"I take responsibility"

[Occhidiangela]

I seldom post but this is too good to pass up.....*moves to side to avoid the flames*

   My sister is civilian Military and works with the CDC...part of her job also involves direct contact with FEMA. At this time she is in NO with a task force to consider the problems with the contamination of the environment and protection of the food supplies.

  I spoke with her the Thursday after Katrina and she told me that one of the major problems was taking away the ability of FEMA to react immediately by placing them in the Department of Homeland Security...there was, according to her, miscommunication between the agencies involved which caused massive delays in the mobilization<sp> of aid to affected areas...the other problem, according to her, was the fact that Brown was unqualified for anything of this magnitude of response*I won't say exactly what she said...but it was rather nasty*
   Shadowe
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Ok, ShadowSpirit, is she civilian or military? Spit it out.

Your post smells like rotten fish. You are either trolling or don't have any idea what you are talking about.

The issue of the reorg has already been addressed on this forum, though I don't doubt that any number of us are very unhappy about it. Interagency friction has been endemic in America since about the time the Department of the Treasury was formed.

As to your cheap shots on Director Brown, he apparently did pretty well last year when 4 Hurricanes his Florida in a short period of time.

Oh but according to your genius of a sister, he's not qualified? Right. Go fish.

I find it interesting that you feel a functional/specialist in environmental impact (difficult stuff) is qualified to judge command and control efficiency, other than seeing from the execution side where things trip.

Hey, Shadow, guess what? In every large operation, stuff goes wrong. Military, Civilian, Business. That everyone working their butts off for the past three weeks to sort out the mess on the fly, too often, is sure to add to frustration at the functional level. I've been there, done that, during a major flood. Frustrating, at times.

Your cause and effect assertion is pure, reductionist, moonshine. Brown was surely scapegoated, a slap he took with reasonable grace. Oh, but wait, you tell us the problem was the extra layers of bureaucracy, of DHS absorbing FEMA, but really Brown (FEMA) is the problem? Once again,

WHICH IS IT?

You don't know.

I suggest you either clarify what you are talking about, in detail, or put a sock in it.

Occhi

[Ashock]

Ok, ShadowSpirit, is she civilian or military?&nbsp; Spit it out.
Occhi
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What's the problem with that? I am for example a Russian-American. Some people might also refer to me as a WiseAss-American. So, she is Civilian-Military. Jane Fonda for example could be called a Capitalist-Communist, or a Traitor-American. I don't see an issue at all here. Life is made of contradictions and dual meanings, you know. Ever hear of Jews for Jesus, or Bob Dylan?





:wacko:


-A

[Any1]

There is unfortunately, and to all our detriment, in the US a culture of looking for a sacrificial lamb instead of a comprehensive solution as a response to any sizable problem. This has been the rule and not in the exception is both politics and business for the last 40-50 years. A disastrous side-effect of this "policy" is that the problem in question often doesn’t get addressed properly.

There seems to an emerging consensus that part of the reason for FEMA’s slow response, is the added bureaucracy it was saddled with when it joined the DHS. I don't believe it is fair to solely blame and punish Brown for these perceived failings. I don't care if he had both thumbs securely inserted and was whistling Dixie the whole time.

This link probably will be more representative of the true assessment for the Katrina response.

A little excerpt:


Critics say FEMA was weakened when it was brought under the control of the Department of Homeland Security after the September 11, 2001, attacks on New York and Washington.

Morris said FEMA should be given back its independence and overhauled to cut the bureaucratic red tape. "It's incompetence. They are encumbered by rules and regulations written by someone who just didn't have a clue."

[Occhidiangela]

What's the problem with that? I am for example a Russian-American. Some people might also refer to me as a WiseAss-American. So, she is Civilian-Military. Jane Fonda for example could be called a Capitalist-Communist, or a Traitor-American. I don't see an issue at all here. Life is made of contradictions and dual meanings, you know. Ever hear of Jews for Jesus, or Bob Dylan?
:wacko:
-A
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Ain't no such thing as civilian military. There is government civil service, and there are military, but there is not category of "civilian military." Mutually exclusive terms.

