In a way, what happened in New Orleans taught us a lesson.
Because our entire disaster plan for the US has been based on a false premise.
Let me bolster my argument and let me state that the lucky readers of this post will be the first to know.
The false premise?
The notion that local authorities would be the first responders and would direct relief efforts ASSISTED by the federal government.
All this time, all that money spent to train local authorities, all the money given to local police departments. All since 9-11 because the premise was, hey they're the local guys. They know the region, they know the population, they know the geography.
Wrong.
And we're damn lucky because the Feds realized the deadly truth sometime around last Monday. They surely had glimpses of the problem even before the hurricane officials hit land.
Wrong.
We cannot count on the local authorities and with the perfect vision of hindsight, it all makes sense.
Beginning with the fact that in the event of a natural disaster, many of the local authorities will themselves be affected!
Duh.
Of course there's what will call the New Orleans syndrome.
Which is basically that it cannot be assumed that the local authorities can handle the situation.
It will soon be known widely enough that the local people in LA fell down on the job. The cops quit, both NO cops and the LA state cops.
Besides corrupt and inept local authorities, how could we have expected men and women with family crushed by a tragedy to be at their best, assuming they bother to show up?
Yup. It's really going to take some re-thinking, folks. There will have to be a procedure and a plan. The constitution and its protection will have to be considered.
What happened in NO, FEMA got its trucks in there and awaited coordination from the locals.
None came.
How are weekend warriors supposed to know their way around NO streets? Then they were getting shot at, something the locals were again supposed to take care of.
We're lucky that the feds managed to get their act turned around quickly enough. That's an amazing feat, frankly.
If you listened to Chertoff during his many press conferences, but especially the one today, he as much as said the premise was false.
It's going to take some thinking outside the box. From people who frankly should have been thinking outside the box waaaaay before this.
I'll go one step further. Us American citizens all dropped the ball. Before NO and the nightmare, I'd have backed the "local authority" premise to my deathbed.
No more.
Disasters like this are going to have to be handled by the Feds. Period. They are going to re-vamp their entire operational vision.
If the army was really smart, they'd pinpoint problem areas, such as NO when everyone knew about the problem of the levees. Then the military can put into effect, BEFORE it happens, a plan of operation. They can research the locale, population, etc, and come up with a plan.
Depending on the local authorities did not work. We should be thanking the corrupt NO police for teaching us this lesson.
Then our elected congress critters are going to have to put into effect a stipulated but quick plan to enact the takeover by the feds while protecting our rights as citizens and the danger of giving our military carte blanche to take over our lives and under what circumstances.
Call them in for a vote, I say. Give this takeover by the feds a time line, able to be extended or cut short.
We cannot assume the local people have done their job in preparation, will do the job as prepared in the event of a disaster, spent their federal funds wisely as earmarked for training in local disasters.
New Orleans taught us that.
We are just so lucky the feds were able to turn it around. It was simply not meant to happen the way it did. Sure there's an underbelly social problem in NO. Let the sociologists debate it.
When it comes to saving lives and reacting in a disaster, time to turn it over to one central experienced entity such as the military.
As far as the NG being able to get around in N.O., I heard most of the street signs were gone...and even locals were getting lost. So how in God's name is a young soldier from Podunk supposed to know how to get to the convention center? Not to mention streets turned into rivers...