This is making people across the country think about whether they can trust their lives in an emergency to the competence (or lack thereof) of their local government.

And it's not a happy thought.

I cannot believe that this asshole had the balls to blame bush for his own negligence. What a piece of shit.

Bush is contaminating the environment!

There. Got the obligatory DK/DU trolling comment out of the way.

Local (incompetent) officials fuck up the situation worse than it was to begin with -- and then have the temerity to blame Bush!

Well, I'll be a majority leader!

/frist post

Charles,

You really should include this.

Louisiana disaster plan, pg 13, para 5 , dated 01/00

'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'

He ought to rightfully proud of this memorial.

/sarc

The nation is divided and one side hates Bush as the south (and others) hated Lincoln.

But unlike that time in history, we are not in a war that will conquer the Moonbats and Marxist bootlicks and SHUT THEM UP ONCE AND FOR ALL.

#5,

Well, it does say "may".

(Or... "may not".)

Can we assume that the bus drivers (along with all the other school district employees) were among the FIRST people evacuated?

I wish I were kidding.

That picture will go a long way in relatively absolving the President of blame. Moreover, this whole crisis will subtly remind people of Giuliani's 9/11 performance under literal fire, enhancing his 2008 presidential prospects.

this picture clearly demonstrates how bush should have saw this coming.
/sarc

Hundreds of buses, abandoned and unused during the evacuation, now leaking gasoline into the already toxic water.

Nagin's budget for 2005

75% partying, limo, backroom payoffs
24% Lawyers
1% infrastructure and emergency planning

I turned on the radio the other day and was listening to this semi-deranged sounding man talking about how "people are dying in NOLA and nothing is being done" and "I don't want to hear about any more press conferences until somthing's been done..."

He quit talking and the segment ended with "that was Ray Nagin, Mayor of New Orleans." It then dawned on me that this guy held the lives of tens of thousands of people in his hands. His babbling, unprofessional, completey detached, "leadership" summed it all up. New Orleans has been looking backward for leadership. They've doomed themselves at the ballot boxes for generations down there.

It's diesel, ixed mwith motor oil, not gasoline. Buses haven't used gas for years.

This doesn't invalidate anything above, just driving me crazy.

Exactly right. Everyone is responsible for themselves, even if they've been conditioned to believe otherwise. All it take is one major disaster (and many major screw-ups in local and state government) to prove that ultimately the only one looking out for you, is you.

leaking gasoline into the already toxic water

A fitting analogy to the behavior of so many Bush Derangement Syndrome sufferers. "Eating corpses", "bush's fault", etc. etc. etc. Two nights ago some nutcase on Airhead America [Randi Rhodes?... can't recall. Insane people all sound the same to me], in discussing the New Orleans disaster, said "Bush hates blacks!" ... "he wants black children to die."

Insane. That's the only word for it. Their perception of reality is distorted.

OT: William Rehnquist dies. Two openings on the SCOTUS. Liberals everywhere Freak Out(tm)! Just imagine if Bush were to name Clarence Thomas as Chief Justice...

GruntDoc: you're right. Now corrected.

By my very rough count, I see 300+ buses. Figure each bus could carry an average of 40 evacuees... that equates to more than 12,000 people who could have been evacuated--in one lift--before the hurricane... if someone had ordered it.

I'm sorry, what am I talking about, it's all Bush's fault. There are no buses, the buses are an illusion implanted in your head by the evil Rove, it's all Bush's fault...

Don't forget about the 100+ city buses. (3rd photo) http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/1475820/p osts?page=386#386

From 10,000 feet they look like coffins.
May God bless the people of New Orleans.

The price of gasoline was too high for the city to use those buses because of George Bush's policies.

/sarc

There should be a mandatory regulation in place when they rebuild NO. That each and every building/house have included on its structure davits to support lifeboats. That would mean davits for every 10 people who reside or work at that location. Just start treating their landed
locations as ships in drydock. Might save some lives next time.

Oooh, you mean the Rovian satellite spy-eye-in-the-sky is being used to do dirty tricks on Bush's political opponents? I knew it! I just knew that the entire space program exists so that the Repugs can see our every move.

They can send a man to the moon but they can't afford to increase my trustafarian frraudulent SSI payments?

(Bumpersticker I plan to make and stick on cars around Telegraph Avenue.)

In case anyone has not seen the transcript of NOLA's mayor's rant :Foul-mouthed tirade by New Orleans mayor:'Excuse my French everybody in America, but I am pissed'

Both the Governor and the Mayor will have to live with their sins of omission and commission...or should that be 'non-commission'?

There is over 230 full size school buses in that picture...

Yeah, baby. That's it.

I'm glad one enterprising individual took one before it was destroyed, and drove 80 people out of town.

For what it's worth, The sheen is pretty much nothing but diesel oil. In that heat, it will evaporate fairly quickly, and has almost no soluability in the water. It looks worse than it is.

I wonder if the MSM will ever post the pictures of the bus yard. There was though, a shot shown on CNN (BAH) once in the early days. However it only showed a single group, probably less than a dozen and the dialog lasted only a couple seconds.

Did I hear correctly that the bus yard was very close to either the Dome or Convention Center?

#25 NY Nana

Both the Governor and the Mayor will have to live with their sins of omission and commission...or should that be 'non-commission'?

The good people of NOLA and LA need to take the initiative and and carry them both out on a rail, tarred and feathered, nude...

#28 annelid

What kind of job are you looking for?

These are the same busses that George Bush personally made an intentional effort to keep locked up in the parking lot, right? The same busses that could have helped the minorities in New Orleans, but didn't because Bush ordered it so, right? The same busses that Bush was going to sell to Halliburton the day before Katrina in order to reap multi-millions in profits for his oil buddies, right?

Moonbats?

(sigh)

Bush blameing in the UK for Katrina

"Katrina comes home to roost

President Bush is to blame for the scale of the disaster as a result of his administration's policies and actions"

#28 annelid

We're definitely 'doomed' if we listen to those reports. Luckily we don't have to and we have better alternatives to substantially inspire ourselves than to listen to those reports. I'm sure once the blame-game ends and all people are rescued in NO and surrounding areas devasted by mother nature/man's stupid lack of initiative you'll get back to focusing on all the good that is really going on...which we certainly don't find in the msm.

#5 got milk?, you missed the update:

Louisiana disaster plan, pg 13, para 5 , dated 08/05

'The primary means of hurricane evacuation will be personal vehicles. Everyone else who can should walk to the Superdome if they feel like it. To those who can't, God be with them.'

Did the media think they could actually cover this up?

#34 annelid

Ever do any tech writing?

That mayor of New Orleans is some piece of work, a real dirtbag. A good leader is somebody who is able to behave in a professional manner under the worst of circumstances. He is beyond pathetic.

I am not exactly surprised but I am angered by reading all of the braindead rantings by leftist scum all over the internet regarding this tragedy.

All of the racists (both blacks and leftist whites) trying to portray this as a "not helping people because they are black situation" are beyond disgusting, not to mention delusional.

Do these people expect Bush to wipe their asses also ? Is it not the responsibility of each individual city to have disaster plans in place and actually execute them in a disaster ? How much money did New Orleans receive after 9-11 in homeland security aid ? Did they spend it all on coke or something ?

A government is only as good as it's weakest chain, and unfortunately for the people of New Orleans, they clearly had incompetant people leading them. There may well be some blame on the federal level also, but we'll see when more details come out.

#41 annelid

Aw shucks! Thought I might be able to do you some good.

#38 Murder

Did the media think they could actually cover this up?

They basically have, by omission. I have yet to see it on TV or local papers.

Anne Rice gets in on the blame game action:
Do You Know What It Means To Lose New Orleans?

But to my country I want to say this: During this crisis you failed us. You looked down on us; you dismissed our victims; you dismissed us. You want our Jazz Fest, you want our Mardi Gras, you want our cooking and our music. Then when you saw us in real trouble, when you saw a tiny minority preying on the weak among us, you called us "Sin City," and turned your backs.

Anne, the help could have been there much sooner if your local politicians had only done their jobs.

#31 Mars trucker

The good people of NOLA and LA need to take the initiative and carry them both out on a rail, tarred and feathered, nude...

Ooooh, my eyes, my eyes! Oh, the humanity!

But they really are ripe for impeachment for dereliction of duty, at the very least. There were so many warnings that went unheeded, and now?

#14 obscured by clouds

this guy held the lives of tens of thousands of people in his hands.

IIRC, Nagin held the lives of the [1.2 million?] residents of NO in his hands, and he dropped over 100,000 of them into the water.

When this is all said and done Nagin and the Governor will look like total fools. They both blew it big time.

There are still people stranded and/or trapped. Some of them have managed to get word out to the wider world: http://www.livejournal.com/users/interdictor/49380 .html#cutid1

Pres Bush is just great. Starting with Diane Sawyer of ABC, then the rest of MSM, all the race pimps, ect. hammered Bush all week long about how long it took to get in there. He never responded harshly or gave any indication of annoyance. Just kept talking about how a plan was in place and we were working it out. People were going to get the help they needed. Always positive. LLL foiled again. Dems get slapped down and he never says a word. heh

If a kitten was caught up a tree and W rescued it, moonbats and the MSM would blame him for making the kitten climb the tree because of his environmental policies in East Timor.

All I keep hearing is how wonderful New Orleans was. However, all I'm seeing are its residents killing and raping each other and its government blaming everyone but themselves for their failures. I've never been there. And when or if it's ever rebuilt, I will not visit.

I can't wait for Nagin and/or Blanco start talking about this.

"How could you expect us to know there would be a problem for a city that was below sea level, surrounded by water and in one of the most active hurricane zones in the country? Who do you think we are? Super geniuses like Karl Rove? Nobody is THAT smart! That's why it's clear it's Rove's fault. He should have known! Yeah, and since he and Bush hate black people, well it's all pretty obvious who is at fault here. Case closed!"

And then the MSM simply repeats it in thier next edition.

Meanwhile, hard working people are risking their lives to save people and others are taking the survivors in to their homes and communities. You know, those same people that hate blacks.

Hopefully, Nagin and Blanco will be making their case in court after they are charged with multiple counts of negligent homicide. May they riot in hell.

The Big Greasy!

Wait a minute... if it's the Ray Nagin Memorial Motor Pool, wouldn't he have to be dead first? Just checking...

#44 epobirs - why is it not surprising that an author of vampire novels finds it easy to excuse the NO bloodsucking political class of any moral responsibility for Katrina's human cost?

New Orleans also has (had) approximately 400 commuter buses.

#51-

Should be 'rot' in hell.

This Mayor Is Definitely No Rudy

[Link: www.politicalfailures.com...]

