brainrow

Tim Russert on the Don Imus Show:

We’ve talked to the head of the Hurricane Center at Louisiana State University, who, one year ago, did a simulated computer model — table top exercise — called “Hurricane Pam,” in which they predicted this almost to the letter. And he called FEMA and said, on Saturday or Sunday, “You have to have tent cities set up outside of New Orleans, outside the state. You’re gonna have hundreds of thousands of evacuees. You have to be able to absorb them, or they’re gonna die in the streets.”

And the FEMA said to them, “Americans don’t sleep in tents.”

That is what went wrong, and that’s what we have to find out. Who’s accountable? This notion that we’re all too busy now to look forward, we can’t look back — we can do both. Because to ignore what happened in New Orleans is to guarantee it will happen again.

Bill Maher, last Friday, on his HBO show:

This is what I call unintentional racism. Because that’s the whole thing with the Bush people — they just can’t imagine. “Why don’t you just pack up your Range Rover, grab a case of Poland Spring water out of the garage, and go to your summer home? What is the problem?”

Once again, comedians provide the most penetrating insights into current events. From The Daily Show on Wednesday:

White House Press Secretary Scott McClellan: Some just want to engage in the blame game…

George W. Bush: One of the things that people want us to do here is to play a blame game.

George Bush the Elder: To me, the fascination with the blame game…

FEMA boss Michael Brown: You’re not gonna suck me into that blame game.

Jon Stewart: Just a quick observation: When people do not want to play the blame game, they’re to blame!

The Daily Show on Thursday:

Jon Stewart: The president has vowed to personally lead the investigation into the government’s failed response to Katrina. Isn’t that a job perhaps someone else should be doing?

Samantha Bee: No, no, no, no. Not at all, Jon. To truly find out what went wrong, it’s important for an investigator to have a little distance from the situation. And it’s hard to get any more distant from it than the president was last week.

Harold Meyerson:

We’re not number one. We’re not even close.

By which measures, precisely, do we lead the world? Caring for our countrymen? You jest. A first-class physical infrastructure? Tell that to New Orleans. Throwing so much money at the rich that we’ve got nothing left over to promote the general welfare? Now you’re talking.

The problem goes beyond the fact that we can’t count on our government to be there for us in catastrophes. It’s that a can’t-do spirit, a shouldn’t-do spirit, guides the men who run the nation. Consider the congressional testimony of Joe Allbaugh, George W. Bush’s 2000 campaign manager, who assumed the top position at FEMA in 2001. He characterized the organization as “an oversized entitlement program,” and counseled states and cities to rely instead on “faith-based organizations . . . like the Salvation Army and the Mennonite Disaster Service.”

Is it any surprise, then, that the administration’s response to the devastation in New Orleans is of a piece with its response to the sacking of Baghdad once our troops arrived? “Stuff happens” was the way Don Rumsfeld described the destruction of Baghdad’s hospitals, universities and museums while American soldiers stood around. Now stuff has happened in New Orleans, too, even as FEMA was turning away offers of assistance. This is the stuff-happens administration. And it’s willing, apparently, to sacrifice any claim America may have to national greatness rather than inconvenience the rich by taxing them to build a more secure nation.

Stuff happens, it’s true. Stuff foreseen and unforeseen, avoidable and unavoidable. It has always been so. “He maketh his sun to rise on the evil and on the good, and sendeth rain on the just and on the unjust.”

It’s not the stuff that happens to us that makes us who we are, for good or ill. No, it’s what we do when stuff happens — how we respond, or fail to respond. All the choices we make along the way. And neglect is not excused by saying “stuff happens.”

Shortly before the start of her son’s invasion of Iraq, former first lady Barbara Bush said:

Why should we hear about body bags, and deaths, and how many, what day it’s gonna happen, and how many this or what do you suppose? Oh, I mean, it’s not relevant. So why should I waste my beautiful mind on something like that?

Perhaps it was out of concern for the beautiful minds of civilians sitting comfortably back home that the Pentagon banned news photographs of coffins returning from Iraq. If so, it was very thoughtful of them.

It’s probably the same concern for all our beautiful minds that motivated FEMA’s attempt to block the news media from showing us any more dead bodies in New Orleans.

Washington Post writer Terry M. Neal doesn’t seem to appreciate FEMA’s great care to protect his beautiful mind:

Cadavers have a way of raising questions.

When people see them, they wonder, how did they get dead?

When a lot of people see a lot of dead bodies, politicians begin thinking of damage control.

Gosh, do you really suppose this policy is about protecting the Bush Administration? That bodies of Americans killed by government neglect aren’t testing well in Karl Rove’s focus groups?

Could it be that they don’t really care about my beautiful mind?

Via Crooks and Liars, Bob Harris looks at Bush’s Declaration of Emergency and doubts his own senses:

I checked the parish map against the White House’s own press release, posted on their own site. I have tried to figure out how this is my own mistake, but I can’t find it. And the results are frankly so bizarre I had to make the graphic in order to properly show you.

