George W. Bush gave one of the worst speeches of his life yesterday, especially given the level of national distress and the need for words of consolation and wisdom. In what seems to be a ritual in this administration, the president appeared a day later than he was needed. He then read an address of a quality more appropriate for an Arbor Day celebration: a long laundry list of pounds of ice, generators and blankets delivered to the stricken Gulf Coast. He advised the public that anybody who wanted to help should send cash, grinned, and promised that everything would work out in the end....
Sacrifices may be necessary to make sure that all these things happen in an orderly, efficient way. But this administration has never been one to counsel sacrifice. And nothing about the president's demeanor yesterday - which seemed casual to the point of carelessness - suggested that he understood the depth of the current crisis.
While our attention must now be on the Gulf Coast's most immediate needs, the nation will soon ask why New Orleans's levees remained so inadequate. Publications from the local newspaper to National Geographic have fulminated about the bad state of flood protection in this beloved city, which is below sea level. Why were developers permitted to destroy wetlands and barrier islands that could have held back the hurricane's surge? Why was Congress, before it wandered off to vacation, engaged in slashing the budget for correcting some of the gaping holes in the area's flood protection?
It would be some comfort to think that, as Mr. Bush cheerily announced, America "will be a stronger place" for enduring this crisis. Complacency will no longer suffice, especially if experts are right in warning that global warming may increase the intensity of future hurricanes. But since this administration won't acknowledge that global warming exists, the chances of leadership seem minimal.
Airlines and oil companies are working on plans to supply jet fuel to at least ten U.S. airports that could be shut down due to a lack of jet fuel caused by refinery and pipeline shutdowns from hurricane Katrina. The airports in most jeopardy for closure include Atlanta, Charlotte, Ft. Lauderdale, Ft. Myers, Orlando, Tampa, Washington Dulles and West Palm Beach.
AAG has learned that ChevronTexaco and Shell had cargoes loaded prior to the shutdowns destined for Florida ports. However, with the Colonial and Plantation pipelines shutdown due to a lost of power it could be sometime for shipments to reach airports from Atlanta to Washington D.C.
While the flow of information is frustratingly difficult, our reporters have yet to find evidence of a coordinated approach to relieve pain and hunger or to secure property and maintain order.
People are hurting and people are being vandalized.
Yet where is the National Guard, why hasn't every able-bodied member of the armed forces in South Mississippi been pressed into service?
On Wednesday reporters listening to horrific stories of death and survival at the Biloxi Junior High School shelter looked north across Irish Hill Road and saw Air Force personnel playing basketball and performing calisthenics.
Playing basketball and performing calisthenics!
When asked why these young men were not being used to help in the recovery effort, our reporters were told that it would be pointless to send military personnel down to the beach to pick up debris.
Litter is the least of our problems. We need the president to back up his declaration of a disaster with a declaration of every man and woman under his command will do whatever is necessary to deal with that disaster.
"I think it took longer to the National Guard's armed troops in. The national guard was here very early with equipment and manpower, engineering batalltions, etc. to help us restore our infrastructure. What's taken longer is getting the actual armed troops and that may be a result that most of our armed troops, most of our armed troops, a lot of our armed reserves are in Iraq. I don't know if they have the troops to send us."
FEMA director Michael Brown just said this on CNN to Aaron Brown:
I just knew in my gut in my heart Monday morning that this thing would continue to grow even after it made landfall and continued to move in to the Ohio and Tennessee valleys. Unfortunately I was right.
So, Monday morning FEMA's director knew that thing was going to be huge and was getting worse by the minute. So then why did George Bush spend the next 48 hours remaining on vacation?
CNN's Chris Lawrence reporting on Aaron Brown, reports of people streaming out of the Superdome, entire families just trying to walk out of the city in fear. Reports of a dead body in the Superdome, several women raped. There is no visible police presence on the ground. He reported a police officer saying "we don't need police here, this needs to be a military action right now", the officer said that the situation was more than the police could take on.
We're in day 3 Mr. President, and it's getting worse. And you go on television today and say you're about to BEGIN WORK?
Pathetic failed President and Presidency. Tags: Katrina
Michael Brown, Bush's director of FEMA, just said the following to Larry King, in an effort to explain why the federal emergency response is going so slow:
"I must say, this storm is much much bigger than anyone expected."
Okay, that's an outright lie. This storm was predicted to be a major category 5 hurricane with 175 mile per hour winds. From everything I read, it actually slowed down before it hit New Orleans, and it went somewhat to the east of the city (it was expected to hit New Orleans dead on), and by going east it spared New Orleans the full brunt of the storm. So what Brown just said, the storm was much bigger than anyone expected, is an outright lie. The storm was, in fact, a tad smaller than expected, and in the case of New Orleans, the storm didn't hit nearly as hard as they thought.
