No, Bush did. he is the President, he has the bully-pulpit.
I think we are saying the same thing but just in different ways. My contention is that Bush's public relations during and after the Katrina ordeal were very poor. He stayed on vacation and continuously thanked his people for doing a great job. None of these actually affected anyone's life but it was a public relations mistake.
The democrats took advantage of Bush's mis-steps and started blaming their mistakes on him and FEMA. This is where Bush really messed up. Rather than using his bully-pulpit as Reagan or Clinton would have done and explained what really happened to the American people and detailed the proper role of federal government, he de facto accepted blame with his speech.
While many here like to say that Bush connects with the American people, he really doesn't. In fact, he is pretty poor at it. It's just that Gore and Kerry were even worse. Even with such poor candidates, we were only a few thousand votes from President Gore and President Kerry.