NOLA Pumping Bombshell - The News Is Horrible!

[kpete]

NOLA pumping bombshell
by mcbrid35
Fri Jun 08, 2007

The Army Corps of Engineers internal investigation into the floodgate pumps is out, and it is a blockbuster. The news is horrible.

.....................


Bottom lines:

The COE New Orleans District has lied to New Orleans and the nation for over a year. The pumps have had major problems, and not only has the public been kept completely out of the loop, the Corps has actually not implemented a critical fix necessary to assure the pumps work. They've known about that fix for over a year, and have done nothing.

So the pumps are far from ready, and - in my estimation - probably won't be ready this hurricane season.

Millions of taxpayer dollars have been misspent or are unaccounted for.

Multiple cover-ups (on both the engineering and contract administration sides) have taken place.

As a result, New Orleans remains nearly as vulnerable to flooding as it was immediately following Katrina.

The report at:
http://www.box.net/shared/eec5ykusyq

Matt

more at:
http://www.dailykos.com/story/2007/6/8/16815/07110
and:
http://fixthepumps.blogspot.com/2007/06/bombshell.html

[rec_report]

1. K&R. n/t

[malaise]

2. To the greatest page

This is serious.

[Mabus]

3. Why am I not surprised?

Millons misspent and/or unaccounted for :banghead:

[Jackpine Radical]

34. Well, I for one AM surprised by the missing millions.

With Halliburton involved in the cleanup you'd think they could have gotten the ripoff up to at least a few billion by now.

[Mabus]

38. That's true

I think billions is still doable.

[whistle]

4. This is now about public endangerment and criminal neglect

...what's next with this Bush administration?

[Greyskye]

5. K & R

:kick:

[Richard Steele]

6. Par for the course in Bushcabal™'s Amurkkka. Thieves, cheats, and incompetent cronies everywhere.

They aren't Administrators running everything,
they are LOOTERS. And B*sh declared open season
on whatever they think they can get away with.

[Lydia Leftcoast]

52. Bush is our very own Ferdinand Marcos

:grr:

Everything his administration touches turns to crap.

[youngdem]

7. We know all of this...I don't know why you assert the Corps is hiding this

The Corps has regular pump tests at the new West End gate system, at the old Marconi Canal and the old pump station in Old Metairie. They televise them! Then, the Corps rep comes over and tells the observers what happened.

They had some cavitation issues that are still not fully resolved, but the Corps has been very upfront about that. They have told us in no uncertain terms that the city will not have Cat. 3 protection for the East AND West Banks until 2011....BUT, please note, we have MUCH better protection today in ALL parts of Southwest Louisiana than we did on August 29, 2005. That much is FACT. Better levees, more pumping capacity, tornado proof crew accommodations at each pump station, new levees along the entire Mississippi all the way to Venice (the mouth), better evacuation routes under construction, sediment diversion projects and marsh replenishment projects are funded, the dreaded MRGO is being closed by next year (saving a marsh system roughly the size of Wales, and on and on.

In short, it is not all bad news, we are working hard, and the levee system is in better shape than the day before the storm.

The corps did buy the pumps from a Jeb Bush crony, but if you demanded Bush cronies get cut out, NOTHING would be funded in recovery out of spite. Just a necessary evil for now.

Honestly, as bad as the Road Home program not being funded is for the city, I feel pretty good about where we are in the recovery, all things considered.

But, we are getting NO fucking help on the day to day recovery funding, rebuilding schools, hospitals, fire stations, NONE of that is being done.

[Nothing Without Hope]

8. Keith Olbermann needs to hear about this. The whole country does. K & R

[e-mail]
[e-mail]

[Uncle Joe]

9. Thanks for the thread kpete

Kicked and recommended.

[Breeze54]

10. Yup! Thank Jeb Bush!

After all his company made the pumps!
The non-working, inadequate pumps! :grr:

[LSK]

11. K&R

[WiseButAngrySara]

12. This is what should be covered non-stop in the M$M and

NOT Hilton. Disgusting.

[EFerrari]

13. Who is surprised.

:nuke:

[Parche]

14. New Orleans

Who cares about New Orleans, when the people in Baghdad dont have enough clean water to drink..................:sarcasm: :sarcasm: :sarcasm:

[truedelphi]

49. Sad to say, our own troops don't have clean water in baghdad

And Halliburton has the water contracts for Iraq just as it has the recovery contracts in
New orleans

[Raksha]

15. This is disgusting!

I'm off to read the DKos story now and find out just how disgusting...

[Kurovski]

16. Jesus H.

They WANT it to happen again.

R

[Swamp Rat]

20. Yes they mutherfucking do!

And if it does, and I survive another Katrina, then I am LEAVING THE USA FOR GOOD!!