Pres Bush is just great. Starting with Diane Sawyer of ABC, then the rest of MSM, all the race pimps, ect. hammered Bush all week long about how long it took to get in there. He never responded harshly or gave any indication of annoyance. Just kept talking about how a plan was in place and we were working it out. People were going to get the help they needed. Always positive. LLL foiled again. Dems get slapped down and he never says a word. heh

I don't know. I'd prefer someone with a rapier wit that would cut these high-heeled simpletons to ribbons and get it over with. I always think I know what I would say if I were in his position. But he takes no chances. I don't think that's much of a strategy.

#46 ibu guru

Just for clarifications sake;

New Orleans only has a population of about 700,000 to 800,000. The entire metro area pushes that number to about 1.2mil, and each area had a separate local government. FYI.

Gaaad! What a waste!

#47 gbl

When this is all said and done Nagin and the Governor will look like total fools.

To whom? By whom?

They both blew it big time.

Does anyone think we'll hear anything remotely sounding like that on CNN/CBS/NYT etc.? I fear most of the voting public won't hear about it.
If they do it will be word-of-mouth and dismissed as rumor. Most, if not all, bloggers know. (but half of them will either deny it or try to stifle it)

A lot of people are talking about what we need to look at after. I think a Citizen's Committee (not politicians but some experts) should evaluate where things went wrong and how to do it better in future so we're not depending on the say-so of corrupt or incompetent officials in future. They obviously must be overseen by someone or a committe that has the power to put the case to the citizens when something is found to be wrong and get the offender removed and replaced.

#50 sarabeara

FWIW, Bush's orange cat Ernie joined the family, so to speak, after Bush rescued him from a tree on the ranch where he'd been chased by dogs. I don't think Ernie was still a kitten, though.

What a hell of a week.

I've had it for one day - I'm going to bed - curling up with Simon R. Green and Something from the Nightside.

So far, neither Nagin or Blanco have been on TV for more than a few seconds. I think the only time Nagin has been in NO since Katrina left has been during Bush's visit, after which he quickly hauled ass right back outta town. Blanco, I've only seen in the occasional news conference. And, as people have said on here, she comes across as a drooling idiot.

The Left and the MSM keep yelling that the federal government failed NO. Can you imagine if Bush had cut through the red tape, declared martial law in LA, and utilized the guard to get those 100,000 people out of NO? The stories would instead be of how Bush stepped on the state gov'ts toes in order to steal the credit for saving people that were the state's responsibility. They'd then keep going on about how a man who emphasizes state's rights violated those rights in order to "play the hero."

I linked this on the Blanco thread but I think it's "on topic" here, too. Ben Stein refutes all of the LLL talking points about how everything is Bush's fault.

Get Off His Back!

Check out Matt Wells here...

[Link: news.bbc.co.uk...]

"A genuinely heroic mayor orders a total evacuation of the city the day before Katrina arrives, knowing that for decades now, New Orleans has been living on borrowed time.

The National Guard and federal emergency personnel stay tucked up at home.

The havoc of Katrina had been predicted countless times on a local and federal level - even to the point where it was acknowledged that tens of thousands of the poorest residents would not be able to leave the city in advance.

No official plan was ever put in place for them."

Then can someone please tell the BBC about
'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'

And shortly thereafter show Matt Wells the photograph of HUNDREDS of "School and municipal buses" up to their roofs in water in the middle of NO.

Then tell Matt Wells to stuff is "article" where the sun don't shine.

Nagin says feds 'don't have a clue' about how to deal with disaster relief

NEW ORLEANS The mayor of New Orleans is seething over what he sees as the government's slow response to his city's disaster.
Ray Nagin (NAY'-gihn) went on W-W-L Radio last night to say the feds "don't have a clue what's going on." He added, "Excuse my French _ everybody in America _ but I am pissed."

The mayor says he needs troops and hundreds of buses to get refugees out.

Nagin accused state and federal officials of "playing games" and "spinning for the cameras." He says he keeps hearing that help is coming, but "there's no beef."

Congress is rushing through an aid package of more than ten (b) billion dollars and the Pentagon is promising 14-hundred National Guardsmen.

Now who exactly doesn't have a clue?

Just a thought about the environment: if they are draining the City into Lake Ponchartrain...what does that do to it's waters? They'll be polluted, won't they? You won't be able to fish there anymore.

This is absolutely astonishng reading

[Link: www.washingtonpost.com...]

As someone who lives in a major earthquake zone, almost directly on top of a faultline, I can say this:

I have a personal disaster emergency plan. Including immediate-term, short-term, medium-term and long-term. I have carefully planned exactly where to run and where to stand (if possible) during the earthquake if it strikes when I'm at home; what to do in the immediate aftermath; how to get out of town from where I live via backroads, if necessary; where to stay for a while if my domicile is destroyed. I have plenty of certain kinds of food (that don't need preparation) always on hand in case I need to survive for a week or two when the infrastructure is down. I live in a building that is retrofitted every which way. And on and on.

And I am not unique -- I'd say the majority of people in California who have lived through an earthquake or five are just as prepared as I am.

But when the Big One hits, what do I expect in the immediate aftermath from the government, either municipal, state or federal? NOTHING! Any help would be appreciated, but I certainly am not going to RELY on them. I understand that a disaster is a disaster, and it usually has apects that are unexpected, and is often larger than expected as well.

I've seen enough '50s-era Ray Milland movies to know that most folks will have to fend for themselves in times of crisis.

Finger-pointing is absurd and childish.

It seems at times that America -- or certain portions of America -- are growing more infantile with time. Where is the self-reliance, the responsibility?

A category 5 hurricane is the equivalent of an 8.3 earthquake (I made that up, but it sounds about right). Those people who stayed behind in New Orleans had at least 4 days' warning that the hurricane was coming. If someone said to me, "zombie, in 4 days there will be an 8.3 earthquake on the San Andreas Fault," do you think I would hang around? No way! I'd be outta here. Walk, ride, hitchhike, drive, crawl, wheel my wheelchair -- one way or the other I'd be out of town long before the quake hit.

I would not wait to be ordered out of town by some politician. I would not wait for a schoolbus to pull up to my home.

(Sorry for the unfocused rant. I'm getting really really sick of the Katrina Blame Game.)

Okay, I know there was an evacuation order and that, thanks to the President, it was mandatory. What I don't know is what, besides the 'shelter of last resort,' was done by those in charge (local officials) for those who could not get out on their own. A caller to C-SPAN today identified as a Bush supporter (not sure why Bush supporter and Democrat are the options they choose) claimed that there was a bus operation before the hit. Is this true? If so the remaining busses are less of an indictment of Nagin, although they are infrastructure that should have and easily could have been moved to a safer place.

#66 pilots wife
Great link. Thanks.
He writes it so it can be understood by a ten year old. Says a lot about his "target" audience, doesn't it?
Anyone...anyone...anyone?

/channeling

Too many rays to the noggin...

When pressed with what to do, their minds went blanko.

#53 cranky objectivist

it's the Ray Nagin Memorial Motor Pool, wouldn't he have to be dead first?

Well, at the very least, we know he is brain-dead, and has been for quite a while.

#67 wurm

Proves my point. (#61)

I'd really rather be wrong.

#58

Thanks, gonzo. I knew I'd seen the 1.2M figure, but was uncertain whether it was Metro population or city itself.

#50 sarbeara:

We're all in love with the 'dream' of New Orleans and Louisiana. The architecture is certainly amongst the finest in the world! And their culture and cuisine...totally unique.

But the reality of New Orleans hasn't been what it was for a long long time...if it ever was for those of lower income.

This wasn't just lower income folks though. It was 'inner city' people and by that I mean, people like me who, though they travel, live in the inner city in a high rise or whatever but DON'T HAVE A CAR!

Rather than haul a$$ to the bus terminal to get out of town (another madhouse) before such a hurricane, when everyone's evacuating, these people decided to find the best place they could and ride it out and hope. Unfortunately the levees broke. They DID survive the hurricane. They almost didn't survive the flood.

But it's a whole economic spectrum here. What you SEE when you see the screen are the black skin colors but there are lots and lots of middle class white folks or spanish, probably Muslim, Asian and they also got caught BECAUSE THEY DIDN'T HAVE CARS AND DIVE THEM OUT OF TOWN.

71 zombie

Same here. I spent my summers with my family on the Gulf... we had supplies set aside, they had already been through 3 hurricanes. We also knew that it may take days for the government to be able to come in and help out.

What happened to being self-sufficient for at least 4 days? And one other thing.. the MSM acerbated the whole thing.

#71 zombie - you are my dream man

as a fellow californian i thank you.

however, in the course of your escape you will encounter unprepared moonbats searching for government notification and hand outs. hopefully you have a some advice on how to avoid these areas? hmm, lemme see...avoid santa monica, west la, the marina, the hollywood hills, pacific palisades, malibu definitely as that will probably all be on fire, south central (see malibu), east la, long beach, pasadena...

71 zombie
Great post.

67 wurm

"A genuinely heroic mayor orders a total evacuation of the city the day before Katrina arrives, knowing that for decades now, New Orleans has been living on borrowed time.

So this heroic mayor orders a total evacuation of the city with a combined suburban and urban population of 1.2 or so million people the day before the hurricane. How is this to be accomplished? Genies and flying carpets? Why does this make him heroic? I think it clearly points out his incompetence.

You know, I gotta say, this ranks up there as one of the greatest disgraces in our nation's history. We proved to the world on 9/11 that, even in our darkest time, we would continue to sacrifice everything for our fellow man. Now, we can't even bend the law to save thousands, simply because we might actually have to answer for it later.

Had Nagin done everything in his power to save those thousands of people and been on the ground to see to those who couldn't get out in time, he'd be considered the next Rudy. Instead, by the end of this year, he'll be lucky if his reputation is a notch above Stalin.

I don't know... they are still 12 feet below sea level

It makes me think about a city built at the foot of a massive cliff and one day there is a huge rock slide that buries the city... so they clear away the rocks and rebuild the city, right under the cliff.. again..

"But it's a whole economic spectrum here. What you SEE when you see the screen are the black skin colors but there are lots and lots of middle class white folks or spanish, probably Muslim, Asian and they also got caught BECAUSE THEY DIDN'T HAVE CARS AND DRIVE THEM OUT OF TOWN."

And that is why the master plan written in 2000 says

"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"

The evacuation plan took into account that many had no private transport.

They, the city, didn't operate PLAN A, and now they are bitching because plan B (state assistance) and plan C (fed help) took so long.

What a (insert expletive) mess...

#79 Bubbles

acerbated

Hmmm. There's a joke there, but I'm afraid to, um, go there...

#84 Bubble Girl

Recent history includes a lot of rebuilding, but history includes a whole lot of rebuilding... over in that area. I think that New New Orleans should be perhaps nearer the coast but no so near the lake and river (after the 500-year flooding along the Mississippi, many towns rebuilt further from the banks). Not an expert on the area's geography, but there may be better choices given the chance to plan where a large city will go.

