The scapegoat has teeth
By jkelly
Irish Pennants
Michael Brown, FEMA's former chieftain, didn't just take abuse at yesterday's hearing on Katrina response before the House Government Affairs Committee. Apparently, he gave as good as he got.
One of Brown's interrogators was Rep. William Jefferson (D-La). I thought that was priceless, given that Jefferson is under investigation by the FBI, and was responsible for diverting National Guardsmen from rescue missions to recover property from his New Orleans home.
I don't think Brown had the qualifications to be head of FEMA, and I think he made mistakes. But the bulk of what he had to say rang true for me.
Democrats apparently are rethinking their plan to boycott Congressional investigations into Katrina, I suspect because they fear future witnesses will have similar unpleasant things to say about officials in New Orleans and Louisiana.
Meanwhile, the Washington Times joins the LA Times and the New Orleans Times-Picayune in writing a critical story of media rumor-mongering about the convention center.
There are, however, three stories that I think will never appear in the MSM:
1. A comparison of the federal response time in Katrina to the federal response time in earlier hurricanes.
2. A description of Brown's performance in earlier natural disasters.
3. A contrast between how governors in Mississippi, Alabama, Florida and Texas responded to hurricanes, and how the governor of Louisiana did. Nor do I expect anyone in the MSM to note that the governors of Mississippi, Alabama, Florida and Texas are all Republicans, while the governor of Louisiana is not.
Update: What he said
John Hinderaker of Power Line has said what I think about this better than I have:
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Of those who participated in the hearing, Brown was by far the most impressive. Democratic Congressman William Jefferson of Louisiana was his party's designated hit-man, but it was painfully evident that his opening speech was a filibuster. He didn't dare stop talking for fear that Brown would have an opportunity to answer his questions. But it wasn't just the Democrats; "Republican" Congressman Christopher Shays, too, was an ill-informed disgrace.
It's hard to say what a marginally-informed citizen would make of the Katrina hearing, but my own impression was that the only person in the room who had any idea what he was talking about was Michael Brown. Many years ago, I harbored a prejudice against public employees and politicians. After I spent several decades working in the private sector, in constant contact with the public sector, I realized that both politicians and civil servants are much more capable than I had assumed--fully equal to leaders in the private sector, and sometimes superior. So it doesn't shock me that the head of FEMA is far more articulate in discussing emergency preparedness than the often dim-witted Congressmen who yammered at him.
No doubt FEMA's performance was imperfect. What else is new? But Michael Brown didn't flood New Orleans. Nor did he fail to order a mandatory evacuation. Nor, when the order was finally given by the appropriate authorities, was he the one who failed to carry it out competently. I thought it was a mistake when President Bush cashiered Brown, and his performance tonight validates that judgment. FEMA's position is eminently defensible. But the Bush administration, historically, has failed to defend itself aggressively, and instead has passively yielded to the news cycle.
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