Welcome to upside-down-land: the areas at risk for Katrina were quite remarkably the areas not included in Bush’s declaration of emergency.

Larry Johnson:

While watching the MSNBC program, CONNECTED, COAST TO COAST with Ron Reagan, a man from the Evergreen Foundation was on air spinning the myth that the President had to “beg” the Governor of Louisiana to take action. Having been on this show several times I called one of the bookers, Susan Durrwatcher, to alert her to the fact that this man was misrepresenting what happened. I offered Susan the following objective, documented facts…. Susan thanked me for my “opinion” and said “we just have a different perspective”. Stunned, I asked her by what standard of journalism that an objective fact was mere opinion? I asked her to simply look at the documents and correct the record. She declined.

Think Progress has a Katrina Timeline.

This may be important as the Bush whitewash picks up steam.

Update: From Crook and Liars, Keith Olbermann’s video timeline.

Apparently Rovegate has given the White House press corps a taste for raw meat. They’re asking White House Press Secretary Scott McClellan the really tough questions:

Q: I just want to follow up on David’s questions on accountability. First, just to get you on the record, where does the buck stop in this administration?

MR. McCLELLAN: The President.

I’ve heard a recording of the exchange. McClellan sounds like he’s asking a question rather than making a statement.

In this administration, the buck stops anywhere but the president.

New York Times columnist Thomas Friedman:

[I]f 9/11 is one bookend of the Bush administration, Katrina may be the other. If 9/11 put the wind at President Bush’s back, Katrina’s put the wind in his face. If the Bush-Cheney team seemed to be the right guys to deal with Osama, they seem exactly the wrong guys to deal with Katrina — and all the rot and misplaced priorities it’s exposed here at home.

These are people so much better at inflicting pain than feeling it, so much better at taking things apart than putting them together, so much better at defending “intelligent design” as a theology than practicing it as a policy.

…

The Bush team has engaged in a tax giveaway since 9/11 that has had one underlying assumption: There will never be another rainy day. Just spend money. You knew that sooner or later there would be a rainy day, but Karl Rove has assumed it wouldn’t happen on Mr. Bush’s watch — that someone else would have to clean it up. Well, it did happen on his watch.

Besides ripping away the roofs of New Orleans, Katrina ripped away the argument that we can cut taxes, properly educate our kids, compete with India and China, succeed in Iraq, keep improving the U.S. infrastructure, and take care of a catastrophic emergency — without putting ourselves totally into the debt of Beijing.

I’m a few days behind on watching video clips online. Watch this interview with Jefferson Parish President Aaron Broussard, from Sunday’s Meet the Press.

There’s a transcript here:

We have been abandoned by our own country. Hurricane Katrina will go down in history as one of the worst storms ever to hit an American coast, but the aftermath of Hurricane Katrina will go down as one of the worst abandonments of Americans on American soil ever in U.S. history.

Watch the whole thing. Don’t worry, there are no pictures of dying babies or dead bodies floating by. But it will break your heart.

Holy cow. I try not to watch anything on Fox News. It’s bad for my blood pressure. But I’ve been hearing about this clip for days. Go to this story at Crooks and Liars, and watch the video. It will probably take a few minutes for it to download. It’s worth the wait:

Shepard Smith and Geraldo Rivera were livid about the situation in NOLA as they appeared on [Hannity and Colmes]. When Hannity tried his usual spin job and said “let’s get this in perspective,” Smith chopped him off at the knees and started yelling at him saying, “This is perspective!”

Daily Kos has a list of FEMA headlines that defy belief:

FEMA won’t accept Amtrak’s help in evacuations

FEMA turns away experienced firefighters

FEMA turns back Wal-Mart supply trucks

FEMA prevents Coast Guard from delivering diesel fuel

FEMA won’t let Red Cross deliver food

FEMA bars morticians from entering New Orleans

…

FEMA blocks 500-boat citizen flotilla from delivering aid

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

FEMA to Chicago: Send just one truck

FEMA turns away generators

FEMA: “First Responders Urged Not To Respond”

Each of the headlines is a link to the full story.

Via Dori Smith: former first lady Barbara Bush says things are working out “very well” for New Orleans evacuees:

In a segment at the top of [an NPR radio program] on the surge of evacuees to the Texas city, Barbara Bush said: “Almost everyone I’ve talked to says we’re going to move to Houston.”

Then she added: “What I’m hearing which is sort of scary is they all want to stay in Texas. Everyone is so overwhelmed by the hospitality.

“And so many of the people in the arena here, you know, were underprivileged anyway, so this — this (she chuckles slightly) is working very well for them.”

Oh, what fun! It’s like a great big camp-out!

Readers at Ric Ford’s Macintouch web site report that the Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA) requires a current version of Microsoft Windows software if you want to apply for disaster assistance online. Reader Gary Mullins:

My 90-year old mother sat out Katrina in her brother’s home next door in Diamondhead, MS, about eight miles from the Mississippi coast where the hurricane’s eye hit. They survived without injury but with massive destruction to their homes, and my mother has lost most of her possesions. I brought her to my home in California yesterday and this morning went to the FEMA website to register to start the assistance process.

