Ohio - I think there's a danger in being myopic, as well, however. There's a lot of defensiveness here where there should be some reflection on how we're going to prove to our enemies that we can take it on the chin and protect our republic in a time of crisis.
Again, I refer to the feverish promotion of preparedness for large scale devastation started by Tom Ridge and echoed by others. What, exactly, IS the plan if a WMD goes off?
IS there a plan? It's an EXTREMELY important question to ask, in my humble opinion.
This is a NATURAL disaster... spread over 4 states ... not akin to a terrorist attack. And, the response to this natural disaster is occurring as we speak.
Actually, I stated that further upthread.
Whatever the plans were, they were inadequate (e.g. relying on cell phones for communication in a crisis).
This is a great opportunity to rethink what went wrong, now that it's been tested, and fix the weaknesses in the plan.
And you can take it to the bank that our Harvard MBA President will make sure it gets done.
But as I also said, the scope of this disaster is so great that we can't be too critical of those who are doing everything in their power to help those in need.
It's not defensiveness, IMO.
It's a final realization of the fact that you simply cannot help people who would prefer to have the issue than the help, who would rather score political points than find solutions, and who don't really give a crap about what this looks like to the rest of the world (in fact, they probably LIKE it.).