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Politics : Formerly About Advanced Micro Devices -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: combjelly who wrote (479098)	5/8/2009 11:04:56 AM
From: jlallen	4 Recommendations Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 1574658

There was no federal response until Dubya dragged himself off of vacation and publicity tours. Complete nonsense. Talk about making shit up! lol

To: combjelly who wrote (479098)	5/8/2009 12:07:29 PM
From: i-node	Respond to of 1574658

>> it was the response. If you want to talk about mendacity, there is plenty to talk about. The "response" only became a problem after the abject failure of local government to fulfill its commitments. And the failures were many. The biggest single failure of local government was the failure to provide any reasonable shelter for those whom it didn't evacuate. The Superdome's own management said, "We are designed to hold a crowd for four or five hours". There was inadequate food and water. They had no access to backup power and the sanitation was inoperable from the time the storm hit. You had thousands of people living in a facility with no toilets, no food, no water, no lights or power. THIS WAS NOT THE FAILURE OF FEMA. IT WAS THE FAILURE OF NAGIN. It was local government's responsibility not only to have a disaster plan, but to have a plan that could be executed with reasonable assurance. They didn't. It was local government's responsibility to recognize the impending problem and act accordingly. They didn't, and only after Bush insisted did Blanco act, only after Bush insisted with a direct call to Nagin did Nagin act, and Max Mayfield had taken the unusual step of calling them both to warn them of the seriousness of the situation even before that. Local government failed to act. It was local responsibility to manage an evacuation, NOT FEMA's. Instead, local government allowed the only evacuation hope -- a parking lot full of school buses, to become submerged. It was local responsibility, NOT FEMA's, to comprehend that people who were caught in the flood would seek the only patch of high ground -- the Superdome, which was beyond capacity, and a small strip along Convention Center Blvd. that lies beneath the ramps to the Connection. It was local responsibility, as first responders, to provide security. Not FEMA's. Instead, we had literally half the NOPD leaving the area -- some in stolen cars. It was state responsibility to tell the federal government what it needed in the way of Federal assistance, which by law must be specific -- for obvious reasons. Blanco failed to do so. It was local responsibility to provide first response. The Federal government stepped up and rescued 10s of thousands before the local government requested assistance. What did Ray Nagin do? He holed up in a suite at the Hyatt Hotel -- next door to the Superdome -- using the only power generation capability to power said suite. He got on WWR and shouted, demanded, cursed at Bush, and broke down crying. He refused to so much as visit the Superdome except for a brief moment during the entire crisis. Ray Nagin had drinking water and toilets. If you want to argue about FEMA's mistakes, we can do that. Yes, they trucked ice all over the country, foolishly. They made other incidental mistakes. But it was never their task to be first responders. I defy you to show me where any FEMA document sets out, as their responsibility, first responder activities. Their charter is very specific: FEMA is not a first responder; that job is left to the local officials. Now, if you want to argue that that FEMA failed in its tasks, you first tell me exactly what NOLA's "first responders" did to ameliorate the suffering. FEMA was not perfect and could have done better in some areas. But FEMA also identified the scope of the problem and acted accordingly. While the "first responders" were MIA, FEMA was setting up a command center at the airport, realizing they needed a place for staging materiel and personnel. Was it FEMA's job to be watching TV and delivering water to the Superdome and Convention Center? Absolutely not. There is no reason FEMA should have been expected to do that. It was local government's responsibility to make that happen before the storm. The criticism of Bush WRT Katrina is an example of extreme nanny-stateism. It was never FEMA's job to solve these problems. They shouldn't have happened in the first place had local government done its job.