none at all, and it was good that the President was showing his face there and looking at the situation up-close. Others tended to react with desperation. One woman burst into tears and said, full of rage, that the President shouldn’t come here, he should finally see to it that help comes. All of the people, his whole entourage, these cars, they should be loaded up with supplies and not with bodyguards, and he shouldn’t play the good samaritan here, and a staged visit like this doesn’t help. And it actually was the case that all of a sudden this morning helper personnel showed up here, people who cleared away the rubble, who went through the houses in search of bodies, but exclusively along the route where the President traveled. Two hours ago the President left Biloxi again, and all of the helper personnel along with him.
Anchor: We know that President Bush promised quick help. Can that be felt where you are? For example, is there clean water and food?
CR: There’s nothing here at all. Aside from what was cleared aside by the helper personnel this morning, the rubble is lying all over the street exactly as it was several days ago after the storm. There are no reasonable provisions; there’s an emergency medical station and otherwise nothing. There is a stench of decomposition across the entire city. There are bodies that haven’t been covered up in the buildings. Everything has been reduced to rubble, and help–from what we can see here and what others from other cities have also said–isn’t coming.”
Is it any wonder why good decent people just absolutely loathe Bush and his conservative cronies?
Makes you wonder which “senior Bush official” has been making calls lately to spread misinformation about the timing of Governor Blanco’s declaration of emergency. Smells like classic Rove to me.
Another slightly unexpected data point: http://leninology.blogspot.com/2005/09/everything-has-gone-according-to-plan.html by China Mieville. (via Making Light)
As I noted elsewhere, unless the president is bringing his chainsaw to help clear debris, what’s the point of this follow-up visit?
Gary- How the heck do you manage to compile all that stuff? It doesn’t sound like you have a staff. How many hours are there in a day where you are at?
In a reflection of what has long been a hallmark of Mr. Rove’s tough political style, the administration is also working to shift the blame away from the White House and toward officials of New Orleans and Louisiana who, as it happens, are Democrats.
Ah, understatement.
Incidentally, hilzoy, don’t forget this.
Don’t worry, by next weekend’s propaganda march, you’ll have forgotten all about this little catastrophe; just like Neo when he finished the cookie.
We are at War! Support the troops. Freedom is on the march. 9/11 changed everything. You’re either with us or with the terrorists.
From a Washington Post article on Bush’s new political offensive:
WTF kind of definition of “strength” do you need to have in order to make sense of that sentence?
It sounds like your standard is that two wrongs make a right, Hil. I agree that the Bush administration is trying to put their best political face on this, but it doesn’t take away your own attempts to politicize this tragedy by putting all of your ire and focus on the federal government and not on all levels where it belongs.
CB: Do you think Operation CBA* is an appropriate use of White House resources at this moment in time?
—————-
*B = Bush’s
Charles, serious question: How do you think this all reflects on what the hell Bush, Congress, DHS and the rest of the Feds have been doing the past four years to prepare for the country’s safety and security in the event of another major terrorist attack? Keeping in mind that doing EXACTLY THAT was what Bush ran, and won, on in 2004?
Anarch and hilzoy,
Laura has an update about the German TV coverage.
http://www.warandpiece.com/blogdirs/002504.html
Citing two German TV channels including links to the videos.
The Market Knows All, Part 3
Hurricane Katrina has been and continues to be a punch to the gut. It’s horrifying and tragic — if you have anything to spare, donate to help.
My good friend Doctor Chuck has posted a couple of pieces on the hurricane and the country’s reaction to it. I
But don’t say FEMA doesn’t offer us good cheer! Sing it! For inspiration!
Charles, out of this whole fiasco, if there is anything more glaringly and inexcusably incompetent than the Federal relief effort, what was it? It’s not enough to say blame belongs at all levels of government, as if everyone is equally culpable on principle alone. What errors on the part of the NO or LA governments can even compare to the titanic clusterf*ck of the Federal disaster relief effort? Bush’s advisors couldn’t be bothered to cancel their vacations to prepare for the worst storm to hit the U.S. in decades. The Sec. of Homeland Security is blaming the locals and the media for his own ignorance and lack of preparedness. The head of FEMA was blissfully unaware of tens of thousands of desperate refugees while the Mayor of NO was literally screaming for help. And now Karl Rove, who was busy posing for snapshots with pro-war counter-protestors, has switched his efforts to crafting a smear campaign against the leaders of a devestated U.S. community to cover the President’s and his toadies’ asses.
What a bunch of bullsh*t.
Criticizing someone who screwed up is not “partisan” just because he happens to belong to the other party.
Bush screwed up. I’d have hammered him on no matter WHAT party he belonged to. Sadly to some folks, ANY criticism of members of the other party are “mere partisanship”.
I’ve asked, several times, but none have ever given me an example of when it would be “okay” to criticise Bush. Perhaps if he was got raping a small girl on film, but even then I wouldn’t take bets on it.
Charles Bird,
Hilzoy seems to be demanding accountability from all responsible parties, including the federal government, with the obvious goal of fixing the problems.
Bush and his apologists are reflexively denying ANY responsibility for this fiasco, with the goal of maintaining political power.
You think these are equivalent?
I agree that the Bush administration is trying to put their best political face on this, but it doesn’t take away your own attempts to politicize this tragedy by putting all of your ire and focus on the federal government and not on all levels where it belongs.
No, Charles.
They are not trying to put the “best face” on this. That’s miles too generous. They are lying about other officials, working harder on photo ops than on relief, and generally pretending that everything they did was fine. They are sticking up for their bungling crony who made mess of the relief effort, and are accepting zero blame. If the planning for Katrina had been as important as the planning of this propaganda campaign, the propaganda would be unnecessary.
And by the way, what the hell does it mean when Bill Kristol says Bush is a “strong president” who can’t execute? That’s like calling someone a strong pitcher, who unfortunately never gets anyone out.
“Gary- How the heck do you manage to compile all that stuff? It doesn’t sound like you have a staff. How many hours are there in a day where you are at?”
Oh, I cut back to light blogging two days ago. Now I’m just being casual, and letting hours at a time go past without blogging.
I read fast, though, and after a childhood of often reading 20 hours in a row, I applied doing that sort of thing regularly, decades ago, to proofreading and copyediting and manuscript reading jobs, so bringing it to online reading more than a decade ago was natural, as was bringing it to blogging nearly four years ago. (But that’s why I get grumpy when friends [not strangers] make recommendations that make me feel neglected, bad me that I am.)
Amygdala does, however, maintain a large staff, so we can have lots of people to fire for our errors and mistakes. We especially hate it when our subtitles turn Swedish.
Bernard Yomtov: And by the way, what the hell does it mean when Bill Kristol says Bush is a “strong president” who can’t execute? That’s like calling someone a strong pitcher, who unfortunately never gets anyone out.
I think it means something similar to what Bush means when he says that the response has been great, but the results have been unacceptable. Fundamental disconnect. Or, as certain political persuasions like to put it “trying to have it both ways”.
I can’t believe the number of stories over the past few days that I have read that contained the following, “We had X ready to help but FEMA didn’t ask/said no.” The head of FEMA must resign or be fired over this.
A strong president who nevertheless cannot execute any of the functions of the presidency.
A perfect definition of the Potemkin President.
And *that’s* from one of his slavish admirers, too.
No wonder they have to keep insisting the shell is strong–it is entirely hollow inside.
Redstate.org:
Pay no attention to the man behind the curtain.
I can’t believe the number of stories over the past few days that I have read that contained the following, “We had X ready to help but FEMA didn’t ask/said no.” The head of FEMA must resign or be fired over this.
In all seriousness, I think I’ve seen counts as high as 15 distinct versions of this story. If that’s the case, we need a public, independent investigation to ascertain what exactly FEMA’s policy was and why it was instituted, as well as to analyze the way it was executed. Heads should, and must, roll.
Q: What do you call an executive who can’t execute (besides a “miserable failure”, I mean)?
A: A figurehead.
Try “define:figurehead” at Google for an interesting selection of definitions. [Yes, “miserable failure” still works.]
One has to wonder as to the nature of the thought process, as such, that goes through the head of blinkered Bush apologists like Charles when posting their upthread comments. Hilzoy points out the ways in which the government bungled and continues to bungle the response to Katrina, and in their eyes she’s politicizing the disaster. Hilzoy then points out ways in which the Bush administration really is politicizing it in ways not only blatantly dishonest, but which continue to have a materially negative effect on the relief efforts, and that’s politicizing it too.
Priceless. It’s been long known that there’s a solid core of Republican partisans so loyal to party over country that they’ll defend almost any level of dishonesty or incompetence, and–when unable to do that–still refuse to withhold their support from the man in charge. They make up that perhaps 15-20% of the American public that should simply be written off and never taken seriously on any political matter for any reason, because there is no reaching them–they will vote for the most corrupt, incompetent, and dishonest Republican imaginable before they’ll vote for a liberal of any sort.
What I can’t grasp is why you waste time and energy trying to reach people like this, Hilzoy. It’s not like they’re lacking in sufficient evidence of the Bush administration’s perfidy and incompetence, they simply put the elephant before the stars and stripes.
Hilzoy then points out ways in which the Bush administration really is politicizing it in ways not only blatantly dishonest, but which continue to have a materially negative effect on the relief efforts, and that’s politicizing it too.
Worth repeating that for some reason Bush’s earlier visit shut down aerial relief operations for the day. Very classy; very nice.
Priceless. It’s been long known that there’s a solid core of Republican partisans so loyal to party over country that they’ll defend almost any level of dishonesty or incompetence, and–when unable to do that–still refuse to withhold their support from the man in charge.
What’s your BTKWB limit?