Sort of like non abrassive sandpaper. :wacko:

Occhi

[Occhidiangela]

Morris said FEMA should be given back its independence and overhauled to cut the bureaucratic red tape. "It's incompetence. They are encumbered by rules and regulations written by someone who just didn't have a clue."
[right][snapback]89431[/snapback][/right]

FEMA did not need to be put into the Megarocracy that is DHS.

The Department of Homeland Security need never have existed. It is one of the stupidest moves in government I have seen in a while. The agencies needed to perform functions were already existent, the only lacking element was leadership.

Need I say more?

Occhi

[jahcs]

FEMA did not need to be put into the Megarocracy that is DHS.&nbsp;

...the only lacking element was leadership.

Need I say more?

Occhi
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Don't forget the lack of inter-agency communication ;)

[Guest]

Blackwater? :P

[Guest]

A good deal of you seem to be ignoring the Governor response issues.


Im addressing many of the posters who are blaming Fema etc. I addressed the original post else where.


From what I gathered litening to the NBC news and even more from a Public Radio walk through of the eventes it seems like The Governor of Luisiana made 2 rather giant mistakes.

1 When other states offered their National Gaurds to be sent BEFORE the storm hit the Govoner told them to wait and didnt ask for them till several days after the Storm hit.

2 When the president offered to send in the regular Military and have the Feds take command of the disaster the Governor didnt want to cede control and told the Prsident to wait 24 hours while she made up her mind.




Im not saying at all that Fema didnt make a good deal of mistakes. But the Governor appears to have been over whelmed and her lack of leadership seems to be what delayed much of the help.

[Occhidiangela]

Don't forget the lack of inter-agency communication ;)
[right][snapback]89443[/snapback][/right]

That has always been a problem at the federal level of interdepartmental communication. Always. This is not new. Some agencies are better than others about their cross boundary relationships. (The Coast Guard were always good at this, in my experience, in terms of working cross agency boundaries.)

You make the mandarins important enough, particularly when the directors are political appointees, and you get battles over who has what. It takes leadership to suppress the petty bickering and keep mission focus.

Same as in a large corporation.

Occhi

[Chaerophon]

You attacked Bush for something he hasnt done yet. That makes no sense.

What I find quite hilarious is that earlier in the week, I quite cogently pointed out WHY Bush deserves to be attacked, and it has not, as of yet, had a single response. I even pointed you in the direction of the post and you refused to address it. What Bush ought to take responsibility for is something that IS NOT excusable, for reasons that I have already stated, and what he does after the fact is completely beside the point. He hasn't taken responsibility for one very specific action on his part that led to a loss of life/failure of execution. He ought to do so, and as soon as he does, he ought to be turfed, because the reasons for his failure are entirely inadequate.

The truth is, you are so concerned with padding your post-count that you refuse to engage in any way the substantive content of the thread, and have instead descended into the trolling behaviours for which you have been so well known in the past, but had managed to avoid for a time. Funny, people on here, including myself, had actually started to gain some respect for you - you were directly addressing arguments and showing that you did, in fact, deserve to hold yourself in high esteem. And then this... a shame, really.

I'm waiting. Thus far, you have shown yourself to be little more than a Bush fanboy - change my mind with some actual discourse.

BTW: in this case as in any other, "I detest you" is not a suitable response.

[Roland]

I mean what I say.

And that's the truly scary part.

[Chaerophon]

Your implication would appear to be that FEMA could not have done its job any better, given the circumstances. I'd like to know how you defend that proposition - I suspect that it will require some pretty impressive dance moves.

