Katrina: A Point by Point Refutation of the Left's Talking Points (Vanity)

9/5/05 | Stanley Jackson

[Stajack]

In the wake of Katrina, The Left has thrown everything but the kitchen sink at the Bush Administration. Here's a point by point refutation of some of their major talking points.

[SIRTRIS]

Strange you would say all that considering there is local comprehensive disaster plan, way ahead of FEMA.

"City of New Orleans Comprehensive Emergency Management Plan" http://www.cityofno.com/SystemModules/PrintPage.aspx?portal=46&tabid=26

[Wooly]

What will finally backfire on them is.

The President names the Cabinet level people that run Homeland Security and FEMA, but the regional people are career employees of the Federal Government of which the majority are union members more intrested in their coffee breaks than doing their jobs in an emergency. At the same time many of the people who run regional offices are there, not because they are experts, but because they know the politician in their region (in this case sy Democrats).
And as to the Corp Of Engineer Budget, if I remember correctly, they are still a part of the U.S. Army and their budget is a part of the overall budgets which the democrats have been cutting every year between Bush I and Bush II. Remember peace dividend.

[KSCITYBOY]

bump

[TheRobb7]

I have also gathered a group of stories and links, saved a a Microsoft Word file.

If anyone wants a copy, FreepMail me.

Godd bless Freeper Nation!

[Fawn]

That's right!! JEB is a cruel cruel man.

[Fawn]

If the would just drop Teddy Kennedy into the breech in the levee, they could save several hundred sandbags..."

Lol.....add Barney Fwank & Michael Moore and that thing is never gonna break!

[sonofatpatcher2]

Re: If the would just drop Teddy Kennedy into the breech in the levee, they could save several hundred sandbags..."
Lol.....add Barney Fwank & Michael Moore and that thing is never gonna break!

Gad, this is too easy... Drop Barney 'cause he would suck all the water right up...

[Robert A Cook PE]

The mayor ONLY gave the evacuation order when TOLD TO DO SO by fed's.

The Mayor left hundreds of city municipal buses and New Orleans school buses to flood in their parking lots.

The mayor ordered evacuation centers in the Super Dome and Convention Center - But failed to stage food and water in either place for the tens of thousands he had DECADES to plan for a hurricane.

The Mayor had no police control, and no police to control because HE (and previous administrations) fed a corrupt and racist police dept.

The mayor had failed to maintain HSI pumps and levees.

The mayor failed to remove people from the Dome when they could have WALKED OUT - through knee-deep it is true, but he left them there in their (his own) squalor.

The mayor and Governor HAVE NOT YET signed papers to give the fed's local authority to take control - but this was requested and signed by AL and Missip. governors BEFORE the storm hit.

[Stajack]

The damage is done. The vandals have fled. You lost. So have we. Again.

I hope that you are wrong. Actually, I think you are. Think back. How long has The Left been doing this type of saturation bombing? And how long have we been winning elections. I truly believe that there's a cumulative effect to thousands and thousands of folks like you and I rattling our cages. And that cumulative effect MATTERS, oftentimes in intangible ways.

[TheRobb7]

http://www.philly.com/mld/miamiherald/news/special_packages/5min/12505019.htm

Posted on Mon, Aug. 29, 2005


U.S. GULF COAST
Storm carries multiple threats
Hurricane Katrina threatened to submerge 287-year-old New Orleans, create numerous dangers

http://www.chicagotribune.com/news/local/chi-050901corps,1,7189346.story?coll=chi-news-hed&ctrack=1&cset=true

Corps officials: Funding levels not to blame for flooding

http://www.guardian.co.uk/uslatest/story/0,1282,-5239074,00.html

Blanco said President Bush called and personally appealed for the mandatory evacuation for the city,


http://www.cityofno.com/portal.aspx?portal=46&tabid=26
City of New Orleans Comprehensive Emergency Management Plan"


http://www.wwltv.com/local/stories/091904ccktWWLIvanFlaws.132602486.html

Ivan exposes flaws in N.O.'s disaster plans
05:09 PM CDT on Sunday, September 19, 2004
"They say evacuate, but they don't say how I'm supposed to do that," Latonya Hill, 57,


an interesting video link:

http://www.foxnews.com/video2/player05.html?090305/pol_blame_090305&Your_World&Blame%20Game&acc&Politics&-1&exp


http://www.post-gazette.com/pg/05242/562353.stm

As dawn broke on the day after Hurricane Katrina's landfall...The federal government began rushing baby formula, communications equipment, generators, water and ice into hard-hit areas of Louisiana, Mississippi and Alabama, along with doctors, nurses and first-aid supplies.


http://news.yahoo.com/news?tmpl=story&u=/050901/480/flpc21109012015


http://news.yahoo.com/s/afp/20050903/pl_afp/usweatherresponse_050903203446
Disintegration of New Orleans police slowed response: guard commander Sat Sep 3, 4:34 PM ET

http://www.cbsnews.com/stories/2004/08/16/national/main636126.shtml

Charley Cleanup 'Organized Chaos'
PUNTA GORDA, Fla., August 15, 2004

that quick response fueled suspicion that he is using disaster politics to help his campaign in one of the most critical battleground states, a notion the president dismissed Sunday.

