Michael "No Clue" Chertoff discusses US aid effort being criticized in New Orleans - Exhibit A

US Tax Payers | 9-1-05 | Chertoff

[kabar]

I am no bureaucrat, in fact I am a libertarian leaning Republican. I just don't see the criticism. It is not that I refuse to criticize the feds, it is the lack of logic to all criticism of them so far.

I am a retired career federal bureaucrat. Your reasoning and explanation sounds just like the culture I worked in for 36 years. Everyone is responsible for something and no one is responsible is for anything. Bureaucrats use rules to avoid personal responsibility and to CYA. The mission is subsumed by the rules, which are deemed more important.

The logic is simple. The Feds and the NGOs had the resources necessary to alleviate the mess at the Superdome, Convention Center, and overpasses, but didn't use them until days later because of a bureaucratic turf battle. Besides the humanitarian aspect, the PR impact was enormous. The Feds had done a magnificent job in responding to this massive disaster, but the defining image became NO and the thousands stranded in the city with the MSM focusing on them. The Feds should have resolved this problem immediately regardless of legalisms. Simple as that.

So the people in FEMA should have abandoned their jobs (organizing aid for the post 96 hour period), and instead rented minivans, and drove down to act as first-responders?

Don't be silly. FEMA isn't a first responder. The NGOs and US military could have done that job. I used the example of the Washington DC woman who rescued her relatves to illustrate how easy it was to get to these people, something the MSM was already doing. The feds and NGOs had the resources to move these people out and provide water, food, etc. They could also ahve restored order quickly to prevent rapes, murder, etc.

Should they have pushed aside the State Officials at gunpoint who were blocking Red Cross from giving the food to the needy? The locals did not just fail, they actively stood in the way of the aid.

Absolutely. If need be, the President could just federalize the LA National Guard. Prior to that, the President could have issued an ultimatum to Blanco privately, that unless the locals allowed the Red Cross and Salavation Army to minister to the needs of these folks, he would take that action.