If Brown is, indeed, being scapegoated, then you will have to explain this to me: why would the Bush camp erect as a scapegoat someone who a.) is clearly not the most qualified candidate for the job and b.) was directly appointed by Bush. Seems to me that this draws a line of responsibility directly back to the man in the oval office, and the only possible answer is that Brown was so far over his head that someone else had to take over. What possible political strategy would lead the White House to make this move?

There are hurricanes in Florida every year: the resources and contingency plans for dealing with such disasters are already established and in place. New Orleans called for some innovation, some footwork, and the response was a complete and utter failure on the part of FEMA.

Your comparison of the two, and your judgement that Brown's appointment is somehow justifiable on the basis of his handling of the Florida hurricanes requires some defense - his suitability is certainly not self-apparent on the basis of his resume and the fact that he handled the Florida cases is not definitive proof of the appropriateness of his appointment. Given that Brown's successor is a FAR more qualified candidate who could quite easily have been given the job in the first place, I really am curious: what is it that would drive the Bush camp to replace Brown if not the absolute need to do so?

The act of replacing him, whether or not it is due to media pressure is as much as an admission of guilt on Bush's part. I firmly believe that the ONLY reason that Bush would replace Brown is due to the fact that he really is incapable of handling the situation, as an admission of guilt on that front is as much as to admit that he has neglected his duty as president of the United States, as per my post above. In other words, he had to be forced by Brown's incompetence into replacing him - from a public relations perspective, replacing Brown is the last thing that Bush would ever want to do, as it amounts to self-incrimination on a scale that is, to my mind, worthy of significant punishment.

[Guest]

Odd that you find it "scarey".

I dont find it scarey when people disagree with me.

And for all my unpopular ideas, precepts and codecensions, I am not one to advocate much violence or intrusive laws.

[Any1]

A good deal of you seem to be ignoring the Governor response issues.
Im addressing many of the posters who are blaming Fema etc. I addressed the original post else where.
From what I gathered litening to the NBC news and even more from a Public Radio walk through of the eventes it seems like The Governor of Luisiana made 2 rather giant mistakes.

1 When other states offered their National Gaurds to be sent BEFORE the storm hit the Govoner told them to wait and didnt ask for them till several days after the Storm hit.

2 When the president offered to send in the regular Military and have the Feds take command of the disaster the Governor didnt want to cede control and told the Prsident to wait 24 hours while she made up her mind.
Im not saying at all that Fema didnt make a good deal of mistakes. But the Governor appears to have been over whelmed and her lack of leadership seems to be what delayed much of the help.
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There is plenty of "blame" to go around. Are you implying that there is no responsibility to be shouldered on the part of FEMA?

They simply responded too slowly: Linky

"Half of Hurricane Katrina evacuees who were trapped in their houses by flood waters waited three or more days to be rescued, according to a survey of storm victims released on Friday.

Thirty-eight percent of the people who stayed behind despite orders to evacuate said they were either physically unable to leave or were caring for a disabled person."

[jahcs]

...um, can everybody please take a deep breath and read each other's posts again and stop reading into each others posts? :(

QUOTE(Ghostiger @ Sep 16 2005, 09:10 PM)
A good deal of you seem to be ignoring the Governor response issues.
Im addressing many of the posters who are blaming Fema etc. I addressed the original post else where.
From what I gathered litening to the NBC news and even more from a Public Radio walk through of the eventes it seems like The Governor of Luisiana made 2 rather giant mistakes.

1 When other states offered their National Gaurds to be sent BEFORE the storm hit the Govoner told them to wait and didnt ask for them till several days after the Storm hit.

2 When the president offered to send in the regular Military and have the Feds take command of the disaster the Governor didnt want to cede control and told the Prsident to wait 24 hours while she made up her mind.
Im not saying at all that Fema didnt make a good deal of mistakes. But the Governor appears to have been over whelmed and her lack of leadership seems to be what delayed much of the help.

There is plenty of "blame" to go around. Are you implying that there is no responsibility to be shouldered on the part of FEMA?

