Posted on 09/20/2005 11:35:05 AM PDT by Congressman Billybob
The US military has categories of stupidity. The highest is “gross public dumb.” But a higher category is needed for moments like the “bus interview” by Louisiana Governor Blanco. It is spectacularly stupid. You’ve got to see this to believe it.
Interview of Governor Blanco by John Hill of Louisiana Gannett News, 19 September, 2005
“GANNETT: In hindsight, what would you have done differently in the first response?
“BLANCO: Well, I would have placed less confidence in a structure elsewhere (the Federal Emergency Management Association) and depended more on ourselves. As an example, when buses were not delivered in a timely fashion, we had already started gathering school buses ... and buses of any kind ...
“We gave ourselves a false sense of confidence when we were counting on 500 buses that FEMA had ordered that did not come in until Wednesday night. So ...we would depend more on our own resources.”
Is this a stupid statement? To quote Elizabeth Browning, “Let me count the ways.”
Louisiana and New Orleans were supposed to use their OWN buses. So says the Southern Louisiana Evacuation Plan, 1 January, 2000. Was Governor Blanco aware of the Plan? Apparently not. But for any Governor of Louisiana, isn’t dealing with the occasional hurricane part of the job?
She refers to “confidence in FEMA.” Did she think FEMA had magic buses which would run with their engines under water? Did she think people could board those buses from the attics of their houses, hiding from flood waters? Hasn’t she seen the aerial photographs of 500 local buses flooded where they were parked before Katrina hit? Hellooo.
In the past she knew how to roll the buses. When she was running for Governor, she got the buses rolling in New Orleans Parish, with signs and Dixieland bands to turn out voters for Blanco. Which is the higher priority – getting votes for Blanco, or saving lives? Hellooo.
Was FEMA “late” in helping New Orleans? Let’s review. Katrina is the worst hurricane measured by square miles of territory wiped out. The second worst was Hurricane Floyd in 1999. It lingered over North Carolina, wiping out roads, electricity, gas lines, letting loose millions of gallons of sewage and agricultural waste on the eastern third of that state.
In 1999, the Governor did not retire to his fainting couch to “think about it” for 24 hours as Floyd approached. Yet FEMA’s response to Floyd (a smaller destroyed area) was slower than its response to Katrina now. Blanco has to know this, because her hired gun for the political aftermath of Katrina is James Lee Witt, Director of FEMA in 1999. Hellooo.
Asked about her comment which CNN taped that she “should have specifically asked for more troops," she said:
“BLANCO: Well, that was at a point in time when we were wondering if we were getting any significant federal aid. I guess because of the dynamics of the situation, when I asked for help, then I started getting bombarded with, ‘Did you ask specifically for this, that or the other.’ .... When people ask me for help, I know what kind of help I can get to them, and I can get it to them pretty quickly... Nobody bothered to ask me those questions.”
Note that last sentence. If nobody asks her a question, she doesn’t even think about that subject. Should any executive in or outside government ever act like this in an emergency? Hellooo.
Asked about the “breakdown... between state, federal and local people,” she replied,
“BLANCO: “I think the breakdown was at the point of not being able to get (buses) there on time. ... We had one mission in those early days, and it was search and rescue. Get people out of the water.”
No, Mrs. Blanco, the FIRST mission was to get the people out BEFORE the water got there. Hellooo. This woman is unfit to run a lemonade stand. She would have a gross lack of sales because she thought someone else was bringing the lemons.
I’m not picking on Governor Blanco as a Southern woman and Democrat. In three generations of women in my family, most are/were Southerners and Democrats. None of them, in a crisis, ever dithered or worked themselves into a swivet. They sized up the situation and did the best they could. No one was harmed because they couldn’t act..
But people did get harmed, people did die, because Blanco became Governor, clueless of her duties whenever the next major hurricane hit New Orleans. That goes beyond the high standard of gross public dumb.
About the Author: John Armor is a First Amendment attorney and author who lives in the Blue Ridge Mountains of North Carolina. John_Armor@aya.yale.edu
The First Rule of Wingwalking
Never let go of anything until you have hold of something else.
John / Billybob
Yep, no doubt about it, this woman is a true 'mental midget' with the intelligence and common sense of a 5 year old. Actually, that is an insult to my 5 year old great grand daughter but it was all that would come to mind.
[Great work pointing out the idiocy of my governor. The sooner she is bumped from office, the better.]
http://www.impeachblanco.org/
Kathleen Blanco is the Plastic Pansy hanging from the ski jacket of life.
But people did get harmed, people did die, because Blanco became Governor.
Very unfortunately for them, people of Louisiana and New Orleans had and still have the government they wanted.
I think someone has spelled her name wrongo...should be BLANKO...
Very well done!
Very well done!
...she just got the "vapors"
Doogle
Congress will investigate the Federal response to Katrina. Who will investigate the State and City fiasco?
Blanco ranks as Stupidity of Mass Destruction with oak leaf clusters.
Great post.
It was NOT the kind of declaration which would permit federal agencies like FEMA and the US Military to come into Louisiana. The State exclusion early on also applied to the Red Cross which, though private, is assigned some of the specific duties which FEMA oversees.
I went on the Snopes website, but I could not find how to contact them with regard to a specific entry.
John / Billybob
bump
And don't forget that they were carrying people to the busses in boats. If Bush had not come up with a better plan, we would still be watching them load 1300 busses.
Blanco and Nagin are public menaces.
How does our Constitution work again? Can we impeach them on the fly?- before the land is dry? - or must other people die?
sp
The poor Mayor didn’t have no drivers because they all left when they heard a hurricane was a comin!
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