Posted on 09/27/2005 7:05:46 AM PDT by SE Mom
Hearings beginning now on C-Span- Michael Brown will be grilled.
Have at it, folks:)
I can't wait to read what he's discovered. Please ping me if something concrete is posted about it. Thanks so much.
Re: the NOPD. I heard on FNC this morning that around 295 NOPD officers are going to be investigated for deserting their posts. Is Snow saying that some/most/all of that 295 never existed? If so, then who the heck are those dumb sods investigating?
ap article , now an FR thread :-)
Brown blames 'dysfunctional' Louisiana (FoRmer FEMA head)
http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/1492174/posts
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WASHINGTON - Former FEMA director Michael Brown aggressively defended his role in responding to Hurricane Katrina on Tuesday and put much of the blame for coordination failures on Louisiana Gov. Kathleen Blanco and New Orleans Mayor Ray Nagin.
"My biggest mistake was not recognizing by Saturday that Louisiana was dysfunctional," two days before the storm hit, Brown told a special congressional panel set up by House Republican leaders to investigate the catastrophe.
The storm slammed into the Gulf Coast on Monday, Aug. 29.
Brown's defense drew a scathing response from Rep. William Jefferson (news, bio, voting record), D-La.
"I find it absolutely stunning that this hearing would start out with you, Mr. Brown, laying the blame for FEMA's failings at the feet of the governor of Louisiana and the Mayor of New Orleans."
Brown, who for many became a symbol of government failures in the natural disaster that claimed the lives of more than 1,000 people, rejected accusations that he was too inexperienced for the job.
"I've overseen over 150 presidentially declared disasters. I know what I'm doing, and I think I do a pretty darn good job of it," Brown said.
Brown resigned as the head of FEMA earlier this month after being removed by Homeland Security Secretary Michael Chertoff from responsibility in the stricken areas.
Brown, who joined FEMA in 2001 and ran it for more than two years, was previously an attorney who held several local government and private posts, including leading the International Arabian Horse Association.
Brown in his opening statement said he had made several "specific mistakes" in dealing with the storm, and listed two.
One, he said, was not having more media briefings.
As to the other, he said: "I very strongly personally regret that I was unable to persuade Gov. Blanco and Mayor Nagin to sit down, get over their differences, and work together. I just couldn't pull that off."
Both Blanco and Nagin are Democrats.
"The people of FEMA are being tired of being beat up, and they don't deserve it," Brown said.
The hearing was largely boycotted by Democrats, who want an independent investigation conducted into government failures, not one run by congressional Republicans.
But Jefferson — who is not a committee member — accepted the panel's invitation to grill Brown.
Referring to Brown's description of his "mistakes," Jefferson said: "I think that's a very weak explanation of what happened, and very incomplete explanation of what happened. I don't think that's going to cut it, really."
Committee Chairman Tom Davis, R-Va., cautioned against too narrowly assigning blame.
"At the end of the day, I suspect that we'll find that government at all levels failed the people of Louisiana and Mississippi and Alabama and the Gulf Coast," said Davis.
Davis pushed Brown on what he and the agency he led should have done to evacuate New Orleans, restore order in the city and improve communication among law enforcement agencies.
Brown said: "Those are not FEMA roles. FEMA doesn't evacuate communities. FEMA does not do law enforcement. FEMA does not do communications."
In part of his testimony, Brown pumped his hand up and down for emphasis.
Brown said the lack of a mandatory evacuation of New Orleans before the storm was "the tipping point for all the other things that went wrong." Brown said he had personally pushed Louisiana Gov. Blanco to order such an evacuation.
He did not have the authority to order the city evacuated on his own, Brown said.
When asked by Rep. Harold Rogers (news, bio, voting record), R-Ky, whether the lack of an ordered evacuation was "the proximate cause of most people's misery," Brown said, "Yes."
By any chance is Lt. Gen. Honrore scheduled to testify before this hearing??
Shays is protecting the democrats. He is protecting clinton, mainly, he owes many chits, as it were.
His comments are beyond the pale, and he hurts our nation by his devastating accusations unfounded because they denigrate the very job Brown was doing....what MORE could Brown do than REQUEST an evacuation...and OF COURSE he did it close to the storm.........it was the GOVENOR and Mayors JOB TO DO THIS.........and they HAD TO BE BEGGED.
By FEMA
By our PRESIDENT
And by the HEAD of the national weather center
These people KNEW what would happen if certain sections of their city were ordered to evacuate....so they hesitated...banking on Katrina missing them....and it did not.......and people were killed.
is FEMA's job to EVACUATE????...No, quite simply.
Exactly.
And then Blanco and Nagin didn't want to send in supplies -- remember the Red Cross said that -- because they didn't want it to be an evacuation center!
..but Gee Louise, who can blame him.
How would ANY of us do when Shays, et al start their bleating, badgering and ugly words!
I thought that is who will always get the blame, even in 2008, 2009, 2010, 2015, Bush will always get the blame. Not the terrorists, not the looters, not mother nature, the levees, etc etc etc.
I will still have my W the President on my car in 2010 supporting my president.
..."Chris Shays is holding Brown responsible for NOT jumping the chain of command."...
>>>>Iraq War. Get Cindy Sheehan on the bat phone. This is her area of expertise.
You owe me a clean monitor!
::laughing!::
I said this last week. Nagin is trying to disguise the fact that many names on the NO payroll are just to draw checks.
The Republican Congress would be well served if the RNC established and staffed an information gathering center that queried and drew on the resources of the conservative bloggers to generate briefs and summary analysis for Congressional staff members.
The Republicans on this commitee are doing a better job for Democrats than had the Democrats been there for themselves.
In other words with friends like Republicans who needs Democrats.
Its apparent that the Reps are going to lynch this guy to save there rear ends as well as the White Houses.
Check out the Tony Snow thread for this A.M., Howlin. It is pretty sick stuff. NO must be one hellacious bed of corruption.
excuse me? I have defended Brown since day one of this, I was never looking for Brown's head. I have consistently said, starting on the live threads for Katrina, that the administration needed to ramp up the political attack against Blanco. it should have started as soon as the levees broke.
if you want to discuss this - stick to the point. Will the administration support the assertions made in Brown's testimony today?
Bonilla is being kind
Brown says he carried the battle of FEMA underfunding to his superiors to his personal detriment.
Beautiful!
From the same man who “cried when I saw the Broaddrick rape allegations”... but still voted NOT to impeach.
Pure, human stool.
Not all of them are
Just the usually RINO's like Shays
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