Anarch- Thanks I really needed that laugh.
I´m watching this disaster and its aftermath from Germany. Obviously I don´t have all the information an American viewer could have but here is my opinion so far. Just in case anyone is interested. 🙂
Mayor of New Orleans:
Speaking from my heart, he should have utilized anything that rolled to get people out of the city. Including school buses. Then I switch on my brain and discover some (possibly big) obstacles.
1) Probably not enough city personnel to actually force/encourage/convince all people to evacuate.
2) And the far bigger problem:
Where´s the destination of these buses?
If you order an evacuation, you should have prepared shelters somewhere. You just can´t throw them out somewhere in a field. Those shelters should have been prepared by state and federal authorities. (Federal because of the sheer amount of people.)
And where are the ambulances to transport all the sick and disabled persons? Not to mention the hospitals prepared to accept the patients?
According to this article that problem remained unsolved.
Just last year [2004], FEMA hired a private company, IEM Inc. of Baton Rouge, to help conduct an eight-day drill for a fictional Category 5 hurricane in New Orleans named Pam. It included staging a helicopter evacuation of the Superdome, a prediction of 15 feet of water in parts of the city and the evacuation of 1-million people.
But the second part of the company’s work – to design a plan to fix unresolved problems, such as evacuating sick and injured people and housing thousands of stranded residents – never occurred because the funding was cut.
I don´t know if he could have done anymore after the hurricane. Without communications and without much help from outside I doubt it.
Now on the Governor of Louisiana:
I admit I don´t know that much about the powers of a governor. In my opinion she could have done more with the National Guard. And she should have started to provide some shelters for people from New Orleans in Baton Rouge for example. And then telling the mayor of NOLA to send some buses there. Ordering all she could on her own and then following that up by a loud scream for federal and other states assistence and help.
Of course according to this article:
New Mexico Gov. Bill Richardson offered Louisiana Gov. Kathleen Blanco help from his state’s National Guard last Sunday, the day before Hurricane Katrina hit Louisiana. Blanco accepted, but paperwork needed to get the troops en route didn’t come from Washington until late Thursday.
Reading this I´m not sure if she could have gotten more help in time?
Now to the Federal level:
Sorry Charles!!!
Watching it I got the distinct feeling that nobody was in charge at that level. Total confusion and bureaucrats trying to cover their a**es by forbiding anything not following their established rules and timetables. Just read all the articles where FEMA officials disapproved of private help and initiative.
According to the Stafford Act
Immediately upon his declaration of a major disaster or emergency, the President shall appoint a Federal coordinating officer to operate in the affected area.
That declaration happened on August 27.
WHO was the Federal coordinating officer?
I sure couldn´t discover him watching TV!
Not to mention the delay in accepting foreign help. Like those Canadian specialized disaster aid teams or the Dutch dyke/levee experts offered days ago.
Things only started to move after Bush and Rice (and I don´t know who else) returned to Washington at the end of last week.
Are you telling me that your federal agencies can´t function without explicit orders by a cabinet member? If the top members of your administration have a vacation, nobody else dares to make decisions?
—
WOW!!!
You should tell Osama Bin Laden that he is required to announce any future terrorist act inside the USA a week in advance. Obviously 2-3 days advance warning (in case of a natural disaster) isn´t enough time for the Department of Homeland Security to start moving. Especially during vacation time. And it would help if he would post his warning in triplicate too!
I apologize for the last few sentences in advance!
But reading and hearing the apologies for the disorganized Federal aid efforts, I couldn´t resist.
a straightforward answer to your question:
*If a Bush adminstration official lies, smears others, or attempts to distract the public from any assessment of accountability, then it’s not politicizing–it’s standing strong behind Fearless Leader.
*If a Republican, Democrat, independent, or human being comments upon the reality of the situation, questions the incompetence that will result in thousands of dead people, or demands more effective action, that’s politicizing.
Silly Hilzoy. It’s really quite simple.
Just an addition to my earlier comment.
Northern Command isn’t happy
According to them BBCWorld published an interview with NorthCom Lt. Commander Sean Kelly. The Command responsible for supporting the Gulf coast in case of disasters.
According to them:
Northcom started planning before the storm even hit. We were ready when it hit Florida, because, as you remember, it hit the bottom part of Florida, and then we were planning once it was pointed towards the Gulf Coast.
So, what we did, we activated what we call ‘defense coordinating officers’ to work with the states to say, ‘OK, what do you think you will need?’ And we set up staging bases that could be started.
We had the USS Bataan sailing almost behind the hurricane so once the hurricane made landfall, its search and rescue helicopters could be available almost immediately So, we had things ready.
The only caveat is: we have to wait until the president authorizes us to do so. The laws of the United States say that the military can’t just act in this fashion; we have to wait for the president to give us permission.”
Detlef–
“Just in case anyone is interested. :)”
I am, for one. Thanks for your reports.
Sorry to be off-topic here but anyone notice that Bush has just announced his nomination of John Roberts to succeed Rhenquist as Chief Justice?
What next?
Charles: “I agree that the Bush administration is trying to put their best political face on this, but it doesn’t take away your own attempts to politicize this tragedy by putting all of your ire and focus on the federal government and not on all levels where it belongs.”
I have posted two (2) explanations of what I think counts as politicization and what I think does not. You responded that you thought that I had a double standard, since I wasn’t blaming local and state officials. I explained why I hadn’t yet posted on that, though I am prepared to do so when I know more. You haven’t replied to that. So I’m wondering: do you think my explanation is wrong? If so, why? If not, why go on calling what I’m doing politicization?
Also, Charles: is it your view that a failure to post on something implies anything at all about what one does or does not think about it, or how seriously one takes it?
Charles has been posting on Katrina, but at RedState.
Jackmormon: yeah, I know. The point of the question was rather: I haven’t said anything about the state and local governments, other than that when I understand that part of the story well enough, I will be perfectly willing to blame anyone who deserves it. Charles seems to think that my not having said anything is not, as I said yesterday, due to my not having a handle on the situation, plus thinking the federal response is more important (since the feds will be involved in all disasters while the NO and LA governments will not), but a sign that I am politicizing things. After writing my first comment (what about my explanation don’t you accept?). it occurred to me that drawing conclusions about someone’s views on stuff from the fact that they haven’t posted on it (“you have posted on an annoying article by Rich Lowry, but not on the Black Death, so obviously you think that Lowry’s errors are more important than the death of a large chunk of the population of Europe!”) is something we normally don’t do here: we take it for granted that one can’t post on everything. But it seems to me that it’s hard to make sense of Charles’ remark without the idea that you can, in fact, draw these sorts of inferences from someone’s failure to post on something. So I wanted to see if he thought that.
BTW, to those who carry water for the ridiculous notion that the Democrats don’t have any ideas:
Choke on it.
In that Redstate post of Charles, he says this:
Which coincidentally also happens to say that NY had Republicans, while Louisiana, alas, had only Democrats.
It’s less easy to worship Rudy if you lived under him as Mayor, and watched him defend everything from black people being pumped full of bullets time after time for being black while holding a wallet or a lighter or not having a broomstick shoved up their a** or something, or who concluded in the mid-Nineties that he was insane when he announced the contstruction of a new hundred-million-dollars (or so) Emergency Center to be built many stories above ground as part of the World Trade Center complex; everyone I talked to at the time — after we were all shattered by the 1992 attack on the WTC — couldn’t make sense of it other than to explain it must be drugs (alternatively, corruption, but Rudy’s managed to stay fairly clean on that), and, yes, that was our reaction at the time.
And Pataki! Sheesh. The guy is a cloud of cotton created by Al D’Amato as his brainless handpuppet. Give me a frigging break. Guiliani at least thinks for himself while he’s bouncing off walls, trying to shut down museums for offending him with art, screaming in anger at people, cursing them, or trying to “get” them. I have at least some respect for the man. Pataki, on the other hand, barely exists at all.
From Anarch’s link:
Yeah, this will really go over with the folks who were so concerned about nonexistent voter fraud in Georgia that they had to radically restrict the forms of valid ID that could be used at the polls. These middle-class white guys all kept asking each other “Do you know anybody who doesn’t have photo ID? I sure don’t!”
Remember, it is worse for folks to get stuff they don’t deserve than it is for deserving folks to be denied.
What I keep wanting to know is the answer to this question?
It’s not particularly addressed at Democrats, mind. Not at all.
Charles has been posting on Katrina, but at RedState.
In an earlier thread I had predicted the response would be to “maximize blame placed on Democrats, minimize blame placed on Republicans, while simultaneously decrying politicization”. He claimed I was “writing from ignorance and prejudice”.
Turns out one of us was, and it wasn’t me.
What I keep wanting to know is the answer to this question?
And it’s a damn good question. I’m terribly afraid I know the answer but since it’s too obvious — and too horrible — I’ll forebear.
Turns out one of us was, and it wasn’t me.
If that had been at all surprising, I’d totally be giving you mad propz right now 😉
Tad—
Thank you for your kind words!
I´m furious! Hopping mad!
Guess I´m just one of these orderly Germans looking for a PLAN, someone in charge. 🙂
It´s common practise in Germany that once a huge natural disaster happens we look for coordination from the federal level.
Looking back at the (really surprising) floodings of the river Elbe back in 2002, in less than 1-2 days we had a clearly established command and control structure. Including town, state and federal authorities. Not to mention the army and NGOs. Published in the media so everyone wanting to help knew which phone numbers to call.
Granted, it was a much smaller disaster than “Katrina”. But that it took you almost a week to coordinate the American aid efforts given American resources puzzled/amazed/frightened us.
Given the resources of the USA and the forewarning of the hurricane weather stations, THIS is the best FEMA could do?
