huh. Apparently the Coast Guard admiral/colone/i can't remember is now leading the relief effort in new orleans. Brown still has his job, of course. I hope I'm not just repeating something everyone knows already. So does this change anything?

Originally posted by Junebug
huh. Apparently the Coast Guard admiral/colone/i can't remember is now leading the relief effort in new orleans. Brown still has his job, of course. I hope I'm not just repeating something everyone knows already. So does this change anything?

i think it's a public gesture to support the idea that the job should have been handled in a much better fashon. i'm pleasantly surprised that the white house supported this move.

Personally I'd like to see him fired all together.

Originally posted by dreamsofdali
Personally I'd like to see him fired all together.

Personally I'd just like to see Bush fire at least one person, just <i>one</i> person from his administration. But I think it's asking for a miracle for Bush to show any small hint of accountability.

But yeah Brown has to go. Pretty unimaginable how they let that guy get the job in the first place.

this is all pretty juicy because the president pretty much stacked the FEMA roster with his completely unqualified and inept buddies, using the agency ranks as fodder for the giving of greasy patronage jobs, and now this little game of criminally irresponsible cronyism is all coming home to roost. this is pretty dangerous to the president, i think, and i hope it gets as much publicity as possible

brown will receive a congressional medal. i'd bet my life on it.

Originally posted by homechicago
brown will receive a congressional medal. i'd bet my life on it.

Well if we go by past records, I'd say that's a safe bet.

What a load of BS. (Courtesy of americablog.org, really)

http://www.nytimes.com/2005/09/10/national/nationalspecial/10crisis.html
Casualty of Firestorm: Outrage, Bush and FEMA Chief

.....The president, long reluctant to fire subordinates, came to a belated recognition that his administration was in trouble for the way it had dealt with the disaster, many of his supporters say. One moment of realization occurred on Thursday of last week when an aide carried a news agency report from New Orleans into the Oval Office for him to see.

The report was about the evacuees at the convention center, some dying and some already dead. Mr. Bush had been briefed that morning by his homeland security secretary, Michael Chertoff, who was getting much of his information from Mr. Brown and was not aware of what was occurring there. The news account was the first that the president and his top advisers had heard not only of the conditions at the convention center but even that there were people there at all.....

If Mr. Bush was upset with Mr. Brown at that point, he did not show it. When he traveled to the Gulf Coast the next day, he stood with him and, before the cameras, cheerfully said, "Brownie, you're doing a heck of a job."

But the political pressures on Mr. Bush, and the anxiety at the White House, were only growing. Behind the president's public embrace of Mr. Brown was the realization within the administration that the director's ignorance about the evacuees had further inflamed the rage of the storm's poor, black victims and created an impression of a White House that did not care about their lives.
----------------------------------------

How is his ignorance of the issue a failing not also a failing on the presidents part? Is there not one single TV in the White House? I guess no one in the WH reads the paper. You didnt have to do much to see it was happening.

Behind the president's public embrace of Mr. Brown was the realization within the administration that the director's ignorance about the evacuees had further inflamed the rage of the storm's poor, black victims and created an impression of a White House that did not care about their lives.

Nevermind actually putting peoples lives at risk, they were worried about the perception of it.

EDIT: Plus he stayed on another week! This is the worst explanation/covering of your own ass in a while.

so poor and so black victims

But I hear they're better off now.

Originally posted by Future Boy
But I hear they're better off now.

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.



she is so wise. especially about the "scariness" of more black people living in texas, though, i think the black people should be scared, not her.

James Byrd was brutally murdered by three whites in Jasper Texas. Byrd's lynchers offered him a lift in their pickup truck, beat him and chained him and dragged him to his death.

Um, thats what I was talking about.

Originally posted by homechicago


she is so wise. especially about the "scariness" of more black people living in texas, though, i think the black people should be scared, not her.


I really don't think thats what she meant. It seems to me she was saying "How bad could things have been in Louisiana that these people think Texas is great?"

But hey, race baiting is the fad of the month right now...so maybe Barbara Bush was just trying to be as cool as everyone else. That non-seqitur James Byrd reference is gonna be hard to top though.

Originally posted by Corganist
It seems to me she was saying "How bad could things have been in Louisiana that these people think Texas is great?"



Yeah, the logical conclusion is she was trashing her home state.

Originally posted by Future Boy
Um, thats what I was talking about.

that's why i was agreeing with you.

Originally posted by Future Boy


Yeah, the logical conclusion is she was trashing her home state.

Originally posted by Corganist
I really don't think thats what she meant. It seems to me she was saying "How bad could things have been in Louisiana that these people think Texas is great?"


Well that's what I would've meant if I were saying that

Originally posted by Future Boy


Yeah, the logical conclusion is she was trashing her home state.
Its a more logical conclusion than to think that she's espousing racist views in the public forum.

Originally posted by Corganist

Its a more logical conclusion than to think that she's espousing racist views in the public forum.

Not if she didnt think she was being racist. Which is common among older people who are rich and white.

Originally posted by dreamsofdali
Personally I'd like to see him fired all together.

me too.

Originally posted by Future Boy


Not if she didnt think she was being racist. Which is common among older people who are rich and white. Yeah, calling people underpriviledged with no mention to race is racist.

Originally posted by Nimrod's Son
Yeah, calling people underpriviledged with no mention to race is racist.

