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What I don't understand is that we can watch this, what seems to turn into a kind of huge spectacle being catapulted in our houses 24 hrs a day by CNN and other networks, together with detailed satellite-pictures and all that kind of bullshit, but that organised help seems impossible of being provided.... It's like a third world country. It's like Bangladesh. It's scary.
I guess the only difference between this and the tsunami last year is that people were warned of this natural disaster.
This planet is a bit of a mess at the minute, when you consider Portugal and Spain have had forest fires aplenty, and Germany has had terrible flooding too.
And the UK? Had a tornado that knocked a few roof tiles off some people's houses in Birmingham...
The last tornado in Birmingham did £20M worth of improvements
how can the authorities take so long to arrive at the convention centre causing needless further deaths and now callous statements are being made to "blame" those who didn't evecuate which comprised many who could not physically evacuate?
my sympathies really go out to all the victims...bush just flew over and had a look from atop in airforce one...the heads of states in everyone of the asian tsunami countries were at site to console the victims the day after...
it's really appalling...and bbc gives much more detailed horror reports than cnn...
what i don't understand is how when the whole of america were glued to their tv sets as katrina approached and with more than a million evacuating through an emergency call by the state governments that it WILL be devastating and YET, YET, they don't have those 1200 trucks and 50 field hospitals etc. etc. standing by within a few tens of km from new orleans and biloxi to move in the moment the hurricans passes!
and that jerk brown gave a meek "no" when asked whether he knew that those thousands of people had gathered at the convention centre!!! he added that even the federal agencies didn't know until now (6 hours ago) and that's some 24 hours after cnn had pictures of the convention centre taken by their producer driving by...
and now anarchy! these people in louisiana and missisippi must hate their governments now won't they?
my god! they are devoting their resources to fight thugs now...rescue crews are now not going out to save tens of thousands more stranded and dying!
what the heck, the mentality of both sides ...thuggery and criminal as well as the side of the law enforcement officers and sity officials are now best described by the word "terrorism" for the criminals and 3 words "misplaced bureaucratic craze" for the officers...let the bastards take what they want and go out to save the people mannnn....
by contrast, the asian tsunami took much more efforts to reach and yet there were tranquill serenity in the rescue and comfort support amongst the victims as well as support from all the surrounding provinces officials and police in the immediate aftermath before the international agencies reached them after a week...the governments of india, sri lanka, malaaysia (which went to help acheh), indonesia and thailand were all swift to react reaching all the affected areas within the same day!
what's wrong with america? is it the gun mentality? and why are they not requesting help when the whole E.U. and the U.N. had offerred help? pride? superiority?
i think its more pride or an admission of failure to perform that america is not responding to these offer of help...imagine if saudi arabia offerred help, would america accept? :-) no, of course not! homeland security cannot afford to have a few hundred arabs running around america...they would take a month to screen them all first!
Emmett, check the weather records. The frequencyand intensity of storms have been increasing over the past 30 years. Has anyone notced that the people left behind in Nwohlins are the poor underclasses without the means or transport to flee the storm. PS if you can't get Tobasco try west Indian Hot pepper sauce. Enco is a great brand but its made from Scotch Bonnet peppers, the hottest of the lot.
Yum - I know as i have grown them in the past - I just like Tobasco for certain situations. RE the climate - lokk back a couple of hundred years you will see cycles - that is all I am saying. NOAA, our climate bunch in Colorado is not attributing this particular hrricane season to GW, and they are watching very carefully.
Re the people left behind. I have sympathy for those who could not get out - old, infirmed children - but the able bodied types? Something tells me some had looting and other nefarious activities on their minds.
Guns again facty? If not for private owbership then many people would have been victims by now - but that debate is one that will not be decided here as we all have hard positions on it.
The long and short is that it is the responsibility of the individual to make sure they have some spare food and water and a small survival packet tucked away for situations just like this. EVERYONE. All you out there whether or not you are in a flood, earthquake, tornado zone. I have not looked at my family's kit for a long time and after inspecting it I now know I would have had expired dehydrated food.
