the ineffective and YEAH GOP-butt=kissing mayor of new orleans

[pitohui]

http://blog.nola.com/times-picayune/2007/08/exnagin_aide_pens_tellall_book.html

most of this stuff is not big news to the people of new orleans but to the ignorant outsiders who think ray nagin is anything but a republican in sheeps clothing, it's time for them to sit down and inform themselves

crazy, blames everybody else, believes and spreads wild rumors w.out confirmation, kisses * butt in private while pretending to be a black democrat in public, hating the real black democrats like william jefferson...ray nagin, the man whose family lives in dallas, he takes the cake for the worst possible mayor to have at the helm in time of crisis

while new orleans drowned, he was trying to step on blanco's face because, what after all, is the real priority here?

excerpt, his excuse for stabbing us in the back in the governor's face and backing the GOP candidate:

Nagin's explanation for that decision is recounted in the book: Nagin tells Forman that Jindal presented him with a "big, well-thought-out plan" for the city, whereas Blanco and U.S. Sen. Mary Landrieu "gave me all this (Democratic) party crap."

oh rilly mr mayor?

or how's this reaction to a rumor that appears to have been completely fabricated out of thin air, regarding choppers order to repair the broken levees:

"'It is my understanding that the governor instead sent the choppers to a church in New Orleans East where a thousand people were stranded on the rooftop,'" St. Martin {the rumor monger) old the mayor, according to the book.

Nagin "became furious," Forman writes. Incredulous, he says: "She diverted the choppers for a minister? A minister had more clout with the governor than we have. This is a bunch of bull."

his mature response is instead of finding out the truth from the governor is, among others, to refuse to take her calls

on his storm preparedness:

Friday, less than 72 hours before landfall, Katrina had yet to command much attention from City Hall or city residents, in part because the storm's path had yet to be clearly charted.

That day, Forman recounts, Nagin's executive staff holds its usual lunch meeting at Cobalt, a chic Central Business District eatery, to talk about things that today seem trifling, like the upcoming mayor's race.

The same day, The Times-Picayune featured a front-page story about Donald Trump's plans for a new downtown skyscraper. Forman notes that several reporters met with Nagin a day earlier and didn't ask a single question about Katrina...

i could actually cut him some small slack on that, contrary to some know-it-alls on the internet, the storm was at that time still looking to hit flora-bama and airlines for example were still flying people INTO nola well into saturday -- i won't say he should have known better than the faa or the nhc or the nat'l weather service, however, i think he might have had at least one eye cocked to the situation instead of kissing trump's butt -- and at the end of the day after all the bush butt has been kissed, after all the trump butt has been kissed, where are those wonderful repairs, where are those gleaming new trump condos?

[Maddy McCall]

1. Nagin is a Republican. He only ran as a Democrat because...

he knew that black New Orleanians would not vote for a Republican, black or white.

I know that you--and most of DU--know this, but I think that his ineffectiveness as post-Katrina mayor is grounded in that very day that he decided to run as a Democrat.

The irony is, had he remained a Republican and been elected (which wouldn't have happened, but let's just hypothesize for a second), he would have received a much more substantial disaster response from the Republican administration. So many Republicans praise Haley Barbour's emergency response and ability to get funding for Mississippians post Katrina (the truth of Barbour's effectiveness is debatable)--it wasn't that Barbour was anything special as far as a leader; it was that Barbour had the right connections to the Bush administration. Imagine if Nagin had remained a Republican and been elected: he would have received better relief response and funding, and the right would have hailed him a hero much as they do Barbour.

Edited misspelled words.

[pitohui]

2. absolutely

the day ray nagin decided to enter public life was a terrible day for all involved, the man just seems to be incapable of making a sound, reasoned, unemotional decision

[Tom Joad]

3. It sure did get sick to see supporters of Nagin excuse his criminal conduct during Katrina.

[pitohui]

4. example -- he freezes up and flubs first contact w. bush after katrina

When Bush comes on the line, Nagin asks him to patch the 17th Street Canal levee, Forman writes. Bush promises to take care of it.

"They talked for a moment about search and rescue and exchanged pleasantries," Forman writes. "When they hung up, I asked the mayor why he didn't ask for more.

"¤'Let's get him to do one job and do it right and then we'll ask for the next thing,' he said....

in other words, he fucking froze up and blew it, forman goes on to say the first * knew that nagin was unhappy w. the (almost total lack of) a federal response was when nagin went on the screaming, crying rant w. garland robinette that we all remember so well...

so now he's not exactly real popular on any side, since he has trashed all the democrats and now he's stabbed * in the back on an interview played round the world!

[Maddy McCall]

5. Oh yeah, I agree.

Probably one of the least popular mayors in the US.

Ineffective, insincere, elitist. How he got elected for a second term just boggles the mind. (Well, except for the fact that many displaced NOLAns didn't vote.)

[Maddy McCall]

6. Hey, pitohui, does Jindal have a chance?

What are y'all hearing?

I know some people from central/western Louisiana who are strong conservatives but who won't vote for Jindal. (I said that I know them; not saying that I like them.)

I think that ethnocentrism/xenophobia is at the base of their distaste for Jindal: they won't come out and say it, but, considering their other conversations about race and their resentment toward all not-white people, I think that they just don't feel comfortable voting for someone that they (incorrectly) label as being of the same cultural group who's "taken over the quick stops and hotel chains." :eyes:

Are you hearing any of this?

[pitohui]

7. yes i've heard it

however at this point he's essentially running un-opposed as far as i can tell

we don't seem to have a candidate to get excited about or that even has any name recognition so far