US GOVERNMENT FUCKS UP, PEOPLE DIE

[fermentor666]

http://americablog.blogspot.com/2005/09/is...r-or-idiot.html

 

 

Read that.

[fermentor666]

http://americablog.blogspot.com/2005/09/is...r-or-idiot.html

 

 

Read that.

[fermentor666]

Dailykos photo diary of the Bush response taken directly from their site:

 

 

SUNDAY, August 28

 

A region is hit with a massive Cat 4 hurricane.

 

 

Meanwhile, Bush, Condi Rice, and Dick Cheney are all on vacation, and can't be bothered to interrupt it for the largest hurricane to hit the United States in generations. Especially since it had little to do with the "war on terror".

 

MONDAY, August 29

 

While an entire region of the United States awakens underwater:

 

 

 

Bush says, "Let them eat cake". McCain says, "I'll bring the cake!"

 

 

(White House picture)

 

TUESDAY, August 30

 

Tuesday rolls around, and the world watches in horror as the true scope of the disaster becomes apparent:

 

 

(CBS News)

 

Meanwhile, our very own Nero fiddles plays "pretend country star" while a whole region of his country drowns:

 

 

(Associated Press)

 

WEDNESDAY, August 31

 

It has been three days since the hurricane hit, yet people are still stranded without a hint of an organized, competent federal response.

 

 

Bush finally decides to show up for work, ends his five week vacation two or three days early (to great fanfare from the Bush acolytes), heads back to DC after he "surveys" the disaster zone:

 

 

FRIDAY, September 2

 

While people are still in need of rescue:

 

 

(LA Times)

 

Bush grounds Coast Guard helicopters and pulls servicemembers from duty to stand as backdrops to one of his photo ops:

 

 

And so on, and so on, and so on...

[fermentor666]

DailyKos:

FEMA's braintrust

by kos

Tue Sep 6th, 2005 at 12:26:30 PDT

 

So we know Mike Brown, disgraced horse lawyer, was given his job at the head of the US' chief disaster response agency because he was a former roommate of Bush's 2000 campaign manager -- strong credentials in an administration where party trumps the Stars and Stripes.

 

Well, the rest of FEMA's braintrust is little better:

 

The Chief of Staff is a guy named Patrick Rhode. He planned events for President Bush's campaign. Rhode has no emergency management experience whatsoever. From Rhode's official bio (PDF):

His first position with the Bush Administration was as special assistant to the President and deputy director of National Advance Operations, a position he assumed in January 2001. Previously, Mr. Rhode served as deputy director of National Advance Operations for the George W. Bush Presidential Campaign, in Austin, Texas.

 

The Deputy Chief of Staff is Scott Morris. He was a press flak for Bush's presidential campaign. Previously, he worked for the company that produced Bush's campaign commercials. He also has no emergency management experience. From Morris's official bio (PDF):

Mr. Morris was also the marketing director for the world's leading provider of e-business applications software in California, and worked for Maverick Media in Austin, Texas as a media strategist for the George W. Bush for President primary campaign and the Bush-Cheney 2000 campaign.

 

With credentials like those, is it any wonder this was the gang that couldn't shoot straight? And who appointed these jokers to their respective positions?

 

Ahem, the guy who now wants to "lead" the investigation into his own incompetence, ol' Dubya himself.

[fermentor666]

FEMA won't accept Amtrak's help in evacuations

 

http://news.ft.com/cms/s/84aa35cc-1da8-11d...000e2511c8.html

 

FEMA turns away experienced firefighters

 

http://www.dailykos.com/storyonly/2005/9/5/105538/7048

 

FEMA turns back Wal-Mart supply trucks

 

http://www.nytimes.com/2005/09/05/national...serland&emc=rss

 

FEMA prevents Coast Guard from delivering diesel fuel

 

http://www.nytimes.com/2005/09/05/national...serland&emc=rss

 

FEMA won't let Red Cross deliver food

 

http://www.post-gazette.com/pg/05246/565143.stm

 

FEMA bars morticians from entering New Orleans

 

http://www.zwire.com/site/news.cfm?newsid=..._id=68561&rfi=6

[fermentor666]

FEMA blocks 500-boat citizen flotilla from delivering aid

 

http://www.dailykos.com/storyonly/2005/9/3/171718/0826

 

FEMA fails to utilize Navy ship with 600-bed hospital on board

 

http://www.chicagotribune.com/news/nationw...ack=1&cset=true

 

FEMA to Chicago: Send just one truck

 

http://www.chicagotribune.com/news/local/c...ll=chi-news-hed

 

FEMA turns away generators (See entry from 3:32 P.M. by Ben Morris, Slidell mayor)

 

http://www.wwltv.com/local/stories/WWLBLOG.ac3fcea.html

 

FEMA: "First Responders Urged Not To Respond"

 

http://www.fema.gov/news/newsrelease.fema?id=18470

[shai]

The message- poor people can tread water, don't sweat it.

[shai]

Let's say, for instance, Bush resigns under massive pubic protest and in the face of criminal charges (well, I can dream, can't I?) and is promply granted a pardon a la Nixon, along with all culpable parties by his successor . I think it's his only ticket out of this, but I think people haven't seen this coming. I really think he should be put on trial with the jury made up of former citizens of NOLA.