Didn't the French originally site the location for New Orleans? Just wondering.

#83 Targetpractice, Worst of Both Worlds

Instead, by the end of this year, he'll be lucky if his reputation is a notch above Stalin.

I hope you're right but who's going to expose him to the gen-pop? The MSM? They're bombarding the airwaves with damage control now.

#66 pilots wife

That was great and thank you for that link. I love Ben Stein's logic. And I love #12

12.) The entire episode is a dramatic lesson in the breathtaking callousness of government officials at the ground level. Imagine if Hillary Clinton had gotten her way and they were in charge of your health care.

I say how about Condi and Ben Stein on the ticket for 2008. Two of the most logical people on this planet.

Only 80% of the town was flooded.. I have a feeling some parts will be permanently razed... down where I used to live, we had stilt houses... next to the water..

I don't even know if they have building codes in New Orleans..

beej,

I just gave you what was on the BBC website.

Read the full article, It is "The mayor did no wrong, it is the fault of Bush" type of article.

I notice there is no feedback link on that article or I would have ripped Matt Wells a new one on the BBC site. His article is so biased it is unreal.

#71 zombie

...But when the Big One hits, what do I expect in the immediate aftermath from the government, either municipal, state or federal? NOTHING! Any help would be appreciated, but I certainly am not going to RELY on them. I understand that a disaster is a disaster...

Truly a great post. Hope you put this on your website. Would like as many folks as possible to read it.

I see all of this happening...and all I want to do is cry.

if this has been said before i'll simply say sorry now. How many school buses does it take to serve 45 schools thats the count I got frome the Louisiana School Directory.

pimf from

#79 squeegy:

[Link: www.washingtonpost.com...]

That incompetent Governor doesn't want to let go so Bush CAN help. Check this out:

"...Behind the scenes, a power struggle emerged, as federal officials tried to wrest authority from Louisiana Gov. Kathleen Babineaux Blanco (D). Shortly before midnight Friday, the Bush administration sent her a proposed legal memorandum asking her to request a federal takeover of the evacuation of New Orleans, a source within the state's emergency operations center said Saturday.

"The administration sought unified control over all local police and state National Guard units reporting to the governor. Louisiana officials rejected the request after talks throughout the night, concerned that such a move would be comparable to a federal declaration of martial law. Some officials in the state suspected a political motive behind the request. "Quite frankly, if they'd been able to pull off taking it away from the locals, they then could have blamed everything on the locals," said the source, who does not have the authority to speak publicly.

"A senior administration official said that Bush has clear legal authority to federalize National Guard units to quell civil disturbances under the Insurrection Act and will continue to try to unify the chains of command that are split among the president, the Louisiana governor and the New Orleans mayor.

"Louisiana did not reach out to a multi-state mutual aid compact for assistance until Wednesday, three state and federal officials said. As of Saturday, Blanco still had not declared a state of emergency, the senior Bush official said.

""The federal government stands ready to work with state and local officials to secure New Orleans and the state of Louisiana," White House spokesman Dan Bartlett said. "The president will not let any form of bureaucracy get in the way of protecting the citizens of Louisiana."

"Blanco made two moves Saturday that protected her independence from the federal government: She created a philanthropic fund for the state's victims and hired James Lee Witt, Federal Emergency Management Agency director in the Clinton administration, to advise her on the relief effort.

"Bush, who has been criticized, even by supporters, for the delayed response to the disaster, used his weekly radio address to put responsibility for the failure on lower levels of government. The magnitude of the crisis "has created tremendous problems that have strained state and local capabilities," he said. "The result is that many of our citizens simply are not getting the help they need, especially in New Orleans. And that is unacceptable"..."

How is Bush responsible when this woman won't get out of the way. WHAT ARE THEY COVERING UP?

since it's late at nite and i really tired, the pic looks like a bunch of cigarettes, butts, and a lighter on the street lined up.

i needed a chuckle...

#71 zombie

I have plenty of certain kinds of food (that don't need preparation) always on hand in case I need to survive for a week or two when the infrastructure is down.

Fantastic post zombie. Is that not called being accountable to yourself and your family? "Prepared" is going to the store and buying bottled water, canned food ect. Hell, go to Home Depot and buy a generator too, get a two-burner coleman propane stove. All that stuff can be packed away and they are easy to use. Anyone who has camped or hiked, knows what to do.

'bout time this photo was posted here. I printed it the other day and carry it in my back pocket. Whenever the blame game comes up, as it inevitably does, I bust it out.

#94 I.K.Chain,

I see all of this happening...and all I want to do is cry.

I'm not watching much of it, just reading some news (but not too much). I've focused more on what few things I can do to help the situation than actual details of the disaster.

New Orleans is a poor city. While many folks had the ability to get out, many more did not.

The poor people of New Orleans have no cars. They ride the public transportation system, which consists of city buses and streetcars. Many of those residents would have had nowhere outside of the city to evacuate to.

The problem with the emergency plan falls in the lack of evacuation centers being publicised prior to the storm. Those poor people didn't know where to go outside of the Superdome and Convention Center.

So here you have a mass of people, somewhere in the 100,000 range, who not only have to get to an evacuation center to be bussed out, but don't want to leave anyway. At the point that those people are looking to get out, the window of escape has closed.

Whether or not there were busses running folks out of the city prior to the storm, I don't know. That will come out in whatever after action review occurs.

But I do know that the original number at the dome when the storm hit was less than half of what it swelled to after the storm, meaning that alot of the refugees wouldn't have left anyway (prior to storm landfall). Same thing at the Convention Center- in fact, I believe the Convention Center crowd did not occur until after the storm, again meaning all those folk came out of their houses.

And that is just the indiginous poor. Those people with relatives or means sure as hell didn't evacuate to the Superdome before or after the storm.

So, I guess my point is that the buses would probably have ended up being flooded out at the Dome had they ben lined up to take people out.

That is not said to argue the point of the decisions the Mayor made, or lack thereof, but rather to try and point out some of the mindset in New Orleans.

It is a city which has always been poor, been taken advantage of by the political machines in the city, rife with corrupt public officials, yet always offers a unique American experience. It is tough to explain why the majority of people from there find themselves almost always wanting to go back, as well as some transplants.

Regarding Nagin, I will reserve judgement on him and how he has handled this crisis until after all the information comes out. I think he was a good mayor for New Orleans up to this point and still have an immense amount of respect for the man and the job done prior to Katrina. The scale of this disaster will dwarf 9/11 in terms of costs and directly affected people. We are talking about roughly 1 million people homeless, an entire city devastated, and an economic disaster which will take the country into severe economically rough waters. Comparisons between Nagin and Giulianni, well, I just don't think they are in the same circumstance.

Certainly there have been failings at the State and local level. But I also believe that some of the history will reflect poorly on the Federal level also. The scale of this disaster is unprecedented for America and while we will step up, we still have taken a solid gut shot.I would expect the response to be somewhat sluggish, just because of the scale of destruction across the entire South and the logistical nightmare New Orleans alone presented regarding the water.

That being said, I certainly would not think that Bush is responsible for any of the mess. At the same time I don't fault the mayor for his frutrations either.

Being from New Orleans and loving the city greatly, I would be lying to everyone if I was not frutrated too. But I also recognize the bullshit being spun from the media as well as the logistical nightmare faced by all. I just would like to see what the entire plan was at the Federal, State and local levels before passing judgement as to who failed where. And all I would like is to see everybody learn from it, because we will see future natural disasters in this country.

Sorry for the rambling.

Anyone who sits around waiting for any government official, at any level, to tell them whether or not to evacuate is already in a bad way.

92 wurm

I just gave you what was on the BBC website.

I'm sorry wurm, I didn't make myself clear. I realized it was BBC, I am just so mad myself at this crappola I can't see straight. To me, waiting till the day before the Cat 5 (at the time it still was) hurricane hit to call for mandatory evac of a metro area of that size...is just insane. The hospitals could have been evacuating Friday and Sat...the inbound lanes that were closed off from inbound traffic could have been diverted to outbound...So many SIMPLE ideas that would have helped...

102 Gonzo

Thanks for the post, I thought it summed up New Orleans pretty good.

Okay, so this is a bit of a random thought, but this tragedy points out one more reason why it's important to nurse babies the natural way. I was just watching a video replay of hurricane evacuees, and for the umpteenth time, the reporter mentioned the need for infant milk/formula.

Yes, I know, it's not always possible to nurse full-time. And yes, I know there are a handful of moms who can't nurse for one reason or another. But, if you can nurse, even if you have to use a pump at work to keep they supply going, do it. We all know it's the best thing for your baby, and in an emergency, you don't need to pray for outside help that may not come in time. A nursing mom could be considered to be a baby's emergency food supply.

Just a thought but I wonder how much Ken Lay is giving. Or that guy who used to be President of the Stock Exchange...how much of his income incredible Golden Retirement Income Package is he offering to give to help the victims? Richard something isn't it?

#107 Infidel Varmint:

Mom's nursing their babies has many benefits for baby. One of them is that the mother's milk has beneficial auto-immune boosters and the act of nursing soothes the baby and makes for a less 'restless' child.

#109 foreign devil,

the mother's milk has beneficial auto-immune boosters and the act of nursing soothes the baby and makes for a less 'restless' child.

Mother's milk is great product, and the packaging is wonderful too.

102 gonzo

The problem with the emergency plan falls in the lack of evacuation centers being publicised prior to the storm. Those poor people didn't know where to go outside of the Superdome and Convention Center.

There is one of the big problems. Considering NO is on the Gulf and is in Hurricane Territory, there is NO REASON why people/citizens/first respopnders etc., did not have this knowledge. There should be a plan that everyone knows...sort of on the basis of a fire drill in school. "Your area is here. Report HERE if you meet these qualifications. People will be bussed to: Houston/Memphis/Anycity to the local shelters set up for this.

For gosh sakes, the Hurricane was NOT a tornado...it didn't just drop out of the sky and in 15 minutes flatten the place.

What's amazing is that anyone who watches weather reports knew full well what could happen to New Orleans in a Cat 4 or 5 hurricane. It was talked about as every hurricane approached the Gulf over the past few years that might conceivably have turned toward NO. Talked about as what would happen, not what might happen.

For five days before Katrina hit, NO was discussed as a likely landfall point and the hurricane had been rated Cat 5 for several days.
It seems insane that anyone with only the information given in weather reports would not have decided to evacuate as early as Friday and no later than Saturday.

Many people decided to play Russian roulette, including the Mayor and Governor.

#109 foreign devil
Not to sidetrack this thread, but there is no getting around those facts. I nursed until my babies until they decided they were done. I hope this doesn't gross anyone out, but had I been a nursing mom in one of those emergency shelters, I probably would have offered my services to at least a couple of starving babies. Now, back to our regularly scheduled programming...