They simply responded too slowly: Linky

"Half of Hurricane Katrina evacuees who were trapped in their houses by flood waters waited three or more days to be rescued, according to a survey of storm victims released on Friday.

Thirty-eight percent of the people who stayed behind despite orders to evacuate said they were either physically unable to leave or were caring for a disabled person."
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[Roland]

The blame goes to more than just people "directly" involved with this whole ordeal - it goes to those indirectly involved, as well, something no one here (or much of anywhere else, for that matter) seems aware of.

One such example is explained thusly:
http://www.groklaw.net/article.php?story...6105216639

Another example is of how hurricane victims are unable to receive aid, find loved ones, etc., all because FEMA will not accept any other browser but IE. Elaboration below.

http://www.groklaw.net/article.php?story...1305273070

It's things like this that make me love my state (although there are a wealth of things that make me hate it, not the least of which is the heavy liberal standing :P). MA was one of the few to stand up to Microsoft during the initial anti-trust / monoploy case, and it was one of the ONLY ones to continue the pursuit (and still does to this very day!) long after the DoJ crumpled. In case you don't know the background, MA is fighting for open standards for document presentation, focusing on an open standard XML, rather than MS's proprietary XML standard. This, of course, has MS in an uproar, spouting no end of nonsense (it truly is ridiculous) - but that is all beside the point.

I bring you these links and stories to raise awareness of other, just-as-critical issues plaguing our country today that Katrina has helped illuminate but that the press, and the majority of the world, still does not consider. I'm not going to bore you all with preachings about Linux (I'm not a Linux zealot; I AM a tremendous supporter of open standards and OSS), etc., but I think it would be detrimental to let this issue go unnoticed any longer - an issue that affects and permeates through every facet of our lives, from the cars we drive to the stores we shop in. It goes beyond simply software (proprietary and otherwise). Because of this, I feel it's important enough to toss into this thread, especially given the relevance it holds with this latest tragedy.

[Roland]

There is plenty of "blame" to go around.&nbsp; Are you implying that there is no responsibility to be shouldered on the part of FEMA?

Now who's trolling? How nice of you to cut out of your quoting the part where he specifically states he's not saying FEMA is completely free of blame.

I, too, am getting sick of reading your tripe spewed over and over. What started out as a decent discussion has devolved into a trollish slugfest that belongs over in the Blizzard forums - and you are one of the biggest causes.

I'm done posting and reading in this thread. Any constructive discussion has been washed away by all this BS. Ironic, isn't it? In a thread touching upon blame, the biggest voice in the thread is doing exactly what he claims to hate - tossing blame around on anyone but himself.

This thread makes me sick.

[Occhidiangela]

Your implication would appear to be that FEMA could not have done its job any better, given the circumstances.

You talkin to me? (Deniro Voice) ;)

I am sure some more perfect out come could have been wished for, and coordination could have been better, in the Compound Emergency. LIkewise, every power sweep in a football game should go for a touchdown, but IRL or in a football game, you work in a resistant medium.

The loss of the structure of valid state and local response, and the utter devastation of infrastructure and transport, as well as the ease with which the lawless erupted, hamstrung FEMA's efforts, and every other contributing agency. FEMA's success relies heavily on success of supporting agencies, please accept my experiences in the FEMA / Military interface in disaster planning, hurricanes, floods, and earthquakes, as valid.

: why would the Bush camp erect as a scapegoat someone who a.) is clearly not the most qualified candidate for the job and b.) was directly appointed by Bush. 

That is how the game is played. And how do you ascertain who "the most qualified candidate is" for any cabinet post? Gimme a break. I have watched a parade of buffoons, over the past 30 years, fill a variety of cabinet posts:

Cyrus Vance (State)
James Watt (Interior)
William Cohen (Defense)

That's just for starters.

What possible political strategy would lead the White House to make this move?

If no one gets fired, no one was held accountable. Someone got fired, someone was held accountable. How hard is that to understand?

There are hurricanes in Florida every year: the resources and contingency plans for dealing with such disasters are already established and in place. 