[GnomeToys]

This will provoke change, I believe. The war on Iraq is/was a farce, but the public couldn't be made to care too much because they believe in our soldiers and the media is saying we're not losing too many.

 

Now that our own citizens are being fucked over people are getting pissed, and in this case I don't think the government spin doctors are going to be able to use it to their advantage to get stricter laws put in place.

 

 

 

And still, Clinton was impeached over a BLOWJOB.

 

 

Remember?

[!@#$%]

i have the worst fucking headache

 

i think this is how people must feel before they launch a grenade into a government building

[POIESIS]

i wouldn't be so sure about accountability at the executive level..

[shai]

That's one of the perks of the job in 2005- carte blanche.

[angelofdeath]

The State and the Flood

 

 

 

by Llewellyn H. Rockwell, Jr.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

"No one can escape the influence of a prevailing ideology," wrote Ludwig von Mises, and Gulf Coast residents know precisely what it means to be trapped—ostensibly by a flood but actually by statist policies and ideological commitments that put the government in charge of crisis management and public infrastructure. For what we are seeing in New Orleans and the entire Gulf Coast region is the most egregious example of government failure in the United States since September 11, 2001.

 

 

 

Mother Nature can be cruel, but even at her worst, she is no match for government. It was the glorified public sector, the one we are always told is protecting us, that is responsible for this. And though our public servants and a sycophantic media will do their darn best to present this calamity as an act of nature, it was not and is not. Katrina came and went with far less damage than anyone expected. It was the failure of the public infrastructure and the response to it that brought down civilization.

 

 

 

The levees that failed and caused New Orleans to be flooded, bringing a humanitarian crisis not seen in our country in modern times, were owned and maintained by the Army Corps of Engineers. The original levees surrounding this city below sea level were erected in 1718, and have been variously expanded since.

 

 

 

But who knew that a direct hit by a hurricane would cause them to break? Many people, it turns out. Ivor van Heerden of Louisiana State University, reports Newsday, "has developed flooding models for New Orleans, was among those issuing dire predictions as Katrina approached, warnings that turned out to be grimly accurate. He predicted that floodwaters would overcome the levee system, fill the low-lying areas of the city and then remain trapped there well after the storm passed – creating a giant, stagnant pool contaminated with debris, sewage and other hazardous materials."

 

Newsday goes on: "Van Heerden and other experts put some of the blame on the Mississippi River levees themselves, because they channel silt directly into the Gulf of Mexico that otherwise would stabilize land along the riverside and slow the sinking of the coastline."

 

 

 

He is hardly some lone nut. National Geographic ran a large article on the topic last year that begins with a war-of-the-worlds scenario that reads precisely like this week's news from New Orleans. It is the Army Corps of Engineers that has been responsible for the dwindling of the coastline that has required the levees to be constantly reinforced with higher walls. But one problem: no one bothered to do this since 1965. That's only the beginning of the problems created by the Corps' levee management, the history of which was documented by Mark Thornton following the last flood in 1999.

 

 

 

Only the public sector can preside over a situation this precarious and display utter and complete inertia. What do these people have to lose? They are not real owners. There are no profits or losses at stake. They do not have to answer to risk-obsessed insurance companies who insist on premiums matching even the most remote contingencies. So long as it seems to work, they are glad to go about their business in the soporific style famous to all public sectors everywhere.

 

 

 

And failure of one structure has highlighted the failures of other structures. The levees could not be repaired in a timely manner because roads and bridges built and maintained by government could not withstand the pressure from the flood. They broke down. 

 

 

 

And again, it is critical to keep in mind that none of this was caused by Hurricane Katrina as such. It was the levee break that led to the calamity. As the New York Times points out: "it was not the water from the sky but the water that broke through the city's protective barriers that had changed everything for the worse…. When the levees gave way in some critical spots, streets that were essentially dry in the hours immediately after the hurricane passed were several feet deep in water on Tuesday morning."

 

 

 

Indeed, at 4pm on Monday, August 29, all seemed calm, and reports of possible calamity seemed overwrought. Two hours later the reports began to appear about the levee. A period of some twelve hours lapsed between when the hurricane passed through and when the water came rushing into the city. There is some dispute about precisely when the levees broke. Some say that they were broken long before anyone discovered it, which is another outrage. There was no warning system. There is no question that plenty of time was available between their breakage and the flooding to enable to people to make other arrangements—and perhaps for the levees to be repaired. People were relieved that the rain subsided and the effects of Katrina were far less egregious than anyone expected.

 

 

 

That's when the disaster struck. The municipal government itself relocated to Baton Rouge even as the city pumps failed as well. Meanwhile, the Army Corp of Engineers apparently had no viable plan even to make repairs. They couldn't bring in the massive barges and cranes needed because the bridges were down and broken, or couldn't be opened without electricity. For public relations purposes, they dumped tons of sand into one breach even as another levee was breaking. But even that PR move failed since most helicopters were being used to move people from spot to spot—another classic case of miscalculation. Many bloggers had the sense that the public sector essentially walked away.

 

 

 

But the police and their guns and nightsticks were out in full force, not arresting criminals but pushing around the innocent and giving mostly bad instructions. The 10,000 people who had been corralled into the Superdome were essentially under house arrest from the police who were keeping them there, preventing them even from getting fresh air. A day later the water and food were running out, people were dying, and the sanitary conditions becoming disastrous. Finally someone had the idea of shipping all these people Soviet-like to Houston to live in the Astrodome, as if they are not people with volition but cattle.