The basic rule of thumb in natural disasters is that you can expect to be on your own for 72 hours. After that then local, State and fed support can be expected. I know for a fact that FEMA was working long hours prepping for this event - ow do I knoe? I just look out my door here at work and i am looking at a FEMA warehouse.
Response time has been slow - very slow. However, the State governments should have been way more prepared for this - after all who know the people and condition/limitations that their geography yadda yadda puts in their way. This is not the first time the Gulf Coast has flooded.
Anyways, it is good to see the countries I shamed into coming forward with offers.
I really do appreciate it - even though I am not immediately affected by this disaster it is good to see some people give a hoot about the US.
I've never understood how America could elect a dope like Bush.
I can only hope that people are now realising the price they pay for such foolish gullability.
There are International teams of experts, medical centres, "doctors without borders", mobile triage centres, communications and command centres all standing by, ready to help, waiting while people die, and Bush says "Send money!"
Bush: the stupidass!
Cheney: badass!
Rumsfeld: always wrongass!
America, you need new leaders!
Spin
Bernie, do you understand now why you have to hold your leaders accountable for their mistakes.
Politicians who overrule the Corps of Engineers who stated over and over that New Orleans needed its levees increased and strengthened to deal with force 5 hurricane floods have to held accountable. Bush doesn't know what they means but he should soon, very soon.
There's a political storm on the boil. We don't have to wait for this body count, experts could have tracked it from the flood levels and storm path. Mind you, the politico-legal climate in the US ia also responsible, because it's not easy to do risk asssessment in the US, as its done in free-thinking modern societies.
It's not constitutional to allow risk of death of American citizens, although Bush is doing a pretty good job of promising more deaths in Iraq, but basically politicians and managers have to deny that their activities or lack of action could cause a fatality. So the decision makers develop a sort of denial attitude.
I won't talk further about this now but I'd like to help set up some international assistance where its needed, but Bush isn't asking.
Doc - you need to get off this Bush kick. We are a Union of States. States have responsibilities. Below the State level we have counties and below that cities and communities. Lastly we have individuals.
The pattern of responsibility goes in reverse order from the individual on up. With a natural disaster of this magnatude we can toss out the individual, to some degree, and the local and possibly the county level. The State is a large area. Most of the State is not affected - and the State plan is either non existent or poorly executed. The next level is States in regions that have agreements. Being that the whole area is affected then we need to go to the Feds. This is a huge problem but it is not GW or Cheney or Rummy or....it is Chertoff and the FEMA. I know they were prepping before hand but the response time is way too slow. We were faster in responding to the tsunami!
But the long and short is all that GW can give is the order to get shit moving. He has done that but the mechanism below is just not doing what it was designed to do.
I have prepared Emergency Reponse plans from local to Federal levels and know full well the heirarchical structures involved. I've headed up the risk assessment for an international major chemical company facility to met the 100 year flood levels, day by day I deal with marine operations in typhoons and monsoonal storms, and and now I've had enough of Bush's stupidity.
Up till now he's been a pain in the but to the world , but now he's really letting his own country down.
America and you need to get off your Bush support kick, and kick some Bush butt.
Bush cut funding on CELA (Council of Landscape Architects) project for flood prevention, after which the head of the Army Corps of Engineers resigned. The warnings about a catastrophic flood in new orleans were ignored, on Bush's watch. Now he's talking more bullshit, first at the Whiethouse and just now in Mobile while more people are dying and suffering. But you say he's not in charge ????
Let me repeat - BUSH is the final stop on this. The buck DOES stop with him.
However, IF you have done emergency preparedness plans you will know that they start from the bottom up - not the other way 'round. New orleans has a plan. it failed immediatly for obvious reason - the infrastructure was gone. But what about the louisana plan? Where is it? Who was in charge of it? What role does the Governor play? It is broken from top to bottom.
Yes, funding was cut for the levees - I posted that the other day. But do you think this problem started 5 years ago? You are mad if you think so. Like RJ posted - there are pumps going 24 hours a day keeping NO dry and have been doing so for generations.
Heads are going to have to roll - and Bush had better be the one to do it. THEN he has to order the reorg of the emergency response plan. Hell see if one is in place. Looks to me like Louisiana has none. But Alabama and Mississippi do.