“…the forewarning of the hurricane weather stations,”
In fairness — now that I’ve posted what seems like 900 articles criticizing the authorities — it needs to be noted now and again that the Gulf Coast gets multiple hurricane warnings a year, and multiple hurricanes a year, and if they evacuated each time there was a clear warning of a major hurricane that’s going to strike, they’d be doing so a few times a year. This is a case of people getting used to hurricanes and hurricane warnings on a regular basis, and reacting accordingly.
There’s endless valid criticism to be made here, and heads should duly roll, but it shouldn’t happen on the basis of pure hindsight.
Gary Farber–
I don’t know why you’re so hard on Giuliani. I think Mr. Bird has a point. After all, if Giuliani were president, this whole show would have been run by his trusted sidekick, the omnicompetent and incorruptible Bernard Kerik.
oops–
I think I got my “omni-” and my “in-” switched around there.
it needs to be noted now and again that the Gulf Coast gets multiple hurricane warnings a year
The Gulf Coast is threatened by hurricanes several times a year, but it isn’t threatened by category 5 hurricanes several times a year:
So if the standard was “if any storm that was ever a category 5 comes within a day or two of the coast, evacuate”, you would be evacuating some area of the US on average once every three and half years or so, as an absolute upper limit, and probably much less often.
Well, at least unless the Atlantic warms up a few more degrees and they have to add category 6…
In all seriousness, I think I’ve seen counts as high as 15 distinct versions of [the story that FEMA actively prevented aid from reaching NOLA].
For those of you who haven’t seen it already, this collection of links at dKos is kind of staggering. I mean, I’d seen or heard of most of these things, but put them all together like that…
“…but it isn’t threatened by category 5 hurricanes several times a year….”
Indeed, and the warning turned out to be wrong insofar as a cat-5 didn’t end up hitting New Orleans, as I understand it. It instead diminished and hit as a Category 4, as well as having taken that jag right, which goes to show the unpredictability of the thing.
Detlef:
Here in the Netherlands it is the same; we assume the government will take appropriate action. So far, they did.
But, all those people in the US who were rooting for a strong government with extended power in the War On Terrorism (including CB): Suppose the levees were not breached by storm but blown op by terrorists; flooding without warning or evacuation! Wasn’t dep. of Homeland Security designed to deal with this? It has been a key point of Bush policy.
You too, Charles B, cannot be satisfied with the present way of dealing with disaster.
Morning all,
Typhoon 14 is off the coast of Kagoshima, moving at about 20k an hour, so we should be able to say hello mid-morning. Will give it y’all’s regards.
Taking the title of the post to heart, I hope you will excuse some tin-foil hat speculation.
I think you will see an interesting thing occur in regards to the Bush CYA campaign. I see the strategy as to shore up Nagin and make Blanco the bad guy. It might not be too hard to do, Nagin was a registered Republican and shifted his affiliation just before he entered the mayoral race as well as controversial endorsement of Bobby Jindahl, the Republican candidate for governor and I think you’ll see (or are seeing?) Nagin next to Bush on every photo op, and he’ll be brought into the inner circle and be told that the Feds want to help more, but were blocked by the governor’s decisions.
I think this is why you have the claims from Nagin about Bush and Blanco being unable to come to some agreement on federal control of the disaster. It seems to me that the plan (which included having Rumsfeld, Myers and Condi show up) was have Blanco turn everyone over to the Feds, and soon, the taps would be opened. Nagin on CNN described Bush’s explanation as Blanco being given two choices on AirForce One on the first visit and Blanco needing 24 hours.
It would be useful to know precisely what those two choices were (and interesting that if it was so gd important, why didn’t Bush lay the two options out publically instead of talking about swinging on Trent Lott’s porch or how everyone in Houston went over to N’Awlins to over-enjoy himself), and I imagine them to be having the state gov completely cut out and turn over all command and control functions to the Feds or turn over the resources as a lump to state officials and let them handle the effort. For the former, you would have probably seen military units with embedded reporters a la Desert Storm, with some information officer helpfully explaining why the local officials screwed up, while with the latter, you would have seen numerous examples of ‘following to rule’, where the Feds would basically dump all the assets and then go on TV saying they can’t understand why this mountain of MREs is not getting out. This strategy would be made easier by the mass of political appointees in FEMA.
That Blanco seems to have (according to Nagin) punted makes either of these options difficult, so the next step is to try to have the mayor explode against Blanco and play both sides against the middle as well as portray Blanco as an indecisive woman (note the highlighted quote). I’ve grown pessimistic enough to think that this might work, as you have a virtual hit squad of RW bloggers who have set the groundwork for a character assassination of Blanco and one could bring up sub rosa those notions of women not really being up to the task and such (an attack which would also be effective on Mary Landrieu, btw). Already, maximum effort is being placed into obsfucating the timeline, and we will see narrow readings of particular laws invoked to justify federal non-response. Furthermore, Anarch’s DKos link above shows the sort of “work to rule” that will continue to hamper efforts. This ironically appeals to small goverment types who will make assertions like this:
After decades of Democrats attempting to utterly destroy the federal system of government on which this country was founded, people like Kathleen Blanco and Ray Nagin freeze in the face of disaster. They no longer do what they need to do at the state and local level to help their citizens. Instead, they look for the federal government to come step in and save them. The federal government as our great American mommy has utterly and completely failed us. (from the Redstate link above)
The only satisfaction we would get would be to see some have to eat their words about the character assasination of Nagin, but cognitive dissonance coupled with a refusal to defend their positions after posting or commenting should alleviate any difficulties they feel.
Of course, to point this out is to be pro-hurricane, I suppose.
hilzoy,
ackmormon: yeah, I know. The point of the question was rather: I haven’t said anything about the state and local governments, other than that when I understand that part of the story well enough, I will be perfectly willing to blame anyone who deserves it.
I´ve read his post on redstate.org after it was mentioned here.
Sorry to say it but his post is b*llsh*t!!!
Just to say it, I´m a German, and I simply don´t care about your American political affiliations. 🙂
—-
Let´s start looking at this diary from an “Old European” wimpy way.
The list of differences between post-9/11 New York City and post-Katrina New Orleans is a long one. One was an atrocity, the other a tragedy, for example.
Very right!
One might also mention that the atrocity happened 4 years ago. And that 4 years later the Department of Homeland Security still can´t protect American citizens from natural disasters even with 2-4 days forewarning. One wonders how the DHS might protect American citizens now from an “atrocity”?
Given that they can´t protect them from a “tragedy” (with forewarning)?
One might also ask why New Orleans is called a “tragedy” here? Tragedy normally describes something “unavoidably”. Like the Tsunami in SE Asia for example. The New Orleans disaster wasn´t unavoidably IMO. It was pretty clear what might happen given a hurricane of cat. 4 or 5 strenght. Avoiding that disaster though would have needed vigorous state and federal help.
One struck a relatively small area, the other struck pretty much an entire city.
Yery big sigh!!!
Obviously Charles Bird doesn´t understand the difference between “a relatively small area” and “an entire city”.
In the first case, you still have the resources inside the city available. Like police, fire fighters, ambulances…
Communications and the help of the state around of that “relatively small area”.
In the second case, you have to deal with a city and all the surrounding area destroyed by a hurricane.
One was evil, the other a force of nature. And so on and so forth.
Charles!
Just go into your cellar, okay?
Don´t forget your duct tape.
If your DHS can´t deal with “a force of nature” (with forewarning), why do you suppose it can deal with “evil” in the future?
But the difference that floats to the top of my list is leadership. New York City had it and New Orleans does not. New Orleans does not have its own version of Rudy Giuliani.
I can´t really answer that.
Since Giuliani only had to deal with the twin towers? The rest of the city stayed intact?
How would Giuliani have reacted if 80% of his city was under water and he couldn´t reach anyone because communications where down?
New York State has a Pataki and Louisiana does not.
Don´t know anything about Pataki…
Exacerbating the situation further, George W. Bush was a better leader after 9/11 than after Katrina.
If you mean that a lot of the world supported him after 9/11 before he insulted them all before the Iraq war…..
You´re right! 🙂
When the terrorists struck, Giuliani understood immediately the nature of the attacks and what needed to be done. He put himself in charge, front and center, and he used all resources available to help the city recover, including his own bully pulpit.
See above.
There is a difference between striking the “twin towers” and destroying a whole city.
Many coastal areas evacuate for Cat 3s, but comparing anywhere else to New Orleans is not a good idea in the first place. I wouldn’t want to be anywhere near the ocean when a Cat 3 hit. You don’t want to be the first thing the wall of wind and water runs into. Even being on the downwind side of an inland lake can buy you a lot more damage than the people across the water.
We’re going to have to see several more years’ worth of data to judge whether this is a trend or not. So far, we haven’t seen a decade of hurricanes that matches the 1940s. THAT there decade, that was Global Warming. Still, we’ve got quite a hunk of this decade left.
Having unfairly criticized CB yesterday, today I’m feeling a little more circumspect. I don’t know enough about Louisiana politics to know who is what — party labels often have very different meanings at lower levels, and in the South — or to know what authorities and capabilities the governor really had.
It does seem to me that the first failure here was state/local. And it’s not a failure of personality, but of the current civic paradigm. I strongly suspect that one reason, maybe the main reason, the state/city didn’t send all available busses into NO as the storm approached, was that there was no place to put the people. Certainly no one was setting up facilities for 100,000 more poor refugees, and no locality within La. would have put up with it. Paying refugees they’ll take, but until a flood hits, the charitable impulse is not strong enough to overcome bigotry/apathy. The city of NO obviously couldn’t have solved this question: any solutions would be beyond its jurisdiction, and way beyond its capabilities. Whether the state has the legal authority to do so, I think it’s fair to say that it did not have the political authority to do so.
