MEMO TO BUSH: FIRE MICHAEL BROWN

MichelleMalkin.com ^ | September 4, 2005 | Michelle Malkin

[wildwood]

MEMO TO BUSH: FIRE MICHAEL BROWN

By Michelle Malkin · September 04, 2005 08:17 AM During his visit to Mobile, Ala., on Friday, President Bush singled out Michael D. Brown, head of the Federal Emergency Management Agency, for praise:

"Brownie, you're doing a heck of a job."

Really? "Brownie's" job is to direct the federal response to natural disasters such as Hurricane Katrina. Let's review his public statements during the past week:

- He admitted that he didn't act more aggressively because as late as last Sunday he expected Katrina to be a "standard hurricane" even though the National Weather Service in New Orleans was already predicting "human suffering incredible by modern standards."

- He proved himself utterly clueless about the disaster unfolding in New Orleans. He claimed that the federal relief effort was "going relatively well" and that the security situation in New Orleans was "pretty darn good."

- He blamed the flood victims in New Orleans for failing to evacuate on time, even though local authorities failed to make municipal vehicles available to residents who could not drive or did not own their own cars.

READ MORE!!

[Dave S]

New Orleans is not your run of the mill city. Just take a look at Rudy Guilaini's response and nagin's.

You're denying reality for politics. Rudy Guiliani had to deal with a small portion of Manhattan while the rest of NYC and adjacent communities were fully functional. All the infrastructure was still in place. People were back at work downtown a few days after 9/11. With the exception of those killed in the attack, most other citizens were able to walk away and eventually find a way out of NYC. Local hospitals were prepared and waiting for wounded which never came. Police, fire and ambulance services were still functional. Most of all he had electricity and was able to make frequent TV and radio broadcasts througout 9/11 and subsequent days. On top of that Rudy was a great leader unlike Nagin and Blanco. However there is no comparison in the events you are attempting to equate. One is localized at one small part of Manhattan Island and the other covers 90,000 square miles. One killed 3000 people and created havok but there were no survivors to feed and evacuate. The other you had hundreds of thousands of people who needed water and food and evacuation. In one case, the people needed directions on how to get out of town and they needed hope. In the other, people needed the basic necessities of life and they needed rescue. In New Orleans you dont walk two or three miles and catch a ferry or train out of town.

In your rush to standup for Bush you overlook the fact that the FEMA Director is totally incompent and needs to be fired. Unless Bush dumps him, he's going to drag Bush down. If he's not fired, look for Bush to name someone to a position above him so Brown will disappear into oblivion.

[George W. Bush]

...the President flew down and kicked bureaucratic a@@ all over the Gulf coast and the rescue effort improved measurably in 24 hours...

Well, those were the same 24 hours when many thousands of NG troops were coming in. Never say Karl doesn't have a sense of timing.

[ForGod'sSake]

I don't suppose this guy could be a lying dimocrat with an agenda could he? Nah, not possible.

[Howlin]

Bush flew over the area on WEDNESDAY....48 hours after the storm had passed

The storm didn't leave the effected states until 1 a.m. on Wednesday; let's keep the facts straight.

there are TON's of AFB's in the affected states

And? Land on airstirps that hadn't been checked by the FAA?

....you mean to tell me he couldn't have ordered Air Force One to land in Baton Rouge for an hour or two...or is Air Force One not allowed to land unless "Lousiana requests it do so"

Just what the people in a middle of a diaster need, Air Force One and all that security.

[Dave S]

The Conservative movement should fire Ms Milkan. It is NOT at all helpful for the Conservative movement to HELP the Liberals in their attacks

So we should all LIE for the cause? Bush can recover from this but he wont be able to he takes advice of the conservative "movement" types who are out of touch with the real world and never had to manage anything more advanced that a debating society.

[mewzilla]

Talk about a picture being worth a thousand words. Those make me want to cry.

[WOSG]

"It's almost as if some consevatives have to 'prove' their fairness and good sportmanship by eating their own."

"LOL! The thought of simply holding public officials accountable for their actions is too advanced for you, apparently."