 

 

 

After evacuations, the looting began and created a despicable sight of criminal gangs stealing everything in sight as the police looked on (when they weren't joining in). Now, this scene offers its own lessons. Why don't looting and rampant criminality occur every day? The police are always there and so are the hoodlums and the criminals. What was missing that made the looting rampage possible was the bourgeoisie, that had either left by choice or had been kicked out. It is they who keep the peace. And had any stayed around to protect their property, we don't even have to speculate what the police would have done: Arrest them!

 

 

 

Now, in the coming weeks, as it becomes ever more obvious that the real problem was not the hurricane but the failure of the infrastructure to work properly, the political left is going to have a heyday (here too). They will point out that Bush cut spending for the Army Corp of Engineers, that money allocated to reinforcing the levees and fixing the pumps had been cut to pay for other things, that we are reaping what we sow from failing to support the public sector.

 

 

 

The ever-stupid right will come to the defense of Bush and the Iraq War that has completely absorbed this regime's attention, pointing out that Bush is actually a big and compassionate spender who cares about infrastructure, while demanding that people recognize his greatness, along with all the other pieties that have become staples of modern "conservatism."

 

 

 

But this is a superficial critique (and defense) that doesn't get to the root of the problem with public services. NASA spends and spends and still can't seem to make a reliable space shuttle. The public schools absorb many times more—thousands times more—in resources than private schools and still can't perform well. The federal government spends trillions over years to "protect" the country and can't fend off a handful of malcontents with an agenda. So too, Congress can allocate a trillion dollars to fix every levee, fully preventing the last catastrophe, but not the next one.

 

 

 

The problem here is public ownership itself. It has encouraged people to adopt a negligent attitude toward even such obvious risks. Private developers and owners, in contrast, demand to know every possible scenario as a way to protect their property. But public owners have no real stake in the outcome and lack the economic capacity to calibrate resource allocation to risk assessment. In other words, the government manages without responsibility or competence.

 

 

 

Can levees and pumps and disaster management really be privatized? Not only can they be; they must be if we want to avoid ever more apocalypses of this sort.  William Buckley used to poke fun at libertarians and their plans for privatizing garbage collection, but this disaster shows that much more than this ought to be in private hands. It is not a trivial issue; our survival may depend on it.

 

 

 

It is critically important that the management of the whole of the nation's infrastructure be turned over to private management and ownership. Only in private hands can there be a possibility of a match between expenditure and performance, between risk and responsibility, between the job that needs to be done and the means to accomplish it.

 

 

 

The list of public sector failures hardly stops there. The outrageous insistence that no one be permitted to "gouge" only creates shortages in critically important goods and services when they are needed the most. It is at times of extreme need that prices most need to be free to change so that consumers and producers can have an idea of what is needed and what is in demand. Absent those signals, people do not know what to conserve and what to produce.

 

 

 

Bush was on national television declaring that the feds would have zero tolerance towards gouging, which is another way of saying zero tolerance toward markets. If New Orleans stands any chance of coming back, it will only be because private enterprise does the rebuilding, one commercial venture at a time. Bush's kind of talk guarantees a future of mire and muck, the remote possibility of prosperity and peace sacrificed on the altar of interventionism.

 

 

 

Moreover, every American ought to be alarmed at the quickness of officials to declare martial law, invade people's rights, deny people the freedom of movement, and otherwise trample on all values that this country is supposed to hold dear. A crisis does not negate the existence of human rights. It is not a license for tyranny. It is not a signal that government may do anything it wants.

 

 

 

This crisis ought to underscore a point made on these pages again and again. Being a government official gives you no special insight into how to best manage a crisis. Indeed the public sector, with all its guns and mandates and arrogance, cannot and will not protect us from life's contingencies. It used to be said that infrastructure was too important to be left to the uncertainties of markets. But if it is certainty that we are after, there is a new certainty that has emerged in American life: in a crisis, the government will make matters worse and worse until it wrecks your life and all that makes it worth living.

 

 

 

September 2, 2005

 

 

 

Llewellyn H. Rockwell, Jr. [send him mail] is president of the Ludwig von Mises Institute in Auburn, Alabama, editor of LewRockwell.com and author of Speaking of Liberty.

 

 

 

Copyright © 2005 LewRockwell.com

[shai]

Hmmmm...that's a lot of food for thought. I like the way that he thinks- he pointed out a lot of the weak links in the chain.

[Guest KING BLING]

http://www.cnn.com/2005/US/09/08/katrina.f...n.ap/index.html

 

Victims feel forgotten in southeastern Louisiana

 

 

CHALMETTE, Louisana (AP) -- The cars were swallowed, the homes shattered and the people left clinging for life. Survivors waited for help, but it seemed like so little, so late.

 

More than a week since Hurricane Katrina cut its swath along the Gulf Coast, word is only now starting to trickle out from this outlying area of some 66,000 people on Louisiana's southeastern edge.

 

What's said is filled with anger -- residents feeling even more abandoned than hard-hit New Orleans -- and disbelief. (See video of a largely submerged parish -- 2:35 )

 

"If you dropped a bomb on this place, it couldn't be any worse than this," said Ron Silva, a district fire chief in St. Bernard Parish. "It's Day 8, guys. Everything was diverted first to New Orleans, we understand that. But do you realize we got 18 to 20 feet of water from the storm, and we've still got 7 to 8 feet of water?"

