Re: Re: By the way, Bill

I just remembered that Bush Sr. losing his reelection campain was said 
to have been affected by the way the Fed's bungled the disaster recovery 
in Homestead after Andrew. We were supposed to have spent a ton of time 
and money improving our emergency response abilities after 9/11, but 
here we arrive at the first really serious test of that ability and.......

The FEMA guy is getting reamed from every side. Interviews are staring 
him right in the face as asking why this is such a mess and the guys 
mumbling stuff like "Well, we did not expect the leveee's to break" and 
the interviewers almost literally have their jaws drop.

Not good, just not good at all.

William Highfield wrote:
> I'm not the only prophet ...
> 
> What kills me is the way this is being handled.  We had mass devestation 
> in Central Florida after last year's 3-pack of big hurricanes in 6 
> weeks.  There are STILL houses in my neighborhood with no roofs or 
> boarded up, and I'm in a pretty decent neighborhood ($250,000 houses).  
> Our leaders had plans, our people were mostly prepared.  Sure some 
> people ignore warnings, but by and large when the wind calmed, everyone 
> rolled up their sleeves and got to work.
> 
> Look at New Orleans now ... the mayor and governor are blaming the feds 
> for not doing more.  The NAACP claim that the so-called "lackof help" is 
> due to racism. People are sitting around waiting for help instead of 
> working together to get out of a dead city.  It took 5 days last year 
> for Federal help kick in and help Florida last year.  States MUST have 
> plans to take care of themselves short term until Federal action kicks 
> in.  New Orleans had no evacuation plan worth a spit, they KNEW those 
> levees could only withstand a level 3 hurricane, yet did NOTHING over 30 
> years to beef them up.  They didn't use city transportation to evacuate 
> people until after the damage was done, they didn't adequately police 
> the areas before, during or after the hurricane. 
> 
> In Florida, we had stories of neighbor helping neighbor.  Few reports of 
> looting, and law and order was restored by the Florida National guard 
> within hours with a threat to shoot looters if necessary.  In Louisiana, 
> there are not only reports of looting, pillaging, and rape inside the 
> shelters themselves,; but also armed gangs shooting at fire, police and 
> other rescue personell.  Cops in New Orleans are turning in their 
> badges, from some reports I saw.  Nobody wants to go in to an area where 
> the people you're trying to save are shooting at you.  Only yesterday 
> did the governor FINALLY mentioned shooting these lawless gangs preying 
> on the remains of the city.
> 
> There's enough blame to go around, but the time for that is later.  
> Mother nature can be a real bitch, as Florida well knows.  It's nobodies 
> fault that a hurricane hit.  New Orleans SHOULD have been better 
> prepared.  When this is all said and done, I'm sure there will be an 
> extensive debate about who is ultimately responsible for the safety and 
> well being of New Orleans - the residents of New Orleans, or the entire 
> rest of the country in the form of the Federal government.
> 
> I feel for the people in New Orleans ... nobody deserves what happened 
> to them.  But bad things happen, and the country IS mobilizing to come 
> to their aid.  Such an effort takes time, and unfortunately is going to 
> require a LOT of patience.  Like I said, parts of Florida are still not 
> back to normal, and we weren't seven feet BELOW sea level swamped under 
> water.
> 
> 
> 


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