No, some of us simply dont want us signing up for the political lynch mob that is attacking the Federal response. I dont care who it is, now's not the time nor place, when we have a disaster to confront, to go about canning people. Let's deal with the situation and fix it.

One reason why I think Bush is a great President btw. He didnt do what arm-chair generals are doing. He didnt panic; he consoled others. He didnt point fingers; he simply said that what's broken will be fixed, what's working will be replicated. HE FOCUSSED ON HELPING ADDRESS THE PROBLEM AND NOT WORRY ABOUT HOW IT LOOKS. The change in the situation since Friday is palpable. The worse is over and now we are in recovery mode.

See post #67 for the REAL STORY. FEMA has done about as well as they do in other occassions. You cannot make the largest natural disaster in our history not look bad, yet hundreds of thousands have been evacuated, aided, given food and medical care, etc. Thousands have been saved from attics and rooftops. New Orleans got chaotic not because the Federal Govt was slow, but because state and local govt was lax about security and law and order.

Texas alone has absorbed 220,000 people.

[George W. Bush]

You know, I have to wonder why it is that the ONLY people on TV saying stuff like that are in Louisiana.

Because no one in the press seems to care about Mississippi. All we see are 5-10 minutes a day of Barbour.

The two situations aren't entirely comparable. New Orleans didn't really turn bad until the storm had passed and the levees broke. Mississippi turned bad and stayed bad. And people either survived pretty well or they just died and got buried or washed away. I think Mississippi may actually end up being the worst story here but no one knows yet.

I assume the account has some merit becuase there will be other witnesses that the president of Jefferson Parish cited. The guards, the sheriff, the driver of the water truck, the commander of the Coast Guard ship. In other words, witnesses that can corroborate.

We will find out if this guy was lying or not. He's not going to shut up and the press will be following him around. He'll appear at the upcoming hearings on DHS/FEMA.

[WOSG]

"One thing that's become apparent from posting on FR is that the "timing" for criticizing the President is never right for you guys."

Why criticize the President when he has been one of the most PRAISEWORTHY of the public officials in all of this??? Oh yeah, he's doing nothing (40,000 NG troops and NORTHCOM and Coast Guard etc. = 'nothing') and he doesn't care (yeah right, he's been the most concerned and level-headed official out there)... His address on Saturday said exactly the right things, and the Federal response has been as good as it can be under the circumstances of this being the largest U.S. natural disaster in our history.

[6ppc]

But Bush really needs to get rid of both Brown and Chertoff.

Agreed. I've noticed that Chertoff has picked a line of defense and isn't varying from the script and it looks like Brown was not qualified for the job. Chertoff is sticking with the line that we couldn't have predicted the double catastrophe when there have been studies over several decades predicting exactly this scenario.

[oceanview]

the comment where he thanks Gov Blanco - that's all I need to read to know this guy's perspective.

[af_vet_rr]

Most of the blame should lie with those in Louisiana, but to be fair, it was pretty idiotic of FEMA to be pretending that everything was okay and efforts were well underway.

I think the biggest thing this whole catastrophe has proven, is that when push comes to shove, don't rely on the government.

Even as the government has expanded FEMA, has grown "Homeland Security" by leaps and bounds, over the past five years, when it comes down to it, you can only count on yourself and the person beside you.

Witness the young man who took the school bus, went around picking up total strangers, and drove them to Houston. He and those with him saved more lives directly than the Mayor and Governor of Louisiana combined.

I think that if people relied less on the government, and more on themselves, we would be in much better shape.

We also need a government that is more flexible, and willing to let people do what's right - witness the government in New Orleans forcing people to stop fleeing the city and instead make their way to the Convention Center or Superdome - how many had to die because of that decision?

[oceanview]

and if Brown had told the truth - if he had given a press conference and hyped the looting and the shooting of small boats and choppers - he would have been criticized for "making excuses". its a no win situation, once the Dems moved to politicize the whole thing, telling the plain truth became impossible - everybody has to start spinning and hedging.

[WOSG]

"LOL. Yes, any disagreement with the President and critique of FEMA is verboten. There were no screw ups, everything was perfect"

Why does everything have to be 'perfect' for the President
to avoid blame??? You are going to blame Bush for the fact that weather happens? You think the biggest Hurricane to rip through the gulf coast ever would not overwhelm us at some point?

