New Orleans Mayor Ray Nagin: "You mean to tell me that a place where you probably have thousands of people that have died and thousands more that are dying every day, that we can't figure out a way to authorize the resources that we need? Come on man," he said. "I need reinforcements," he pleaded. "I need troops, man. I need 500 buses, man. This is a national disaster.Say, uh, Mayor, what about the ones in your own city? I'm still working on a flogging of W, but first things first; Nagin is a pathetic poser, especially in light of what we saw from Rudolph Giuliani.
UPDATE: More here.
3 comments:
Buses do not drive themselves. Normally the National Guard would be called upon to provide drivers, but as we know, most of the Louisiana National Guard was/is in Iraq.
40% of Louisiana National Guard are overseas, not all in Iraq. The National Guard maintains Emergency Management Assistant Compacts (EMAC's) beteween states, which is why Guard units from other states are now in LA.
You're right, busses do not drive themselves. There were alrady plenty of bus drivers in New Orleans. If only someone had called them before the canal walls broke . . .
The Mayor's hands were tied, just like the Governor's. Budget cuts left the levees unfinished, the war on terror took half of the National Guard and all of their high-water gear, presidential authorization never came and so NorthCom had to stand down even though they were literally following Katrina to shore in the USS Baton. FEMA stood in the way of evacuations, levee repair and delivery of help. If FEMA had acted like Amtrack, Walmart, or Canada, this would have been a much smaller human disaster.
You talk about the every man for himself spirit of the USA, well it was there in the form of private companies. We were prepared to do what we could for ourselves. And the US Government actually stood in our way.
At least the mayor was there. Where was W? Where was Chertoff? Chertoff claimed he thought the bullet was dodged when he read newspaper headlines proclaiming it so. THE HEAD OF DHS GETS HIS NEWS FROM THE PAPERS??
You need to see this Chris:
http://www.informationclearinghouse.info/article10121.htm
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