Ok, how bad is it getting when the cops are ordered to forget trying to save people who are dying and instead focus on criminals? Actually, read the article, it's gotten THAT bad in New Orleans. Sounds like Baghdad, on a good day. Glad we have the National Guard in place ready to help. Oh yeah, they're in Baghdad.
Mayor Ray Nagin ordered 1,500 police officers to leave their search-and-rescue mission Wednesday night and return to the streets to stop looting that has turned increasingly hostile as the city plunges deeper into chaos....
Managers at a nursing home were prepared to cope with the power outages and had enough food for days, but then the looting began. The home's bus driver was forced to surrender the vehicle to carjackers.
Bands of people drove by the nursing home, shouting to residents, "Get out!" Eighty residents, most of them in wheelchairs, were being evacuated to other nursing homes in the state.
"We had enough food for 10 days," said Peggy Hoffman, the home's executive director. "Now we'll have to equip our department heads with guns and teach them how to shoot."....
New Orleans' homeland security chief, Terry Ebbert, said looters were breaking into stores all over town and stealing guns. He said there are gangs of armed men moving around the city. At one point, officers stranded on the roof of a hotel were fired at by criminals on the street.
The reverberations of this just keep growing. Police without gas can't keep you safe:
The Transit Authority in Huntington, which supplies fuel to its fleet of buses, ambulances for Cabell County Emergency Services and to the Cabell County Sheriff's Department, only has enough gasoline for police cruisers until Friday, Vickie Shaffer, TTA general manager, told The Herald-Dispatch for Wednesday's edition.
I'm still watching reports on WWL. It isn't getting any better, people are overwhelmed, out of water, food, and there are probably still "thousands" either on their roof or trapped in their homes.
A gas shortage that closed some stations and caused lines at others could last through the Labor Day weekend and beyond, Asheville city and Buncombe County officials warned at a press conference this afternoon.
It could take six days for fuel to flow as normal from the Gulf of Mexico, officials said.
Of the county’s nearly 100 gas stations, more than 20 have run dry.
And my friend Sean just called from North Carolina. He is terrified at what he's seeing. There are lines, long lines down the block, at every gas station. The local news just reported that there is no more gas coming, the stations have what they're gonna get, until next Tuesday - the supply line is gone.
This is turning into a nationwide disaster. I'm so glad Bush finally decided to return from vacation at 3pm TODAY. I hope someone made him walk all the way.
Beyond the poll numbers, the Bush administration faces some immediate, urgent challenges—and serious questions about its response to the disaster. For all the president's statements ahead of the hurricane, the region seemed woefully unprepared for the flooding of New Orleans—a catastrophe that has long been predicted by experts and politicians alike. There seems to have been no contingency planning for a total evacuation of the city, including the final refuges of the city's Superdome and its hospitals. There were no supplies of food and water ready offshore—on Navy ships for instance—in the event of such flooding, even though government officials knew there were thousands of people stranded inside the sweltering and powerless city.
Then there's the speed of the Bush administration's response to such disasters. Just one week ago the White House declared that a major disaster existed in Louisiana, specifically most of the areas (such as Jefferson Parish) that are now under water. Was the White House psychic about the disaster ahead? Not exactly. In fact the major disaster referred to Tropical Storm Cindy, which struck the state a full seven weeks earlier. That announcement triggered federal aid for the stricken areas, where the clean-up had been on hold for almost two months while the White House chewed things over.
Now, faced with a far bigger and deadlier disaster, the Bush administration faces at least two difficult questions: Was it ready to deal with the long-predicted flooding of New Orleans? And is it ready to deal with the long-predicted terrorist attack that might some day strike another of our big cities?"
Did anyone watch the President? Exhibit A as to why the Government is overwhelmed. First, he recited a list of the facts about the situation...like he had just learned them himself. But, hey, he saw the devastation....he asked the pilot of Air Force One to fly over the gulf coast. He asked that himself, he told us. And he was devastated.
The one thing that caught my attention was the emphasis he placed on the problems the oil companies are having. The AP caught that, too:
President Bush is warning Americans about the nation's gasoline supply, saying everyone must understand that Hurricane Katrina has had a significant effect.
Speaking at a White House news conference, the president stressed that Katrina has disrupted America's ability to both make and distribute gasoline.
To try to ease the problem, Bush says the Environmental Protection Agency has granted a nationwide waiver for fuel blends. He says that will make more gas available and take some pressure off skyrocketing prices.
What's he trying to tell us? He should be challenging the oil industry not to gouge...and not to screw with the American people. He should, but he won't.
This gas thing is going to get really ugly...really, really ugly. And Bush's pals in the industry better not be reaping windfalls.
Just a brief snippet from the CNN reporters "blog". Read it, it's terrifying and saddening:
People are carrying their children, trying to get them to safety. A woman coming down to the police, close to hysterics, saying, "My elderly mother is in a building over there, she needs dialysis. She can't get it. She is dying. Can you help me?"
And the police had to say, "There is absolutely nothing we can do. We don't have a precinct house. We don't have communication. There is absolutely nothing we can do for you."