And this isn’t a knock on Louisiana: I don’t think Maryland has a plan for housing say 100,000 residents of Baltimore who live below the poverty line for six days, much less six weeks or longer, in the event of a dirty bomb or something equivalent. I don’t think any state can take on this many poor people (most of whom are African-American) — both in absolute and relative numbers — for anything more than a day. If that. It’s just not who we actually are right now, or who we’ve ever been.
Maybe we will someday be a people capable of this. And I guess we’re now going to get a chance to see.
As for FEMA and the President — I’m not sure there is such thing as too cynical here. My own feeling is that the Base wasn’t really fired up until there were looters, and people dying publicly and needlessly at the Civic Center. This offended two different self-images the Base has, and had to be rectified. The President will completely succeed in vindicating the Base’s self-image in a few more days, and all will be well again in Bushworld.
Rob,
I raised exactly the same points after you posted your comment, I believe.
New Orleans got hours, days of forewarning of the incoming hurricane. Unlike a terrorist attack.
And don´t confuse “strong American government” with a “government fighting against terrorism”.
Seems that we define things differently.
I’m curious about Cheney. Where is he? Is he dead and no one has noticed yet? When 911 happened Bush looked like the strong decisive leader because he did the media events and Cheney did the work. In this mess Bush looks like a twat because he is doing the media events and no one is doing the work. So where is Cheney and why hasn’t he been out saving Bush’s butt?
So far, we haven’t seen a decade of hurricanes that matches the 1940s. THAT there decade, that was Global Warming. Still, we’ve got quite a hunk of this decade left.
Not according to this:
[See also the deadliest and costliest lists, very few of which are from the 1940s.]
Not according to this
Satellites didn’t start monitoring them until the ’60s…so who knows?
To all those criticizing DHS for not being prepared:
That’s really unfair. See, DHS doesn’t need to be ready for terrorist attacks. That’s why we’re fighting them Over There, remember? So they can’t attack us at home?
Our only mistake was neglecting to attack the homeland of hurricanes as well. Hmm… Katrina… You know, that sounds sort of Communist doesn’t it? Communist like… Cuba! Cuba, where they have lots of hurricanes! It all fits. I smell regime change.
There is this from Brenden Loy.
Satellites didn’t start monitoring them until the ’60s…so who knows?
The list ostensibly goes back to 1900, although I’ll grant you that it makes no claims of being perfect.
Satellites didn’t start monitoring them until the ’60s…so who knows?
The list ostensibly goes back to 1900, although I’ll grant you that it makes no claims of being perfect.
Crap. Once again I play Leibniz to Giblets’ Newton.
“So where is Cheney and why hasn’t he been out saving Bush’s butt?”
Like most of the admin, he was on vacation.
Just to clear up the record on what Mayor did or did not do:
He said today in a televised interview that after ordering a manditory evacuation of the city he sent buses around to collect people that did not have transportation. They were taken to the superdome, the refuge of last resort. He expected state or federal relief following the hurricane since his capacity to act was almost totally wiped out. He called FEMA, he called cabinet members, he called the President. Everyone promised that help would come, but none did.
I was thinking this, Anarch. You’re looking at single seasons. I’m thinking that trends are not made of single seasons.
I’d guess that prior to then, mostly they were recorded because they made landfall.
Jack Lecou–
It’s no shame to be scooped by fafblog. They are geniuses. We are not.
(Leibniz, on the other hand, was every bit the genius Newton was–but that’s a story for another day, and nowhere near as funny as fafblog).
cont’d–
I, for instance, just discovered that billmon used the phrase “Potemkin President” on his blog yesterday; I used it above, this morning, without being aware of this.
billmon is a genius. I am not. (Not that it took any *great* genius to make this particular point).
Congress will confront Katrina
WASHINGTON Congress returns in full force Tuesday to confront a legislative agenda turned on
[H]e sent buses around to collect people that did not have transportation.
This seems like exactly the right thing to do. In perfect hindsight maybe it looks like it would have been a good idea to fill up every available bus and just start driving toward Texas. Ex ante, though, that’s a very risky thing to do. You need someplace to put them, for one thing.
It makes more sense to simply do your best to get people into shelters on high ground, then wait for the storm to clear and the cavalry to arrive. The real problems started when the cavalry didn’t arrive…
Also, I’m not sure what that famous picture of drowned school buses really illustrates. They’re barely up to their wheel wells – they may even still be drivable. Maybe there was a lot more flooding after the picture was taken, but otherwise that looks like (relatively) high ground, so it may have been considered a fairly safe place to leave them.
Tad: Thanks for the sympathy. Global War on Weather (GWoW) was probably pretty low hanging fruit. Anyway, I might still be the first to spot the Cuba connection. I even have a confidential source placing Fidel and Katrina together in Prague last year.
Apparently the superdome was always considered to be the refuge of last resort. After the mayor did what he could to get those willing to go to it his city was basically wiped out. When the superdome become overcrowed he then had the police unlock the convention center as a backup refuge. It too was on high ground.
The victims of this disaster did what they could to survive both individually and collectively. There where inumerable selfless acts of heroism by citizens helping others survive and get to safety.
The problem was that the federal government, under the exective leadership of George Bush, failed. Americans died because of that failure.
ken, is your point that the federal authorities were responsible for evacuating New Orleans?
Slarti- Sometimes I read what you have to say, and hate you.
One depressing thing about this disaster is that the evacuation was successful.
No one in the neighboring localities would have accepted thousands of poor black refugees before the flood.
Slart, the feds are responsible, according to law, according to FEMA mission statement and according the federal governments own disaster relief plan to provide rapid relief to disaster areas. The city did what it could, the state probably could have done more but the state was hit hard as well. The Feds had primary responsibilty for evacuating those people trapped in New Orleans.
frank, you have to take off the bold tag
i really do like the concept that Bush needed to be elected to protect us from danger, while at the same time, we mustn’t assume Bush will be the one to rescue us danger.
what a magical world Bush defenders inhabit…
out darned -bold
help. I’ve bolded and I can’t get up!
Which law is that?
I was thinking this, Anarch. You’re looking at single seasons. I’m thinking that trends are not made of single seasons.
No, the difference appears to be that the chart I linked indicated the maximum strength of the ‘canes, while the chart you linked indicated the maximum strength of the ‘canes upon landfall. In particular, if you check the linked source from which the table was compiled, it specifically states that “Hurricanes are ranked by estimated central pressure at time of landfall.” [Additionally, this NOAA source shows 9 hurricanes in the 2004 season, the entire total of all 2001-2004 seasons on the chart you linked. In fact, it’s pretty darn obvious from a quick comparison of the numbers on the two tables that they have to be measuring different things.] The US has been extraordinarily fortune of late — or perhaps there’s something else at issue? — that most of the turbocharged hurricanes of the past ten years have vented their fury elsewhere.
Incidentally, while I recognize that I was posting single seasons, did you not notice that every one of the past five seasons (2000-2005) is in the top 10 most active single seasons of all time and that none of the 1940 seasons are? [So are 1990, 1995, 1996, 1998 for that matter.] While I recognize that that isn’t a formal decade-long average, I’d say that’s a pretty damn clear trend.
I am only occasionally bold.
Which law is that?
presumably the law that gives them the authority to put this on their web site:
The Federal Emergency Management Agency – a former independent agency that became part of the new Department of Homeland Security in March 2003 – is tasked with responding to, planning for, recovering from and mitigating against disasters.
…
As it has for more than 20 years, FEMA’s mission remains: to lead America to prepare for, prevent, respond to and recover from disasters with a vision of “A Nation Prepared.” At no time in its history has this vision been more important to the country than in the aftermath of Sept. 11th.
maybe you’d like to find the exact law and parse it. have fun. the dead need that kind of clarity.
I agree; it’s as you said: one is looking at total hurricanes and the other is looking at major hurricanes that made landfall. Two quite different things.
No, I didn’t. Because, as I pointed out, historical data for hurricanes that didn’t make landfall isn’t kept that far back.
Sweet, but that works on both sides of the discussion. If this sort of thing works for you, feel free to not participate.
Yeah, seriously slart, you cannot possibly not know that FEMA as well as the DHS were created by acts of Congress, otherwise known as “law”?
I don’t want to get all snarky on you but you have to realize by now that the responsibility for evacuating those trapped in New Orleans was primarily with the Feds.
And that “law”, exactly what legal authority does it empower FEMA with, as regards evacuations?
You know, I’m willing to give you the benefit of a doubt. But just in case, I ask you to show me, because I’m curious to see at what point authority is taken from state and local authorities and handed over to Federal authorities.
So: snark or no snark, how exactly is this supposed to work?
If this sort of thing works for you, feel free to not participate.
oh, that’s rich.
ken, is your point that the federal authorities were responsible for evacuating New Orleans?
and…
Which law is that?
and…
Sweet, but that works on both sides of the discussion. If this sort of thing works for you, feel free to not participate
Is there a point? Do you know the answer to these questions? It sounds like you do. Could you, perhaps, give the answers then?
And perhaps make a point?
You’re really not doing your cause any good with this behaviour, for which you been criticized on other threads. You are, I think, driving people away.
Nope. Hence, the continued asking of them.
It’s a simple request for information, 2shoes.
I just wish Hilzoy would publish SOMETHING about Katrina. I’m just so tired of hearing about the WORST NATIONAL DISASTER of our lifetimes from the Center/Right posters of this site, Von and Sebastian and Charlesbird etc., stop creating new threads about it, it’s just exhausting!