Underpriviledged? Yeah, thats what she was talking about.

Originally posted by Future Boy


Not if she didnt think she was being racist. Which is common among older people who are rich and white.
The lesson here kids? Stereotyping based on race is A-OK when used against harmless old ladies.

Originally posted by Corganist

The lesson here kids? Stereotyping based on race is A-OK when used against harmless old ladies.

That part was a joke, jeez. Barbara Bush looks like she fights dirty, I wouldnt call her harmless. You never had a Grandma say inappropriate things?

Even still, stereotypes are all-encompassing. I didnt say all old people, I said old white rich people, and even then, I said common, not all.

Nevermind, I dont really care about this, so I dont have to defend my postion.*




*Taken from Corganists' rules of debate.

Fired/Resigned it is!

http://www.cnn.com/2005/US/09/12/katrina.impact/index.html

Originally posted by Future Boy


Underpriviledged? Yeah, thats what she was talking about. that's what she said. that's the word she used.

That says it all then doesnt it.

Originally posted by BeautifulLoser
Fired/Resigned it is!

http://www.cnn.com/2005/US/09/12/katrina.impact/index.html

indeed. it needed to happen one way or another.

cronyism is maybe a word thats lost its full impact after being misused for so long, but i hope we hear a lot more of it soon

All the President's Friends

By PAUL KRUGMAN
Published: September 12, 2005

The lethally inept response to Hurricane Katrina revealed to everyone that the Federal Emergency Management Agency, which earned universal praise during the Clinton years, is a shell of its former self. The hapless Michael Brown - who is no longer overseeing relief efforts but still heads the agency - has become a symbol of cronyism.

But what we really should be asking is whether FEMA's decline and fall is unique, or part of a larger pattern. What other government functions have been crippled by politicization, cronyism and/or the departure of experienced professionals? How many FEMA's are there?

Unfortunately, it's easy to find other agencies suffering from some version of the FEMA syndrome.

The first example won't surprise you: the Environmental Protection Agency, which has a key role to play in Hurricane Katrina's aftermath, but which has seen a major exodus of experienced officials over the past few years. In particular, senior officials have left in protest over what they say is the Bush administration's unwillingness to enforce environmental law.

Yesterday The Independent, the British newspaper, published an interview about the environmental aftermath of Katrina with Hugh Kaufman, a senior policy analyst in the agency's Office of Solid Waste and Emergency Response, whom one suspects is planning to join the exodus. "The budget has been cut," he said, "and inept political hacks have been put in key positions." That sounds familiar, and given what we've learned over the last two weeks there's no reason to doubt that characterization - or to disregard his warning of an environmental cover-up in progress.

What about the Food and Drug Administration? Serious questions have been raised about the agency's coziness with drug companies, and the agency's top official in charge of women's health issues resigned over the delay in approving Plan B, the morning-after pill, accusing the agency's head of overruling the professional staff on political grounds.

Then there's the Corporation for Public Broadcasting, whose Republican chairman hired a consultant to identify liberal bias in its programs. The consultant apparently considered any criticism of the administration a sign of liberalism, even if it came from conservatives.

You could say that these are all cases in which the Bush administration hasn't worried about degrading the quality of a government agency because it doesn't really believe in the agency's mission. But you can't say that about my other two examples.

Even a conservative government needs an effective Treasury Department. Yet Treasury, which had high prestige and morale during the Clinton years, has fallen from grace.

The public symbol of that fall is the fact that John Snow, who was obviously picked for his loyalty rather than his qualifications, is still Treasury secretary. Less obvious to the public is the hollowing out of the department's expertise. Many experienced staff members have left since 2000, and a number of key positions are either empty or filled only on an acting basis. "There is no policy," an economist who was leaving the department after 22 years told The Washington Post, back in 2002. "If there are no pipes, why do you need a plumber?" So the best and brightest have been leaving.

And finally, what about the department of Homeland Security itself? FEMA was neglected, some people say, because it was folded into a large agency that was focused on terrorist threats, not natural disasters. But what, exactly, is the department doing to protect us from terrorists?

In 2004 Reuters reported a "steady exodus" of counterterrorism officials, who believed that the war in Iraq had taken precedence over the real terrorist threat. Why, then, should we believe that Homeland Security is being well run?

Let's not forget that the administration's first choice to head the department was Bernard Kerik, a crony of Rudy Giuliani. And Mr. Kerik's nomination would have gone through if enterprising reporters hadn't turned up problems in his ********** that the F.B.I. somehow missed, just as it somehow didn't turn up the little problems in Michael Brown's résumé. How many lesser Keriks made it into other positions?

The point is that Katrina should serve as a wakeup call, not just about FEMA, but about the executive branch as a whole. Everything I know suggests that it's in a sorry state - that an administration which doesn't treat governing seriously has created two, three, many FEMA's

I thought Newsweek's Conventional Wisdom feature last week said it best:

Bush: Late, lackadaisical and largely oblivious to the enormity of the mess. It's a competence thing.

Homeland Security: Four years after 9/11, what happens in an emergency? No food, no medical aid, no law. Do you feel safer?

http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/9192686/site/newsweek/


I think it's about time for people to realize how ineffective this administration really is regarding things like this. It's really too bad that the death toll and price tag had to be this high, but maybe something good will come out of it politically. A little education.