"earlier presidential involvement could have speeded the response"

[sabra]

http://www.mediainfo.com/eandp/news/article_display.jsp?vnu_content_id=1001995632

'Wash Post' Gets Scoop on Katrina Report Which Blames Gov't and White House

NEW YORK A 600-page congressonal report to be released Wednesday, but described Sunday by the Washington Post, charges that officials from President Bush down "disregarded ample warnings of the threat to New Orleans and did not execute emergency plans or share information that would have saved lives," according to the story in the newspaper.

A draft of the report by an 11-member House committee, made up entirely of Republicans, includes 90 findings of failures at all levels of government, a senior investigation staffer told the Post. Titled "A Failure of Initiative," it is one of three separate current reviews by the House, Senate and White House.

The Post received a 60-page summary of it.

The report "lays primary fault with the passive reaction and misjudgments of top Bush aides, singling out Homeland Security Secretary Michael Chertoff, the Homeland Security Operations Center and the White House Homeland Security Council," the Post declared.

Regarding Bush, the report found that "earlier presidential involvement could have speeded the response" because he alone could have cut through all bureaucratic resistance.

[davidinalameda]

1. Bush was busy

why would anyone expect him to cut short his vacation or fund-raising trips to bother with this

damn libruls

[Liberty Belle]

2. And what was Bush doing after learning the levees broke? This:

Bush or at least his top staff were informed Monday that the levees had broken, but he stayed in San Diego doing PR shots, laughing and playing a guitar while people in New Orleans drowned.

SAN DIEGO HOSPITAL CLOSED TO ACCOMMODATE BUSH VISIT; NO CHEMO

Miriam Raftery

RAWSTORY -- SAN DIEGO, Aug. 30 -- The Naval Medical Center in San Diego's Balboa Park was shut down to accommodate a visit by President George W. Bush Aug. 30, RAW STORY has learned, forcing patients to cancel chemotherapy treatments and hundreds of scheduled patient visits...

Hundreds of protesters lined Park Boulevard outside the hospital entrance.

Earlier that morning, peace activists also gathered outside North Island Naval Air Station, where Bush spoke to an invitation-only group of World War II veterans. Backstage after the appearance, the President strummed a guitar, smiled and laughed, but did not comment on the unfolding catastrophic disaster in New Orleans...

On Monday night, an estimated 600 to 2,000 peace activists held a candlelight vigil outside the Hotel Del Coronado, the historic luxury resort where the President was staying. . .

http://www.rawstory.com/news/2005/San_Diego_hospital_closed_to_acommodate_Bush_visit_No_ch_0906.html