Yes. It is also assumed in the article that the Federal Gov't is solely responsible for Emergency Management and Planning. This is not true. Local gov'ts have a responsibility as do State gov'ts. Gov't and public service agencies usually coordinate in their disaster response planning and staging. What went wrong in N.O is that no one can truly plan for the human element. It is an individual's choice to refuse evacuation. It is an individual's choice to loot, create mayhem and threaten the safety of others. No way any amount of planning could have forseen that. If the mayor and governor of N.O had announced from the very beginning a zero tolerance for any looting and had a strong police presence. It might. I say might have helped. But bad people do bad things.
You want to know what really sickens me??? I have a close relative who is the emergency management director for my little area of the world. He's been telling stories about the millions and millions of dollars that's been thrown his way for Homeland Security, for this "little" area of the US. Now image NO with its' essential shipping ports and the possibly hundreds of millions if not billions of dollars that were sent there to ramp up and prepare for disaster planning and/or something like this. Just where the hell did all that money go? It certainly doesn't appear that there was ANY kind of disaster planning ever done. When I saw the Mayor of NO and the Gov on tv on Sunday, they were all just kind of frozen in shock as to what they should be doing. For cryin out loud it's not like they've never been threatened and hit with a hurricane before.