Posted on 09/08/2005 8:46:29 AM PDT by InvisibleChurch
Thursday, Sept. 8, 2005 11:38 a.m. EDT Ray Nagin: School Buses Not Good Enough
New Orleans Mayor Ray Nagin garnered a ton of publicity with a profanity-laced interview he gave to WWL radio last Thursday, where he blasted President Bush and Louisiana Gov. Kathleen Blanco for not coming to rescue his city in time.
However, Nagin's most newsworthy comments - where he explained why he didn't used hundreds of city school buses to evacuate his city's flood victims - went almost unnoticed.
Turns out, Nagin turned his nose up at the yellow buses, demanding more comfortable Greyhound coaches instead. "I need 500 buses, man," he told WWL. "One of the briefings we had they were talking about getting, you know, public school bus drivers to come down here and bus people out of here."
Nagin described his response:
"I'm like - you've got to be kidding me. This is a natural disaster. Get every doggone Greyhound bus line in the country and get their asses moving to New Orleans."
While Nagin was waiting for his Greyhound fleet, Katrina's floodwaters swamped his school buses, rendering them unusable.
More like, when told a stitch in time saves nine, replied, kiss mine.
Quite true.
School buses were terrible, getting hoisted up into hovering helicopter by winch for 90 year old disabled grandmothers is good. Go figure?
Or just make sure their families are on their first busload out.
What Nagin is REALLY saying is:
"I was so busy blaming Bush, and so unfit to act as a leader that I FORGOT about the PLAN and the buses...so now I am COVERING for my incompetence."
Which there was a lack of.
This moron's swearing is not the problem....
The PROBLEM is he is swearing to show anger, and his anger is no substitue for constructive action.
A Mayor is elected to LEAD....
A LEADER uses what he HAS, not curse the heavens for things he DOESN'T HAVE..
New Orleans had a PLAN on paper to evacuate the most needy..
This MORON of a Mayor had HUNDREDS of buses and plenty of time to move the needy and willing out of the low ground and to a safe distance from the storm...
HE DIDN'T move anyone...but HIMSELF to Baton Rouge.
Nagin is the kind of elected official you get, when you allow morons to vote..
Semper Fi
Are you kidding? Nagin would wait for the feds to build him an elevator rather than use a ladder. That's low-class dontchaknow. We's gotsta ride us up in style!
NO is simply a loser of a town. You can't count on anything...from the mayor, the cops, the council, the emergency plans, etc. I've never seen a major city like this. You'd be safer in Baghdad on a Saturday night. The mayor of Baghdad is probably more competent than Nagin. At least the cops in Baghdad will shoot you if you threaten them.
That kid was a hero. But does anyway know his name?
All logical questions, and I am sure the Mayor's lawyers rposed them to him. Moral of the story: first kill all the lawyers.
If this mess ad happened in Japan several people would already have done Sepuku ( HARA KIRI as it is know here )
There is also a report that the mayor said his buses were not suitable because they had no bathrooms.
The bus story did make the main stream. Fox News put the bus photo up and it is now part of the public record. When the hearings begin I guess there will be a billboard size copy and wittnesses can be raked over the coals bus by bus. They can probably take 3 days taking testimony from those having authority over busses. The governor will not answer directly though, she will request 24 hours to review the photo in private.
"Those were a bus full of people who were more interested in saving their own lives, rather than wait to have someone save it for them."
Makes you wonder if others had known of the availability of those buses which ones would have made the effort to save themselves and others.
Jabbar Gibson.
When they were polishing his head, the breeze from the buffer blew his brains out.
That is what I tend to think is being covered up by the Mayor. The investigation of the bus fiasco should reveal who was charged with driving those buses in an emergency. I read several days ago about a union dispute with the Mayor over pay for union drivers. I hope the truth is not obfuscated by the Mayor's remarks about getting buses in from around the country. On the face of it that is plain stupid. The emergency is gone by the time they would have arrived. The need was immediate and the help was parked right in the city. Also, it is time to find out who paid for the use of those buses, along with pay for the drivers, during the election when they were sent throughout the city to collect recalcitrant voters needed to put Senator Mary Landrieu over the top. It might help explain the later non use of those same buses. Maybe it was legal, maybe not. Inquiring minds need to know.
I have read several of these threads on the number of buses parked in those flooded New Orleans parking lots.
I wish we had aerial photos of the school bus parking lot in Baton Rouge on the Sunday before the storm.
If Governor Blanco was up to the task, she would have ordered her National Guard to take all of the buses in Baton Rouge to New Orleans to evacuate the people.
I would expect there are another 1,000 buses in the near vicinity of New Orleans that could have been commandeered by the Governor if she had ordered the mandatory evacuation.
The fact the governor had to be asked to order a mandatory evacuation further points to her gross incompetency.
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