That was amazing to me.
The other thing that struck me was the looting. The police were standing in the middle of the street and right in front of them stores were being ransacked. And they didn't even make an effort to stop it. I don't think they could, under the circumstances.
They were totally outnumbered. They couldn't call for any reinforcements. And frankly, the priority now isn't property. The priority has to be people and people's lives. The police are there protectively, I think, in case things escalate even further. But they are powerless. They're powerless in this situation.
Why is it George Bush, both in Iraq and here, can't seem to figure out that he ALWAYS misunderestimates what it takes to get the job done. Too few troops in Iraq, too few here. People die as a result of your decisions Mr. President. I wish you cared about that, but clearly you don't. Tags: Katrina
The mayor said Wednesday that Katrina probably killed thousands of people in New Orleans - an estimate that, if accurate, would make the storm by far the nation's deadliest hurricane in more than a century.
``We know there is a significant number of dead bodies in the water,'' and other people dead in attics, Mayor Ray Nagin said. Asked how many, he said: ``Minimum, hundreds. Most likely, thousands.''
CNN's Jack Cafferty is clearly not drinking the Kool-Aid. Good for him. This is what he just said on CNN:
You wonder, given the notice that we had, that this thing was out there and it was getting to be just as deadly and nasty as they're capable of being, you wonder if more could have been done, should have been done to prepare, to evacuate, to do some contingency planning... You wonder with almost a week's notice from the time this thing crossed the Florida peninsula if enough was done to protect the people in the path of this storm.
An evangelical Christian group that regularly demonstrates at LGBT events is blaming gays for hurricane Katrina.
Repent America says that God "destroyed" New Orleans because of Southern Decadence, the gay festival that was to have taken place in the city over the Labor Day weekend.
The president decided he should be in the nation's capital given the magnitude of destruction and death caused by Katrina, one of the most severe storms to ever hit the United States.
Yeah, AP, he decided on the third day of the disaster, a good 5-7 days after the disaster was predicted, that he should be in the nation's capital and you write it as though he's a hero.
The obvious question any reporter worth his salt would ask, and put in the story, is if the president decided he should be in the nation's capital given the magnitude of the destruction and death, then why didn't he return on Sunday or Saturday when we thought the destruction would be even greater (remember, they expected an even BIGGER hurricane to have hit New Orleans DIRECTLY, and it didn't)?
Why didn't Bush return on Monday or Tuesday when we already knew the level of the destruction?
You don't just report the man coming back 3 days late and act as though he's really early and doing a good thing.
That title is from an editorial today in the super-conservative super-Republican Manchester Union Leader.
It's now time for an AMERICAblog na na na na na to all the Democratic politicians in DC who haven't said boo about Bush's MIA status over the past 3 days. Guess we were right and you were wrong. I'm so glad that you're receiving millions and we receive, oh, chump change for our respective work.
AS THE EXTENT of Hurricane Katrina’s devastation became clearer on Tuesday — millions without power, tens of thousands homeless, a death toll unknowable because rescue crews can’t reach some regions — President Bush carried on with his plans to speak in San Diego, as if nothing important had happened the day before.
Katrina already is measured as one of the worst storms in American history. And yet, President Bush decided that his plans to commemorate the 60th anniversary of VJ Day with a speech were more pressing than responding to the carnage.
A better leader would have flown straight to the disaster zone and announced the immediate mobilization of every available resource to rescue the stranded, find and bury the dead, and keep the survivors fed, clothed, sheltered and free of disease.
The cool, confident, intuitive leadership Bush exhibited in his first term, particularly in the months immediately following Sept. 11, 2001, has vanished. In its place is a diffident detachment unsuitable for the leader of a nation facing war, natural disaster and economic uncertainty.
Wherever the old George W. Bush went, we sure wish we had him back.
Watching the hospital briefing right now on WWL. State office of emergency management is reporting that the hospitals are out of supplies, generators have been flooded, temporary generators installed but they are now out of fuel. Full evacuations of many hospitals underway. There are some hospitals in other parishes that they still have not been able to make ANY contact with. We have thousands of people who are getting ill. They aren't sick in hospitals already, but they are going to get sick.
Not enough fuel? A hospital no one has even been able to CONTACT? I certainly know that the military knows how to move fuel in a desert, and any reason why they can't seem to get it together to help drowning and dying Americans? Tags: Katrina
We've known about this approaching disaster for well over 5 days, we've had the disaster for well over 2 days, and the commander of the US Northern Command, an Admiral no less, is talking about "if and when" the president decides to step up his response to the hurricane?
Huh?
Of course, Bush did only just get off Air Force One in DC, carrying his dog, no less, so I'm sure he's still in vacation mode. You know how it is. Funny it took him 8 hours to fly from Texas to DC, since he's only arriving here at 3pm EST. Even with the detour over New Orleans, it shouldn't have taken a jet 8