"Yeah, and if I didn't come they'd have said he should have been here more rapidly," Mr. Bush said.


http://msnbc.msn.com/id/9177135/

Why is the relief effort taking so long?
Analyzing the government's response to Hurricane Katrina

Updated: 5:02 p.m. ET Sept. 2, 2005
: Unless you're going to drop the palates from 10 or 20,000 feet on the heads of these poor people

http://abcnews.go.com/US/print?id=1094262

Poll: Bush Not Taking Brunt of Katrina Criticism
Hurricane Preparedness Is Faulted; Fewer Blame Bush for Problems

[feedback doctor]

Remember we were the first State to be hit by Katrina and we lost 11 people and it was during it's passage across Florida that JEB Bush used his secret powers to send it into the Gulf and turn towards Louisiana.

You forget Katherine Harriss' role in this. She's trying to win the support of the evil Repbulicans who were against her candidacy. And for further confirmation, the Supreme Court was part of the plan to cripple NO, and when Justice Renquhist threatened to tell about what was going on, well, you know what happened to him.

[PhilipFreneau]

>>> "As for people saying there was an evacuation order(which the mayor gave not Bush BTW), I am at a loss to understand how shallow these "thinkers" really are. You cannot evacuate millions of people for hundreds of miles on 2 or 3 roads at the drop of a hat. Pull your head out of wherever you are storing it." <<<

The Mayor did not evacuate N.O. until Bush pleaded for an evacuation, and only then after the Mayor consulted with his lawyers. Only an absolute idiot would wait until the last day to evacuate when a Cat 4 or 5 hurricane is bearing down on you. Only an absolute idiot would leave all those poor, disabled and dangerous inside the city, when he had many hundreds, maybe thousands, of buses at his disposal. As for legal authority, the SE Louisana Hurricane Evacuation and Sheltering Plan clearly states:

"The primary means of hurricane evacuation will be personal vehicles. School and municipal buses, government-owned vehicles and vehicles provided by volunteer agencies may be used to provide transportation for individuals who lack transportation and require assistance in evacuating."

BTW, where are your storing your head?

[MizSterious]

Good work on these points, Stajack.

[scouse]

Justice Renquhist threatened to tell

Ah yes! He was sent to Marcy Park.

[Stajack]

Ah heck, let's give them the one that Bush, leader of the right and grandest party, is able to control the weather and the entire universe.

Oh yeah, I forgot that one ;-)

[Stajack]

What does "bump" mean?

[Huber]

Ping. Contains good links.

[TaxRelief]

from my view, the mayor is blameless

Did the mayor use the public school buses to evacuate the indigent?

Did the mayor alert FEMA to the fact that thousands of refugees were being sent to an undocumented, insecure refugee center (convention center).

Did the mayor remain in the city working side-by-side with the chief of police, etc to secure provisions and shelter for the refugees?

[ckilmer]

The Southern Louisiana Evacuation Plan specifically stated that people without private transportation were to be transported on public buses. Here is the original post of the plan

There were not just "200 buses". There were 200 buses in just one photo and Freepers studying the post-Katrina satellite images have counted over 400 buses altogether at other city parking.

At 70 people per bus that is 28,000 people per round trip that could have been taken out of the storm surge area in the 48 hours prior the Katrina striking.

After the storm hit, what makes you think that buses sent from outside of New Orleans could drive through the flooded mess any better than the 145 New Orleans city buses that were parked 1.2 miles away from the Superdome?

Was Scotty supposed to beam the outside buses to the Superdome and them beam them back out so that they would not have to drive through impassable roads?

The time to evacuate those 200,000 low-income people on public buses OUT OF THE STORM SURGE ZONE was BEFORE the Category 4 storm struck.

That was what the Southern Louisiana Evacuation Plan for New Orleans specifically called for.

The Democrat Governor and the Democrat Mayor did NOTHING to carry out that portion of the plan. They left 200,000 low-income resident abandoned and they now blame the Federal Government for not having Scotty beam down a massive logistics effort after a human disaster of their own making.

[Elyse]

Can anyone explain to me the 'paperwork from Washington' that they say kept 10,000 guardsmen from getting their until Thursday?

"New Mexico Gov. Bill Richardson offered Louisiana Gov. Kathleen Blanco help from his state's National Guard last Sunday, the day before Hurricane Katrina hit Louisiana. Blanco accepted, but paperwork needed to get the troops en route didn't come from Washington until late Thursday."
http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20050903/ap_on_re_us/katrina_national_guard

I'm trying to understand why paperwork would have to come from Washington on this. I thought that it was between the state governors and Washington had no jurisdiction over the Guard unless they were called up for foreign duty. I'm also wondering how they know when the paperwork got out of the state TO Washington in the first place. Just because he said that he would send them on Sunday and she accepted doesn't mean that both Louisiana and Arizona got the paperwork out that day and Washington knew about thier deal. Maybe Washington didn't recieve the 'paperwork' until Wednesday or Thursday from Louisiana. But, I'd still like to know what paperwork it was to begin with.