Nagin also delayed issuing the mandatory evacuation order because he was trying to figure out the "legalities" of doing so. This was Saturday night; the storm hit Monday morning. Even at that proverbial eleventh hour, Nagin still hadn't finalized a plan. Nagin should be impeached for his gross negligence that directly resulted in hundreds or thousands dying.

#102 gonzo:

Well said. A reasoned and thought-provoking analysis of the situation. I instinctively trust the mayor though I think he should have pushed for the evac sooner but when I read that piece from the Washington Post I realize even the President can't get that witch of a Governor to move. She's one of those women is quiet and motherly and a tough nut to crack where her 'responsibilities' are concerned. There should be a mass appeal by the people to remove her. What do they do...'impeach'? Is that how they'd do it. Anyway she should be impeached and removed upon conviction.

#115 Doss:

If, as I suspect, that steel butterfly of a Governor would allow the President to get her to declare an emergency, how was the mayor to get her to move. She's jealous of her 'area of authority' and didn't want anyone horning in on her turf. Plus, I strongly suspect a good accountant going over the books with particular emphasis on where funds for emergency or Homeland Security issues are concerned has gone, might uncover whatever it is she's hiding.

PIMF: would = wouldn't

#111 IF

Interesting thought. I wasn't trying to actually say that, but I can see how you would get there.

Given the numbers in major population centers, it would be impossible to pull the plug on public transportation. Many people who are not poor rely on public transportation also, as pointed out by Foreign Devil earlier.

This disaster really makes sensible people think harder about what to do if the things we rely on so much suddenly are not there any more.

I live in one of those places in the USA where we are above sea level so I know that if it floods then the water will go away eventually on its own. A boat is not on my list of essentials.

However I do know that I may lose electricity for hours or maybe days during both the summer (Tornado season) and winter (ice storms, snow and wind) so you plan accordingly.

In town losing electricity does not mean losing running water. Here out in the middle of nowhere it does, so we have, in summer access to a rainwater cistern outside, and in winter several trash cans of "flushing" water in the basement.

Here you plan to exist without running water or electricity because it happens, not for long, but you plan for it to happen for days, just incase.

In April and May I get sick of eating the canned winter stock of food, just so I get fresh stock in the fall!

What this tragedy has taught me is I have no secure cages for my animals in the event of a tornado. I have secure underground shelters, but no way of keeping the animals confined there. (look how the NO people lost their pets, no way out for pets)

That is the winter project... build cages.

As a side note, the longest in isolation was 10 days, and I ran out of cigaretts, filthy habit I know, but life was hell...

However I found it easier to crawl into bed and sleep for 36hrs until the snowplough came by than walk 16 miles through 4ft high snow to loot a gas station.

The point is, the "survivalists" may be nuts but they may have a point.

#111 Iron Fist:

In the inner city...where do you park it? Driving becomes torturous on city streets because EVERYONE has a car. When no one in the inner city has a car of only about 20% do, then the rest of us can move around. Then there's the cost of insurance, overnight parking, and on and on. Poor people can't hack all that.

P.S always have a six dollar real phone in your house, when the power goes out those cordless ones quit working, but the phone line is still there...

#117 foreign devil

If, as I suspect, that steel butterfly of a Governor would allow the President to get her to declare an emergency, how was the mayor to get her to move.

Not really sure what you mean there.

#113 a.k.a. Will
#116 Foreign Devil

In all fairness to calling for the mandatory evac, any time a storm enters the Gulf the probability is out there for a hit at some point.

Now with thhis storm, it was called early by the weather services in terms of where landfall will occur, but that is not the norm. Most of the time the landfall projections even three days out are off.

Also, part of the regular drill is that the civic leaders call for people to evacuate voluntarily all the time. I've never given any real thought to a mandatory versus voluntary evacuation in terms of advisories issued by the mayor or other local officials; you just know if its a Cat 3 or higher to split.

The question is when to split to avoid trafffic. Anytime the city starts to evacuate (and it has always been voluntary until this storm), you literally will be sitting in bumper to bumper traffic for 70 plus miles in any direction. A trip from New Orleans to Baton Rouge, normally about 45 minutes or so, will take you about eight hours.

#110 PDM:

You're a saucy boy! Cut it out!

@111 Iron Fist

At least gonzo didn't blame the President for the lack of drinking water in NO. :)

#124 IF

No doubt, as aptly demonstrated this week.

#123 Doss:

There's a certain kind of woman (maybe men are like this too...some of them) where they are passive-aggressive. They don't have the CAN DO attitude and will get in the way of anyone who does because they want to have control. It's a control thing and they're deadly people if you have to work with them. They'll sabotage you when you're trying to accomplish something. They usually manage very well socially and are well liked...as long as you don't cross their 'area of control'. They exercise their veto by passive-aggressive means. Butter won't melt in their mouth but they'll do you in with a vengeance behind your back. Just like the Governor.

2500 Canadian Red Cross left today for three week gig down there plus restaurant workers left from here as well to help cook meals down there. Just getting this of CBC.

#71 zombie
Great post!
These people knew that an enormous and growing storm was bearing down quickly on New Orleans. At one point, while the storm was still perfectly heading straight for the city, Katrina was a Category 5 storm with sustained winds of 175 mph. It's old news that the Big One (which this was) would put the entire city under 20 feet of water.
The local and state authorities should have had a plan to get the carless, infirm, etc. out of town, but, considering that they didn't, that doesn't mean that someone has to be inundated in 20 feet of polluted water.
If you were too dumb to leave, you were choosing to face that storm. Those without cars know people that do have cars. If someone says that those without cars couldn't get out of town, I'd ask if they even tried. The answer is "no."

#129 foreign devil
I saw a good line somewhere in the blogosphere about Blanco being weepy and frazzled: "I don't need a mom, I need a govenor."

And Jesus H Christ I am sorry to add onto this however [Link: news.yahoo.com...]

@ # 71 zombie

A category 5 hurricane is the equivalent of an 8.3 earthquake (I made that up, but it sounds about right).

It does sound about right! You crack me up; Thanks for the chuckle, I needed it.
I'm gonna steal that line: "I made that up, but it sounds about right."

@ # 102 gonzo

Sorry for the rambling

Not at all. Thanks for taking the time to make that thought-provoking post. Not sure I agree with it all (a lot to chew on), but I most certainly appreciate the context you provided, as someone who knows NOLA well.
Thanks again. No rambling there, whatsoever.

#127 Quark 2

No, I wouldn't blame any President for how things were handled.

Here you have a storm which wiped out not only everything on the coast from Grand Isle to Mobile, but went inland and wiped out another 300 plus miles from the coast northward.

Even if the support was seamless, how long would it take to move stuff and equipment in? Anything staged in that storm area, were it not damaged or detroyed, would still have to be dug out, not to mention landing areas cleared in the area needing relief or roads cleared to get in.

And for New Orleans lets add only one road in now and all the water.

I think alot of people recognize that; especially some of the locals.

When Jesse Jackson paid is visit the other day, some of the crowd got pissed off because he was holding up their ability to get on the bus and get the hell out. Some good footage on one of the local stations showing the crowd basically tellling him to piss off so they could leave.

115 Doss 9

Nagin also delayed issuing the mandatory evacuation order because he was trying to figure out the "legalities" of doing so. This was Saturday night; the storm hit Monday morning. Even at that proverbial eleventh hour, Nagin still hadn't finalized a plan.

Maybe it's just me, but isn't this something he should have known in advance? In an area of that size and population, I'd have thought this might be something learned in the early days of his job...doesn't he have legal counsel, or advisors? Why was he waiting this far into the game to check his game plan?

#20 hithere

They are the coffins that'll carry the Mediacrat's Bush bashing right out to sea. Facts are stubborn things...

OT: BREAKING *** Chief Justice Rehnquist has died ***

#137 beej

Why was he waiting this far into the game to check his game plan?

That's a question that only Reckless Ray can answer.

I would not want to be Mayor Nagin. He will have a lot to live with. To be charitable, it may have been in shock and denial over what was expected to be a loss of 10,000s of lives.

#142 Baldy

I would not want to be Mayor Nagin. He will have a lot to live with. To be charitable, it may have been in shock and denial over what was expected to be a loss of 10,000s of lives.

I can't give this man or the Gov any excuses on this one. He actually wanted to be Mayor of NO. The worst case scenario of any hurricane there would have been one of the things he would have had to consider prior to running for office. At least, it should have been. If he was just a braggidocio, and froze at the first sign of big trouble...still no excuse. That 15 year old boy who took the school bus and drove people to Houston showed more gumption than the Mayor.

oops--143 to 142

I emailed this photo to Charles... everyone take a look...

@135 Gonzo

It just hurts to see one of our oldest cities suffering this way because there was no plan A, nor a plan B.
We can if this thing to death and it won't change history.
I hope when the water is gone, and they start making their decisions of how to rebuild it's certainly on a better footing and with good workable plans that will involve every resident
of NO.
It looks as though things are going to dynamically change in NO, lots of businesses are now going over to LaPlace and Baton Rouge.
Will they ever return to NO you have to wonder.
G'nite. :)

#145 efuseakay
If ever two photos were asking to be juxtaposed...

#146 Quark 2

Hell, alot are going to Houston!

G'night.

#147... no doubt about it...

Just Finsihed watching the BBC World News.

The color commentator they had was former BBC Correspondent CHARLES WHEELER.

In his opinion there has been no sniping in NO, no rapes. He said "Show me any evidence of this. This is just talk trying to direct attention away from Bushs inattention and that the poor of America should unit against the injustice that Bush "Who history will judge as incompentent" and his group has done to them.

Ha! Watching you guys position this as only a local fuck up is hilarious. Of course the locals were pathetic. That's why we invested billions and billions into a federal agency that was supposed to cordinate our response to these kinds of disasters. Right?

Instead, you are in denial mode, clutching at straws to protect Bush and his bloated baby - Department of Homeland Security.

Yes, the locals were overwhelmed. Isn't that why the "experts" from Homeland Security were supposed to take over? And if they didn't, or couldn't, whose fault is that? Some low level mayor of a mid-sized town?

When the next major disaster happens - perhaps another 9/11 type terrorist attack - will you be making excuses then, too? Because the Cleveland Ladies Association forgot to evacuate? Or the San Francisco Chamber of Commerce forgot to distribute water? It took 5 days to get water to people massing in stadiums, and you think this is only the Mayor's fault?

Bottom line. Who is in charge? If it's the locals, remind me again why we have Homeland Sucurity? Let's put the money to better use. After all, it's up to the local guys to do something, right?

