Krugman: "Point Those Fingers"

[Inland]

Gotta Read Krugman. I think he is one of the great essay writers.


http://www.nytimes.com/2005/09/09/opinion/09krugman.html?hp=&pagewanted=print

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It might make sense to hold off on the criticism if this were the first big disaster on Mr. Bush's watch, or if the chain of mistakes in handling Hurricane Katrina were out of character. But even with the most generous possible assessment, this is the administration's second big policy disaster, after Iraq. And the chain of mistakes was perfectly in character - there are striking parallels between the errors the administration made in Iraq and the errors it made last week.

In Iraq, the administration displayed a combination of paralysis and denial after the fall of Baghdad, as uncontrolled looting destroyed much of Iraq's infrastructure.

The same deer-in-the-headlights immobility prevailed as Katrina approached and struck the Gulf Coast. The storm gave plenty of warning. By the afternoon of Monday, Aug. 29, the flooding of New Orleans was well under way - city officials publicly confirmed a breach in the 17th Street Canal at 2 p.m. Yet on Tuesday federal officials were still playing down the problem, and large-scale federal aid didn't arrive until last Friday.

In Iraq the Coalition Provisional Authority, which ran the country during the crucial first year after Saddam's fall - the period when an effective government might have forestalled the nascent insurgency - was staffed on the basis of ideological correctness and personal connections rather than qualifications. At one point Ari Fleischer's brother was in charge of private-sector development.

The administration followed the same principles in staffing FEMA. The agency had become a highly professional organization during the Clinton years, but under Mr. Bush it reverted to its former status as a "turkey farm," a source of patronage jobs.

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[JDPriestly]

1. Legal questions about the scope of its authority

seem to have mired the Bush administration. Funny how legal questions did not hinder the Bush administration from placing prisoners into the Guantanamo prison camp and depriving them of their legal rights, or kidnapping and transporting terror suspects from around the world to countries that allow torture or the OKing the practices that developed into torture in Abu Ghraib. Yet bureaucratic legal questions prevented them from acting quickly in Democratic NO or from cooperating with Democratic La governor Blanco. The crassness and excuse-making of the Bush administration never cease to amaze.

[Inland]

4. Supposed legal or bureaucratic issues excuse for doing nothing.

If it's something Bush wants to do, that itself is reason enough to ignore or "reinterpret" laws to the contrary.

If it's something Bush doesn't care about, then they fake a paralysis brought on by that damn gommint rules and regulations and pretend their hands are tied, so sorry!

[CrispyQ]

2. Once again Krugman is spot on!

One of our best voices!!

[abluelady]

3. I Think He's Brilliant

Paul Krugman is definitely one of my heroes.

[sarcasmo]

5. Krugman doesn't hold anything back, that's what makes him GREAT.