Turn on CNN NOW : Aaron Brown - what they KNEW before Katina Hit

[cthrumatrix]

contradicts the FEAM and Bush satatements

[Rose Siding]

1. He's done really well, tonight. This new info is stunning

[Gregorian]

21. THERE'S NO OIL IN NEW ORLEANS.

Sorry about the caps. I've been getting overzealous lately.

[fearnobush]

31. But there may be a lake of it underneath?

Is there oil under NOLA?

[cthrumatrix]

2. talking about a NO news article PREDICTED it ALL

[mike_c]

7. people have been predicting this for DECADES....

eom

[TahitiNut]

20. Here are many such articles from the last 5-6 years.

http://www.hurricane.lsu.edu/in_the_news.htm

[cthrumatrix]

3. B4 911 FEMA predicted NO and hurricane was a National Issue

[cthrumatrix]

4. talking about how BUSH CUT FUNDING

[cthrumatrix]

8. Federal Officials ignored NO requests.....

[AuntiBush]

22. Yeah. And "NOW" the new FEMA under Bush Says Different!

Just delete, not-disclose, cut benefits, blame Clinton, blame the poor, blame "looters" for taking food and water, blankets - whatever. Oh, their old, elderly, sickly, dying and dead on the streets and all I can think is "Why do they hate us? Why?"

[Miss Chybil]

5. This is it. When will they ask the question another poster asked...

here tonight?

"How can the American people have any confidence that this president and his administration could possible handle a terrorist attack on a grand scale when they are failing so horribly at handling a natural disaster they knew was coming a week before it hit?"

How can we? How can we?

[joanne]

10. Needs to be on the front page of EVERY newspaper in America!

Good reporting!

[babylonsister]

23. It's happening. We have been duped, and everyone is

waking up to that fact. I'd like to be happy about it, but the devastation is unreal.

[Catchawave]

6. WOW....amazing stuff

Can we find a copy of the article? I'm saving this kind of stuff for the Impeachment Hearings (in my perfect world).

[cthrumatrix]

13. here is all you need...take a good read

Point #1
----------
In 2001, FEMA ranked a major hurricane strike on New Orleans as “among the three likeliest, most castastrophic disasters facing this country.” Bush slashed hurricane funding anyway. August 29, 2005 10:19

http://thinkprogress.org/2005/08/29/bush-knew /


Point #2 - Study to confirm
----------------------------
IEM Team to Develop Catastrophic Hurricane Disaster Plan for New Orleans & Southeast Louisiana
June 3, 2004

IEM, Inc., the Baton Rouge-based emergency management and homeland security consultant, will lead the development of a catastrophic hurricane disaster plan for Southeast Louisiana and the City of New Orleans under a more than half a million dollar contract with the U.S. Department of Homeland Security/Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA).

In making the announcement today on behalf of teaming partners Dewberry, URS Corporation and James Lee Witt Associates, IEM Director of Homeland Security Wayne Thomas explained that the development of a base catastrophic hurricane disaster plan has urgency due to the recent start of the annual hurricane season which runs through November. National weather experts are predicting an above normal Atlantic hurricane season with six to eight hurricanes, of which three could be categorized as major.

The IEM team will complete a functional exercise on a catastrophic hurricane strike in Southeast Louisiana and use results to develop a response and recovery plan. A catastrophic event is one that can overwhelm State, local and private capabilities so quickly that communities could be devastated without Federal assistance and multi-agency planning and preparedness.

Thomas said that the greater New Orleans area is one of the nation’s most vulnerable locations for hurricane landfall.

snip

http://www.ieminc.com/Whats_New/Press_Releases/pressrel ...


Point #3 - Bush cuts NO funding by 80%
--------------------------------------
In early 2004, as the cost of the conflict in Iraq soared, President Bush proposed spending less than 20 percent of what the Corps said was needed for Lake Pontchartrain, according to a Feb. 16, 2004, article, in New Orleans CityBusiness.

On June 8, 2004, Walter Maestri, emergency management chief for Jefferson Parish, Louisiana; told the Times-Picayune: "It appears that the money has been moved in the president's budget to handle homeland security and the war in Iraq, and I suppose that's the price we pay. Nobody locally is happy that the levees can't be finished, and we are doing everything we can to make the case that this is a security issue for us."

Also that June, with the 2004 hurricane season starting, the Corps' project manager Al Naomi went before a local agency, the East Jefferson Levee Authority, and essentially begged for $2 million for urgent work that Washington was now unable to pay for. From the June 18, 2004 Times-Picayune:

"The system is in great shape, but the levees are sinking. Everything is sinking, and if we don't get the money fast enough to raise them, then we can't stay ahead of the settlement," he said. "The problem that we have isn't that the levee is low, but that the federal funds have dried up so that we can't raise them."
snip

http://www.editorandpublisher.com/eandp/news/article_di...

[kittenpants]

9. "how could we have anticipated that the press would actually

call us on our BS this time?"

[LisaL]

12. I am amazed at it as well. It's like their old self have been

snatched and replaced with honest versions.

[leftchick]

11. good but short

way too short

[Pithy Cherub]

14. Ed Henry - wow!

way before the recommendation on Millions to be spent which would be a drop in the bucket compared to the BILLIONS that would be needed to rebuild NOLA.