--JC

I think it was on Monday, but on either Fox or the Weather Channel, they were showing how New Orleans had fared and using the elevated I-10 as a vantage point. Apparently, the mayor or Police Chief had decided to use the freeway as a makeshift elevated parking structure for the city's police cruisers, most of which had their windows blown out but otherwise intact. Wonder if they could've also used that space for some of the buses that are now submerged.

141 Iron Fist - I just woke up. Sorry.

I am glad I have had few doubts about Bush's response to Katrina. The main ones I've had are cosmetic, but were days ago. I got into an argument with people on LGF about his VJ Day speech. I thought everything should have been dropped immediately to deal with this. Compared to Nagin & Blanco though,, he is the only one who's been a leader since.

Also, anyone with common sense knows we are always on our own for first few days (at least) after a major disaster. It is common (maybe not so common considering people looting for food within a day in NOLA) knowledge to ALWAYS have a few days food and water for emergencies.

151 JoeChristmas - Yes, I've wondered why it took so long to SUPPOSEDLY get food and water to refugees. However, the press and the left has spun this as usual. The Mayor sent them to a deathtrap. Maybe Bush was wrong in assuming Nagin had enough sense to have food and water somewhere in NOLA.

Joe Christmas

5 days to get water to people massing in stadiums

Can you count? The levees broke Tuesday. Roads, infrastructure destroyed. It's not been 5 days yet. The left has been dancing on corpses for years. 9/11, Iraq & now NOLA. The left has no response except it's Bush's fault. IIRC, it was Dems who wanted to reorganize govt with a Homeland Security monstrosity. An idiotic move, IMO. Further complicating & disrupting the govt when that's the last thing needed. The Dems also push funding for first responders all of the time (help AFTER a attack), what did NOLA do with their Federal monies? Also, what about the savages shooting at rescuers? Precious time was lost getting help because Nagin WOULD NOT control his thugs.

I live in Portland, Oregon. We've had one little very minor tremble of an earthquake ten years ago but otherwise not a hint. And that was at 5 in the morning so I just went back to sleep. But supposedly there's a major fault that runs right through downtown, and it's been said that we'll have a very big earthquake for sure sometime in the next one hundred years.very big

Nobody thinks about it. Few if any are prepared. I know I don't like thinking about it. Day to day life seems tough enough. But now, after New Orleans, I'm starting to think about it. And what I can do to be prepared.

Tell again about the rabbits, George...Live offa the fat o' the land...

The people that stayed were idiots.

/Obscure Steinbeck reference

Poor JoeChristmas cannot understand that the failure of the local/state Government is what made this all such a mess, and made the NG/DHS's job all the more difficult. Oh well. BUSH DID IT!

Armed "INSURGENCY" by Supposed Americans Hurt Morale of National Guardsman in New Orleans (Army Times)

While some fight the insurgency in the city, other carry on with rescue and evacuation operations. Helicopters are still pulling hundreds of stranded people from rooftops of flooded homes...Numerous soldiers also told Army Times that they have been shot at by armed civilians in New Orleans...“I never thought that at a National Guardsman I would be shot at by other Americans,” said Spc. Philip Baccus of the 527th Engineer Battalion. “And I never thought I’d have to carry a rifle when on a hurricane relief mission. This is a disgrace.”

I hope there is soul searching when blaming Bush. What kind of people shoot at their rescuers? I have never heard of this in a disaster before. I know in the ghettos, people shoot at fireman (and cops), but really...

RE; Breastfeeding - I'm sure a lot of women in NOLA were HIV+. It then isn't a good idea.

It is Bushs fault,

and now he is sending Federal troops over here to shoot us.
Iraq,
no,

evactuee on American Red Cross. Org. wants me to send monies.

/maroons

Good morning. Is the dead thread actually going to be the top thread today ? I had't heard about the Chief Justice dying until I scanned the threads.

Regarding this screed by Wells of the BBC,

[Link: news.bbc.co.uk...]

I have the benefit of being 9 hours ahead, so I did write a complete destruction of Mr. Wells article and sent it to two locations. The first place to voice you displeasure is the complaint department of the BBC, there is an email link:

[Link: www.bbc.co.uk...]

However, and I would only recommend this to those of you who feel quite confident in your writing and rhetorical ability (fortunately there are many of you here), the Labour Party MP who has authority over the BBC is the Rt Hon Tessa Jowell MP, Secretary of State for Culture, Media & Sport.

[Link: www.culture.gov.uk...]

Some letters outlining the serious lack of factual reporting by Wells and the BBC might get more headway here. Be respectful, the official way to address her is "The Right Honorable Tessa Jowell".

Funny, I discussed the staggering levels of corruption and incompetence of the local NO and LA authorities with Beagle on Thursday.

Knowing New Orleans and Louisiana, I'm not at all surprised at this news.

I suppose I should also not be surprised that everybody's busy blaming the Fed Govt for this, particularly the NO mayor, that pos.

The MSM is overflowing with "Bush dropped the ball"-innuendo.

Nagin should be put on trial for dereliction of duty, IMO. Same goes for LA Gov. Blanco.

# 185 GJ

Well, it now appears we'll have a real, full-blown 3-ring political circus going here. In the first ring, the wonderful Katrina relief effort blame game. In the second ring, the somewhat less impressive "Katrina was caused by global warming" blame game. And in the third ring, now forecfully brought back to the top of the headlines, the supreme court nominations fiasco. And we've got mid-term elections waiting in the wings.

#28 annelid

And not to sound to self centered but I'm still unemployed.

Hey, do what I did! Start your own business!

I'm not making any money, but I'm not bored anymore!

:)

OT

Chief Justice William H. Rehnquist has died.

Obviously a Bush/Rovian plot, to take attention away from the Hurricane Katrina that they planned, the war in Iraq that they planned, the 2000 Rehnquist "selection" of George Bush...well you know they rest.

Now the Bush/Rove team will foist it's black robed Taliban upon the country, taking every single right away from all.

Seriously, May you rest in peace, William H. Rehnquist.

Ahhh yes, of course NOW I see the thread, I should have scrolled to, prior to my post concerning Justice Rehnquist.

A genuinely heroic mayor orders a total evacuation of the city the day before Katrina arrives, knowing that for decades now, New Orleans has been living on borrowed time.

ive lived through 4 hurricanes and the mayor of new orleans is a stupid turd and should be impeached.

/my letter to the BBC,
do you think they will print it?

# 169 ElCid

The morning dead thread is traditionally considered an open thread for all practical purposes.

If a 15 year old kid could get a bus, and drive 70 people to Houston, why couldn't Ray Nagin get ONE person to Houston? Stupidity? Incompetence? Or did he know that thousands would die, in advance, so he could use that to blame the feds?

#44 epobirs

Ah, yes, good old Anne "Could have said it in half as many pages" Rice joins the fun.

What a callous, pompous ignorant bitch. I think I may have some of her books around here, and I do need some cat litter.

Everybody except the Mayor and Governor is jumpin' high to make sure people in NO get saved and get clothes & a hot meal and whatever they need . . .

And little Miss Anne jumps in with "it's not enough! IhateyouIhateyouIhateyou!" like some spoiled rich 9 year old brat who got a Pony instead of a real horse.

In all the vituperation and self-serving dreck we've faced from media mavens in the last few days, this one shines out like a gold-plated diarrheac turd.

What a f*** b***. I really mean that. What an arrogant, elitist, self-righteous, sittin' in California while everybody else is doin' the real hard work b***.

But I ain't mad.

#163 Mike C.

Morning? You people are sick. SICK I TELL YOU! :)

I'm going to bed now...

:)

# 174 Merovign

Just practicing for getting up 7 hours earlier starting Wednesday.

#175 Mike C.

Uh oh. Where are you off to?

Good morning, afternoon, evening *everyone*™

Looks like the NOPD walked off of the job.

200 officers haven't shown up for work - most simply quit, while 2 committed suicide.

I wonder if all those blaming the feds for the Katrina fiasco will be wearing "NOPD" gear like the "NYFD" gear that folks wore after 9/11. They should. They can show their support for these outstanding, selfless public servants.

171 Mike C.

The morning dead thread is traditionally considered an open thread for all practical purposes.

Yeah I know...but , it's such a DUH!.

I am pleading the extreme lack of caffeine defense.

May I take the time to laud and applaud yours and others efforts, in this Katrina disaster.

# 176 littleoldlady

Lovely Kuwait City.

# 178 ElCid

I did some phone and e-mail work, and spent too much time on this blog. Save your applause for RebTex, Bayou_King, 'Nam Grunt and those folks.

#179 Mike C.

Sheesh. All the garden spots of the world...I don't know how you do it!

Louisiana did not reach out to a multi-state mutual aid compact for assistance until Wednesday, three state and federal officials said. As of Saturday, Blanco still had not declared a state of emergency, the senior Bush official said

She was waiting for the tide to go out.

Hillary Clinton democrat president,
Mrs Blanco vice president.

More from that article on the NOPD (or better - NO PD)

A Baton Rouge police officer said he had a friend on the New Orleans force who told him he threw his badge out a car window in disgust just after fleeing the city into neighboring Jefferson Parish as the hurricane approached. The Baton Rouge officer would not give his name, citing a department policy banning comments to the news media.

The officer said he had also heard of an incident in which two men in a New Orleans police cruiser were stopped in Baton Rouge on suspicion of driving a stolen squad car. The men were, in fact, New Orleans officers who had ditched their uniforms and were trying to reach a town in north Louisiana, the officer said.

"They were doing everything to get out of New Orleans," he said. "They didn't have the resources to do the job, or a plan, so they left."

Find em. Shoot Em.

# 181 littleoldlady

All it takes is a strong heart, a weak mind and an overwhelming fear of going broke.

As we all know;

If the President had walked on top of the water carrying out infants and children, the next NYT headlines would read;

BUSH CAN'T SWIM.

Morning all.

Like I said yesterday, and I'll continue to say it - this was a failure of leadership at the lowest levels - they didn't even follow there own disaster plan (check out the Junk YardBlog)...UFB...Now some of the military are calling NO "little Somalia" - I don't believe it's happening here in America.

#184 Mike C.

All it takes is a strong heart, a weak mind and an overwhelming fear of going broke.

I am so unqualified for what you do: weak heart, vivid imagination (for things that could go wrong) and I discovered there's things I won't do, even for money.

I admire you!

# 187 littleoldlady

Oh, I do draw the line every once in a while. I turned down Luanda. And my cardiologist is not real happy about my heart, either. But Kuwait is not even remotely near the bottom of the barrel in the oil biz.

Liberals Help the Poor with Propaganda (Austin Statesman)

Evacuees also were housed at Reunion Arena in Dallas. As a few people smoked cigarettes outside, a plane emerged overhead trailing a sign that read, "Shame on You George Bush."

Nice to know they care about the refugees. Or whatever the PC word is now. The politics of this whole thing disturbs me.