:grr:

[Kurovski]

26. If it happens again, you and your family will be out of there

and you will survive. Is that understood?

I don't want to hear any different about the "survive" part.

You made it out last time, even though you hesitated somewhat.

[Swamp Rat]

28. I have the elderly to consider.

It depends on if they can and are willing to be moved.

The last time nearly killed some of us, while a few of my elderly neighbors either died or never returned.

[Kurovski]

30. I hope you can talk to them and make emergency plans now,

so there will be as little hesitation as possible.

Make a plan now.

Please, Swamp. :hug:

[Recursion]

17. Are you f***ing kidding me? Do you know what this means for "heartland" farmers?

It was bad enough when we were screwing over disenfranchised poor black people. But this has the potential to make the crisis much wider. The entire Mississippi valley and a good deal of the Plains depend for their economy on there being functioning ports at Chicago and NO. Lots of my farming relatives had to lose a lot of money last year because they still couldn't get their soybeans downriver.

NO is a cultural treasure and I want to see the city rebuilt, but we're facing nothing short of an economic disaster for a very large (geographicly, at least) section of the country if this nonsense continues. I'll give my freeper flyover country farming relatives credit, though: they never once went down the cowardly "why rebuild a city below sea level" path. They knew exactly why: because economies from Kansas City to Chattanooga to Chicago depend on there being a functioning port where the Mississippi hits the Gulf.

How much did we pay for this?

[frogcycle]

55. you hit the nail on the head

this is essential to our economy
it is national security
it is like the interstate highway system - part of our basic infrastructure

go look at this website:

NOLAPlan

your point is expressed there - forget quibbling over the cultural aspects and the he said/she said = the country NEEDS it and needs to fix it RIGHT - permanently, not dither around with bandaids.

[colorado_ufo]

68. THANK YOU for pointing this out!

I have been pounding my head against the wall with people who don't understand why there is a city there, and there always will be. It is crucial, indispensable, for the American economy as well as for country's defense.

My whole family is there and has been for generations. I'm the only black sheep who moved away, to Colorado. Some of my family are elderly, and I worry about them constantly.

The way that this city and its good citizens have been treated is an ongoing disgrace.

And don't even get me started on the idea of having the ports overseen by foreign entities!

[porphyrian]

18. Why does the Army hate America? - n/t

[Hubert Flottz]

19. Yes but look at the bright side...

Jeb and his friends are happy as clams!

[Swamp Rat]

21. If I recall correctly, the pumps were sold to us by one of Jeb Bushler's former business partners

[Breeze54]

23. Republicans, not content with Katrina, continue their mission to destroy New Orleans

Jeb Bush

Republicans, not content with Katrina, continue their mission

to destroy New Orleans, this time with faulty pumps from Jeb Bush

http://www.correntewire.com/tags/jeb_bush

Submitted by lambert on Tue, 2007-03-13 21:23.

* Republican Looting
* Department of Stop it! You're killing me!
* Jeb Bush
* katrina
* New Orleans
* Republicans

Un-fuckin-believable. No, cancel that. Standard operating procedure*. Read it and scream:

The Army Corps of Engineers, rushing to meet President Bush’s promise to protect New Orleans
by the start of the 2006 hurricane season, installed defective flood-control pumps last year
despite warnings from its own expert that the equipment would fail during a storm, according
to documents obtained by The Associated Press.

The 2006 hurricane season turned out to be mild, and the new pumps were never pressed into action.
But the Corps and the politically connected manufacturer of the equipment are still
struggling to get the 34 heavy-duty pumps working properly.

The pumps are now being pulled out and overhauled because of excessive vibration, Corps officials said.
Other problems have included overheated engines, broken hoses and blown gaskets, according to
the documents obtained by the AP.

And guess what the political connection was?


Read more » http://www.correntewire.com/republicans_not_content_with_katrina_continue_their_mission_to_destroy_new_orleans_this_time_with_faulty_pumps_from_jeb_bush

:grr:

[Swamp Rat]

27. What will America be like without New Orleans?

How will Americans, in general, live with themselves knowing they let us die?

[Breeze54]

29. I don't know how they live with themselves now...

:hug:

It really, really is heart breaking.

[DemBones DemBones]

44. America would never be the same without New Orleans.

And I still rage about how they let people die there, and how they dispersed the evacuees all over the U.S and how they won't let people back in their own houses still.

I think the people dying while * played guitar and ate John McCain's birthday cake woke a lot of people up as to how little our government cares about protecting us.

[KamaAina]

48. Believe it or not, it wouldn't suck...

...it'd suckity suck suck!! It'd be so boring it'd drill a hole through itself all the way to China!