Then the other reporter brings up the 690,000 successfully evacuated in China...

[cthrumatrix]

15. FEMA told bush.... bush cut the funding...what else does anyone need

to know?

[snot]

16. did you see this re- what the new FEMA Dir did in Miami-Dade?

Just posted at: http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=view_all&address=104x4567425 :

FEMA Director Michael D. Brown's earlier scandal

I just posted this on a thread about Brown from several hours ago -- but at the rate things are moving, I thought it had better have a thread of its own. It seems that Michael D. Brown, the blitheringly incompetent head of FEMA, was involved in some interesting goings-on back last winter;

http://www.sun-sentinel.com/news/sfl-fema24nov24,0,2387...

Florida lawmakers Tuesday called for state and federal investigations into how the government approved about $28 million in Hurricane Frances claims for new furniture, clothes and appliances for residents of Miami-Dade County, which was barely touched by the storm.

<snip>

The actions follow a report in the South Florida Sun-Sentinel Sunday that hurricane relief in Miami-Dade bought thousands of new televisions, microwaves, refrigerators and other appliances. FEMA paid for new cars, dental bills and a funeral, even though the county Medical Examiner recorded no deaths from Frances.

FEMA inspectors attributed damage to tornados -- there were none recorded in the county -- and in six instances listed "ice/snow" as the cause, the newspaper reported.

<snip>

Shaw wrote to FEMA Director Michael D. Brown six weeks ago, after the newspaper first reported that thousands of Miami-Dade residents had collected hurricane relief from the Labor Day storm that hit 100 miles to the north. Brown announced that FEMA would investigate, but so far has not provided any results or returned phone calls from the congressman's staff, said Shaw, chairman of Florida's delegation.

http://www.sptimes.com/2005/01/25/State/Suspect_in_kidn...

FEMA Director Michael D. Brown has "stymied investigations" and failed to accept responsibility for mistakes that led to more than $30-million in Hurricane Frances payments to residents of Miami-Dade, even though the county experienced "no more than a heavy rainstorm," Rep. Robert Wexler, D-Fla., wrote to Bush.

"Such a gross waste of taxpayer monies cannot be taken lightly," Wexler wrote.

Bush had not seen Wexler's letter but stands by Brown, said Taylor Gross, a White House spokesman. "The president has full faith in the outstanding job that Under Secretary Mike Brown and FEMA are doing in providing assistance to hurricane victims."

FEMA issued a statement saying the agency will cooperate with an ongoing criminal investigation by the Department of Homeland Security's inspector general into allegations of fraud in Miami-Dade.

[RagingInMiami]

19. I remember when that was happening

It was an election year.

[Liberty Belle]

26. The links don't work.

[Drum]

28. Well there ya go:

"stymied investigations and failed to accept responsibility for mistakes"

That quote might as well be from this Admin's psych profile.
Too many agencies and corporations singing in tune with that dynamic.

Time to throw the bums out.

[against all enemies]

17. Both CNN and ABC have been good tonight. MSNBC Bushshit.

[seito]

18. Countdown and Scarborough have been good

[fearnobush]

32. Olbermann was excellent on MSNBC.

The NBC affiliate reporter, Rodreguez I think, had me in tears, he explained that the people at the civic center are dying, how they are all stand up, orderly citizens with no food or water and NO ONE was looting amoung them. He broke in tears a few times, filming dead people, The US Federal GOVT's crimes to humanity. He pleaded with the GOVT that these are good people who deserve to live.

[boddhi]

24. CNN is angry

They're "embedded". They're the only news organization that has any pool of reporters to speak of, and they're there. One of their reporters is hiding in the attic of a police station where the police are just hoping to protect the station through the night.

Just a little while ago, the anchor said something to the effect of: "In the 'help is on the way category' - I wish I could stop saying that - the senate has passed a relief package."

[jillan]

25. Did anyone get to see Anderson Cooper?

I was going to watch Hardball, but Cooper was fantastic!!

He was broadcasting from the area (NO) and he was very emotional.

He interviewed Landreiu, and she was saying how thankful she was for this and that, and for bushit coming tomorrow and for this congressman and that, and he cut her off!!! :toast: He said to her - do you have a clue what is going on here? There are people dying in this city, I don't think that people really care who you want to thank!

He interviewed citizens from the area, and cried with them.
He was awesome. I never turned back on Hardball.

[osaMABUSh]

30. I may have to get cable back

are they all so clueless? people are dying. get your fucking amphibious equipment in there and save some lives. fuck the looting. if you give people some food and water and medicine and sleep and hope then they ain't going steal nothing.

[Liberty Belle]

27. Wow, great! I sent Keith a bunch of articles--looks like he read 'em!

I hope the other networks will be bold enough to expose these truths, too.

[kenny blankenship]

29. Of course Jaimie McIntyre showed up to present the view

that mobilization has been perfectly uncompromised by the diversion of the National Guard to Iraq.
Sucked that Chimp dick like he was born to do it. Said the criticisms are viewed by Pentagon as disloyalty to Bush...

[Atman]

33. Jamie was GOOD. He sounded as if he knew he betraying Bush

I didn't think he was selling out to BushCo at all. He was pointing out how absurd they are, and Aaron did a good job with the followup. Cut him some slack.