Bush declared a disaster on Saturday, and Brown waits until MONDAY to start moving people....
The guy is completely incompetent.
I think you better check your days. The storm didn't hit till Monday. The levees broke the next day. FEMA doesn't go in BEFORE a storm. When the full import of the mess was realized it took a bit to marshal the forces to move a hundred thousand people.
You are really being unrealistic.
Half the folks who made up the crisis could have gotten out. They chose to stay. The other half should have been taken out on those busses starting the Friday before the Monday the storm hit. All low lying areas of NO should have been forcibly evacuated.
A thousand National Guard should have been put in the Dome and another thousand in the Convention Center ... even though it was not a refuge site. They broke in.
The only evidence of incompetence I've seen on this thread are your posts. Or perhaps you really believe it's "competent" to deploy personnel into a hurricane?
Yes, he should have moved them into the parts of New Orleans where the worst flooding was anticipated, so they could be there to help out.....
FEMA did the right thing. FEMA are not first responders and remember the levee broken on Monday night. Did you expect them to be in New Orleans during the storm? They don't have bus drivers.
The mayor had all the tools at his disposal, police (the half that stayed), buses, drivers, etc. to get the people out. He fell apart and couldn't handle it. HE should be removed from office.
All the initial responsibility comes from local and state governments, which is why people must be reliant on their own and never trust gov't bureaucrats with their lives.
So you knew on Saturday exactly where the hurricane was going to hit. Maybe we should appoint either you, or better yet, your crystal ball as the head of FEMA.
You guys didn't do your homework and you end up agreeing with the ultra Liberals:
http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/1477255/posts
Hurricane Katrina strikes New Orleans at 8:00 AM with winds at 150 MPH and a storm surge of 18 feet.
As the Category 4 surged ashore just east of New Orleans on Monday, FEMA had medical teams, rescue squads and groups prepared to supply food and water poised in a semicircle around the city, said agency Director Michael Brown.
Brown, in a telephone interview with The Associated Press, said the evacuation of the city and the general emergency response were working as planned in an exercise a year ago. I was impressed with the evacuation, once it was ordered it was very smooth.
Levee break at 17th street floods about 20% of the city.
At 11:00 AM, FEMA Director Brown arrives in Baton Rouge at the State Office of Emergency Preparedness.
http://www.fema.gov/about/bios/brown.shtm
Under Secretary Brown has led Homeland Securitys response to more than 164 presidentially declared disasters and emergencies, including the 2003 Columbia Shuttle disaster and the California wildfires in 2003.
Why would you move people INTO a storm? Why would you send them there before learning where "there" is?
If I understand what you are saying, FEMA should have positioned all their assets in NO and have a Catagory 5 huricane destroy them.
If I remember correctly the levee system was still intact a good 12-18 hours after Katrina passed.
Lots of uninformed armchair thinking if you ask me.
Why dont you put the blame where it belongs, city and state officiaqls are at fault here not the feds.
You're confused. He didn't wait until Monday to start moving his people. He waited until Monday to call for back-up, i.e., extra people from outside his department. (Assuming this article has the facts correct, of course.)
So EFFEN what!! The Governor waited until Sunday to declare it a disaster area. FEMA DOES NOT supercede either the mayor of NOLA or the Governor of LA. This isn't Communist China FGS.