Question: do any blogs have video recordings of the MSM's *ahem* coverage of the situation in New Orleans? Like the reporter saying there were no cops while a police car rolls by and such?

Good to see Drudge has the Where's the Bus's article up.

I guess we need to change the rotating title that said

"We don't need oil, we ride the bus"

At least in NO

#188 Mike C.

Well at least here at LGF we've trained you to check in daily. Let's not give your cardilogist any more business, okay?

:-)

“And I never thought I’d have to carry a rifle when on a hurricane relief mission. This is a disgrace.”

Up there with his stunning evacuation of his city, now a ghost tow, is the level of lawlessness there. I'm not gonna blame it on poverty. There was no excuse for any of this.

#189 Baldy

Evacuees also were housed at Reunion Arena in Dallas. As a few people smoked cigarettes outside, a plane emerged overhead trailing a sign that read, "Shame on You George Bush."

Of course if The President had not acted, they would have had to fly the plane over the Superdome in order for the evacuees to see it.

On the plus side, while talking with LLL's here in Baltimore, it has not been hard to get them to change their view.

Seems that the info here on LGF has helped front load me with some excellent rebuttals to those idiots.

# 192 littleoldlady

Well, I may not be checking in for a long while. If LGF is blocked in The Magic Kingdom, it's almost certainly blocked in Kuwait.

I get the impression the rate of Americans killed in Iraq has fallen a lot in the last few weeks.

Oops - I killed the dead thread.

Imagine being a lefty and trying to figure out how to feel about this story.

Zimbabwe: CIA Is Behind Kidman Movie

Mike C.
No, you didn't kill it.

I think most of us are cruising the various sites and threads to catch up from overnight.

Plus, it's sunday, so many of us puppy killing, baby eating, black hating repugs are going to church.

Those of us who have not already set up evacuee camps in their back yard like RebTex and BK.

I ran into this comment on Hurry up Harry.
I had writen to make many of the same points myself, in opposition to what was there blaming it all on Bush, but this one says it better:
Reader David Terron-- AKA dave the mad jock (NOT David T)-- offers a different take on the Bush administration's response to Katrina:

"Think of an area the size of Great Britain devastated by a natural disaster. Add a federal system of government that guards state rights and limits the ability of the federal government and the joint military to intervene. Add the fact that most of the state administration is from a different political party to the federal administration and they treat each other accordingly; with suspicion and in some cases hostility. Into the whole horrible mix throw a media intent on apportioning blame in one direction only-- towards the federal administration, a populace who are needing help but stuck in a place where is it difficult to get aid in because the roads and bridges that are left cannot bear the weight of most big trucks and therefore needs the aid to be offloaded onto smaller trucks or helicopters (who cannot land in many places either due to the built up area).

Some points:

President Bush appealed directly by phone to the state governor to evacuate New Orleans before the hurricane hit and it was not until he did that things got moving. Bush did something unprecedented with this disaster in declaring a Federal State of Emergency in Alabama, Mississippi and Louisiana before Katrina even landed. But President Bush does not have the power to order a US city to evacuate unless he declares martial law for every single state in the United States.

The state government failed in many ways to plan and then implement a plan resulting in hundreds of buses becoming flooded and large groups of people becoming cut off as they remained behind despite being told to leave.

I saw a lot of ambulances, police cars, and fire equipment flooded in the Katrina footage. It will be interesting to see what the New Orleans preplanning was, since their director of emergency response is all over the TV blaming Bush.

It's up to local and state people to tell the feds what they need and to run the emergency command centers, not just throw their arms up in the air and start blaming everyone else.

The media and some opposition politicians claim that funding was cut to protective walls but forget to mention these cuts were made by the previous administration lead by President Clinton. The Corps of Engineers say that there were no cuts and that in any event all their walls were suitable for a Cat 3 storm not a once in a lifetime Cat 5 like Katrina was. The main failure occurred at an upgraded section.

President Clinton himself has gone on TV saying that the current administration and President Bush are doing a good job-- as well as can be expected under the circumstances.

Rather than everyone trying to slant things would it not be better to look at both sides and then decide? I for one gave up on the BBC after Matt Frei's rants this afternoon. Back to the blogsphere (left and right) for me!"

In defense of Bush

# 198 trespasser

Been rummaging in the "stupid news story" bin, eh ? I din't even bother to open that when I spotted it this AM. Gotta put that one in with the football coverage.

Wanna know what happened? Here is what happened.

These two tools didn’t want to spend the money on the disaster plan, figured they would get off as they always do, the pumps would save them, the reports of doom and gloom were overstated. We now know the only reason they evacuated at all was because of the direct request from the White House.

On Monday, when it looked like everything would be OK, the mayor and the Gov thought, cool, we seriously got lucky there, and we didn't spend a dime.

Then the levee started leaking...

So, they thought, cool, the Army Corps of engineers will fix it, and we will dodge another bullet too.

Then another levee failed...that bullet was a shotgun with a wide spread on target.

I've been saying this since Thursday, [Link: littlegreenfootballs.com...] Frick and Frack are TOTALLY to blame for doing NOTHING to get there notorious poor crime ridden underclass out of the city or make preparations to feed and water them.

Now the game is pin the donkey blame on the Elephant. What I HATE is the stupid self-ritious European media (like this BBC tool Wells) lapping all this crap up like a two-bit crack whore and they DON'T HAVE AN F-ING CLUE as to the actual regulations of the FEMA.

Lick my American sack, BBC, AFP, TeleBruxelles, etc. etc. etc….

I kinda wondering if all the Sunday "talking heads" shows are scrambling to readjust their guest list today to start in on the US Supreme Court thing. My guess is that they were booked solid with the Katrina blame game story.

Sooo glad that this is making headlines now!

Too much blaming Mr Bush, and anyone and everyone that they could, for their own laziness and stupidity.

A POX on them ALL!

#189 Baldy
That is unbelievable (and, yet it's not). The Democratic Party treats its constituency like mushrooms: feed them shit and keep them in the dark. With leaders like Blanco, Nagin, Landrieu and Hillary Clinton, the ordinary people who are members of the Dem Party in this country don't have a snowballs shot in hell at a life.
I am stunned at the politicizing.

# 205 Mary

You ain't seen nothing yet. Wait until the SCOTUS story ramps back up to full speed.

Been rummaging in the "stupid news story" bin, eh ?

Well, technically, yes, since it was on Yahoo's front page. It amused me in an ironic sort of way. Internationalist moonbats make movie fawning overt the U.N. and ICC and as thanks they get accused of being everything they hate by the sort of person they most admire.

# 205 Mary Addendum

Oh, and don't forget, while it's been dropped from LGF for more important matters, this week Kos is going to destroy part of the Democratic leadership. Surely that will overtake all other news stories.

# 207 trespasser

Sounds fairly typical, doesn't it ?

trip

A POX on them ALL!

Man, pox's are like sooo 18th century

How bout a trojan virus on them all!

I think this tregedy could have been much less severe if the Levee Commission (btw,they are a local agency) had spent their budget on levees instead of private jets,buying a casino and first class "junkets" for commission members,not to mention all the pocket lining.

This was world class corruption,they must have taken lessons from the UN.

This is something you'll never see or hear in the TSM(terrorist supporting media).

#208 Mike C.

'mornin' Mike.

Only two more days until the world is saves by America's newest superhero...Moonbatman.

#5 got milk? 9/3/2005 10:13PM PDT
Charles,

You really should include this.

Louisiana disaster plan, pg 13, para 5 , dated 01/00

'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'

What is your grief with Charles? Here is the plan for the whole state of Louisiana (2000!). And we are talking about NOLA, after 9/11. I sure as heck would hope there is an updated plan for a major metropolitan area, especially if you know most of your residents do not possess their own vehicles.

#187

and I discovered there's things I won't do, even for money.

I'm guessing you're not an attorney.

Man, more news today!
Chirac hospitalized with vascular problem
[Link: www.boston.com...]

Mike C.
Do tell...(not following. I did sleep on the livingroom floor last night with my 7 year old - her idea of fun! Am in need of more coffee...) What story is this?

#214 MeanMrMustard

I'm guessing you're not an attorney.

LOL! No, but you're close. I used to be in advertising.

#204 trip

A POX on them ALL!

Suppurating(sp?) pustules on them all!

Not to mention painful rectal itch.

I could NEVER be an elected official. My lizard skin is way too thin. One of the many things I admire about President Bush is that he doesn't lash out at unreasonable criticism (or even reasonal criticism, for that matter).

Not all of the buses went to waste.

They are talking about prosecuting this kid, they should give him a medal.

[Link: www.local6.com...]

An 18-year-old also decided to take matters into his own hands and stole an abandoned city school bus and drove storm victims to Texas, according to a CNN report.

The teen driver, Jabbar Gibson, 18, said he had never driven a bus before but wanted to save people.

"If it wasn't for him, we'd still be in New Orleans on the Gulf," bus passenger Randy Nathan said. "He got the bus for us."

Watch the video.

#218 Totally

Yuck. And before breakfast, too.

That's using your Nagin.

# 212 Totally Sirius

Heh.

# 216 Mary

The Chief Justice died last evening.

Has someone made sure to send this pic to all the left-wing blogs and ask that they post it?

Have any left-wing blogs posted it yet?

#223 Mike C.
Thanks. I finally turned on the TV.

Special good mornin' and kudos to BK, NG, et al.

Special good mornin' to the greater central Ohio region minions. TS, righty, Geeps, MMM, Got.., lil IF, And I'll include Cartman as on honorary GCOR minion.

General grumble of ga' mormin' in the general direction to the rest of you.

I have a question, if anybody knows. Nomination hearings are supposed to start Tuesday on Roberts. Since there is now another vacancy, there will obviously have to be one more new nomination and hearing. But assuming W appoints a sitting justice to the position of Chief Justice (probable), does that require yet a third hearing ? Or does that essentially internal promotion slide through without the "advice and consent" of the Senate ?

#222 Free

Exactly so. Much like "his name is mud", in years to come the expression "he pulled a nagin" will become a commonly used expression meaning "mind-boggling stupidity and ineptitude resulting in disaster".

[I should copyright this now...]

#227 Mike C.

They CAN elevate by acclaimation a sitting justice to CJ, if GW goes that route.

As far as starting hearings on JR I think the dims/libs/traitors will demand hearings on how FEMA performed instead. (ended with a prep)

# 229 BZ

Well, I just took a peek at the US Constitution, and, of course, the "advice and consent" of the Senate is required for an appointment TO the Supreme Court. But if a sitting justice is elevated to Chief Justice, I don't see how "advice and consent" is required. But I'm a rock guy, not a constitutional lawyer. If the Dems delay the Roberts hearings in the face of yet another vacany, they will be handing the Republicans a club to beat them with in the upcoming mid-terms.