To my dismay, our Federal emergency agency requires Microsoft Internet Explorer 6, and only IE 6, to use the website for disaster assistance.

Reader Todd Del Priore:

I tried the latest Safari, IE [for Macintosh] and Firefox, none work. Heaven help all the Mac users in the South… assuming they have power.

Macintosh users aren’t the only ones left out. Users of Linux, older versions of Windows, and other alternatives to Microsoft’s current operating system offerings are left in the lurch, too. IE 6 runs only on recent versions of Microsoft Windows.

FEMA’s web site includes a list of charities for those making donations to help the victims of Katrina. Sploid.com notes:

FEMA is directing Katrina donations to none other than the Rev. Pat Robertson …

FEMA has released to the media and on its Web site a list of suggested charities to help the storm’s hundreds of thousands of victims. The Red Cross is first on the list.

The Rev. Pat Robertson’s “Operation Blessing” is next on the list.

When I checked, Robertson’s operation had been moved down to third on the list.

The Bush Administration’s “culture of life” talk seems kind of hollow right now. On HBO’s Real Time with Bill Maher, television actor Bradley Whitford said he had received $250,000 worth of federal tax cuts since 9/11. Discussing the tragedy in New Orleans, he said:

They’ve revealed themselves as inept in preparation, at a time when our country needs protection most. And with the pictures we’re seeing, they’ve revealed themselves as — I think we see that the Republican agenda leaves a lot of people behind. You mentioned that these people are a bunch of Jesus freaks. Where is the Christianity?

…

If it’s not Christianity, what do these people believe in? Their religion, their religion, is supply-side economics. That is the religion. And if you think about it — with George Bush, before 9/11: tax cuts. After 9/11, is it national security, terrorism? No. Tax cuts — for me. And I guarantee you, the estate tax is coming up. Will any sacrifice be made for the infrastructure? Will any sacrifice be made for our soldiers over there? No! More tax cuts. That is his Jesus.

New York Times columnist Paul Krugman says the victims in New Orleans were killed by contempt:

[T]he federal government’s lethal ineptitude wasn’t just a consequence of Mr. Bush’s personal inadequacy; it was a consequence of ideological hostility to the very idea of using government to serve the public good. For 25 years the right has been denigrating the public sector, telling us that government is always the problem, not the solution. Why should we be surprised that when we needed a government solution, it wasn’t forthcoming?

…

Which brings us to the Federal Emergency Management Agency. In my last column, I asked whether the Bush administration had destroyed FEMA’s effectiveness. Now we know the answer.

…

[T]he undermining of FEMA began as soon as President Bush took office. Instead of choosing a professional with expertise in responses to disaster to head the agency, Mr. Bush appointed Joseph Allbaugh, a close political confidant. Mr. Allbaugh quickly began trying to scale back some of FEMA’s preparedness programs.

You might have expected the administration to reconsider its hostility to emergency preparedness after 9/11…

But the downgrading of FEMA continued, with the appointment of Michael Brown as Mr. Allbaugh’s successor.

Mr. Brown had no obvious qualifications, other than having been Mr. Allbaugh’s college roommate. But Mr. Brown was made deputy director of FEMA; The Boston Herald reports that he was forced out of his previous job, overseeing horse shows. And when Mr. Allbaugh left, Mr. Brown became the agency’s director. The raw cronyism of that appointment showed the contempt the administration felt for the agency; one can only imagine the effects on staff morale.

That contempt, as I’ve said, reflects a general hostility to the role of government as a force for good. And Americans living along the Gulf Coast have now reaped the consequences of that hostility.

The administration has always tried to treat 9/11 purely as a lesson about good versus evil. But disasters must be coped with, even if they aren’t caused by evildoers. Now we have another deadly lesson in why we need an effective government, and why dedicated public servants deserve our respect. Will we listen?

At the end of A Streetcar Named Desire, Tennessee Williams’ harrowing play set in New Orleans, the shattered Blanche Dubois looks up, with fear and hope, into the eyes of the doctor who has come to take her away. She tells him, “I have always depended on the kindness of strangers.”

This week, strangers from all walks of life stepped forward with a helping hand for the people of New Orleans. Ordinary citizens called the Red Cross and other relief organizations with donations large and small, to help suffering people along the Gulf Coast. Meanwhile, the Bush Administration played the role of the heartless Stanley Kowalski.

Apparently the administration’s cruel indifference isn’t polling well. So they’re doing the only thing they know how to do: they’re trying to shift blame to state and local officials:

Tens of thousands of people spent a fifth day awaiting evacuation from this ruined city, as Bush administration officials blamed state and local authorities for what leaders at all levels have called a failure of the country’s emergency management.

…

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.

…

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.

On the streets of New Orleans, Blanche Dubois met a woman selling “flores para los muertos” — flowers for the dead.

In the America of George W. Bush, that’s increasingly becoming a solid business opportunity.