Bush support - I guess you only read what you want. i have many, MANY problems with him and his administration. But as a leader you have to expect that the people that have been hired to do jobs such as this actually are doing them. In this case....sadly, it was not done very well at any level.
I have learned from this - my emergency kit will be sorted ASAP. Something that people in NO should do for the future.
Last time I checked my Emergency Kit, all the band-aids were shrivelled up.
We lost a mother of eight to a tiger near here the other day, and I think I disturbed a black panther on a search for one of our lost girls the other night. Those things are huge and just as powerfuil as the tigers. They drag their prey up into trees.
Meanwhile.... SHANGHAI, China (AP) -- Torrential rains and flooding from Typhoon Talim have killed at least 13 people and left 15 missing in eastern China, the government says.
At least two other people were killed when the typhoon passed over the island of Taiwan on Wednesday and Thursday. About 30 people were injured there.
Almost 600,000 people were evacuated as the typhoon struck southern China, forcing authorities to shut down schools, highways and airports, officials said.
The mainland deaths occurred in Fujian and Zhejiang provinces on China's southeastern coast, the official Xinhua News Agency said Saturday.
You can judg the state of a society by the way it cares for its indigent population. Nwahlins looked like evry man for himself and the devil take the hindmost. PS Did any catch Dubya on the television. He staes that Trent Lott lost his house. Who gives a flying fart if some right wing Millionaire Republican looses his house. He wasn't in the sports centre taking his chances with the rest was he.
It was the bit "We will rebuild a better house" (for Trent Lott) that got me.
His grammar and expression was woeful. "When you stand on the porch of a house that's been completely swept away"
We think he meant that in the past he had admired NO from the porch of that house and now its gone.
But his meaning was clear, we're here to look after the rich. No wonder some of the poor are saying they'll never go back.
It's great to know that the Navy Hospital Ship "Comfort" has finally stocked and crewed up and departed for the South.
OK, normally it may take 5 days to provision but surely they could have departed early last week and flown medical crew and supplies down to it en route or to Florida where it has to call for more provisions before reaching the devastated areas.
Who gives a flying fart if some right wing Millionaire Republican looses his house.
You should! That kind of class warfare bullshit is just what causes the unrest you see in NO - look man the street goes both ways. If you don't respect you fellow man WHATEVER social class you are in there is trouble brewing.
Emmett, Bush is all about the photo op, waaaayyy more than Clinton ever was. Did you see him putting his arms around those two mixed-race girls in Mobile or wherever the hell it was? He couldn't turn them around to face the cameras quick enough. :rolleyes:
I'd like to see him on the ground in New Orleans - IN New Orleans, not on the fringes where it's politically safe and no one will verbally challenge him directly - actually HELPING people.
Hell, go to the Superdome ffs, smell that rancid air, see the dead bodies, get some fucking perspective George! :mad:
For the World's only remaining Cold War superpower, America has shown itself to be absolutely pathetic when it comes to dealing with a crisis within it's own borders. Wasn't this kind of emergency response supposed to have been fixed after 9/11? Or was that all just political rheteric?
Malta aid for hurricane-afflicted US by Editor di-ve.com
BIRKIRKARA, Malta, (di-ve news) -- September 04, 2005 -- 1845CEST -- Malta is joining other EU member states in responding to the request for assistance made by the United States following the disaster left by hurricane Katrina.
The Civil Protection Department has thus made a call for the public to provide blankets, first aid kits, tents, bedding and water that will then be sent to the victims in the afflicted areas.
The Civil Protection Department has also called for cash donations, with persons wishing to donate money being able to do so at one of the local banks until Wednesday, September 7th.
it's like a microscopic bacteria trying to help an elephant
-----
MCSF you have to admit that Bush's response was slow and pathetic. The guy is too obsessed with thinking (?) about foreign policy and then in face of an internal crisis he doesn't know how to tackle it.
My point is simple. There is a major Class division in the US based on Moneyand Katrina has exposed it! I agree that there's no excuse for the lawlessness, but hell people are desperate. From the outside looking in it seemed that the administrations had to be shamed into doing something for the people left behind. You will also be pleased to know that I have made my donation the the Red Cross.