#220 Karlito

I saw him interviewed by Rita Cosby the other night. I applaud his actions and agree that he should be rewarded not punished. According to his story he did not exactly steal the bus...

#228 Littleoldlady

"he pulled a nagin"

I like!

And for all of those who think our military can't take of things at home and abroad.
[Link: billroggio.com...]
September 03, 2005
Battle along the Northern Ratline
By Bill Roggio

U.S. and Iraqi forces have launched the largest operation since Fallujah last November. Over 5,000 U.S. and Iraq troops strike at the town of Tal Afar, which is located west of Mosul, along the northern ratline from Syria. The insurgents have taken heavy casualties, and U.S. Army helicopter pilots are learning to spot IED deployments via air, and react accordingly.

During the course of the day, at least 30 insurgents were killed as U.S. troops conducted house-to-house searches in the baking sun. Apache attack helicopters that circled the city of 250,000 all day killed 27 people, including eight who were attempting to conceal roadside bombs in old tires, commanders said. No American or Iraqi army casualties were reported.

Watching Fox right now, backhoe operator 'poling' a barge into place using the backhoe's arm as the pole. Impressive, that guy deserves a raise.

Once watched a Navy CPO walk a MKIV combat patrol boat sideways across a lock in the Panama Canal, without moving more than an inch fore or aft. Some people are just born with skills that the rest of us will never acquire.

#151

Bottom line. Who is in charge? If it's the locals, remind me again why we have Homeland Sucurity? Let's put the money to better use. After all, it's up to the local guys to do something, right?

If the Fed is in charge, why do we have state and local governments?

It's time you had some edumacation. Start with this.

/frigging dump and run nitwits..

How ironic that Judge Rehnquist, a staunch defender of State's Rights, should pass while this debate goes on.

From NY Times:

"The evacuation plan was really based on people driving out," said Craig E. Colten, a geologist at Louisiana State University and an expert on the city's vulnerable topography. "They didn't have buses. They didn't have trains."

Not the first time an academic has ignored the facts.

Morning EW1

Read this article from Drudge

Police officers quit

Mr. Riley said some of the officers who left the force "couldn't handle the pressure" and were "certainly not the people we need in this department."

The officer said he had also heard of an incident in which two men in a New Orleans police cruiser were stopped in Baton Rouge on suspicion of driving a stolen squad car. The men were, in fact, New Orleans officers who had ditched their uniforms and were trying to reach a town in north Louisiana, the officer said.

"They were doing everything to get out of New Orleans," he said. "They didn't have the resources to do the job, or a plan, so they left."

Yes, I'm cherry picking.

But read the article with the question in your mind of How could the President have forseen this level of collapse and discipline within the ranks of the local government.

Couple this with the Memorial Motor Pool, and it's pretty obvious that the mayors plan was about as real as Kerry's plan for Iraq.

220 Mike C.

If President Bush decides to nominate a sitting member of the court to the Chief Justiceship, then there will be a need for Senate approval, with all the bells and whistles and LLL shrieking to go with it, then, once the elevation is approved, he will have to nominate another person to be an associate justice, with more hearings and television commercials from all the liberal groups talking about how the nominee is a rabid racist who will overturn Roe v Wade and demolish the wall of seperation between church and state and make all of our little schoolchildren proclaim their allegiance to Halliburton each morning. Because of this, I have heard at least one analyst surmise that the President is better off just naming somebody outside of the court to be cheif justice.

The perfect bumper sticker

"Democrat's..we have a plan for everything.
Blame Bush"

#236 Van Impe 9/4/2005 06:37AM PDT

Ahh, those pesky facts, they can be so confusing.

oooppps! last post was in response to 227, not 220 pimf, but I treat it like a leper.

Who owns all those flooded-out cars you see in the arial footage of the poor neighborhoods?

I thought they were too poor to own them? That might be true, but many appear to of at least have access to them.

Mornin' Ya'll,

Well the situation is very calm here in my little town, everyone is signed up for food stamps, they are finding housing, they have food, the children are being signed up for school, and there are hundreds of volunteers coming out of the woodwork (where were all these helpers 5 days ago when we were just a handful being over run), I'm not complaining, I'm glad everyone has decided to get off their a$$es and do something, I haven't even talked to my son in a week so I'm might go visit him and my grandson today.

243 nam grunt

Thank you for all you have been doing. Go ahead and hug your grandson today, you deserve a bit of time to recharge the batteries.

GWB being ripped by the panel on This Week with George Snufulupagus at this moment.

Morning, all

I just followed a link from Drudge to a NY Daily News piece.

link

Get past the "why don't we take care of our poor" bit because there are some more eye-opening statistics about NO/LA corruption etc.

Then there is this closer, which is a real kicker:

Ten billion dollars are about to pass into the sticky hands of politicians in the No. 1 and No. 3 most corrupt states in America. Worried about looting? You ain't seen nothing yet.

Folks, Blanco (according to the WaPo article Charles has linked to) just set up her own "philanthropic fund."

Now I understand why.

The people of America can't be caught sleeping at the wheel on this one. We need to DEMAND accountability as we pour money into this relief effort.

Re 246
LA has been notorious for corruption and poor government. After the destruction of Galveston, the city was rebuilt and a new system of government replaced the inadequate government that had proved unequal to the task. Maybe this cleasning will force a reform of government in LA. I have my doubts...

If anybody is watching CNN, this morning's whole show is a spectacularly biased bush-bash. Earlier Soledad O'Brien scientifically proved that there was no looting by inventorying the shelves in ONE store. More chocolate missing than booze, QED. Then somebody interviewed a Police PR or High-ranking guy (sorry, had baby issues, wasn't paying strict attention), and set up this strawman: Reports of "sixty--six zero--sixty percent of your force walking out on the job. Was that true?" Of course not, as the 60% figure was only reported for A SINGLE PRECINCT, and the average was, I think, between 20% and 30%. Also, Soledad asked about a report that "one of your officers" committed suicide. I knew it was two so far, and the police rep soon set her straight. (BTW, one of the officers did himself on discovering his wife was dead, other one unknown). Most recently, Miles O'Brien (from the studio) interviewed Ben Nelson (D-who cares?), with questions such as "Was the guard stretched too thin due to the commitments in Iraq..." and "This is inexcusable, isn't it?" Even the risible Ben Nelson wouldn;t quite take that bait--"Well, Yeah, I--no, I--well it ought to be explainable, there should be an explanation, but..."
CNN is actually way further out on the left than their darling leftist lawmakers.
I live in Japan, and I can't get FOXNEWS. CN is it. Ugh.

Katrina was a large, 200 mile wide cylinder with 140mph winds with a surge of over 35 feet.

What does that mean? It means that the Creator's used the storm to drop 803 billion cubic meters of water on South Louisiana and Miss. V=pi x radius squared x height (for our purposes pi is 3.14, the radius is 100 miles or 160km or 160000M, and height is 10M). Now I am sure the water was not evenly distributed in the cylinder and the full cylinder did not come over N.O. but we are talking about one halacious act of G-D here folks. Fell free to check my math and assumptions, I am a writer not a mathematician but I haven't seen anyone talking about the scope of what happened as the starting point for where we are.

This gives new meaning to the word big. Zombie's #71 post got it just about right. But there is one difference, California has an earthquake culture and Louisiana has a Marid Gras Culture. Mr. Nagin was elected to keep the party partying. Unfortunately, people like that don't fare well in diaster relief situations.

To be fair to all pols involved, the very scale and nature of the storm made things much more difficult: everything within 200 miles of the affected areas was in poor shape to help for at least a couple of crucial days just repairing their own local damage. Helicopters, the most effective rescue vehicle, are best based about no more than 100 miles from the job site and this was not possible.

Federal, State and Municipal disaster preparedness is expensive and doesn't get you votes. Four lane highways connecting nothing to nowhere and giant billion dollar bridges between partially inhabited fishing villages are where the votes are.

A single team of engineers on site at the levees with bulldozers and some concrete blocks could have saved the city. ALL levels of government failed to act and yet it would have been in everyone's best interest to do so; we will be spending tens of billions we did not have to on fixing Katrinas damage. The cost of our collective failure to prepare, years after 9-11, bodes very poorly for what would come in the event of a large terror strike. We just simply aren't ready.

The test of leadership in a crisis is simple: did the pol in question act with the speed, focus and intelligence of a strong leader faced with a crisis in an election year?

While I support Bush, I don't think his responce was as vigourous as it would have been in 2004 (and while I accept that the admin is very POed at the Dem's fingerpointing, Katrina only reinforces my belief in on term for any president), Louisiana and New Orleans official performance has been pathetic but I began my post with the enormity of Katrina; don't think anyone could have done much better either.

Even if Mayor Nagin had used the buses, no one would have left. Nagin is not the sharpest knife in the political drawer, he presided over an electorate satisfied, if not proud, to have him as their leader. The unique culture of Louisiana, Katrian also contributued to a formula for disaster involving weather, government and people each doing exactly what they shouldn't at exactly the wrong time producing a cataclysm we shall remember for many years to come.

it will ALL be blamed on GW. All of it.

Every penny stolen by Blanco and Nagin, every deed left UNDONE by tweedledum and tweedledummer-- blamed on GW. What a joke.

And still the press feeds the fire of that erroneous postulate "our President doesn't care."

Well said...we can't be caught sleeping this time.

246 k

At least we haven't yet heard of any swindlers that are setting up "relief funds" to line their own pockets like so many did after 9/11. That is a disgusting practice and anyone doing so should be shot on sight.

BTW, notice that I added "yet" to that first sentance. I am not always the biggest proponent of the goodness of human nature.

#238 tankdemon, I beleive it would demonstrate a total lack of courage to nominate a new justice for the Cheif Justice. I'd like to see Justice Sacalia and Thomas draw for the privilage, the've earned it. Let the demonrats fight it. I doubt the Evil Rowe needs more for the next election, but what the heck, let the LLL's give him more.
Next, I despise scum sucking bottom feeding laywers, but if the mayor and the govenor haven't opened themselves to wrongfull death lawsuits, what would it take? You know the MSM will not cover what went wrong. Hopefully, the courts will. The poor decisions, petty power gaurding, the failure to impliment their own evacuation plan, the misspent desaster funding, the outright lies by puplic figures are unbelievable. Another 911 style commission would be just another large expenditure whitewash.

Hi, mpax,

Let's hope the blogosphere can get ahead of this and keep an eye on where the money goes.

We can't leave this to the MSM. Two years from now, they'll be running hand-wringing articles about how much relief money "disappeared" and blaming the Bush administration for not preventing the stealing.

GWB being ripped by the Sunday Morning Magazine on ABC...Boy the media is not holding back this AM.

Lousy morning everyone. It's Bush's fault.