 

In the working-class parishes of St. Bernard and Plaquemines, the heavy rain and levee break brought a wall of water up to 20 feet high. Local officials expect the number of deaths to be in the hundreds.

 

In one wrenching case, 30 residents in a nursing home died and 30 others were evacuated, said Lt. Gov. Mitch Landrieu, who has been working with search and rescue. (Full story)

 

Homes were chopped open, a Baptist church's steeple ripped off. Water gurgles and spurts in places from leaking natural gas.

 

"I can't even imagine trying to rebuild this," said Kevin Cobble, a U.S. Fish and Wildlife officer from Las Cruces, New Mexico, who has been looking for survivors.

 

As relief efforts sputtered in the days after the storm, Verlyn Davis Jr., an out-of-work electrician, took charge. He transformed his parents' bar and seafood restaurant, Lehrmann's, into a shelter where he dispatches people to clear roads, hook up generators and help in the disaster relief process.

 

About 20 people have been staying there these days. On a boarded-up window out front is a blue spray-painted sign: "ABOUT TIME BUSH!"

 

"The governor and the president let thousands of people die and they let them die on their roofs and they let them die in the water," said Davis, 45. "We got left. They didn't care."

 

Help has begun to pour in -- the sound of the military helicopters overhead interrupts the silence. Search teams in boats pound on rooftops. They shout, "Anybody home?" But they know the answer.

 

"New Orleans took a beating," said Jason Stage, a 47-year-old maintenance worker staying at Lehrmann's. "But St. Bernard Parish and Plaquemines was ground zero."

[fermentor666]

Dailykos:

 

These eleven congressmen, Republican conservatives all, just voted against the $51 billion package ( H. R. 3673) for the victims of Hurricane Katrina. Horrible human beings, all.

 

Rep. Joe Barton - TX

 

Jeff Flake - AZ

 

Virginia Foxx - NC

 

Scott Garrett - NJ

 

John Hostettler - IN

 

Steve King - IA

 

Butch Otter - ID

 

Ron Paul - TX

 

James Sensenbrenner - WI

 

Tom Tancredo - CO

 

Lynn Westmoreland - GA

 

 

 

----------

 

 

 

Tom DeLay: Response to Katrina a “Phenomenal Accomplishment”

 

Speaking on the floor of the House an hour ago, Tom DeLay evaluated the response to Hurricane Katrina:

 

It’s easy to be a Monday morning quarterback, but you should have been in that control room where those people were making life and death decisions, people that stayed up and got no sleep and very little food for five to six days straight trying to make the right decisions to save people. What happens when we come up here? They point the finger. You didn’t make the right decision here. You didn’t take care of my aides there. You didn’t do this. You didn’t do that. The point is if you look at the big picture, it’s a phenomenal accomplishment by everybody involved. It’s unbelievable. I am constantly struck by where we are today just a little over a week from the worst catastrophe that this country has seen.

 

 

 

 

 

 

WTFEVER MR. DELAY. MR. DELAYED RELIEF IS MORE LIKE IT FGT.

[fermentor666]

http://www.post-gazette.com/pg/05250/566844.stm

Santorum retreats on evacuation penalty remarks

Didn't mean those without cars who stayed

 

Wednesday, September 07, 2005

By Sean D. Hamill, The Associated Press

 

Sen. Rick Santorum said in a weekend interview that people who do not heed evacuation warnings in the future may need to be penalized. But the Pennsylvania Republican yesterday clarified his remarks, saying he did not mean people who lack cars or other resources.

 

His remarks were sharply criticized by the campaign of Democrat Bob Casey Jr., who is seeking to unseat Santorum, the No. 3 GOP leader in the Senate. "At face value [santorum's comments] show an incredible amount of insensitivity to the Gulf Coast," said Jay Reiff, Casey's campaign manager. "What exactly does Senator Santorum mean by imposing penalties on people who often times had no transportation and no place to go?"

 

In a weekend interview with Pittsburgh's WTAE-TV about the victims of Hurricane Katrina, Santorum said: "I mean, you have people who don't heed those warnings and then put people at risk as a result of not heeding those warnings. There may be a need to look at tougher penalties on those who decide to ride it out and understand that there are consequences to not leaving."

 

Last night on WTAE, Santorum clarified his comments: "Obviously, most of the people here in this case, an overwhelming majority of people, just literally couldn't have gotten out on their own," he said. "Many didn't have cars. ... And that really was a failure on the part of local officials in not making transportation available to get people out."

 

National Republican Senatorial Committee spokesman Dan Ronayne responded for Santorum's office, saying Casey's campaign took the senator's comments out of context.

 

"The senator was saying if people can get out of the way of a hurricane, they should," Ronayne said. "Of course, he wasn't referring to people who do not have the resources or the means to get out of the way of the hurricane."

 

Casey, Pennsylvania's current state treasurer and son of a former governor, announced early this year that he would challenge Santorum in 2006, setting up a contest expected to be one of the most bitter in the next federal elections.

 

House Speaker Dennis Hastert, R-Ill., and former first lady Barbara Bush also have drawn criticism for their comments.

 

After a tour of the Houston Astrodome in Texas earlier this week, where thousands of hurricane victims are now being housed, the wife of former President George H.W. Bush and the current president's mother said in a National Public Radio interview: "So many of the people here, you know, were underprivileged anyway, so this is working very well for them."