A new (post-K) New Orleanian, one of my all-too-few personal acquaintances in the city, had this to say while vacationing on the nearby Florida Panhandle:

http://wetbankguide.blogspot.com (post of Saturday, June 2)

Even my wife remarked on it after her year-and-a-half in New Orleans: Destin is just like everywhere else, she said was (sic) we drove down the main drag to dinner one night. The implication coming from one of the newest Orleanians was clear to me: New Orleans is not.

[Patchuli]

54. I love your city

and I never made it there before Katrina. I still love your city and I hope to see * and Halliburton go down in flames for what they have done. You are part of us and part of us will die without you.

[WiseButAngrySara]

59. I loved NOLA! And I still ache for the lost beauty and the human

tragedy. I really believe that Edwards recently gave the most convincing discussion of how he would handle Katrina differently were he elected. I was quite impressed with his response and I thought he was genuinely sincere. He is now on the top of my list unless Gore enters the race.

[babylonsister]

39. You would be right:

http://southernstudies.org/gulfwatch/2007/03/no-pump-problems-renew-cronyism.html

N.O. pump problems renew cronyism concerns

It's become a familiar theme in the ongoing Hurricane Katrina saga: Businesses with close Bush administration ties get key contracts, only to flub the job they were paid handsomely to do.

Yet another example came to light this week, thanks to the Associated Press: Scrambling to meet President Bush's promise to protect New Orleans before the start of last year's hurricane season, the Army Corps of Engineers installed defective flood-control pumps despite warnings from its own engineer that the equipment would likely fail during a storm. And -- surprise, surprise -- the manufacturer who got the $26.6 million contract to install the problem pumps happened to have close ties to the Bush family.

The contractor in this case is Moving Water Inc., a Deerfield Beach, Fla. firm owned by J. David Eller and sons. Eller was a business partner of former Florida Gov. Jeb Bush in a company called Bush-El that marketed MWI pumps overseas in questionable deals that remain under investigation. In addition, Eller has donated about $128,000 to politicians -- mostly Republicans -- over the past decade, according to information the AP obtained from the Center for Responsive Politics.

more...

[opihimoimoi]

22. I told them not to get the Chinese Pumps...did they listen?? NOOOO

Ya get what ya pay for...crap...and I should know...I'm Chinese....

[Hubert Flottz]

36. Pubs know pumping!

Pooches!

[opihimoimoi]

45. Someone got the friggen cheap pumps that can't pump for shit

The Pubs pump Pooches??? Oh, I get it now. I think you're on to sumpthin....thats what they do.....thats all they do...pump BS into pooches....oops, that don soun rite....lemme think...

[corkhead]

24. Further proof that government doesn't work and should be drowned in a bathtub

I believe Republicks are fuckups on purpose

[ptolle]

57. old line

What's the old line about republicans are the party that say government doesn't work, then get elected and prove it.I'm sure the ruling class cons will turn this into an argument for privatization a sort of blackwaterization of the Corps of Engineers.

[frogcycle]

25. there is a better solution for New Oleans area

NOLAPlan

It is massive, but permanent, and restores the environment as it should be.

[uppityperson]

41. That looks interesting, will have to check out further.

Rather than a temporary fix, make it big a permanent?

[frogcycle]

53. Please do -

and send feedback

[Pooka Fey]

31. Oh for fuck's sake. Can't we get anything done right around here?

:mad:

[emilyg]

40. No. Nobody cares anymore.

[frogcycle]

56. no

[earth mom]

32. They want to completely annihilate New Orleans one final time....

because they gotta make way for the "New Disneyfied New Orleans" that will make some people-the chosen few-DISGUSTINGLY FILTHY RICH. :puke:

[kickysnana]

33. Is this part of the Mexico-Canada superhighway plan? n/t

[SharonRB]

35. Why does this not surprise me?

Unfortunately.

[incapsulated]

51. Yeah I was about to post the same thing

:(

[babylonsister]

37. Why does this remind me of all the 'improvements' in Iraq? Rec'd. nt

[sellitman]

42. The decider can take over the country completely with another NO disaster.

Remember?


This is his plan.

His "Final Answer"

OMFG!!!

[DemBones DemBones]

43. Louisiana 1927

What has happened down here is the winds have changed
Clouds roll in from the north and it started to rain
Rained real hard and rained for a real long time
Six feet of water in the streets of Evangeline

The river rose all day
The river rose all night
Some people got lost in the flood
Some people got away alright
The river have busted through clear down to Plaquemines
Six feet of water in the streets of Evangelne

Chorus:

Louisiana, Louisiana
They're tryin' to wash us away
They're tryin' to wash us away
Louisiana, Louisiana
They're tryin' to wash us away
They're tryin' to wash us away

President Coolidge came down in a railroad train
With a little fat man with a note-pad in his hand
The President say, "Little fat man isn't it a shame
what the river has done
To this poor crackers land."