I made adonation to the tsunami victims, $300 bucks, but AFAIC if the Americans have enough money to fight wars in other continents and spend as much as they do on the omnipresent military establishment, they have enough money to look after themselves in a crisis like this. :rolleyes:
The Oz Govt. donated on my behalf, let's hope it's spent well.
MCSF you have to admit that Bush's response was slow and pathetic. The guy is too obsessed with thinking (?) about foreign policy and then in face of an internal crisis he doesn't know how to tackle it.
How many times do I have to tell you people this. I do not know how your governments react to situations like this but over here we have a local response a State response and a Federal response. All three of these are managed by different organizations that work together or at least should do so.
The city of Norleans had their plans shredded by the hurricane but based on what is coming out in the news the plan looked sketchy anyway.
The next level of response is from the State. The Governor, a Democrat if you want to play politics, appears to have falen to pieces about the same time the hurricane hit - she definately did not move fast enough. Seventy percent of the Louisiana Nat'l Guard was available for duty....thats alot of troops. The President can't touch them as they belong to the State - the Nat'l Guard is a "State" militia as it were and the President has to aske permission to get use of them. She did not seem to get them moving fast enough OR they were not prepared which is the pervue of the Adjutant General of the Louisiana Nat'l Guard. TheGovernor is the boss or top dog in the chain anyway. No blame for her from you guys eh?
Let me make another point clear - Norleans is a very unique city - very hard to deal with a n emergency in due to its geography, the small streets - this may be common in Europe but it is a tough nut.
Let me also State that Alabama and Mississippi were hit by the same storm - albeit not as directly as Louisiana but their response system worked significantly better. If Bush gets the blame for MO then does he get credit for the success in the other HARD it areas? Just think about it.
Okay back to Emergency Management US Style 101.
Remember we are on a system of Staes here - we are a Republic. A Union of States. If the Fed came crashing in with out working with the States then everybody woul dbe bitching that the Fed is playing heavy handed yadda yadda.
President Bush is just the boss of the federal organization FEMA. With me so far? Good. The boss of FEMA is a guy named Chertoff. Chertoff has to go to the head of the State , the Govenor and say to her, in this case, what do you need and where do you need it? They just can''t barge in...that is just the way it is.
Now, where is Bush culpable? Because after a few days of NO action by the govenor of Louisaiana he should have just told Chertoff, to go in and take control. he should have used a very obscure law which allows the use of FEDEZRAL troops ie the ARMY, Maries etc etc to go in and restore order. The 82nd Airbone could have been there in less that 12 hours. All of them - well at least the QRF Brigades.
Where Bush failed is in trying to let an underqualified State Governor handle her own crisis management plan.
As far as him rolling up his sleeves and grabbing a shovel or ladle and spponing water out of the City...come on P1. The Secret Service makes many of the calls on what the President can and can't do based soley on safety - and with armed mobs running about shooting at aid workers sent to HELP them there would be difficulty in guarantting his safety. You all piss and moan about Cheney - well that would be the fastest way to have him running the US IMO.
P1, your quote
The Oz Govt. donated on my behalf, let's hope it's spent well.
echoes my own sentiment when a bum asks me for money.... me respone, "I gave at the office."
Comments
It's like a third world country. It's like Bangladesh. It's scary.
http://www.wwltv.com/local/stories/wwl090105usgetshelp.16cbe69d.html
how can the authorities take so long to arrive at the convention centre causing needless further deaths and now callous statements are being made to "blame" those who didn't evecuate which comprised many who could not physically evacuate?
my sympathies really go out to all the victims...bush just flew over and had a look from atop in airforce one...the heads of states in everyone of the asian tsunami countries were at site to console the victims the day after...
British students caught up in Hurricane Katrina have spoken of their four days of "hell" at the New Orleans Superdome shelter.
They say their refuge descended into a scene of terror as people ran amok with knives and guns, used crack cocaine and hurled racial abuse.
At one point, up to 30 British students were forced to set up a makeshift security cordon to fend off abusive locals.
