Finger pointing
The federal government’s response to Katrina was atrocious. Michael Brown of FEMA and Michael Chertoff of DHS both said that they thought that New Orleans was fine after the hurricane because they had read so in the newspaper, and meanwhile the New York Times, Washington Post, Washington Times, and New Orleans Times-Picayune all had “New Orleans catastrophy” stories on Tuesday, August 30th. What the hell newspaper was he reading? The rest of America knew, how did the head of FEMA not know?
Then Bush was playing guitar at a fundraiser in San Diego while people drowned in New Orleans. I just don’t get this guy: if there is a crisis in this country you get off your Presidential ass and go and deal with it. You don’t keep reading My Pet Goat, you don’t go on vacation, you don’t go to a fundraiser — you go and bring the full resources of the federal government to bear on the problem, and you do it immediately. The entire goddamned country was glued to the television and the Net, and everyone was wondering where the hell the government was.
The notion that this was in any way the fault of the local officials is absurd. When an emergency of this magnitude happens across state lines it is then by definition a federal emergency. It is the responsibility of the federal government — specifically the Federal Emergency Management Agency — to step in and manage the frigging federal emergency.
If FEMA isn’t there to swiftly and effectively manage Federal Emergencies then what they hell are they there for? This wasn’t 9/11 where two (large) buildings were struck and the entire local social infrastructure was still left intact, allowing local officials to do their jobs. This was the destruction of an area the size of the continent of Europe. The local law enforcement, just like the people who lived in New Orleans, were destroyed, and we all watched it. They had no resources to bring to bear on the subject because they were underwater.
San Francisco is going to have a disaster of this magnitude. Many people who live here happily ignore this fact. But now that we’ve seen how FEMA responds to emergencies such as this I don’t know how anyone in their right mind could say that a.) this was handled well or b.) that we should have faith that the next time something like this happens that we’ll be prepared.
At the moment it appears we will not be. God help us.