#251 tankdemon

At least we haven't yet heard of any swindlers that are setting up "relief funds" to line their own pockets like so many did after 9/11.

'Fraid so. Scamming on the Internet is like mammals breathing air.

251 tank

"Yet" exactly -- we haven't heard of it yet!

But you can bet your bottom dollar it's happening. there were people who were already thinking about this 28 hours before Katrina landfall . . .

#237 Village Idiot's Apprentice:

How could the President ANYONE have forseen this level of collapse and discipline within the ranks of the local government.

Boggles my mind. I swore the same oath you did, you know what I mean.

#248haakondahl
Sorry you only get CNN. You have missed some of the best coverage on FOX. It was especially good yesterday at right about 1800 hours CST. The airlift was over and areas in NO that had previously been over run were empty. After hearing the constant chatter of helicopter rotors all day it was eerily quiet. Fox was showing the hopeful and grateful people who had been evacuated. The others CNN and MSNBC just dwelled on the blame and of course the old stand by Blame Bush. Well I wonder if now they are going to give him credit for this tremendous humanatarian mission just accomplished in spite of roadblocks put up by the Gov of LA.

CNN Continued...
Idiot Soledad O'Brien is walking through the Convention Center, saying "we heard reports of what was so bad, and we wanted to see for ourselves."
IDIOTS! The bad part was of course the FEAR and VIOLENT CRIME. But CNN covered that up well: Of course there were reports of gangs of young men--roving gang-bangers, but the worst of it was the feces, and the urine, and the smell--not knowing when they were going to get out of here".

BTW, in this and my previous comment, all of the "quotes" are best-effort paraphrases...just sayin' for the record.

Why doesn't CNN use its vast array, "the army of reporters we deployed to bring you the truth", of resources to track down a real mystery--where the fnck is Nagin? Where is Blanco? And why didn't they take any of the life-saving actions within their powers?

I have a general question--If not for Ray Nagin's emergency Evacuation order, how many people would have left anyway? I'll bet the number is comparable (but I have NO EVIDENCE, not even scanty). In my opinion, the best thing the mando evac order got done was opening the oposing trafic lanes (which fascinated CNN before the hurricane hit.

Back to the point of my rant; if you want to see the Clinton News Network in full swing, this is the morning.

#226 BenZacharia

Top of the mornin' to you as well. Proud to be considered an honorary GCOR minion. Hope things are going well on your end. Just lurkin' this AM. Too tired to offer anything coherent, so I'm on the sidelines with a cup of java.

Re: Bush & the MSM,

Am I the only one who is starting to think "screw it"?

The MSM is a cesspool of ideological crap. Tell them you think so. Then shut them off.

Spread the word about what's really going on. Send the links you follow to other people -- the stuff that junkyardblog, this blog, Lou Minatti's blog, are documenting -- send them to people. The MSM can get the jump, but nobody trusts them anyway, and this will just be one more time when people find out AFTER the fact that they had things completely wrong. So let them step on their dicks -- be sporting! They can't get away with it any more -- we've proven that!

#248 haakondahl 9/4/2005 06:57AM PDT

Hey big guy, I'm on this half of the world also only a little hotter. Watched the CNN hatch job. My advice is let it slide.

I also got to watch the BBC International news. THey were al ot worse than CNN.

BUT,

I got to see the faces of NO come shinning through. People starting to pull together and helping each other. Let the riff raft rot but lets get to the business of helping out the Americans that are shinning through the bull shit in NO. There are some very good people there and in the surronunding areas. Forget the politics and move on.

Tim Russert is ripping Chertoff on CBS at this moment.

259 Haak

I have a general question--If not for Ray Nagin's emergency Evacuation order, how many people would have left anyway?

Nagin didn't order a mandatory evac until Sunday morning.

Here is the chronology:

Friday the 26th: bloggers like Brendan Loy begin sounding an alarm.

Saturday the 27th: Loy telling ppl to get OUT. He linked to wwltv.com piece that says Nagin was "interrupted at dinner" that night by Blanco calling him to tell him "phone the National Hurricane Center." (That wwltv.com article is now GONE btw. But there are copies around still.)

Sunday the 28th: Sometime that morning, Nagin makes his mandatory evacuation call. I think it was around 10:00.

By 10 or 11 that night, conditions were such that evacuation was no longer feasible.

The real question is why didn't Nagin care enough about his people to start bussing them out on Saturday. THAT is what he needed to do. He left them to die, instead.

Now isn't this lovely...

New Orleans deputy police commander W.S. Riley launched a bitter attack on the federal response to the disaster though he praised the way the evacuation was eventually handled.
***
"We expected a lot more support from the federal government. We expected the government to respond within 24 hours. The first three days we had no assistance," he told AFP in an interview.

Riley went on: "We have been fired on with automatic weapons. We still have some thugs around. My biggest disappointment is with the federal government and the National Guard.

"The guard arrived 48 hours after the hurricane with 40 trucks. They drove their trucks in and went to sleep.

"For 72 hours this police department and the fire department and handful of citizens were alone rescuing people. We have people who died while the National Guard sat and played cards. I understand why we are not winning the war in Iraq if this is what we have."

One "stolen" school bus was used for evac.. the 18 year old who hot wired it should get a medal from the president, and Nagil should have to stand on the platform and watch. Then get his mechanic clothes on and start repairing all the buses he left sitting unused.

# 219 Goddessoftheclassroom

I could NEVER be an elected official. My lizard skin is way too thin. One of the many things I admire about President Bush is that he doesn't lash out at unreasonable criticism (or even reasonal criticism, for that matter).

It's the drugs!

/moonbatmode

Good Morning Lizards!

The NYT Bumiller speaks of this being "widely seen" as an "ineffectual" and "slow" White House response. Of course that's how she sees it, and how they want us to see it. The problem is that far too many people see the MSM as their only news source. This point of view will be well-entrenched in many minds long before the crisis is over. It will be like the "Gore really won" myth. Disprove it a thousand times and people will still believe the myth.

# 262 Thorfin
I envy you your continuing AFN access--mine dried up a while ago. Having FXN made up for the nauseating commercials. However, I don't envy you the rest of it. Leaving the weather out of it, how hot is it where you are?

There is an all out, no holds barred coup in progress by the MSM...

A_G

but I haven't seen anyone talking about the scope of what happened as the starting point for where we are.

You're preachin' to the choir here. Katrina looked like Andrew on steroids before she came ashore. They had days to watch her beautiful symmetry, organization, and size before the damage started. All this was over very warm Gulf waters. There was no reason to predict significant weakening. All the models had her danger close to NO.

The locals are used to every storm hitting Florida or Texas. They dropped the ball big time. Everyone in Florida knows the local and state authorities are the first responders. In NO many of the cops looted, killed themselves, or quit for lack of leadership. The ones who stayed faced conditions not unlike Blackhawk Down. There was no plan for evacuation, which was ordered too late anyway. But for Bush, there might not have been an evacuation.

This is another crucible for the MSM. They've decided to run the "everything is Bush's fault" story, unsurprisingly. Over time, people will learn the truth. Only the Michael Moore Kool Aid drinkers will remain ignorant.

sen mary landrieu has threaten to punch bush if he criticizes n.o. police force. newsmax.com now this is it for me. these people are no better than the fools who bring their shit to the jerry springer show. the idiots are dragging in all our dirty laundry on the world stage.

This is just another example of ludicrous MSM bias.

"Bush panics and sends in the marines".

[Link: scotlandonsunday.scotsman.com...]

Anyone ever seen Bush panic?

Me neither.

265 Dar

What has become clear is that the NO civic infrastructure, from the top to the bottom, was founded on individual greed, not on any idea of service.

Of course it fell apart, and of course nobody is going to take personal responsibility. They are going to point fingers with one hand, while, off camera, they grope for the money pot with the other.

I'm going to repeat what I said in post 246: We need to start keeping an eye on this NOW to prevent rampant theft of relief monies. Let them whine all they want, but please, let's not let them profit from this.

EW1(SG)

How could the President ANYONE have forseen this level of collapse and discipline within the ranks of the local government.

I think we're missing something.

You and I have both been in leadership positions before.

As leaders, we knew the strengths and weakness' of those who worked for us.

If this mayor had no clue as to the underequip'd state and likely collapse of his city's emergency response org. than he's a fool.

Everyone is saying "No one could imagine the collapse of the levee system"

Sure you can imagine it. All it takes is someone asking "What do we do if the levee's collapse"
From there, you can develop the theoretical flood levels.
Then you can look inside the red circle of projected flooding and say "Whats inside that circle that we are going to need.
after that you can either relocate it, or develop contingancy plans for duplicate equipment.

The cities disaster plan addressed the existance of both metro and school bus's.

I would like to see the second level planning as to how they were supposed to use them.

If there was a viable plan, what failed in the execution of it.

If there was no detailed execution plan, then we know that the whole didaster plan was nothing other than window dressing, designed to placate the masses with a hope that this would never happen on their watch.

To those police and firefighters who stayed the course, my hat is off to them.
But as more and more info comes out, this city had no viable plan to deal with the situation.

What I would like to see is some downright honesty from both the mayor and the governor.

But from what I am hearing from other lizards is that somewhere during the recent tv interviews, the mayor is coming across as throwing his arms in the air and walking away from the whole thing.

Like I posted on earlier thread.

Some one counted 230 buses. Those are 66 pass busses, with kids on laps 100 easily on a bus. When you are running for your lives screw air-conditioned comfort.

100 x 230 = 23,000 out in one trip. Evac order was 12 hours before the storm, there was a lull after the storm before the flooding.

How many round trips could those buses have made?

2 = 46,000
3 = 69,000
4 = 92,000

How many left in NO for the floods? around 100,000?

Criminal Negligence not to use those buses in a mandatory evacuation.

Load Mayor Nagin and his emergency staff into one of those buses and roll it into the deep end.

269 haakondahl 9/4/2005 07:19AM PDT

Too much sand to try the old egg trick but the tube is not worth watching unless you can get FOX.

BBC is so full of it one can only take it in small doses. I rather watch the camel races.

CNN is getting so low in that they are now making the news not reporting it. I was waitign for them to start interviewing each other and low what do they do but start interviewing the their own producers. IF you cant report the news fabricate it.

Looks like most of those that wanted to be evacuated were. Here's my question...What happens to the looters? Are they going to blend into the background and try to get themselves evacuated and leave the loot behind? I doubt it. Are they going to try to stay in NO? Couldn't do that for very long. How are they going to get out on their own? Seems to me we got them trapped like wet rats with all "collateral damage" already out of harms way. Any thoughts on how do deal with them?

#265 Dar

Now that one woke me up. If his statement is doesn’t border on the seditious, than I don’t know what does.

#278 9Iron 9/4/2005 07:26AM PDT

A well placed 9 iron usually gets very good results.