" Critics
One person: Leslie Gelb,...he's been on ALL the cables, all the shows."
Gelb , the William Ginsburg of catastrophes, is just the tip of the spear.
We ain't seen nothing yet.
Wait till the Congressional ( primarily Senate ) bloviators get back to DC and indignantly huff and puff in front of the cameras demanding answers.
Answers, that probably only God can give.
That Senatorial fool from Maine, ( I know, which one ) Olympia Snowe has announced that she will conduct hearings ASAP.
Snowe is "exploring and looking into why NOAA was not able to provide this valuable, life-saving information to the 11 affected nations," Snowe's spokeswoman Antonia Ferrier said.
"But only two countries in the affected region, Indonesia and Australia,
both of which take part in the Pacific Ocean tsunami warning system, received the NOAA bulletin.
Countries located across the Indian Ocean from the earthquake, including India and Sri Lanka, do not take part in the warning system."
"Officials at NOAA's Pacific Tsunami Warning Center in Hawaii have said that they lacked contacts in the Indian Ocean region,
where tsunamis are rare."
"The center is geared toward detecting tsunamis and issuing alerts in the Pacific region, where large, destructive waves are much more common."
"Snowe chairs the Senate's Subcommittee on Oceans, Fisheries, and Coast Guard, which has oversight over the NOAA.
" April Boyd, a spokeswoman for ranking Democratic member John F. Kerry of Massachusetts, said she expected hearings on NOAA's reaction."
Sounds like Snowe and Kerry are going to hang out the Americans at NOAA,( over which Kerry and she had oversight ) because most of the third world nations in the Indian Ocean refused to join the early warning system.
By all means,Snowe and Kerry and the New York Times and Patrick Leahy, let's blame Americans ( ie: conservative Republicans ) for this horrific natural disaster.
I heard a little while ago on the radio, that Thailand was warned about the earthquake which could produce a tsunami heading their way, and they didn't warn anyone because it was the height of the tourist season and they didn't want the hotels to sue them if it was a false alarm.
What do you do if you warn someone and they don't listen---just like some of the people that don't evacuate during a hurricane warning, I guess. You clean up the mess for them anyway, if they survive.
Bush's ranch isn't called the Texas White House for nothing--he has staff with him all the time and is a plugged into world events and the people he needs there, as much as at the White House. I dare say Kofi Annan, whose JOB IT IS TO COORDINATE AID FOR COUNTRIES, didn't have the same set up at the top of a ski slope.