The 'incompetent criminal negligence' you refer to is on the part of the state officials who didn't do their job. Apparently, they were too busy giving each other high fives when New Orleans wasn't directly in Katrina's path. They were on TV stating that New Orleans had "dodged a bullet".
Since you're looking for someone's head and you know it's not going to be the President (I know you in the BLAME BUSH crowd real tore up about that!), you want to nail someone with his administration. All reality points to those who didn't get people out BEFORE the storm even hit!
Fox doesn't even watch their own coverage! There was a briefing just an hour or so ago regarding the incident of shooting thugs on the bridge by NOPD. The NOPD officer laid out the specifics of the event, yet Fox has someone on now and the interviewer still asking questions and doesn't know the specifics. All she had to do was tune in to her own news channel, right?
It is absolutely impossible to evacuate a large population before a hurricane strikes. Fuel, transportation, and shelter space are all limiting factors.
My home has been hit directly by two major hurricanes within the last year and has been within Category 1 winds of two others. I had first hand experience with FEMA after hurricanes Ivan and Dennis. FEMA's responses were very uncoordinated and inconsistent. Their responses in those cases only caused a prolonged recovery period but those same problems in Louisiana and Mississippi have caused a large loss of life and prolonged misery.
That is criminal negligence. FEMA has had multiple opportunities to learn from their mistakes but they have not done so. As long as Chertoff and Brown remain in control all Americans face a greatly increased risk from disasters and terrorist attack.
WHY HAVEN'T CHERTOFF AND BROWN BEEN FIRED ALREADY???