Posted on 09/04/2005 1:56:57 AM PDT by Crackingham
Like many seismic events, Katrina’s true impact might take a while to absorb. What started as a natural disaster soon became an unforeseen social meltdown and potential political crisis for the president. The poverty, anarchy, violence, sewage, bodies, looting, death and disease that overwhelmed a great American city last week made Haiti look like Surrey. The seeming inability of the federal or city authorities to act swiftly or effectively to rescue survivors or maintain order posed fundamental questions about the competence of the Bush administration and local authorities. One begins to wonder: almost four years after 9/11, are evacuation plans for cities this haphazard? Five days after a hurricane, there were still barely any troops imposing order in a huge city in America. How on earth did this happen? And what will come of it?
In the past, American disasters have led to political changes — the Johnstown flood in 1889 and the Galveston hurricane in 1900 led to fury at class privilege and a government that seemed not to care for the poor. The 1927 flood in New Orleans — and the inequalities it exposed — propelled the rise of the populist demagogue Huey Long. There seems to me a strong chance that this calamity could be the beginning of something profound in American politics: a sense that government is broken and that someone needs to fix it. It did, after all, fail. It failed to spend the necessary money to protect New Orleans in the first place. This disaster, after all, did not come out of the blue.
Below is a passage from the Houston Chronicle in 2001, which quoted the Federal Emergency Management Agency on the three likeliest potential disasters to threaten America. They were: an earthquake in San Francisco, a terrorist attack in New York City (predicted before 9/11), and a hurricane hitting New Orleans.
Read this prophetic passage and weep: “The New Orleans hurricane scenario may be the deadliest of all. In the face of an approaching storm, scientists say, the city’s less-than-adequate evacuation routes would strand 250,000 people or more, and probably kill one of 10 left behind as the city drowned under 20ft of water.
“Thousands of refugees could land in Houston. Economically, the toll would be shattering . . . If an Allison-type storm were to strike New Orleans, or a category three storm or greater with at least 111mph winds, the results would be cataclysmic, New Orleans planners said.”
Katrina, of course, was category four.
So what was done to prevent this scenario? There was indeed an attempt to rebuild and strengthen the city’s defences. But the system of government in New Orleans is byzantine in its complexity, with different levees answering to different authorities, and corruption and incompetence legendary.
More politically explosive, the Bush administration has slashed the budget for rebuilding the levees. More than a year ago, Walter Maestri, emergency management chief for Jefferson Parish, Louisiana, told the New Orleans Times-Picayune: “It appears that the money has been moved in the president’s budget to handle homeland security and the war in Iraq, and I suppose that’s the price we pay. Nobody locally is happy that the levees can’t be finished, and we are doing everything we can to make the case that this is a security issue for us.”
It’s still unclear whether even with higher levels of funding the levees would have been strong enough to withstand Katrina in time. The Army Corps of Engineers has backed the president and said that the levees were built for only a category three hurricane and were in satisfactory shape. But levees need constant maintenance and an agency with a one-year budget cut of $71m might have skimped. The connection between shifting funds to fight wars abroad rather than to defend against calamity at home is a politically explosive one. As one Louisianan said: “You can do everything for other countries, but you can’t do nothing for your own people. You can go overseas with the military, but you can’t get them down here.”
Wow. I guess Bush will not be running for a third term now.
Don't you just love objective reporting?
Absolutely no shame.
When Mt. St. Helens erupted on May 18, 1980, did anybody blame then-president Jimmy Carter for the death of that lodge owner named Harry Truman, who refused to leave the mountain even after numerous warnings?
Airtight logic.
"Say no to Bush in 2008" Makes the libs crazy when you tell em that
It is fortunate for us that the liberals and their media whores believe their own lies, when the majority of people will never believe it, this my fellow freepers will guarantee that liberals will always be crushed in elections.
The plan is to impeach Bush. That has been the plan since 2000. The media whores are gonna rides this one all the way to the ground. I haven't heard them this shrill since... Cindy.
These fools in the MSM just don't get it. GW Bush is going to be the POTUS until January 20, 2009, no matter how much they piss and moan. Plus, at the end of the day, just as they did with Ronald Reagan, they, and their low life Democrat friends will look like the butthead idiots they are!!! They will never learn. I guess desperate people do desperate things!!!
20 to 25 years would have been needed to make the levee sustain a Katrina powerful cat 4 storm or cat 5. So Jimmy Carter can be blamed.
Fact is: John Kerry lost by almost four million votes.
After talking to relatives and friends, it is now clear that politically the Bush Presidency is over. The lack of response has demolished the credibility of this administration as good leadership in crisis. People are really surprised at the inability of the bureacratic Washington mess to deal directly with food, water, shelter, facilities, something everyone understands.
I am a Bush supporter but the events of this week have ended the Bush Presidency.
You need to read better, this is what I said:
It is fortunate for us that the liberals and their media whores believe their own lies, when the majority of people will never believe it, this my fellow freepers will guarantee that liberals will always be crushed in elections.
I said majority of people and not all the people, you only need a majority to win.
bttt
I have another quote to share with Andrew:
In 1998, the DoD and the US Army Corps of Engineers drafted a document detailing the fact that New Orleans was protected by levees which were designed to protect N.O. from a LEVEL 3 hurricane. These groups wanted to go into N.O. and assess what needed to be done to improve the levees to at least withstand a LEVEL 4 OR 5 hurricane.
This serious request and supporting information was deemed highly necessary to protect N.O. and was presented in full to the President of the United States for approval of this critical project.
THE REQUEST WAS DENIED BY WILLIAM JEFFERSON CLINTON. For those interested in the details, they are available in the FEDERAL REGISTER as a matter of permanent record.
So, how many more deaths do we attribute to this horrid excuse for a criminal, negligent, incompetent excuse for a human being ???
In summary, politics in critical situations, usually costs lives, it always has.
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So, because of Bush, the levees can't be finished. Because of a Republican President, 5 years into office and in the middle of fighting a way, a well known local problem that has existed for 30+ years, though Republican and Democrat Administrations, has now become another "Bush crime". Despite being known as the most politically corrupt state in the Union for the past 100 years, and until very recently, a total Democrat potentate, since this country now has a conservative, Republican President, it is he who is responsible for the condition of the local levees in Louisiana? Really?
Well first, excuse me if that line isn't a bit overly well worn. Excuse me if the pundits (like Andrew Sullivan) who have been willing shills for the Democrats though any outrage, who put personal and political gain ahead of our country's security and the well being of our troops at war, EXCUSE ME if I chose not to believe a damn word they say now.
Certainly, the Federal response may have been lacking. It may indeed be due to incompetence, or due to bureocratic mis-mangement, or failed policies of this President, Congress, or previous Presidents. However, I'll give President Bush the benefit of the doubt just now, because I don't know of a single elected Democrat who has done ANYTHING constructive before, during, or after the storm hit, for the people of New Orleans, Louisiana, and Missisippi. Not one. NOONE.
Time will tell, and we'll know more answers after a year or two. But, no, I don't believe one word Andrew Sullivan, or the other Democrat shills say. I DO NOT attribute patriotism, ernestness, or any other characteristic except expedeniency, and Machavellianism ("end justifies the means") to the Democrat party, Democrat politicians, the Democrat rank and file voters, and certainly, not to Democrat shill-media "journalists" like Andrew Sullivan. They have lied, they will lie, and they will protect the vilest, or most incompetent bureocrat or politician, as long as they have "Democrat" on their voter's registration.
SFS
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