Blanco says she would have gotten better help for her state if she had been Republican.

[madfloridian]

She is sadly probably correct. What a corrupt administration this is. Maybe she will be free to speak out more now on all the things that happened. How Bush wanted to control the National Guard. Everything.

Blanco says she wishes she had switched to GOP

Video at the link.

Louisiana Gov. Kathleen Blanco, who dropped out of the governor's race Tuesday amid widespread dissatisfaction with her job performance, told a group of Louisiana newspapers today her biggest failure was not switching to the Republican Party after Hurricanes Katrina and Rita devastated the state.

"When I look back at the storms, if I had had the knowledge that I would be treated as a pariah by the national Republicans in office, I would have joined the Republican Party to save my state," Blanco said in an interview with a reporter for Gannett newspapers around the state, including The Times in Shreveport.

"Then I would have been hugged and kissed and lifted, and I would have been declared the best governor in this whole country," Blanco said. "I wish I had realized that earlier. I think that was the fatal error."

She has blamed national Republicans, particularly the White House, for trying to shift the blame to her for their own failures in hurricane response.

[rockymountaindem]

1. Well, that's laying it on the line

Gotta respect her for that.

[napi21]

2. Well now, isn't that cute! If you can't win a battle, you join the enemy?

What the hell is wrong with THAT thinking?

Kathy, if you can't do the damn job, the get the hell out of politics! It soundslike you should never have gotten into it at all!

Your comments make me ashamed that you have pretended to be a Dem!

[madfloridian]

4. I don't think that was what she was saying.

Now that she is not running, she is speaking out more. I know Bush refused a lot of help because she would not let him federalize the National Guard.

She is not appearing to be disloyal, but angry at how they treated her.

[napi21]

7. I suppose that could be true, but she said it very wrong!

There are many ways to have phrased her statement, IF you are right and all she was trying to say is Shrub was against her becasue she wouldn't let him have HIS WAY. BTW, I don't doubtthat she suffered for that position.

I would have found it a lot more acceptable if she had been more plain, and simply said, if I had been a PUB, LA. would have gotten the help we needed. This Prez played everything by politics, and the citizens of my state paid a very heavy price!

[blitzen]

8. that is in fact exactly what she said--read her words, not the headline

[blitzen]

5. Hey, she is clearly being sarcastic... She's pointing out the...

difference between the way the Bushies treated Haley Barbour and the way they treated her...I live in Baton Rouge and have never been a big Blanco fan--but I gotta hand it to her for this, one of her most anti-Repuke statements.

[madfloridian]

6. Maybe she is freed now to tell more.

With Breaux running, she can tell us all about it.

:hi:

[blitzen]

9. they (the Blanco people) did tell a fair amount to Congress...

but it didn't get much attention...And, of course, it was the Repuke congress.

But you're right...And I hope she has the guts to do something dramatic, like write a book about it.

[Justice]

3. in other words, the federal response to Katrina was politicized? What a surprise

so family values of the WH

[ComerPerro]

10. it would have helped, but it wouldn't have changed the fact that Bush is a lazy shitbag

[fasttense]

11. The repukes are politically profiling everything

from who they prosecute to who gets our tax dollars. If you ain't a lying, cheating criminal repuke, you ain't getting contracts or emergency relief but you will get investigated.

[nadinbrzezinski]

12. She's right

from what we've seen