##
Charming. Whatever happened to the Dunkirk spirirt?!
what i don't understand is how when the whole of america were glued to their tv sets as katrina approached and with more than a million evacuating through an emergency call by the state governments that it WILL be devastating and YET, YET, they don't have those 1200 trucks and 50 field hospitals etc. etc. standing by within a few tens of km from new orleans and biloxi to move in the moment the hurricans passes!
and that jerk brown gave a meek "no" when asked whether he knew that those thousands of people had gathered at the convention centre!!! he added that even the federal agencies didn't know until now (6 hours ago) and that's some 24 hours after cnn had pictures of the convention centre taken by their producer driving by...
and now anarchy! these people in louisiana and missisippi must hate their governments now won't they?
Bit of a wake-up to governments beefing up security that it cannot be done at the expense of Emergency Services planning.
This is an 'eye off the ball' situation for the US and the State of Louisiana particularly.
what the heck, the mentality of both sides ...thuggery and criminal as well as the side of the law enforcement officers and sity officials are now best described by the word "terrorism" for the criminals and 3 words "misplaced bureaucratic craze" for the officers...let the bastards take what they want and go out to save the people mannnn....
by contrast, the asian tsunami took much more efforts to reach and yet there were tranquill serenity in the rescue and comfort support amongst the victims as well as support from all the surrounding provinces officials and police in the immediate aftermath before the international agencies reached them after a week...the governments of india, sri lanka, malaaysia (which went to help acheh), indonesia and thailand were all swift to react reaching all the affected areas within the same day!
what's wrong with america? is it the gun mentality? and why are they not requesting help when the whole E.U. and the U.N. had offerred help? pride? superiority?
i think its more pride or an admission of failure to perform that america is not responding to these offer of help...imagine if saudi arabia offerred help, would america accept? :-) no, of course not! homeland security cannot afford to have a few hundred arabs running around america...they would take a month to screen them all first!
Has anyone notced that the people left behind in Nwohlins are the poor underclasses without the means or transport to flee the storm.
PS if you can't get Tobasco try west Indian Hot pepper sauce. Enco is a great brand but its made from Scotch Bonnet peppers, the hottest of the lot.
Re the people left behind. I have sympathy for those who could not get out - old, infirmed children - but the able bodied types? Something tells me some had looting and other nefarious activities on their minds.
Guns again facty? If not for private owbership then many people would have been victims by now - but that debate is one that will not be decided here as we all have hard positions on it.
The long and short is that it is the responsibility of the individual to make sure they have some spare food and water and a small survival packet tucked away for situations just like this. EVERYONE. All you out there whether or not you are in a flood, earthquake, tornado zone. I have not looked at my family's kit for a long time and after inspecting it I now know I would have had expired dehydrated food.
The basic rule of thumb in natural disasters is that you can expect to be on your own for 72 hours. After that then local, State and fed support can be expected. I know for a fact that FEMA was working long hours prepping for this event - ow do I knoe? I just look out my door here at work and i am looking at a FEMA warehouse.
Response time has been slow - very slow. However, the State governments should have been way more prepared for this - after all who know the people and condition/limitations that their geography yadda yadda puts in their way. This is not the first time the Gulf Coast has flooded.
Anyways, it is good to see the countries I shamed into coming forward with offers.
I really do appreciate it - even though I am not immediately affected by this disaster it is good to see some people give a hoot about the US.
I can only hope that people are now realising the price they pay for such foolish gullability.
There are International teams of experts, medical centres, "doctors without borders", mobile triage centres, communications and command centres all standing by, ready to help, waiting while people die, and Bush says "Send money!"
Bush: the stupidass!
Cheney: badass!
Rumsfeld: always wrongass!
America, you need new leaders!
Spin
Bernie, do you understand now why you have to hold your leaders accountable for their mistakes.
Politicians who overrule the Corps of Engineers who stated over and over that New Orleans needed its levees increased and strengthened to deal with force 5 hurricane floods have to held accountable. Bush doesn't know what they means but he should soon, very soon.
There's a political storm on the boil. We don't have to wait for this body count, experts could have tracked it from the flood levels and storm path. Mind you, the politico-legal climate in the US ia also responsible, because it's not easy to do risk asssessment in the US, as its done in free-thinking modern societies.