You know, I’m willing to give you the benefit of a doubt. But just in case, I ask you to show me, because I’m curious to see at what point authority is taken from state and local authorities and handed over to Federal authorities.
I haven’t been able to read through this yet, but here’s the National Response Plan. The main difficulty is that the bulk of it is written assuming that a Incident of National Significance which overwhelms the resources of the local government hasn’t happened (e.g. Federal authorities are supposed to provide “supplemental assistance” which has entirely the wrong connotations for a disaster like Katrina). Someone with better chops than I will have to search through it to find out what it says about evacuation procedures.
You know, I’m willing to give you the benefit of a doubt. But just in case, I ask you to show me, because I’m curious to see at what point authority is taken from state and local authorities and handed over to Federal authorities.
The National Response Plan.
Seems like just yesterday I posted this link. Oh right, I did. The answer to the question is “when the Federal Government decides it’s warranted”, otherwise known as an Incident of National Significance.
It’s more complicated than that, 2shoes. There are several variants of INS that do not necessitate the transfer from state and local authorities to Federal ones, at least as far as I can tell based on my preliminary read.
I’ve seen that, 2shoes. Which part of that do you think gives FEMA the authority to supercede local authority in this instance?
Slart, here is quote from the DHS web site under the tab for disasters and emergencies.
‘In the event of a terrorist attack, natural disaster or other large-scale emergency, the Department of Homeland Security will assume primary responsibility on March 1st for ensuring that emergency response professionals are prepared for any situation. This will entail providing a coordinated, comprehensive federal response to any large-scale crisis and mounting a swift and effective recovery effort.’
I am sure this reflects the ‘law’ that established this departments function.
A document released in December of 2004, outlined in its entirety the Federal Governments responsibility for providing relief and specifically stated that they will not wait for local authorities to act or give authorization.
slart, you and people like you are the reason people died in New Orleans.
ken: completely out of line. Stop it.
Cut Slart some slack, here. He’s only asking the same questions that Bush Administration officials spent, oh, 3 days after the floodwaters drowned New Orleans asking.
Because it’s very important to know exactly what the law mandates and when. The Bush Admin is widely and well-known for its painstaking legality.
We certainly can’t have “the Country’s CEO” interpreting laws any old whichway he wants, can we? Good heavens, what if he decided to suspend habeus corpus, or the 4th and 5th Amendments? There’d be hell to pay!
And if the Bush Administration couldn’t find a law requiring Federal assistance to a devastated disaster area where thousands were dying, in three days’ worth of legal research, I doubt any of us can.
Good point, Slart!
Larry Johnson has Gov. Blanco’s letter requesting federal aid here. I can’t dissect this stuff, but maybe the lawyers here can.
Also, speaking of the National Response plan, will someone please read pages v through vii, then read this response to this comment, and explain to me why anyone on that site takes the responder seriously?
There would be no reason to have FEMA if FEMA wasn’t supposed to help state and local governments with major projects like evacuations. I’m really stunned that this role would even be questioned. If fact it is so obviously a Federal responsiblity that there might not be a site that says FEMA does evacuations for the same reason that there is not likely to be a site that says “during the day the sky is often blue.”.
To me the bottom line is that Bush had a responisibity to put a competent person in charge of FEMA, and he failed to do it. FEMA’s screwups flow from the bad appointment. The levee breakage isn’t, at least to my knowledge, clearly Bush’s fault–partly it’s the fault of administration decisions, but there are other decisions over many many years that contributed. The failure to get the people out before the storm appears to be mostly FEMA’s fault, for not completing their plans as sited above. Local authorities could plan ways to get people out of town but the logistics of where to take them and how they are to be sustained out of town is beyond the scope of a mayor or city concil, so a pre-storm evacuation by bus would have to planned by the state or the Feds.
The biggest screwup is the delay in rescuing people who had found their way to high ground. I really can’t see how FEMA and Bush can dodge the responisbility for that.
At risk of not Not Properly Laying The Blame, I’d like to observe that if I live somewhere, particularly an entire region, which is, we fear, likely to be relatively largely wiped out and made unlivable in 48 hours, I’d like my city government, my state government, and the federal government to all do the utmost in their power to get everyone in the region, including me, out of here.
If any of the three screw up, I will hold them faulty, and I’m really not interested in the question of which of the three, per se, has “primary” responsibility, because my perspective is that the responsibility to do what is within their power should be primary for all.
Questions about who has what power are another matter.
Slarti:
First, “ You’re looking at single seasons. I’m thinking that trends are not made of single seasons.”
but from Anarch’s data, it would appear that if you took the decade 1995-2005, there are only two years (97 and 99) that aren’t in the top 13.
Secondly, I don’t know if you read RealClimate, but I’d advise you to check out that post for the actual theory on how “anthropogenic forcing” can affect the climate.
Quoting the whole thing would be pointless, but that’s what links are for. In any event, I would really think twice before writing something that put me on the fingers-in-ears side of the “Is Global Climate Change Real?” debate.
“You are, I think, driving people away.”
Is that via pre-cognition, or are the lurkers supporting you in e-mail?
Meanwhile, demonstrating that the apple didn’t fall too far from the tree, the repugnant Barbara Bush weighs in with some words of unparalleled empathy. Said she of the refugees in the Houston Astrodome:
“And so many of the people in the arena here, you know, were underprivileged anyway, so this–this (she chuckles slightly) is working very well for them.”
Monstrous woman.
Oh, indeed: a fitting Agrippina for our own little Nero.
Sheesh. At the opposite end of the spectrum from Barbara Bush…
Slartibartfast, I apologize for lumping you in with those federal officials actually responsible for the deaths of our fellow citizens.
For me, it comes down to this. The current administration is willing to spend countless hours finessing language and finding legal ways to torture potentially innocent people for iffy military intel. On the other hand, it believes the Federal government is sadly — tragically! — bound by the fine letter of the law to let its own citizens die in a sewage-infested hellhole.
Imagine how many lives might’ve been saved if such daring legal know-how had been applied in this case.
First, about ken’s comment: consider me. I write long answers to questions (this will be one), that have sub-parts a, b, c, etc; long parenthetical remarks on unrelated topics like Turkish pronunciation, ludicrous examples, and so on. If one could assume that I would behave exactly the same way in an emergency as I behave on this blog, then any of you might say: hilzoy, in the time it takes you to answer a simple question, hundreds of people could drown. Maybe thousands. — But so what? There’s no reason at all to make the crucial assumption.
As it happens, I have one of two reactions in crises: either I am efficient and level-headed (and terse), or my brain shuts down and I can hardly speak, let alone do anything useful. But I never act the way I act here.
About the law: here is the section of the Homeland Security Act laying out FEMA’s responsibilities. It includes the following responsibilities:
(Note explicit reference to response plan, and explicit endorsement of FEMA’s lead role.)
So, you might ask, what is the law referred to in the first bit? It’s here. In this chapter, the basic laws governing emergency response are laid out. They include: definitions :
Procedures:
(Note: others have already linked to Larry Johnson’s version of Gov. Blanco’s request pursuant to this law; it’s on the LA state web site here. I can’t find the text of the President’s declarations just now, but Scott McClellan describes them here. So this procedure was followed, and its requirements satisfied.)
Powers:
So I think it’s pretty safe to say that when the President declares an emergency, the NRP goes into effect, and FEMA leads the emergency response, including the coordination of federal and state agencies.
I hope it goes without saying that New Orleans is in fact equipped with an evacuation plan (not to mention an catastrophic disaster plan), and that the above doesn’t say anything at all about FEMA being responsible for making sure that New Orleans adheres to it.
God forbid we should identify exactly what screwups were committed; the consequences for even trying can be pretty severe.
(ken: cross-posted with you. Thanks.)
If anyone is interested in looking up laws themselves, the easiest way I’ve found is to use the Table of Contents here, since for some reason search engines don’t seem to work for me, as far as the US Code is concerned. The code is handily arranged by topics, so it’s usually possible to find what you’re looking for without undue effort.
Slart, it is called the Stafford Act and it is cited in the letter that the Governor of LA wrote to Bush via FEMA on August 28, requesting assistance, just like she was obliged to do under the Stafford Act. 42 U.S.C. ss5121-5260. see also regs implementing same at 44 C.F.R 206. And if you want more information than that my charges for legal work are $200 hour, as I am an attorney w/ almost 30 years experience. Let me know and I’d be happy to do the research for you.
I hope it goes without saying that New Orleans is in fact equipped with an evacuation plan (not to mention an catastrophic disaster plan), and that the above doesn’t say anything at all about FEMA being responsible for making sure that New Orleans adheres to it.
When FEMA previously wargamed the scenario of a powerful hurricane striking New Orleans, how many people did they estimate would still be in the city after such an evacuation plan was put into action? Did FEMA ensure that emergency response professionals were prepared for that situation? You might also want to look up the word federal. It is not clear from your post that you understand what it means in the context it is being used in.
Slarti: if you don’t feel like paying hrc’s fees, the Stafford Act is what I cited (not the first law cite, I think, but the others.)
Shockingly, I have in fact heard of the Stafford Act. Also shockingly, I’ve read pretty much all of it, as hilzoy was kind enough to have left links to it above.
Yes, the Governor did request emergency assistance from the federal government. Believe it or not, I was actually aware of this before you (or, earlier, hilzoy) mentioned it on this thread. What this request has to do with FEMA directing evacuation, though, I have no idea.
Slart, I think you are a pretty smart guy.
Did you even read the links you gave. New Orleans did not have the resources to evacuate the estimated 140,000 people without transportation. Their plan, such as it was, was to open the superdome as the refuge of last resort and to provide bus transportation to it before any hurricane hit. That is what they said, that is what they did.
Where exactly is the screwup? The made the plans based upon the resources they had.