 

And last week, Hastert told the Daily Herald newspaper in Arlington Heights, Ill., that since New Orleans is located below sea level, he wasn't sure whether it should be rebuilt.

 

Hastert later issued a statement saying: "My comments about rebuilding the city were intended to reflect my sincere concern with how the city is rebuilt to ensure the future protection of its citizens and not to suggest that this great historic city should not be rebuilt."

[fermentor666]

http://www.crooksandliars.com/2005/09/08.html#a4861

 

Nancy Pelosi Slaps down Kyra Phillips

 

On CNN today, from the Daily Kos diary:

 

Nancy Pelosi just absolutely laid out a CNN commentator (Myra something-or-other) after the commentator's incredibly aggressive, adversarial line of questioning and b.s. rationalizations for why others are really to blame for New Orleans...

 

PHILLIPS: But if you, if we go back, I mean, we can go back year after year after year, and we can talk about FEMA and what went wrong within FEMA and should FEMA be under the Department of Homeland Security. But if we want to be historical here, and we want to go back in time, I mean, we can go back to "The Times Picayune" and the investigation that it -- when it -- when reporters revealed that time after time, monies were asked for from all types of various politicians, of the politicians you worked side by side with, laws that you yourself vote on, and monies that should have gone to Louisiana to take care of the problems with regard to the flood control systems.

 

And I think it's unfair that FEMA is just singled out. There are so many people responsible for what has happened in the state of Louisiana.

 

PELOSI: Well, that's true. That is true. And I'm sorry that you think it's unfair. But I don't. I think it's unfair to the people who lost their family members, their lives, their livelihoods, their homes, their opportunity.

 

And FEMA has done a poor job. It had no chance. It was (INAUDIBLE)...

 

PHILLIPS: But what about all those warnings...

 

PELOSI: ... may I please respond?

 

PHILLIPS: What about all the warnings from the Army Corps of Engineers...

 

PELOSI: But the Army Corps of Engineers...

 

PHILLIPS: ... years ago, saying there's a problem with these levees, there's a problem with this city.

 

PELOSI: Kyra, Kyra, Kyra...

 

PHILLIPS: It's Kyra. It's Kyra.

 

PELOSI: ... if you want to make a case for the White House, you should go on their payroll. ...

 

 

 

 

 

 

VIDEO ON PAGE AND AT: http://movies.crooksandliars.com/cnn_lt_pe...ush_050908a.wmv

 

 

WATCH IT FOR SHITS AND GIGGLES!

[fermentor666]

WATCH CHENEY GETTING TOLD TO GO FUCK HIMSELF!

 

http://www.youtube.com/watch.php?v=V3nuh6mNdH8

 

THE AMERICAN PEOPLE ARE SPEAKING!

[POIESIS]

heh heh

[fermentor666]

DailyKos:

 

Democratic Senate Minority Leader Harry Reid made the following statement on the floor of the Senate:

 

 

Mr. President, there are many things we don't yet know about the government's response to Katrina, but two things are clear to us all: the federal government's response was unacceptable and the victims and all Americans deserve to know why. Following 9/11, preparedness for national emergencies was supposed to be a priority for this government. Americans were made to believe the government was doing everything it could to prepare for terrorist attacks, natural disasters, and other national crises.

 

Katrina makes it clear this government has failed.

 

We must find out why immediately to make sure the devastation caused by Hurricane Katrina never happens again. When we faced a similar situation after September 11, Democrats and Republicans came together and established an independent, blue-ribbon Commission.

 

Republicans now apparently want a different approach. Yesterday, the Republicans unveiled their proposal to investigate the events of last week. They called it a "bipartisan commission."

 

Although I have no details on this proposal, what little I do know raises serious concerns about whether their proposal will provide Americans the answers they deserve.

 

One, it's not bi-partisan. An investigation of the Republican Administration by a Republican-controlled Congress is like having a pitcher call his own balls and strikes.

 

. . . Finally, we have seen what happens when this administration - or any administration - investigates itself. The American people will not get the real answers they deserve.

 

 

------------

 

http://www.prospect.org/weblog/archives/20...dex.html#007626

 

 

 

THE CORRUPT INVESTIGATING THE INEPT. I think a lot of liberals got their hopes up that last week's solid Katrina coverage was a harbinger of better media behavior to come. I'm a lot less sanguine. The GOP, having apparently decided that they can't get away with the farce of letting the White House investigate the White House's handling of the hurricane, has decided instead to do it with an ordinary congressional panel. That means a majority on the committee will be Republicans; it will be able to subpoena anything the GOP wants, and nothing the Democrats want. Under ordinary circumstances, that would be bad enough, but the 21st-century congressional Republican Party has really been unique in its absolute fealty to the White House. We haven't seen any congressional oversight at all. Even clear-cut no-nos that the Republican members have self-interested reasons to be upset about and that upset significant elements of the broader conservative movement, like the whole lying to Congress about the Medicare bill thing, have gone un-investigated and un-punished.