It's not constitutional to allow risk of death of American citizens, although Bush is doing a pretty good job of promising more deaths in Iraq, but basically politicians and managers have to deny that their activities or lack of action could cause a fatality. So the decision makers develop a sort of denial attitude.
I won't talk further about this now but I'd like to help set up some international assistance where its needed, but Bush isn't asking.
Spin
The pattern of responsibility goes in reverse order from the individual on up. With a natural disaster of this magnatude we can toss out the individual, to some degree, and the local and possibly the county level. The State is a large area. Most of the State is not affected - and the State plan is either non existent or poorly executed. The next level is States in regions that have agreements. Being that the whole area is affected then we need to go to the Feds. This is a huge problem but it is not GW or Cheney or Rummy or....it is Chertoff and the FEMA. I know they were prepping before hand but the response time is way too slow. We were faster in responding to the tsunami!
But the long and short is all that GW can give is the order to get shit moving. He has done that but the mechanism below is just not doing what it was designed to do.
With respect, you are talking bullshit.
I have prepared Emergency Reponse plans from local to Federal levels and know full well the heirarchical structures involved. I've headed up the risk assessment for an international major chemical company facility to met the 100 year flood levels, day by day I deal with marine operations in typhoons and monsoonal storms, and and now I've had enough of Bush's stupidity.
Up till now he's been a pain in the but to the world , but now he's really letting his own country down.
America and you need to get off your Bush support kick, and kick some Bush butt.
Bush cut funding on CELA (Council of Landscape Architects) project for flood prevention, after which the head of the Army Corps of Engineers resigned. The warnings about a catastrophic flood in new orleans were ignored, on Bush's watch. Now he's talking more bullshit, first at the Whiethouse and just now in Mobile while more people are dying and suffering. But you say he's not in charge ????
Come on!
Spin
However, IF you have done emergency preparedness plans you will know that they start from the bottom up - not the other way 'round. New orleans has a plan. it failed immediatly for obvious reason - the infrastructure was gone. But what about the louisana plan? Where is it? Who was in charge of it? What role does the Governor play? It is broken from top to bottom.
Yes, funding was cut for the levees - I posted that the other day. But do you think this problem started 5 years ago? You are mad if you think so. Like RJ posted - there are pumps going 24 hours a day keeping NO dry and have been doing so for generations.
Heads are going to have to roll - and Bush had better be the one to do it. THEN he has to order the reorg of the emergency response plan. Hell see if one is in place. Looks to me like Louisiana has none. But Alabama and Mississippi do.
Bush support - I guess you only read what you want. i have many, MANY problems with him and his administration. But as a leader you have to expect that the people that have been hired to do jobs such as this actually are doing them. In this case....sadly, it was not done very well at any level.
I have learned from this - my emergency kit will be sorted ASAP. Something that people in NO should do for the future.
Last time I checked my Emergency Kit, all the band-aids were shrivelled up.
We lost a mother of eight to a tiger near here the other day, and I think I disturbed a black panther on a search for one of our lost girls the other night. Those things are huge and just as powerfuil as the tigers. They drag their prey up into trees.
Better get some more cat repellant!
Cheers,
Spin
SHANGHAI, China (AP) -- Torrential rains and flooding from Typhoon Talim have killed at least 13 people and left 15 missing in eastern China, the government says.
At least two other people were killed when the typhoon passed over the island of Taiwan on Wednesday and Thursday. About 30 people were injured there.
Almost 600,000 people were evacuated as the typhoon struck southern China, forcing authorities to shut down schools, highways and airports, officials said.
The mainland deaths occurred in Fujian and Zhejiang provinces on China's southeastern coast, the official Xinhua News Agency said Saturday.
It said Talim caused $450 million in damage.
Spin
PS Did any catch Dubya on the television. He staes that Trent Lott lost his house. Who gives a flying fart if some right wing Millionaire Republican looses his house. He wasn't in the sports centre taking his chances with the rest was he.
His grammar and expression was woeful. "When you stand on the porch of a house that's been completely swept away"
We think he meant that in the past he had admired NO from the porch of that house and now its gone.
But his meaning was clear, we're here to look after the rich.
No wonder some of the poor are saying they'll never go back.
It's great to know that the Navy Hospital Ship "Comfort" has finally stocked and crewed up and departed for the South.