--Randy Newman

[FloridaJudy]

46. **Sigh**

Business as usual for the BFEE. Having f#@ked over Florida, Jeb now gets to ruin a whole new place. Heckuva job.

K&R

[yardwork]

47. k*r

[NewJeffCT]

50. Friday news dump, it looks like

will this make any headlines over the weekend?

[lies and propaganda]

58. They should be fucking hung for what they allowed to happen

They drowned a goddamned city and fucking Brownie resigned. thats all we fucking got.

If katrina wasnt treason i dont know what is.

[fooj]

62. You speak the truth.

:grr:

[19jet54]

60. The reality of New Orleans....

... is that there was SO much damage done by mother nature, it will take us mere mortals a very long time to catch up, never mind getting ahead?

[madrchsod]

61. those pumps were about a hundred years old

and what ever company built them is out of business. i live in a town where a 100+ year old company who built all the pumps for the water supply in chicago and most nuke plants in the mid west finally went out of business...why? because they could`t get good castings from china and the chinese under cut their bids. i doubt the bush connected company is demanding the finest quality castings from china..what the hell if they have sand holes? no one will notice....

[proud patriot]

63. This is outrageous

:grr: we have levees out here in the delta of California and
this news is just so infuriating :mad:

[PurpleChez]

64. Heck of a job, Georgie!

Bush and his coterie of vampires can all just rot.

[ChairmanAgnostic]

65. Army corpse of Engineers is notable for screw ups, not successes

Probably because they have so many.
They foolishly think that they can do battle with Mommy nature (thanks, paris) and win.

the Missississississippi is a great example of man-made disasters.

[Tuesday_Morning]

66. k & R!

:kick:

[undergroundpanther]

67. The Bush administrations solution

Tho global warming and ecological collapse is to let people die in disasters or murder them in useless wars or in other ways.


Humans have overpopulated the Earth and in the process have created an ideal nutritional substrate on which bacteria and viruses (microbes) will grow and prosper. We are behaving like bacteria growing on an agar plate, flourishing until natural limits are reached or until another microbe colonizes and takes over, using them as their resource. In addition to our extremely high population density, we are social and mobile, exactly the conditions that favor growth and spread of pathogenic (disease-causing) microbes. I believe it is only a matter of time until microbes once again assert control over our population, since we are unwilling to control it ourselves. This idea has been espoused by ecologists for at least four decades and is nothing new. People just don't want to hear it.
http://uts.cc.utexas.edu/~varanus/Everybody.html

http://dieoff.org/

How would a Nobel Prize-winning economist solve our global environmental crisis? Friedman:

"Ecological values can find their natural space in the market, like any other consumer demand. The problems of the environment, like any other problem, can be resolved through price mechanisms, through transactions between producer and consumer, each with his own interests." <13>

And what if something threatened the very false foundation of this magical marketplace belief system held by corporations that these pathological optimists have created? A threat like , ecological collapse being caused by too much growth,producing and consuming?

Over consumption has costs the corporate bean counters do not factor in..caused by too many people existing and people producing too much stuff . This happens because it is in the owners self interest to make himself rich off others labor that's what corporations exist for.


A massive Die off would be the simplistic solution of choice for these psychopathic, immoral,rigid controlling magical thinkers with too much money and too much power to risk ANYTHING outside of the 'free' market religion of "growth" and causing crashes to bear imagining..

Killing off billions of people by letting it happen by doing nothing to help them, like the situations in NOLA or Darfur or causing deaths like War in Iraq and polyheme,and letting a TB patient go globe trotting all over to try to start an epidemic.
Die off is the corporate pathological grow at any cost optimists way of fixing a problem without changing himself, It is also a psychopaths way of solving a big problem,And most big companies are run by pathologically optimistic con men psychopaths. Kill 'em all and let god sort them out. No people no problems.


These market -place growth worshipers do not want to give up thier'economic dream; and solve this problem because the solution requires them too turn away from the magical marketplace religion of booms and busts ,the bulls and bears they so desperately believe will solve anything.So what do they do, it's a bust,placed on US ,we die to correct the environmental crisis the marketplace growth worshiping fools created and got wealthy from..

[Imagevision]

69. MSM refuses to provide coverage - Big biz still rules... A another Bushco fleece-job!

[Bluebear]

70. This will work out (chuckle) VERY WELL for New Orleans.

Right, Ma?

[orleans]

71. when is mary landrieu going to be voted out??

this on kos link:
"Update: Senator Landrieu has called for deeper investigation, including calling on the Justice Department to look into the contracting irregularities and telling the GAO to do better."

hasn't new orleans had enough of her republican politics?