Y'know, I was just doing some thinking...

[joemurphy]

Around 48 hours before Katrina made landfall, there were predictions that it was going to do a direct hit on New Orleans. As it happened, Katrina moved slightly east and the deadliest Northeast quadrant hit Mississippi instead. Accordingly, New Orleans was spared what could well have been much worse.

But suppose the early prediction had been correct. That original scenario had the levees DEFINITELY breaking and New Orleans DEFINITELY being devastated, not only by a hurricane, but also by a massive flood resulting from fractured levees. Presumably FEMA had those original warnings too. Accordingly, FEMA should have been preparing for both eventualities -- the hurricane AND THE FLOODING as was originally being predicted. Helicopters, boats, relief, manpower, communications devices, and other precautionary measures should have been mobilized pro-actively to be ready for the predicted wind and flood devastation that was going to occur in New Orleans.

FEMA thus had all kinds of time to get ready for flooding in New Orleans. Everyone knew it was a Category 5 storm -- a monster. Everyone was predicting the levees would break.

So, given the above, why was FEMA relying on local and state resources in the first instance? Why weren't the Federal relief efforts in place? Was FEMA ignoring all the predictions of broken levees?

So, what boggles my mind is that everything could have been much much worse and if the original predictions had come to pass -- and a direct Cat-5 hurricane smashed into New Orleans -- FEMA would have been even less prepared and the death toll even higher.

Thus, given what he should have been preparing for, Brown's waiting until 5 hours after landfall to ask DHS's permission to put a paltry 1000 FEMA workers on the ground in the hurricane area strikes me as so incompetent as to be almost ludicrous. It would be ludicrous -- Keystone Kops ludicrous -- if it weren't for the fact that FEMA's belated decision to act hadn't resulted in the deaths of so many people.

[libertypirate]

1. I thought about this too... I think it has to do directly that * didn't...

get what he wanted. He needed to put Blanco in a tight spot, because she wasn't going to give him full control of her state.

[Quakerfriend]

2. FEMA has been intentionally stripped per PNAC plan

[KoKo]

3. Good Points...and Du'ers who live in Hurricane Areas were glued to the

reports...once you've lived through a Hurricane of any magnitude you listen 24/7...and share vibes with those who might be in a hurricane's path.

We saw that disaster report from NOOAH...we saw the dire warnings of "Death, Destruction, Evacuate...and some here living far away might have found it kind of hysterical and not bothered. Hey, if I lived anywhere but the South East this dire prediction would have seemed kind of fanciful to me too...but there it was.

And what the "National Weather Service" predicted came true..and we are as a Nation all the worse for the lack of preparedness from that Giant Beaurocracy FEMA/HOMELAND SECURITY.

It sure shows that Bushies Blather about "country is safer since 9/11 and it was all Clinton's fault, and we've created a "new more efficient agency to deal with disaster," was all lies, lies, lies. Just like Bush and DeLay/Frist's "No Child Left Behind" and the rest of their CRAP LEGILATION...we are less safe and less able to care for our population and our TAX DOLLARS go down the MIGHTY CORPORATE SINKHOLE..that THEY CONTOL.

WAKE UP AMERICA... WE DON'T EXIST ANYMORE!