Do you make plans to vacation for a week at the Ritz Carlton when you only have enough money to pay for a single night at Motel 6?
hilzoy, cross 🙂
So I think it’s pretty safe to say that when the President declares an emergency, the NRP goes into effect, and FEMA leads the emergency response, including the coordination of federal and state agencies.
The complicated part is that the NRP explicitly lays out powers according to Federal, State, and local/tribal jurisdiction. This explication, however, is more or less moot in the event of an INS wherein the State or local authorities are “overwhelmed”, under which I think the coordination devolves as described above but it’s not entirely clear. Can anyone help me out here?
In re hurricance recording prior to the weather service, this implies pretty strongly that what’s changed of late is incidence of landfall, not frequency or strength of hurricanes.
So you’re saying that even though they had an evacuation plan, they knew they couldn’t execute it. Interesting. You’d think that someone would have mentioned that beforehand, and requested assistance.
Anarch, I read the whole thing and the language seems to be couched in terms of assistance, with even the direct (as opposed to financial) assistance being done at the direction of the local and state authorities. But what do I know?
To the extent that state laws or local plans contradict federal statute, federal statutes pre-empt. I find the argument that the President had his hands tied legally utterly implausible.
As far as NOLA’s lack of an evacuation plan:
they made it sound like the main Red Cross shelters were not far away, just up I-10. I think it should have been possible to give dibs at those shelters to those relying on buses, but who knows if it really was. I agree that without shelter lined up in advance, you don’t just start packing buses and sending them onto the roads. Safer in the Superdome than the interstate.
I also don’t see the inadequacy of the evacuation plan as solely the local government’s failure. The state and federal authorities were well aware. If it was a question of money–and it sounds like it was–they should have been able to get it from the feds. There is no city in the United States that needed an evacuation plan like New Orleans did. In many cases it would be stupid and not cost effective, but the hurricane-hits-NOLA was known to be THE most realistic scenario for more or less losing a U.S. city–and unlike the other nightmare scenarios, the giant California earthquakes and the nuclear attacks on NY or DC, there is advance warning. If we can afford the Don Young bridge to nowhere and the various luxurious amenities for Homeland Security in Wyoming and North Dakota, we can afford some damn buses for this. And even if THAT were not possible FEMA had ample notice that a lot of people were going to be left behind, that the levees might break, and that things could get very bad very quickly for a whole lot of people. So while I think the city and state could havedone much better, especially on the evacuation front, it doesn’t really exonerate the administration or FEMA to me.
I haven’t been back to this thread for a few hours, but I’m really unhappy that a few posters have turned Slartibartfast into a cardboard stand-in for (whatever). Enough is not known that a little politely phrased second-guessing from a regular deserves better treatment.
The main reason I read ObWi is that it tries really hard not to be partisan. Slartibartfast was asking devil’s advocate questions of a consensus that was rapidly forming among more liberal commentors. I suspect that one of the reasons that his comments have become more terse and cryptic is that he feels that commentors here will leap all over any extended and more committed comment.
I’m sure Slartibartfast can defend himself, but I’d like to plead to my fellow liberals to remember why they’re here rather than at the avowedly Democratic sites. Even if your only goal is to shame and smash Republicans of any stripe, driving Republicans/conservatives away from this site will hardly be effective: they will simply go elsewhere, convinced that there’s no use arguing with leftists.
And lo, Slartibartfast defends himself. I retire, hoping for reality-based comity.
Anarch: I’m working now not from the NRP, but from the implementing regs which hrc was kind enough to direct us to. (hrc: if you ever need an ethics consult, just ask.) Here is the table of contents for 44 C.F.R 206. In it we find:
this:
Then this:
Wow. I have to say I didn’t expect that, Jackmormon. I thank you, and affirm that you’re pretty much dead on.
Anarch: on p. 4 of the NRP, an example of an ‘Incident of National Significance’ is a major disaster or emergency as defined under the Stafford Act, which Katrina is. So I think it counts.
Here it is! I knew I’d seen this somewhere, and finally found it:
“Pursuant to 44 CFR ? 206.35, I have determined that this incident is of such severity and magnitude that effective response is beyond the capabilities of the State and affected local governments, and that supplementary Federal assistance is necessary to save lives, protect property, public health, and safety, or to lessen or avert the threat of a disaster. I am specifically requesting emergency protective measures, direct Federal Assistance, Individual and Household Program (IHP) assistance, Special Needs Program assistance, and debris removal.
– From Gov. Blanco’s letter of August 26, 2005, in which she declared a state of emergency and requested Federal assistance.
So. The state Governor makes a formal declaration of a state of emergency, and formally asks for Federal assistance, and cites the Federal law that pertains to same.
How is it possible that, that being done, there is any doubt that the Federal goverment is required to, in fact, assist?
Is there some odd little gap in the law perhaps? One that states the declaration of emergency and request for Federal assistance, even if done according to the relevant Federal law, doesn’t actually count unless the Federal government invokes some other CFR?
Is requesting disaster assistance from the Federal Government, in other words, kind of like playing Simon Says?
Maybe Slarti can answer this question.
A little reading upthread might have saved you some work. Here‘s the original, just in case.
With cleanup? With unemployment assistance? I’m sorry, exactly what part of the letter do you need help with? Maybe you can help me, in turn, with the location of those parts of the letter that are salient to your point.
Jackmormon- I can’t speak for everyone, but I get angry when Slarti gets like this. Longer comments from him would be much less likely to get me upset.
Slarti- Despite repeatedly asking for evidence you seem to not be willing to provide it yourself.
Where is your evidence that Nagin didn’t follow the N.O. evacuation plan. Where is your evidence that the evacuation failed?
I ask because I have already said the plan was successful.
from Brad Delong’s site:
City, state and federal emergency officials are preparing to give the poorest of New Orleans’ poor a historically blunt message: In the event of a major hurricane, you’re on your own. In scripted appearances being recorded now, officials such as Mayor Ray Nagin, local Red Cross Executive Director Kay Wilkins and City Council President Oliver Thomas drive home the word that the city does not have the resources to move out of harm’s way an estimated 134,000 people without transportation.
In the video, made by the anti-poverty agency Total Community Action, they urge those people to make arrangements now by finding their own ways to leave the city in the event of an evacuation. “You’re responsible for your safety, and you should be responsible for the person next to you,” Wilkins said in an interview. “If you have some room to get that person out of town, the Red Cross will have a space for that person outside the area. We can help you. “But we don’t have the transportation.”
Officials are recording the evacuation message even as recent research by the University of New Orleans indicated that as many as 60 percent of the residents of most southeast Louisiana parishes would remain in their homes in the event of a Category 3 hurricane. Their message will be distributed on hundreds of DVDs across the city. The DVDs’ basic get-out-of-town message applies to all audiences, but the it is especially targeted to scores of churches and other groups heavily concentrated in Central City and other vulnerable, low-income neighborhoods, said the Rev. Marshall Truehill, head of Total Community Action. “The primary message is that eachperson is primarilyresponsibleforthemselves, for their own family and friends,” Truehill said.
In addition to the plea from Nagin, Thomas and Wilkins, video exhortations to make evacuation plans come from representatives of State Police and the National Weather Service, and from local officials such as Sen. Ann Duplessis, D-New Orleans, and State Rep. Arthur Morrell, D-New Orleans, said Allan Katz, whose advertising company is coordinating officials’ scripts and doing the recording. The speakers explain what to bring and what to leave behind. They advise viewers to bring personal medicines and critical legal documents, and tell them how to create a family communication plan. Even a representative of the Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals weighs in with a message on how to make the best arrangements for pets left behind.
Production likely will continue through August. Officials want to get the DVDs into the hands of pastors and community leaders as hurricane season reaches its height in September, Katz said.
Believing that the low-lying city is too dangerous a place to shelter refugees, the Red Cross positioned its storm shelters on higher ground north of Interstate 10 several years ago. It dropped plans to care for storm victims in schools or other institutions in town. Truehill, Wilkins and others said emergency preparedness officials still plan to deploy some Regional Transit Authority buses, school buses and perhaps even Amtrak trains to move some people before a storm.
An RTA emergency plan dedicates 64 buses and 10 lift vans to move people somewhere; whether that means out of town or to local shelters of last resort would depend on emergency planners’ decision at that moment, RTA spokeswoman Rosalind Cook said. But even the larger buses hold only about 60 people each, a rescue capacity that is dwarfed by the unmet need. In an interview at the opening of this year’s hurricane season, New Orleans Emergency Preparedness Director Joseph Matthews acknowledged that the city is overmatched. “It’s important to emphasize that we just don’t have the resources to take everybody out,” he said in a interview in late May.
In the absence of public transportation resources, Total Community Action and the Red Cross have been developing a private initiative called Operation Brother’s Keeper that, fully formed, would enlist churches in a vast, decentralized effort to make space for the poor and the infirm in church members’ cars when they evacuate. However, the program is only in the first year of a three-year experiment and involves only four local churches so far. The Red Cross and Total Community Action are trying to invent a program that would show churches how to inventory their members, match those with space in their cars with those needing a ride, and put all the information in a useful framework, Wilkins said. But the complexities so far are daunting, she said.
The inventories go only at the pace of the volunteers doing them. Where churches recruit partner churches out of the storm area to shelter them, volunteers in both places need to be trained in running shelters, she said. People also have to think carefully about what makes good evacuation matches. Wilkins said that when ride arrangements are made, the volunteers must be sure to tell their passengers where their planned destination is if they are evacuated. Moreover, although the Archdiocese of New Orleans has endorsed the project in principle, it doesn’t want its 142 parishes to participate until insurance problems have been solved with new legislation that reduces liability risks, Wilkins said. At the end of three years, organizers of Operation Brother’s Keeper hope to have trained 90 congregations how to develop evacuation plans for their own members.