Coast Guard crews are doing 18 hour shifts saving lives, and conservatives have to join in the bashing of the Federal response? Gimme a break. Things can always be better; this is an awful situation and a high-pressure, life-and-death challenge for many many EMS, NG, coast guard, FEMA, etc. people. Not everyone is doing 100% but there have been thousands of acts of heroism done already.

" and the bureaucracy functioned in an impeccable manner."

if you fire bureaucrats who are not impeccable,
and you'll end up with a very small Government. :-)

"Unlike you, I saw a clusterF@@@ that was unbelievable in scale and it didn't even begin to be sorted out until President Bush PERSONNALLY flew down and told the bumbling buffoons that the effort was "not acceptable". I noticed a drastic improvement almost immediately."

Yes. But let the record show that the vast majority of the incompetence is on the state/local side. Mississippi didnt have this problem. Florida was in much better response shape last year ... same FEMA, difference local/state Governments ... note the pattern???

Most of the areas of 'we could do better' focus squarely on two facts:
1. The failure to control looting in New Orleans, which led to out-of-control situations that hamered rescue efforts.
2. The failure to evacuate from New Orleans in a more timely manner and the related failure to manage and care for the thousands at the superdome. (anecdote: Newspaper account noted that people were asked to bring 3 days worth of food and water with them ... newspaper interviewed one woman showing up with a diet cola saying 'oh, they'll be feeding us'. Let's get real. Clueless non-self-reliant people got desperate quickly.)

Problems fall squarely on the lack of seriousness and lack of coordination in the new orleans and louisiana state govt. There are many anecdotes of how Nagin and Blanco were not utilizing or coordinating as they should and not following disaster recovery plans already laid out.

If anyone needs to be fired in is La Gov Blanco.

But, no, let's go ahead and join the Liberals who are more interested in bashing Bush than seeing a better response next time.

[oceanview]

its getting hard to fend off the freeper "FEMA quagmire" contingent - I mean, the city was flooded Tuesday, why wasn't this all wrapped up by Thursday or Friday? some of these people are unreal.

look at the small boat rescues on FNC this morning - people sitting in their homes surrounded by flooded streets still DO NOT WANT TO LEAVE. I guess that's Browns fault too.

[WOSG]

For more on this ... see:

http://junkyardblog.net/archives/week_2005_08_28.html#004749

so the local official who screwed up are blaming the Feds for their own incompetence. Figures.

[texasbluebell]

On c'mon guys.....how hard would it have been for Bush to have landed in those Southern States on Tuesday afternoon or Wednesday morning....met with the pols....kicked some butt...and ordered a bunch of Chinook Helo's from one of the bases either in LA or TX to help evac operations?

Psst, hey buddy. Ever hear of states' rights? Or the 10th Amendment to the US Constitution? You might want to do some googling.

[ScreamingFist]

I agree except for "But, no, let's go ahead and join the Liberals who are more interested in bashing Bush than seeing a better response next time".

FEMA could and should do a better job, regardless of the screeching on this thread stating otherwise. When the "Big Government" FEMA lovers on this thread are standing neck deep in water, or naked in a ditch after a tornado their attitudes will change drastically, trust me, I know.

[George W. Bush]

the comment where he thanks Gov Blanco - that's all I need to read to know this guy's perspective.

Given that he's been fighting the storm waters and rebuilding his levy until yesterday, I doubt he's really kept up on the news. Nevertheleess, what he related was about what FEMA did. Not the governess.

[inquest]

Consider, if the man was bobbing and weaving and trying to cover up something he felt was a bad decision, would he have been as up front as he was?

...

He admitted to nothing that I can see.

Interesting contrast between those two statements.

Regardless, though, just to address your question more directly, his statement could very easily be interpreted as covering up for something. He was trying to give a reason, one might say an excuse, for why his agency didn't act more aggressively than it did. That reason, as Malkin explained, doesn't hold up. If someone has any new information to post, I'd be glad to read it, but so far, it doesn't look good for Brown.