OK, normally it may take 5 days to provision but surely they could have departed early last week and flown medical crew and supplies down to it en route or to Florida where it has to call for more provisions before reaching the devastated areas.
It should be renamed "cold comfort".
Spin
[Edited on 4/9/2005 by Dr_Spin]
This from of all people, you .
I'd like to see him on the ground in New Orleans - IN New Orleans, not on the fringes where it's politically safe and no one will verbally challenge him directly - actually HELPING people.
Hell, go to the Superdome ffs, smell that rancid air, see the dead bodies, get some fucking perspective George! :mad:
For the World's only remaining Cold War superpower, America has shown itself to be absolutely pathetic when it comes to dealing with a crisis within it's own borders. Wasn't this kind of emergency response supposed to have been fixed after 9/11? Or was that all just political rheteric?
by Editor di-ve.com
BIRKIRKARA, Malta, (di-ve news) -- September 04, 2005 -- 1845CEST -- Malta is joining other EU member states in responding to the request for assistance made by the United States following the disaster left by hurricane Katrina.
The Civil Protection Department has thus made a call for the public to provide blankets, first aid kits, tents, bedding and water that will then be sent to the victims in the afflicted areas.
The Civil Protection Department has also called for cash donations, with persons wishing to donate money being able to do so at one of the local banks until Wednesday, September 7th.
-----
MCSF you have to admit that Bush's response was slow and pathetic. The guy is too obsessed with thinking (?) about foreign policy and then in face of an internal crisis he doesn't know how to tackle it.
-----
You will also be pleased to know that I have made my donation the the Red Cross.
The Oz Govt. donated on my behalf, let's hope it's spent well.
The city of Norleans had their plans shredded by the hurricane but based on what is coming out in the news the plan looked sketchy anyway.
The next level of response is from the State. The Governor, a Democrat if you want to play politics, appears to have falen to pieces about the same time the hurricane hit - she definately did not move fast enough. Seventy percent of the Louisiana Nat'l Guard was available for duty....thats alot of troops. The President can't touch them as they belong to the State - the Nat'l Guard is a "State" militia as it were and the President has to aske permission to get use of them. She did not seem to get them moving fast enough OR they were not prepared which is the pervue of the Adjutant General of the Louisiana Nat'l Guard. TheGovernor is the boss or top dog in the chain anyway. No blame for her from you guys eh?
Let me make another point clear - Norleans is a very unique city - very hard to deal with a n emergency in due to its geography, the small streets - this may be common in Europe but it is a tough nut.
Let me also State that Alabama and Mississippi were hit by the same storm - albeit not as directly as Louisiana but their response system worked significantly better. If Bush gets the blame for MO then does he get credit for the success in the other HARD it areas? Just think about it.
Okay back to Emergency Management US Style 101.
Remember we are on a system of Staes here - we are a Republic. A Union of States. If the Fed came crashing in with out working with the States then everybody woul dbe bitching that the Fed is playing heavy handed yadda yadda.
President Bush is just the boss of the federal organization FEMA. With me so far? Good. The boss of FEMA is a guy named Chertoff. Chertoff has to go to the head of the State , the Govenor and say to her, in this case, what do you need and where do you need it? They just can''t barge in...that is just the way it is.
Now, where is Bush culpable? Because after a few days of NO action by the govenor of Louisaiana he should have just told Chertoff, to go in and take control. he should have used a very obscure law which allows the use of FEDEZRAL troops ie the ARMY, Maries etc etc to go in and restore order. The 82nd Airbone could have been there in less that 12 hours. All of them - well at least the QRF Brigades.
Where Bush failed is in trying to let an underqualified State Governor handle her own crisis management plan.
As far as him rolling up his sleeves and grabbing a shovel or ladle and spponing water out of the City...come on P1. The Secret Service makes many of the calls on what the President can and can't do based soley on safety - and with armed mobs running about shooting at aid workers sent to HELP them there would be difficulty in guarantting his safety. You all piss and moan about Cheney - well that would be the fastest way to have him running the US IMO.
P1, your quote echoes my own sentiment when a bum asks me for money.... me respone, "I gave at the office."