Yeah, and from that stand point, Brown being removed is annoying. If he had skipped some of the bureaucratic red tape or taken short cuts, all we'd of heard for a week is how Brown is a cowboy just like Bush and ran roughshot over States rights, doing things that weren't even totally legal, and didn't follow the established rules of protacol you have to follow after an emergency. It's the same old story. Damned if you do, damned if you don't. Though a couple of his comments were a little silly. I can forgive him for not knowing what was going on at the Coliseum though. For him to know, him or some of his people would have had to been watching tv for a while, and I'd like to think they were doing anything but watchin tv. There was lots of work to be done.
I suppose you'd have forgiven Bush if he'd said he didn't realize how bad things were in N.Y. while TV was showing the towers falling...which means party loyalty means more to you than anything else.
Brown has a lot of explaining to do. How could he not know? Was his department really that removed from reality? Was he playing bridge? Counting strawberries (a la Capt. Queeg)?
Everyone has relatives and friends who can't get or hold jobs on merit so everyone understands patronage. But appointing someone who can't read as library chief is a lot different than appointing an incompetent Defense Secretary. When incompetence and patronage are exposed by a disaster of this magnitude no one escapes.
The Republicans might not be blamed because the Democrats were even more compromised...but it'll be a close thing.
In August of last year, Brown, himself, appointed someone else to handle FEMA duties in Pennsylvania.
Statement on Federal Assistance for PennsylvaniaRepresenting the Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA), Michael D. Brown... named Thomas Davies as the Federal Coordinating Officer for Federal recovery operations in the affected area.
The MSM conveniently forgets that Brown was in charge of FEMA through those hurricanes of 2004 -- Charley, Frances, Ivan and Jeanne,
The press badgered Bush on August 15, 2004, while he was looking at hurricane damage in Florida, asking the President about slow FEMA response for hurricane Andrew way back in 1992, twelve years before.
Q There was some consternation after Andrew that the federal aid didn't arrive soon enough. Can you promise that there will be a more expeditious response this time?THE PRESIDENT: It's happening now --
Q Sir --
THE PRESIDENT: Hold up for a second. We're moving a lot of aid very quickly and, again, you can ask the governor whether or not he's satisfied with how fast the aid is moving. All I can tell you is that FEMA was on the ground yesterday morning and there's a lot of supplies surging this way. [snip]
Q What about what happened in '92, with Hurricane Andrew? ....
The press has been trying to paint Bush as someone who is incompetent during crises, even when the crises are handled well.