New Orleans called for some innovation, some footwork, and the response was a complete and utter failure on the part of FEMA. 

Now you are talking out of your Ivory Tower, and you have again chosen to ignore the frightening incompetence of the State and Local authorities.

Requires Innovation? Nice platitude. Hard to innovate on the piano when half the keys are gone, dear friend.

Your comparison of the two, and your judgement that Brown's appointment is somehow justifiable on the basis of his handling of the Florida hurricanes requires some defense -

Did you read the FEMA biographical clip of his background? It was as good as, and in some cases better, than any number of political appointees I have seen over the years. Political appointees are POLITICAL appointees. That is how the game is played. I return once again the the complete ass, John Deutsch, as CIA director. Talk about a collossal f*** up.

The fact that he handled the Florida cases is not definitive proof of the appropriateness of his appointment. 

Now you are making me giggle. You seek perfection in political appointment? OK, please pass me the doobie when you are done drawing on it. :D

It met the good enough standard. If he were so bad, so egregiously AFU, he'd have made a hash of those as well. Hurricane George was a Significant Emotional Event. That was no minor hurricane.

Given that Brown's successor is a FAR more qualified candidate who could quite easily have been given the job in the first place, I really am curious: what is it that would drive the Bush camp to replace Brown if not the absolute need to do so? 

Thank you, 20/20) hindsight. See above. Why do you assume this country is teeming with qualified (may have) and politically reliable for the administration in power (harder standard for many to meet) for every position in government? And, who are interested in serving the public?

The act of replacing him, whether or not it is due to media pressure is as much as an admission of guilt on Bush's part.

Guilt of what? Picking a guy whose Peter Principle threshold had not yet been reached? Again, this happens rather frequently in American politics. Les Aspin, Sec Def for a year, then fired.

It happens.

I firmly believe that the ONLY reason that Bush would replace Brown is due to the fact that he really is incapable of handling the situation, as an admission of guilt on that front is as much as to admit that he has neglected his duty as president of the United States, as per my post above.

Your if then is broken. It is not an admission of neglect of his duty, and if you read any of the articles not shrilly screaming about all kinds of red herrings, (funny, I thought herrings came from the North Sea, not the Gulf of Mexico) you would have known that the president was, within the law, trying to put the strong arm on the LA Governor to get her sorry butt in gear, so federal aid could be phased in. No, the admission of neglect are YOUR words, not those of the President. He will only admit what he admits. (My own views on his competence will rest for another time.)

This hurricane is no test of his quality. Were John Kerry President, and Albert Einstein the FEMA chief, the long term neglect, local failure, and systemic local political neglect of both planning and infrastructure would have all made

Pretty Much The Same Mess.

In other words, he had to be forced by Brown's incompetence into replacing him - from a public relations perspective, replacing Brown is the last thing that Bush would ever want to do, as it amounts to self-incrimination on a scale that is, to my mind, worthy of significant punishment.

Chaer, I think you don't understand American politics particularly well. What I heard him say, between the lines, was that he is responsible for solutions to remedy the mess and the structural problem. Of course, he speaks so poorly, he might have been trying to sort out a carry out Chinese order for all the merit his speech had. :P

You would need to hang GHW Bush, WJ Clinton, GW Bush, and every Mayor of NO, Gov of Louisiana, and each and every Senator and Rep from Louisiana since about 1990 if you want to hang the guilty for the infrastructure defects that led to levy failure. That is where the compound emergency arose from. The lack of evac is purely a local failure. LOCAL.

You also appear to confuse the structures and limits of fedaralism in America with somewhere else, notwithstanding that disaster response is a miniscule portion of the Chief Executive's concerns. Much of the first response is delegated to the states, by statue and by agreement, legally binding agreement.

