Michael Hiltzik: Bush's Hurricane Response a Disaster

[realFedUp]

http://www.latimes.com/business/la-fi-golden5sep05,1,6942190.column?coll=la-headlines-business&ctrack=1&cset=true

September 5, 2005

Michael Hiltzik:
Bush's Hurricane Response a Disaster
Nearly five years ago, the Bush administration rode into office bearing its cynicism about government high, like a banner.

It promoted a massive tax cut as a way of "starving the beast" of federal government. President Bush traveled the country telling us that we were overdependent on the government for help with healthcare and retirement. To those wondering what resources might see them into old age, he advised: "a conservative mix of stocks and bonds."

New Orleans is, or should be, the graveyard of the conservative ideology that government is useless. An American city is reduced to Third World desperation as people who own nothing scrounge for necessities in a sea of waste and federal officials offer lame excuses about how their disaster plans would have worked fine had there not been, you know, a disaster. The president, at the head of a global power that can't get its own troops or supplies off their bases to reach the needful, whines, "The private sector needs to do its part."

This deplorable performance has deep roots. Joe M. Allbaugh, a Bush campaign hack without any crisis management experience who was named director of the Federal Emergency Management Agency, disparaged federal disaster assistance as "an oversized entitlement program" before Congress in 2001. The public's expectations of government in a disaster situation, he said, "may have ballooned beyond what is an appropriate level." He advised stricken communities to rely for help on "faith-based organizations … like the Salvation Army and the Mennonite Disaster Service."

If Allbaugh were not an amateur, he would have known that communities, "faith-based organizations" and the private sector become overwhelmed by disasters more modest than this one. In a crisis the federal government should be the first responder, not the last, to take charge, not wait to be asked.

continued

[Ravenseye]

1. New Orleans is, or should be, the graveyard of the conservative ideology

Amen

[opihimoimoi]

2. Cockyness and arrogance will soon wreck havoc on ones self..Mongo.

[Jade Fox]

3. "would have worked fine if there had not been, you know, a disaster..."

That sums it nicely.

[Mike_The_Computer]

4. Mennonite Disaster Service? You've got to be kidding me.

Is the Mennonite Disaster Service some elite, ragtag team of disaster-prevention experts numbering in the thousands, that I just haven't heard the fuck of?

[Nothing Without Hope]

5. Albaugh was not only callous and incompetent, his "management style"

was so abusive and disruptive that many of the valuable career managers left FEMA because they could not tolerate it. So he's like a Bolton clone this way - use vicious abuse and all kinds of disruptive tactics to cripple the organization he's sent to. Bush knew him well beforehand, of course, and there would have been numerous complaints on how Albaugh's insane rampages, intransigence, and anti-relief ideology were gutting FEMA's effectiveness in every way. Obviously, these were ignored. Like sending Bolton to the UN, at what point does it become stretching the imagination too far to think this is part of a deliberate gutting of FEMA by the Bush Administration?

To get an idea of Albaugh, read this description by a DUer, cited in the opening post of this thread:
http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=view_all&address=104x4523783

YES ! Joe Albaugh, 1 of Bush's campaign managers & nutcase.

This man has a truly violent temper and short trigger to go with it. At one of his first meetings with career FEMA high level staff, one woman who was called on to make a report started out by introducing herself to Albaugh with her name and title. He went ballistic, screaming and raging - DID SHE THINK HE DIDN'T KNOW WHO SHE WAS?!?!?!? HOW DARE SHE PRESUME SUCH A THING??? . . .yada, yada, yada along the same line for minutes to the dead silence of everyone else in the room who had never seen such a display of temper. In other words, someone following standard business etiquette was screamed at and berated in front of her peers.

This was typical behavior for Albaugh, and one result was that many, many of the top level FEMA people left for other jobs or took early retirement because Albaugh wouldn't allow them to do the jobs they were trained to do. This was a tremendous loss of institutional knowledge for the relatively small federal agency. Albaugh hated being at FEMA and left after about a year. Although he had zip experience with disaster relief or any kind of government/public service before his explosive period with FEMA, when he left there he started a very high priced consulting firm on counter-terrorism.

Bush initially put Albaugh in place to gut FEMA - I mean why should all that federal money go to people in trouble and need through some natural disaster. Bush's attitude was that if you weren't wealthy enough to private pay someone to help you handle a disaster, you deserved whatever befell you. Anyway, when 9/11 occurred, he couldn't outwardly gut FEMA, but he pretty much emasculated it by putting it under DHS.

[stevietheman]

11. Is there any corroboration outside of DU for this?

I might want to link to it from an article I'm writing. Thanks.

[Cha]

14. There's probably lots of links

but the search engine is off now..so, hopefully, in the near future.

[Betsy Ross]

6. Mennonites

Yeah, I want to see them out there with their helicopters, heavy earthmovers, and all-terrain vehicles repairing levees.

Betcha when it comes to helping out the oil industries, the Feds will be right on it.

[BootinUp]

7. Woa! That was a brutal assessment of the Bushevic failure.

[stevietheman]

8. Rarely have I seen an editorial written so powerfully from...

start to finish. Kudos to the author!