 

Naturally enough, the coverage of the Republican plan gives you no flavor of any of that. Instead, it's just your typical D.C. partisan food-fight coverage reflecting the most entrenched bit of media bias around -- a die-hard commitment to moral equivalence. If one party is maneuvering for partisan advantage it must be that both partyies are. If something bad happens, it must be that both parties are equally at fault. Compromise is always good, and anyone capable of maintaining power must deserve it. Fortunately, it looks like the Democrats are pushing back on this and, if they're lucky, once New Orleans' refugees get a bit settled we'll see some kind of victim's group capable of exerting independent pressure, but don't get your hopes up about the media.

 

--Matthew Yglesias

 

----------------

 

http://www.prospect.org/weblog/archives/20...dex.html#007629

 

 

REVERTING TO TYPE. Reading the major dailies today only reconfirms Matt’s point that the media is now clearly reshackling its Katrina coverage to the hideous he-said, she-said strictures of mainstream "partisan food-fight" political reporting. The piece he cited was typically bad, but it’s been a while since I’ve read newspaper articles as simultaneously wearying and infuriating as this Washington Post story on the “controversy” surrounding Hillary Clinton’s vocal criticisms of the disaster response (is she just positioning herself for ’08? is she overplaying her hand?) or this New York Times write-up of congressional Republicans’ proposed investigation, which, under the headline “Bipartisan Inquiry Proposed,” waits until the fifteenth paragraph to merely note Democrats’ “skepticism” about the panel's bipartisan nature. It's back to business as usual.

 

--Sam Rosenfeld

 

---------------

 

 

Watch as democracy rots from the inside out.

[fermentor666]

http://www.time.com/time/nation/article/0,...1103003,00.html

 

 

 

President Bush is briefed by FEMA chief Michael Brown in Mobile, Ala.

How Reliable Is Brown's Resume?

A TIME investigation reveals discrepancies in the FEMA chief's official biographies

By DAREN FONDA AND RITA HEALY

 

Posted Thursday, Sep. 08, 2005

When President Bush nominated Michael Brown to head the Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA) in 2003, Brown's boss at the time, Joe Allbaugh, declared, "the President couldn't have chosen a better man to help...prepare and protect the nation." But how well was he prepared for the job? Since Hurricane Katrina, the FEMA director has come under heavy criticism for his performance and scrutiny of his background. Now, an investigation by TIME has found discrepancies in his online legal profile and official bio, including a description of Brown released by the White House at the time of his nomination in 2001 to the job as deputy chief of FEMA. (Brown became Director of FEMA, succeeding Allbaugh, in 2003.)

 

Before joining FEMA, his only previous stint in emergency management, according to his bio posted on FEMA's website, was "serving as an assistant city manager with emergency services oversight." The White House press release from 2001 stated that Brown worked for the city of Edmond, Okla., from 1975 to 1978 "overseeing the emergency services division." In fact, according to Claudia Deakins, head of public relations for the city of Edmond, Brown was an "assistant to the city manager" from 1977 to 1980, not a manager himself, and had no authority over other employees. "The assistant is more like an intern," she told TIME. "Department heads did not report to him." Brown did do a good job at his humble position, however, according to his boss. "Yes. Mike Brown worked for me. He was my administrative assistant. He was a student at Central State University," recalls former city manager Bill Dashner. "Mike used to handle a lot of details. Every now and again I'd ask him to write me a speech. He was very loyal. He was always on time. He always had on a suit and a starched white shirt."

 

In response, Nicol Andrews, deputy strategic director in FEMA's office of public affairs, insists that while Brown began as an intern, he became an "assistant city manager" with a distinguished record of service. "According to Mike Brown," she says, "a large portion [of the points raised by TIME] is very inaccurate."

 

Brown's lack of experience in emergency management isn't the only apparent bit of padding on his resume, which raises questions about how rigorously the White House vetted him before putting him in charge of FEMA. Under the "honors and awards" section of his profile at FindLaw.com — which is information on the legal website provided by lawyers or their offices—he lists "Outstanding Political Science Professor, Central State University". However, Brown "wasn't a professor here, he was only a student here," says Charles Johnson, News Bureau Director in the University Relations office at the University of Central Oklahoma (formerly named Central State University). "He may have been an adjunct instructor," says Johnson, but that title is very different from that of "professor." Carl Reherman, a former political science professor at the University through the '70s and '80s, says that Brown "was not on the faculty." As for the honor of "Outstanding Political Science Professor," Johnson says, "I spoke with the department chair yesterday and he's not aware of it." Johnson could not confirm that Brown made the Dean's list or was an "Outstanding Political Science Senior," as is stated on his online profile.

 

Speaking for Brown, Andrews says that Brown has never claimed to be a political science professor, in spite of what his profile in FindLaw indicates. "He was named the outstanding political science senior at Central State, and was an adjunct professor at Oklahoma City School of Law."

 

Under the heading of "Professional Associations and Memberships" on FindLaw, Brown states that from 1983 to the present he has been director of the Oklahoma Christian Home, a nursing home in Edmond. But an administrator with the Home, told TIME that Brown is "not a person that anyone here is familiar with." She says there was a board of directors until a couple of years ago, but she couldn't find anyone who recalled him being on it. According to FEMA's Andrews, Brown said "he's never claimed to be the director of the home. He was on the board of directors, or governors of the nursing home." However, a veteran employee at the center since 1981 says Brown "was never director here, was never on the board of directors, was never executive director. He was never here in any capacity. I never heard his name mentioned here."

 

The FindLaw profile for Brown was amended on Thursday to remove a reference to his tenure at the International Arabian Horse Association, which has become a contested point.

