Bush says authorities doing ‘best they can’ after Katrina
Tuesday, September 6, 2005 at 07:38 JST
NEW ORLEANS — While thousands of returning suburban residents jammed roads to check on their homes evacuated a week ago, President George W Bush made his second tour of the devastation Monday and said authorities were doing the “best they can” to cope.
from Japan Today
(comments below)
Help me understand your point, Barnie. Yesterday, Sept. 6, President Bush said authorities were doing the best they can. I know you believe that the first three or four days were a royal screw-up, but are you contending that authorities were still botching the job yesterday, when all evidence indicates that the situation had turned the corner? I know you think that Bush was AWOL on the job for the first couple of days, but are you contending that he was still AWOL yesterday?
(P.S. To help out readers, you should add new comments to the same thread rather than starting a new post and assuming readers can pick up the context — unless, of course, you’re taking the conversation in a significantly new direction.)
Jim, just for your own amusement track the administration spin over the next few days and weeks. We’re from ‘unacceptable’ to ‘doing the best we can’ already. Let us watch where this one goes. 9/11 took us from “will hear from us soon’ to non-existent WMDs to war in the wrong country. I know you think I have no credibility, and I won’t try to convince you otherwise. That is not important to me. Just track it for your own enlightenment. I’ll say no more about it.
I realize that there’s more to this than an exercise in semantics, but it may well be that the federal government is indeed doing “the best it can” and that the results are “unacceptable.” The two concepts are not intractably contradictory. The discussion going forward will be whether the people of the United States are willing to establish an extreme case disaster relief capability that will do better than we have done in this case. The answer may well be yes. If so, commitments of resources and a substantial re-jiggering of lines of authority will have to be considered.
Barnie, I will watch the White House spin as you suggest…. Now that Katrina has become politicized, I have no illusions that the Bush team is spinning like mad now…. spinning like a hurricane. (Ooh, good line. Too bad I’m not a Bush basher!)
Basher? You are a Bush apologist!
http://www.suntimes.com/output/novak/cst-edt-novak08.html
Robert Novak’s take on the spin–URL posted above.
I am shutting down this thread and any other thread connected to Hurricane Katrina — unless there is a clear and compelling Virginia angle to it. If you want to assert George Bush’s culpability in the disaster, then fine another blog. If you want to defend George Bush, find another blog.
If you want to discuss what Katrina means for Virginia, I recommend any number of posts that already appear on Bacon’s Rebellion. Our contributors have raised any number of serious issues already. Development of vulnerable coastlines. Erosion of the wetlands that buffer hurricane storm surges. Evacuation routes out of Hampton Roads. Reshaping government entities with appropriate size and authority to respond to emergencies. Empowering communities to respond to emergencies. Virginia’s response to the Katrina catastrophe. The Governor’s response to Katrina.
There are any number of other useful questions that could be addressed here. What are the major threats that face Virginia? Where are the gaps? Who has first-responder responsibility, and how long would they have to operate alone before FEMA could arrive on the scene? What is the condition of Virginia’s emergency communications infrastucture — how interoperable are state, local and federal communications sytems?
I welcome discussion on any of these topics. However, I will delete any post that veers back into partisan blame mongering/defending of President Bush, FEMA or anyone else for their role in Katrina.
This decision is not targeted at any individual or their comments No one person’s actions or comments have inspired this decision. (Salt Lick, take note: This is not about your use of a particular word.) I don’t blame people for having strong emotions. I just refuse to allow Bacon’s Rebellion to become a forum for bitterness and divisiveness.
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