Meanwhile, some churches appear to have moved on their own to create evacuation plans that assist members without cars. Since the Hurricane Ivan evacuation of 2004, Mormon churches have begun matching members who have empty seats in cars with those needing seats, said Scott Conlin, president of the church’s local stake. Eleven local congregations of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints share a common evacuation plan, and many church members have three-day emergency kits packed and ready to go, he said. Mormon churches in Jackson, Miss., Hattiesburg, Miss., and Alexandria, La., have arranged to receive evacuees. The denomination also maintains a toll-free telephone number that functions as a central information drop, where members on the road can leave information about their whereabouts that church leaders can pick up and relay as necessary, Conlin said.
If you want to claim or imply that Nagin didn’t ask the state and the feds for resources to do better by his people provide some evidence. He has arlready said otherwise.
Internet has been in and out today, so several comments compressed into one
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I strongly suspect that one reason, maybe the main reason, the state/city didn’t send all available busses into NO as the storm approached, was that there was no place to put the people.
A wargame for a ‘Hurricane Pam’ predicted all of this, and the followup was to plan emergency services for those evacuated to the Superdome. Federal funding for that followup was cut.
========
Some comments from the NO police chief at the Times-Picayune’s weblog
“Not one of my deputy chiefs left,” said Compass, who was accompanied by the Rev. Jesse Jackson in Baton Rouge. “We had 150 officers trapped in eight feet of water. It wasn’t 150 desertions. We were fighting odds that you could not imagine. We had no food. We had no water. We ran out of ammunition. We were fighting in waist-deep water.”
and
Compass also blasted anyone who thought he was out of town during the storm or its aftermath. “I have an 8-month pregnant wife and a 3 year-old daughter who I evacuated in my police car to Denham Springs,” he said.
The police chief, who came from the ranks of NOPD to lead the department once plagued by corruption and outrageous law-breakers wearing badges, said New Orleans was overwhelmed by a tiny contingent of the worst kind of criminals — not the masses of city residents who took shelter from the storm.
I think this will be one of the big stories to be picked out, especially since the Mayor is arranging vacations for NO first responders. Note how this article focusses the point, making it seem unreasonable, but Las Vegas is an obvious destination because the infrastructure and casino links to New Orleans guarantee donations of rooms, etc.
===========
Party discipline kicks in. Sen Vitter is on CNN and just said that Bush was focussed on the crisis, but ‘the bureaucracy under him failed’.
second data point
============
Some predictions about stories
Two airlines are about to go bankrupt, Northwest, followed by a second one, because they can’t handle increased fuel costs (Northwest is in particular troublt because they are already hanging by a thread and have a fleet of relatively inefficient jets because they have postponed purchasing new ones)
A long series of lawsuits will take place over access to admin deliberations over the disaster and national guard deployment questions, with the admin declaring that they can’t be released because of national security.
A diaspora of New Orleanians will not only change the political landscape, but will result in more activism/discontent with the right in the communities they relocate to.
Aaron Broussard. Gutsy decision to open up Jeff Parish will make a difference in people and the city getting back up.
Foreign workers, especially on the Coast casinos. This article underestimates the number who were employed, I think.
Anarch: on p. 4 of the NRP, an example of an ‘Incident of National Significance’ is a major disaster or emergency as defined under the Stafford Act, which Katrina is. So I think it counts.
I know, I’ve cited it elsewhere. The problem was that I didn’t have the Stafford Act at hand, and the NRP is deliberately couched in “companionable” language (as now Slarti and I have both noted). I assumed, for a number of reasons, that an INS invoked as per CaseyL’s cite above would supercede the “companionability” clause on simple pragmatic grounds, but it’s nice to have this confirmed.
Oh no! embedded blockquotes!
CaseyL: the President can refuse the request for assistance. But in this case, he granted it. Under both the regs and the NRP (see p. 15), the feds coordinate the response in any Incident of National Significance, of which this is one. NRP, p. 7:
Hang in there, LJ. Storm should pass soon, if it hasn’t already done so.
Anarch: since I posted about half the Stafford Act, it should always be at hand now 😉
A diaspora of New Orleanians will not only change the political landscape, but will result in more activism/discontent with the right in the communities they relocate to.
Just heard on the local news that Madison’s going to be picking up about 500 (?) evacuees from Nawlins. Go us!
And on that note, I heard on MSNBC, I think it was, earlier today that due to absorbing refugees a number of states are now eligible for Federal disaster aid that weren’t otherwise eligible. They specifically mentioned Colorado and Florida as getting funds but not Minnesota, Massachussetts or (now) Wisconsin. Anyone got a list of the states now eligible?
I politicize (with bonus attempted New Testament reference!) a non-politicization of Katrina (all content in second link).
Two things: I am as I have always been (same as it ever was…), and…ok, and the second one is just petty. Consider this an effective self-editing.
You know, I think I’d look pretty goddamned silly if I were asking for that which I already had. Wouldn’t I?
You know, sometimes I feel a kinship with Gary Farber: if I hadn’t cited this very thing upthread, maybe you could assume that I hadn’t laid eyes on it before.
Aside from the numerous claims here that it did? I thought that was one point we were all in agreement on: that the evacuation was a failure. Well, here’s the plan; you tell me if you think all the steps were followed. I can point out a few things that didn’t happen, but since this isn’t a particularly well-written plan, there’s a bit of wiggle room. I suppose that at some point, Mobilize parish/local transportation to assist persons who lack transportation or who have mobility problems may have been executed to some small degree.
slarti- Small degree? They filled the stadium and sent ~25,000 people to a secondary shelter. Supposedly 80% of New Orleanians left town. The best they had ever done before was 60%. What do you want from the guy?
Just to make it clear:
“The overall strategy for dealing with a catastrophic hurricane is to evacuate as
much of the at risk population as possible from the path of the storm and
relocate them to a place of relative safety outside the projected high water
mark of the storm surge flooding and hurricane force winds.”
Everyone who got to the stadium or the convention center was sucsessfully evacuated acording to plan.
Is that via pre-cognition
Indeed. The doctors say the pineal gland in my brain is unusually sized. It’s that, or….it’s possibly via reading the comments on this website and making an educated guess.
Hence “I think”. Which, btw, is the sort of turn of phrase Slartibartfast might use.
Regardless, he has clarified that he is indeed asking these questions, repeatedly, out of sincere ignorance of the subject and my pineal gland is silent as to the truth of the matter.
Of course the question as to whether the survivors should have followed the plan by going to the designated sites is a completely different one. I would have to answer in the negative.
Probably no US evacuation in the future will be as sucessful as this one since now the survivors will know that they will be on their own.
For Georges. A Category 2. I’m thinking there’s not much of a comparison, here.
It’s not important or even relevant what I want from the guy, Frank. I do think when assembling the blame team, though, that it’s important to include a few representatives who are actually responsible.
I suspect that one of the reasons that his comments have become more terse and cryptic is that he feels that commentors here will leap all over any extended and more committed comment.
Actually, my pineal gland is telling me that it’s because of terse and cryptic commentary that, hmm…no, not “turn on”, but rather no longer feel inclined to listen.
Perhaps if you feel you’re are being misunderstood then maybe terseness and crypticism are not the way to go?
But this is all pre-cog nonsense.
That’s just me, though.
Hopefully, the urge to eat human brains* is one you can resist, 2shoes.
Frank, that Times-Picayne article is hardly support for a strong civic evacuation drive. DVD warnings to the poor? Matched with a statement that some local churches felt that parallel plans would be better? This article doesn’t *prove* much except that certain weaknesses were foreseen, that the local authorities hoped to use busses in the event of an evacuation, and that everybody hoped to use church networks as a subsitute for government. (Yay, Mormons evacuated their own. They also have a parallel welfare system funded by a ten percent tax on their members.)
Where I agree with what I imagine you’re arguing: 80% is really an amazing evacuation rate, if it’s indeed true. (I remain agnostic about all numbers coming out of this disaster zone.)
It’s the next part that deserves argument, and it deserves civil argument, particularly now that we have reason to hope that federal relief has finally kicked in. I’m as pissed off as anyone about the week that New Orleans drowned, but it’s worth our while to think clearly about how responsibility and authority sorts out.
What kills me is that nobody seemed in control, that chain of command wasn’t clear, that available and willing resources weren’t tapped while NO drowned. This fiasco needs honest sorting out so that it can never happen again. It seems clear to me, sitting safely in my NYC apartment, that some cities simply don’t have the resources to save their populations. I would like such cities to be able to call in federal support. I would also like such callings-in to have a clear line of authority so that everybody knows who’s in control. That process is what is really in debate, I think.
I’m out for good now.
Slarti- Well no doubt. There is no one more responsible than Bush and he is always the Captain of the blame team.
I’m going to bed. My cause and I bid you all a fond adieu.
I hesitate to wade into this, but there was Ivan
(9/14/04)
In New Orleans, Mayor Ray Nagin declared a state of emergency and strongly recommended that residents evacuate immediately.
A hurricane warning was issued from Grand Isle, south of New Orleans, to Apalachicola, Florida. A hurricane warning means hurricane conditions will likely affect the area within 24 hours.
A hurricane watch remained in effect west of the warning area, from Grand Isle to Morgan City, Louisiana.
“[New Orleans] basically sits like a bowl, and most of the city is under sea level … so if we get a storm like Ivan to hit us directly” there could be 12 to 18 feet of water in the city, Nagin said.
If people can’t get out of New Orleans, the mayor said, they should do a “vertical evacuation.”