 

Brown's FindLaw profile lists a wide range of areas of legal practice, from estate planning to family law to sports. However, one former colleague does not remember Brown's work as sterling. Stephen Jones, a prominent Oklahoma lawyer who was lead defense attorney on the Timothy McVeigh case, was Brown's boss for two-and-a-half years in the early '80s. "He did mainly transactional work, not litigation," says Jones. "There was a feeling that he was not serious and somewhat shallow." Jones says when his law firm split, Brown was one of two staffers who was let go.

 

— With reporting by Jeremy Caplan, Carolina A. Miranda/New York; Nathan Thornburgh/Baton Rouge; Levi Clark/Edmond; Massimo Calabresi and Mark Thompson/Washington

[fermentor666]

http://money.cnn.com/2005/09/08/news/econo...ina_wages.reut/

 

Bush lifts wage rules for Katrina

President signs executive order allowing contractors to pay below prevailing wage in affected areas.

September 8, 2005: 9:42 PM EDT

 

 

WASHINGTON (Reuters) - President Bush issued an executive order Thursday allowing federal contractors rebuilding in the aftermath of Hurricane Katrina to pay below the prevailing wage.

 

In a notice to Congress, Bush said the hurricane had caused "a national emergency" that permits him to take such action under the 1931 Davis-Bacon Act in ravaged areas of Alabama, Florida, Louisiana and Mississippi.

 

Bush's action came as the federal government moved to provide billions of dollars in aid, and drew rebukes from two of organized labor's biggest friends in Congress, Rep. George Miller of California and Sen. Edward Kennedy of Massachusetts, both Democrats.

 

"The administration is using the devastation of Hurricane Katrina to cut the wages of people desperately trying to rebuild their lives and their communities," Miller said.

 

"President Bush should immediately realize the colossal mistake he has made in signing this order and rescind it and ensure that America puts its people back to work in the wake of Katrina at wages that will get them and their families back on their feet," Miller said.

 

"I regret the president's decision," said Kennedy.

 

"One of the things the American people are very concerned about is shabby work and that certainly is true about the families whose houses are going to be rebuilt and buildings that are going to be restored," Kennedy said.

 

The Davis-Bacon law requires federal contractors to pay workers at least the prevailing wages in the area where the work is conducted. It applies to federally funded construction projects such as highways and bridges.

 

Bush's executive order suspends the requirements of the Davis-Bacon law for designated areas hit by the storm.

 

 

-----------------------

 

 

 

 

 

THIS IS SERIOUS SHIT PEOPLE! WHEN THEY START TO DO THINGS THAT ARE BLATENTLY WRONG AND SELFISH WITHOUT TRYING TO COVER IT UP, IT MEANS THAT THEY KNOW THAT THEY CAN GET AWAY WITH IT BECAUSE THE PUBLIC JUST DOESN'T CARE ANYMORE.

 

KISS THE FUTURE GOODBYE.

[fermentor666]

http://www.cnn.com/2005/POLITICS/09/08/kat...bush/index.html

 

 

 

First lady: Charges that racism slowed aid 'disgusting'

 

Friday, September 9, 2005; Posted: 12:39 a.m. EDT (04:39 GMT)

 

 

 

(CNN) -- First lady Laura Bush on Thursday denounced critics who say race played a role in the federal government's slow response to victims of Hurricane Katrina, calling the accusations "disgusting."

 

However, she noted that poor people were most vulnerable to the devastation and said that the disaster's aftermath is a "wake-up call" for the nation to address the issue.

 

Black people comprise about two-thirds of the population of New Orleans, and many lived below the poverty line.

 

On Wednesday, Democratic National Committee Chairman Howard Dean said Americans have to face the "ugly truth" that race and class played a significant role in who lived and who died when Katrina swept across the Gulf Coast. (Full story)

 

Dean also said that "lots of people perished" because the Bush administration lacked "vision" in handling the disaster.

 

Several black leaders and groups have expressed outrage over rescue efforts. Among them was the Rev. Al Sharpton, who said last weekend that race played a role, and called Bush's response to the crisis "inexcusable."

 

President Bush on Saturday met with members of the Congressional Black Caucus to discuss their concerns.

 

Last week, rapper Kanye West condemned the Bush administration on a live telethon to benefit Katrina victims, contending: "George Bush doesn't care about black people." (Full story)

 

"I think all of those remarks were disgusting, to be perfectly frank because, of course, President Bush cares about everyone in our country, and I know that," Laura Bush told a journalist with American Urban Radio Networks on one of her flights to survey damage in Mississippi.

 

"I mean I am the person who lives with him. I know what he is like, and I know what he thinks, and I know how he cares about people."

 

The first lady also said: "I do think -- and we all saw this -- was that poor people were more vulnerable. They live in poor neighborhoods; their neighborhoods were the ones that were more likely to flood, as we saw in New Orleans.

 

"Their housing was more vulnerable, and that's what we saw and that's what we want to address in our country."

 

 

 

 

----------------

 

 

That's what we want to address in the country? And how shall we go about doing that? Oh, RIGHT!! GIVE MORE TAX CUTS TO THE EXTREMELY WEALTHY BY WAY OF ELIMINATING THE ESTATE TAX@!!!!`1

 

 

BRILLIANT!!~

[angelofdeath]

Originally posted by fermentor666@Sep 8 2005, 11:47 PM

Dailykos:

 

These eleven congressmen, Republican conservatives all, just voted against the $51 billion package ( H. R. 3673) for the victims of Hurricane Katrina. Horrible human beings, all.