As to response failures, see Ghostiger's on point reply regarding the criminal failure of the Governor of Louisiana to set the interagency, state-federal event chain in motion. The Governor of Florida, Lawton Chiles, did something similar for Andrew and got his arse handed to him. He took much heat. He was the guy, and I loved him for this, who filed a 2 billion dollar federal suit against Pres Clinton's government for failure to defend America's Borders and the cost to his state handling illegal aliens.

His successor, Jeb Bush, learned from the mistake of his predecessor. He got help early. However, the LA governor is too stupid to learn from someone else's mistake, so she has to make her own.

For her, a wall, a blindfold, and a cigarette. She failed her people monumentally. What I don't get was what she was trying to prove with her wait and see posture? That she was lucky at rolling the dice? They always come up 42.

Louisiana has a hurricane season every year. The Gulf Coast of Louisiana has hurricanes hit nearly every year. Louisiana is no stranger to hurricanes, flooding, and they always need to have an actionable plan.

As I pointed out earlier, this was a compound emergency. I don't think very many any of you "get" that, yet. It's a heart attack that has added to it during surgery an epileptic seizure and internal bleeding in the lower abdomen. Sometimes the patient dies.

The hurricanes in Fla were not compound, which made FEMA's job less burdensome, kept the problem below the Peter Principle threshold, so yes, the overall effort was less difficult to coordinate, as the

Transporation and communication infrastructure was not nearly as badly disrupted in those cases.

And the State of Florida DID NOT SIT ON ITS HANDS.

And that, my very sharp friend, is precisely the point. The backbone on which any plan is built will, once removed, shatter the plan.

I think those who point to how FEMA's job was made more difficult by being assimilated by the HSC borg has a decent point, and I tend to agree,

BUT

FEMA is, and always was, the pivot man in a circle jerk. With a check book.

The task of FEMA is to coordinate a host of interagency and interorganization activities, cross functional activities, and write contracts, fund rapid influx of materials and people, etc. No matter that they are "independent" or a major department of DHS (See the Air Force when it was the Army Air Corps, under the Army for a gross analogue) they still have a discrete and coherent mission.

That missions relies on cooperation and timely response by local and state elements. That was sorely lacking. It relise on timely

DECISION MAKING

That was absent.

It has to act lawfully, within its lawful bounds. That slowed Federal decision making.

Bush can't fire the criminally inept governor of Louisiana, nor can he stand in front of a wall, blindfolded with a cigarette, the mayor of New Orleans. Some say that is a shame, I say that is good. The State of Louisiana will address their own idiotic leaders, just as DC addressed Marion Barry. Some will excuse them because "Whitey Be Keeping Me Down!" The race card has been in play for weeks, I see anyone playing in that game and raise them two lire.

So, Bush scapegoats his FEMA chief. That comes with the badge, at that level: things go wrong on your watch, you may hang. My years as a naval officer taught me that the accountability piece has to be there for all commanders, of which the FEMA director was a sort. So, he gets relieved.

Is there fault in the Federal Government not acting illegally and taking over against the wishes of State authorities.

NO! NO! and a thousand times NO! This is America, and our federalism is supposed to be limited. There are MOU's and Letter's of Agreement between Federal Agencies and states that cover a whole host of coordination. Those letters are scraps of paper when the State lies inert.

See one of my first posts on this topic. America is not any other place. States guard their rights jealously, despite massive federal encroachment. States have to stand up and play smart as a consequence of that. The State of Texas is STILL in court over the base closures in 1993 and environmental clean up. Their opponent? Federal government.

That's our system, as it IS, not as some Federalist Patermalist Socialist pigs would wish it.

Occhi

[Guest]

That is a lie.

1 You said "troll" not "trolls".

2 Prior to yourr post no one except the original poster(and appearently me in your opinion) was doing anything that could be called trolling.




The absurd lack of logic in the original political post could be called trolling(you cant reasonably rant about what someone MIGHT do, you could on the other hand speculated or warn) - but nothing else was.

[Lady Vashj]

If that's how you choose to interpret it I have no way to stop you.