“Basically, go to hotels and high-rise buildings in the city.”
Mandatory evacuations have been issued for St. Charles and Plaquemines parishes. Officials strongly urged residents of Jefferson Parish to begin leaving.
Louisiana Gov. Kathleen Babineaux Blanco declared a state of emergency Monday, and in a news conference Tuesday urged coastal residents in designated areas to leave immediately.
However, Katrina was the first time a mandatory evacuation was ordered, so it was unprecedented. I was in Mississippi on from the 8/19-8/22 and all of the New Orleans stations were discussing the steps taken to prepare the Superdome, as well as 10 other shelters of last resort.
Indeed, while the power was working, staying in the Superdome was not too problematic.
The Superdome opened its doors at noon Sunday, and New Orleans’ most frail residents got priority. The stadium is by far the most solid of the Big Easy’s 10 refuges for the estimated 100,000 city residents who don’t have the means, or strength, to join a mandatory evacuation.
“They hadn’t opened up and let us in here, there’d have been a lot of people floating down river tomorrow,” said Merrill Rice, 64. “If it’s as bad as they say, I know my old house won’t stand it.”
Residents lined up for blocks, clutching meager belongings and crying children as National Guardsman searched them for guns, knives and drugs. It was almost 10:30 p.m. before the last person was searched and allowed in. Thornton estimated 8,000 to 9,000 were inside when the doors closed for the 11 p.m. curfew.
[snip]
Thornton worried about how everyone would fare over the next few days.
“We’re expecting to be here for the long haul,” he said. “We can make things very nice for 75,000 people for four hours. But we aren’t set up to really accommodate 8,000 for four days.”
There is also this
Gov. Kathleen Blanco this morning urged evacuees to sit tight and try not to rush back home to the New Orleans area when Hurricane Katrina begins to pass later today.
At about 9:30 a.m., the storm was about 30 miles southeast of New Orleans and heading north.
“It will be impossible for you to get where you need to go – undoubtedly,” she said as roadways flooded and tress came down across south Louisiana.
“Too many people stayed as far as we are concerned,” she said. “Please be patient and stay away. Be safe.”
The governor said evacuees should wait for an all-clear from their parish officials.
Both of these suggest that Blanco and Nagin succeeded in providing the first line of defense, but it was the breeched levee, coupled with the absence/inability of Guard response that takes the main blame.
Also look at this link and the date.
The National Guard’s solid response to Hurricane Katrina demonstrates that the Guard is still fully capable of responding to stateside emergencies while supporting the war in terror overseas, the chief of the National Guard Bureau told the American Forces Press Service today.
Army Lt. Gen. H. Steven Blum described the thousands of Army and Air National Guard troops called to active duty in Louisiana, Mississippi, Alabama, Florida and other states to support hurricane operations as a testament to the Guard’s ability to carry out its federal and state missions simultaneously.
Guard members along the Gulf Coast are performing a variety of missions, from providing security at the emergency shelter at the New Orleans Superdome, where thousands of local residents are seeing refuge from Hurricane Katrina, to assisting with emergency evacuations.
As the storm’s fury begins to wane, the Guard will begin providing a wide range of other support: helping law enforcement agencies with security and traffic control; transporting and distributing food, water and ice; conducting searches and rescues; providing generator support; and carrying out other missions to support live and property.
This roundup points out the preparations made and the grinding poverty of those who were trapped.
So you’re saying that even though they had an evacuation plan, they knew they couldn’t execute it. Interesting. You’d think that someone would have mentioned that beforehand, and requested assistance.
No, that’s what you’re saying. I’m saying that, instead of ensuring that emergency response professionals were prepared for any situation (and you have cited information that claims this is their responsibility), FEMA did not even ensure that emergency response professionals were prepared for entirely predictable situations forecast well in advance. They did not ensure that emergency response professionals were prepared to deal with courses of action they themselves recommended. They didn’t do their damn job.
The reasons? Nothing new, just the incompetence and ideology of the Bush administration.
Come back after a few days away and you find just insane stuff – Derbyshire on the greater need of African-Americans for moral guidance, via Atrios. Glad at least ObWi hasn’t burned down.
OK, let me get this straight. The reason that Bush is not to be blamed here is because the Mayor and/or governor didn’t fill out a 27B/6? Good luck with that one guys.
More politicizing Katrina from RedState.
Just in case anyone is curious, and hasn’t already figured it out, Google has recent (31 Aug) satellite snaps of New Orleans. For example, a different perspective on the famous school bus photo: before and after. Also, yachts. (Won’t someone think of the yachts?)
Thanks for the troll-pointing, J, and hope you don’t mind that I cleaned up your comments with theirs. I figured they were disposable, having served their purpose.
Thanks for the troll-pointing, J, and hope you don’t mind that I cleaned up your comments with theirs.
Of course not. Thanks for the cleanup work.
Oops.
Rove Building Political Levees
Thanks to Hilzoy for clearing this up. Because if you listen to the conservative right you would think the liberals are the only ones politicalizing Katrina. Most interesting is the fact that the media still seems to be Bush cheerleaders,
Rove Building Political Levees
Thanks to Hilzoy for clearing this up. Because if you listen to the conservative right you would think the liberals are the only ones politicizing Katrina. Most interesting is the fact that the media still seems to be Bush cheerleaders,
Conversely: non-politicization of Katrina.
Jes: I just cleaned up one of your spam pointers too, after reading that it was OK.
About the RedState story: by the time either the liberal or the conservative blog donation thingos had appeared, I had already given directly through the Red Cross. As, I assume, had a lot of people.
some quick thoughts.
it seems to me that the City’s plan for dealing with a hurricane of providing a central facility or two is entirely reasonable. After all, the Mayor cannot force people to leave their homes nor force other cities to make space and transportation available.
the State should have probably done more to protect transportation assets. Once it was clear that the storm would be a monster it was likely already too late to start moving large numbers of people. but getting buses to high shelter should have been a priority.
once the storm was through and the levees went, i don’t understand what anybody expected from the Mayor. His city was underwater and his too-small police force was overwhelmed.
now, as between the state and the feds I don’t know who has the power to deploy Guardsmen. That is a key question. Obviously only the feds can deploy US military assets, and those seem to have moved very slowly except for certain Coast Guard units.
but the responsibility for extracting the thousands of people left stranded has to be laid at FEMA’s doorstep. That’s what we have it for, to bring the power of the several states to bear when a single state is overwhelmed.
to the conservatives objecting to the liberals’ attack on FEMA, what were the deficiencies of the state and local response? what should have been done differently?
As has been pointed out, the liberal one is an single donation account, the conservative one an aggregated list.
In any event, the desire to wipe certain smug grins off certain smug faces was strong enough to make me donate there even though I’ve already donated once.
Oh, and to respond to Slaritbartfast in a way that I think is appropriate:
The evacuation of the city was, in my opinion, a State and Municipal responsibility and, for whatever reason, (not helped by Nagin being a schmuck) they dropped the ball.
After the hurricane hit and wiped out the infrastructure, it became far more than State resources could reasonably handle and demanded a full and prompt federal response. This did not happen.
Saying that everyone deserves to be raked over the coals for this does not let Bush or the feds off lightly at all. This was a massive failure at every level.
The governor of the state in question. To import NG from other states, there has to be a request put to the governor(s) of the state(s) in question.
… because the Mayor and/or governor didn’t fill out a 27B/6?
Aha! FEMA is being run by the Vogons!
Exactly.
To import NG from other states, there has to be a request put to the governor(s) of the state(s) in question.
And which must also be approved by the White House. The holdup of which is why the New Mexico Guard was delayed for a number of days.
The governor of the state in question. To import NG from other states, there has to be a request put to the governor(s) of the state(s) in question.
I’m fairly sure that all the affected states were requesting NG presence in the 28th-29th, since CNN was talking about that sort of thing, but I don’t have a cite offhand.
Perhaps the part: I am specifically requesting emergency protective measures, direct Federal Assistance,..
Perhaps Blanco was negligent for failing to list all the possible avenues for assistance and protective measures, but since FEMA’s early notable accomplishments seem to have been in keeping aid from arriving to those who needed it and in not providing significant protective measures, the point is probably moot.
With a federal response like this, it would behoove state governors (especially in hurricane areas) to nix any more requests for National Guard for Iraq. It looks like you better hold on to any resources you’ve got because you’re going to need them.
Politicizing Frances.
Lost In Translation
Although the images do show Bush visiting a New Orleans food distribution point, there is nothing in the New Orleans segment that suggests the distribution point had been specifically set up for Bush, and in fact nothing that even represents his visi…
The “At All Levels” post is broken…
It was broken from the moment it was conceived…
If by broken you mean “misleading, factually-challenged, and filled with more hackery than a Counterstrike LAN party,” then yes, it’s broken.
Ok, I can get to it again. Lately it seems as if a lot of the web is run by FEMA.
JMM on what the admin thinks firefighters are best at. I hope those responsible receive justice.
I’m not sure why political pundits would balk at being accused of “politicizing” this event. That’s what they do. ESPN focused on the impact this would have on the area sports teams and didn’t take the time to worry about whether they were sporticizing Katrina.
At the same time, I’m not sure why this would be an accusation, as if it were something to be ashamed of. Unless they happen to live nearby, the only way most pundits can help is with their wallet, and most that I read at least already have and will continue to do so. That still leaves plenty of time to focus on the political aspects of the situation, which is again what political pundits do.
Aha! FEMA is being run by the Vogons!
Ral – get your movie references right, damnit!
ladan: I’m not sure why political pundits would balk at being accused of “politicizing” this event.
Because, uniformly, the right-wing blogosphere seems to call it “politicizing” if you criticize Bush.