 

Rep. Joe Barton - TX

 

Jeff Flake - AZ

 

Virginia Foxx - NC

 

Scott Garrett - NJ

 

John Hostettler - IN

 

Steve King - IA

 

Butch Otter - ID

 

Ron Paul - TX

 

James Sensenbrenner - WI

 

Tom Tancredo - CO

 

Lynn Westmoreland - GA

 

 

 

----------

 

 

 

Tom DeLay: Response to Katrina a “Phenomenal Accomplishment”

 

Speaking on the floor of the House an hour ago, Tom DeLay evaluated the response to Hurricane Katrina:

 

It’s easy to be a Monday morning quarterback, but you should have been in that control room where those people were making life and death decisions, people that stayed up and got no sleep and very little food for five to six days straight trying to make the right decisions to save people. What happens when we come up here? They point the finger. You didn’t make the right decision here. You didn’t take care of my aides there. You didn’t do this. You didn’t do that. The point is if you look at the big picture, it’s a phenomenal accomplishment by everybody involved. It’s unbelievable. I am constantly struck by where we are today just a little over a week from the worst catastrophe that this country has seen.

 

 

 

 

 

 

WTFEVER MR. DELAY. MR. DELAYED RELIEF IS MORE LIKE IT FGT.

Quoted post

 

 

 

easy there my friend. once again, you guys dont understand conservatism. Ron Paul, and Tancredo personally, dont let "compassionate conservatism" get in the way of ideology. take mr Ron Paul for instance. he supports for re-instatement of the 10th amendment. He routinely and consistently votes AGAINST any federal aid of any sort, as well as against the patriot act, the iraq war, nearly all government spending except military, for home defense, against NAFTA, CAFTA, GATT and on down the line. he is a compassionate man, but is a strict constitutionist. end of story. he'll be the first to tell you, federal government does no good, it only harms.

[!@#$%]

hahhaa compassionate?

 

anyway, i don't think this is an argument about politics, angel

 

this is about what the government that is IN PLACE

did about the response to katrina

 

we can argue democratic/republican policies somewhere else, and how the current administration is kinda moving toward their own ideology, and not that of republicans or democrats..in another thread.

 

who cares about the opinions of ron paul and tancredo,

because PEOPLE ARE FUCKING DYING AS A DIRECT RESULT OF OUR CURRENT ADMIN

 

i think the early years of social security and the fed are examples of good things about our federal government that have made decent responses to social crisis.

a lot of medical and scientific research is also government funded.

[!@#$%]

FEMA director Brown recalled to Washington

Official: Coast Guard admiral to coordinate Katrina relief efforts

 

Friday, September 9, 2005; Posted: 2:56 p.m. EDT (18:56 GMT)

 

Coast Guard Adm. Thad Allen will head up on-site Hurricane Katrina relief efforts.

 

 

 

 

WASHINGTON (CNN) -- Coast Guard Vice Adm. Thad Allen will replace Michael Brown, the embattled FEMA director, as the on-site head of hurricane relief operations in the Gulf Coast, Homeland Security Secretary Michael Chertoff announced at a news conference in Baton Rouge Friday afternoon.

 

Brown will head back to Washington from Louisiana to oversee the big picture, the official said.

 

http://www.cnn.com/2005/POLITICS/09/09/kat...gton/index.html

[casekonly]

Former Assistant Secretary of the Treasury on New Orleans: "Americans Are Being Brainwashed"

 

http://prisonplanet.com/Pages/Sept05/060905brainwashed.htm

[angelofdeath]

symbols,

hey i got you man.

i just couldnt let this "jab" go.

 

"These eleven congressmen, Republican conservatives all, just voted against the $51 billion package ( H. R. 3673) for the victims of Hurricane Katrina. Horrible human beings, all."

 

i wanted to clear up the "spin" that is trying to take place on why certain "conservative republicans" voted nay.

[Guest KING BLING]

http://www.editorandpublisher.com/eandp/ne...t_id=1001054719

 

Barbara Bush: Things Working Out 'Very Well' for Poor Evacuees from New Orleans

 

By E&P Staff

 

Published: September 05, 2005 7:25 PM ET updated 8:00 PM

 

NEW YORK Accompanying her husband, former President George

H.W.Bush, on a tour of hurricane relief centers in

Houston, Barbara Bush said today, referring to the

poor who had lost everything back home and evacuated, "This is working very well for them."

 

The former First Lady's remarks were aired this

evening on American Public Media's "Marketplace"

program.

 

She was part of a group in Houston today at the

Astrodome that included her husband and former

President Bill Clinton, who were chosen by her son,

the current president, to head fundraising efforts for

the recovery. Sen. Hilary Clinton and Sen. Barack

Obama were also present.

 

In a segment at the top of the show on the surge of

evacuees to the Texas city, Barbara Bush said: "Almost

everyone I’ve talked to says we're going to move to

Houston."

 

Then she added: "What I’m hearing which is sort of

scary is they all want to stay in Texas. Everyone is

so overwhelmed by the hospitality.

 

"And so many of the people in the arena here, you

know, were underprivileged anyway, so this--this (she

chuckles slightly) is working very well for them."