Sec. Chertoff is on CNN and he's really spinning this badly. He's essentially saying that FEMA is struggling because of the unprecedented scale of the disaster...a catastrophic flood in a major US city and hurricane damage along the gulf coast.
Sorry, this is a load of BS. It's not like this result wasn't predicted in the wake of a cat4/5. It was predicted up to a year before the actual event. The feds have really dropped the ball. Five days after the event people are still being raped, bodies still rotting, looters still looting and people still dying in public. And don't give any excuses about local incompetence hindering efforts. Thats a cop-out. Given local incompetence, the Feds should have been in override mode from the moment Blanco started having a breakdown on live TV.
This is a huge debacle on every level.
Not the feds but the local "leadership".
I hate to say this, but it's been eating at me for days...
How many people on this forum decry the usurpation of power over local authorities by liveral entities - under Clinton, the courts, Carter, et al... The discussion most times makes no provision whatsoever for exceptional circumstances or emergency - it is always wrong wrong wrong. I still happen to belive that.
If we are to believe in and promote a representative republic we must defer to local authorities unless and until they PROVE themselves unable to cope. Yes its sad. Yes, some of you may call me heartless. Yes, I can take the heat - flame on.
Yep. That should have solved the problem right there. It should be a piece of cake to solve all the problems of one of the largest cities in America being wiped out, and 90,000 square miles of populated shoreline erased from the map. I just can't understand why 4 days into the greatest natural disaster in this nation's history we don't have federal employees planting rose bushes along city streets.
Excuse me, and don't take this personally, but I'm afraid that many don't comprehend just how bad this is. It's not going to be better in 5 days. I don't care what the plan is. I don't care who is in charge. It is physically impossible to make this better in 5 days. It's a miracle that so many have been saved in 5 days. This is akin to a tornado and a flood hitting three states all at once. It's not just New Orleans. People are doing everything they possibly can. It's like complaining that there's not enough being done because Mt. St. Helen's blew up. It's a catastrophe. It's a natural disaster. We are ineffectual against an event of this magnitude. Could things have been different? Sure, people could have evacuated. But they didn't for whatever reason and wouldn't have no matter what. Nothing could have stopped it. Even if nobody died, everything would have been destroyed and there would still be problems with what to do with all the people.
FEMA is the only agency doing anything. I'll admit, there are problems, but the security situation is hampering this.
the decision to dismiss the governor from her responsibility to maintain civil order, is not one to be taken lightly. once Bush federalizes this, the albatross is around his neck.
"To: All
Sec. Chertoff is on CNN and he's really spinning this badly. He's essentially saying that FEMA is struggling because of the unprecedented scale of the disaster...a catastrophic flood in a major US city and
hurricane damage along the gulf coast.
Sorry, this is a load of BS. It's not like this result wasn't predicted in the wake of a cat4/5. It was predicted up to a year before the actual event. The feds have really dropped the ball. Five days after the event
people are still being raped, bodies still rotting, looters still looting and people still dying in public. And don't give any excuses about local incompetence hindering efforts. Thats a cop-out. Given local
incompetence, the Feds should have been in override mode from the moment Blanco started having a breakdown on live TV.
This is a huge debacle on every level. "
No, just on your level. You know, that special place you retreat to where the storm hit on Saturday, "5 days" ago.
In the world the rest of us live in the storm hit Monday, and if you don't know what the standard response time is for hurricane assistance, then perhaps you're better off in your other world.
You cannot just take over the State, this is not some third world country. The Fema people cannot just bust into the state and take over like Hitler. We are 50 States not a Monarchy.