[feminazi]

9. great article

here's another gem:


"The Bush administration is not alone in having ignored pleas to improve the hurricane and flood defenses of New Orleans. But it bears sole responsibility for a crisis response that has been fairly labeled a national disgrace. FEMA drafted an action plan for a New Orleans flood: pre-position food, supplies and hospital ships for immediate deployment in the aftermath. Brown and Chertoff failed to implement it adequately, pleading that no one could have anticipated a disaster that had in fact been anticipated by engineers, geographers and political leaders for decades."

as mike malloy would say, "have i told you how much i HATE these people?"

:grr:

[glitch]

10. He ends it with this:

"Probably. George W. Bush is known for never admitting his mistakes. Consequently, he never learns from his mistakes. The chances are dismal that he will learn from this one. We're on our own."

If we're on our own why the HELL should we pay federal taxes?

[PinkyisBlue]

17. Why should we pay federal taxes?

How else is Halliburton going to get paid?

Great article. He doesn't skirt around the truth: "The Bush administration...bears sole responsibility for a crisis response that has been fairly labeled a national disgrace."

[Nothing Without Hope]

12. Too few articles in the corporate media point to Bush as responsible

Except for a few op/eds by designated house "liberals," there are scandalously few clear indictments of Bush as bearing the responsibility of what has happened in the hurricane-devastated south. Instead, the reporting dances the usual despicable "we won't decide, both sides have some blame" game and only the most "liberal" columnists dare to blame Bush for what his actions and negligence have done. OF COURSE BUSH IS RESPONSIBLE. It is sickening to see the usual false arguments bolstering outrageous scenarios by the neocons as deserving equal consideration. Like "intelligent design" vs. science, and surely you have your own list of egregious examples. It's the Poodle Press in action.

This LA Times article, in the business section, speaks the TRUTH. It doesn't pander to the phony "both sides have good points" dance that has been used for years on TV, radio, network internet sites and printed media to hide the true clarity of blame or truth under this administration. By denying the clear truth and giving equal or greater credence to lies and propaganda, the US media are responsible for allowing and promoting the propagandizing of the American public.

This article is all too rare in its truth-telling, especially for a piece not clearly labeled as op/ed - disclaimed as factual news or the opinion of the editors.

Other articles in the major media venues almost all are STILL playing the "he said/she said" game of hiding the clear truth of Bush's responsibility for all the deaths and suffering due to the delays, incompetence, and outright PREVENTION of aid efforts of the federal authorities under his orders as well as the utter unpreparedness and the vulnerable state of the New Orleans levees. (I myself believe much of this is deliberate, but talking about that gets posts locked at DU. To me, insisting that it's all "just incompetence" was a baseless claim from the beginning and with every day the evidence of deliberate "negligence" piles that much higher. Sure there's incompetence. But shoot me, but I believe saying it's ALL "just incompetence" is the nutty theory.)

Even now, after all the days of deadly delays and all the rest of the clear evidence of Bush and his top appointees' culpability, new articles STILL avoid blaming Bush. They talk about "partisan bickering" and "diffuse authority" or "playing the blame game" and allow the obvious, provable lies of Bush, Chertoff and others to stand unchallenged except by citing opposing opinions of other people. See, both sides have to be handled as if their statements are equally valid even though the facts overwhelmingly prove otherwise. This is contemptible and doing a very grave disservice to the victims of the "incompetence" and to the American people. This is a familiar ploy by now, used to deflect accountability and muddy the facts.

So I am very glad indeed to see the LA Times article reported in the opening post. May there be many, many more in the press who dare to speak the truth. It is way, way, WAY past due and desperately needed.

[Cha]

13. This guy is Good! Thank you,

realfedup!

"President Bush will surely feel the consequences of his dereliction. Every policy of his administration will be viewed through the prism of the debacle of New Orleans. The pursuit of a personal vendetta against Saddam Hussein, supported by manipulated intelligence, has sucked billions out of the treasury and removed more than 30% of Louisiana and Mississippi National Guard members from their homes, so they must watch the disaster unfold from half a world away instead of assisting their own communities. Tax cuts for the wealthy have been financed by budget cuts."

[LeftyDarthBrodie]

16. Indeed Hiltzik is good

Bush has publicly backed off his plan to destroy Social Security, for now, although I expect it to start as the midterm elections heat-up. I wasn't aware that Hiltzik was a regular columnist but very much enjoyed and found very informative his recent book "The Plot Against Social Security." The book is an excellent history of Social Security and the right-wings attempts to bring Social Security down. Hiltzik also identifies some potential problems in the system and offers solutions to those potential problems.

[Gronk Groks]

15. Timeline of Bushitler's incompetence with Katrina

How come the Canadians can put together a better timeline of shrub's inaction then the American MSM? Following is an excellent recounting of what went wrong and where:

http://www.ctv.ca/servlet/ArticleNews/story/CTVNews/1125626150335_18

(Sorry folks, I don't know how to do a hyperlink. Give me a break, when I went to school they were still using slide-rules.)

P.S. Ahh the computer does it for me. That is useful...