Did everybody read about Bush losing the list of LA's needs from Kathleen Blanco during Katrina?

[sinkingfeeling]

http://www.salon.com/books/excerpt/2008/06/06/rove_katrina/index2.html

"It didn't matter. Not only did Blanco refuse to sign, she gave Bush a two-page letter detailing everything the state needed to cope with the disaster -- troops, buses, supplies, money, and more. It would not be until several days later, when Blanco's aides released the letter to the press and got frantic phone calls from Rove's aide Maggie Grant, that it became clear that Bush had taken the letter Blanco had personally handed to him -- and lost it."


How could the President of the United States lose that letter during the terrible crisis of Katrina? How could anybody be more incompetent? Why didn't he turn it over to an aid, FEMA commanders, or telephone it to somebody? How could he have lost it?

[babylonsister]

1. First I've heard of this, but I echo your question. How on earth could he, with

the staff he has, lose that letter? He's an incompetent nincompoop, for starters. Also doesn't say much for his staff.

[MountainLaurel]

2. Just when you think it can't get any worse

He surprises us.

:cry:

[GCP]

3. Yeah - he accidentally tossed it into the round file

He didn't "lose" it - he tossed it, I'm sure.

[MO_Dem]

4. Lost it intentionally.....

That's my thinking.

[Selatius]

5. Maybe he lost it on purpose to make Blanco and Landrieu look bad.

I live on the Mississippi coast. What they looked like they were trying to do is what the military dictatorship in Myanmar accomplished after their hurricane swept through.

[ljm2002]

16. No "maybe" about it...

...his one goal, as always, was to make political hay. In this case, it was his big chance to make Democratic leadership in the state look bad, and he succeeded very well at that. Unfortunately for him, the net result of his actions and inactions was to make himself and the federal government look bad. However, even at that, he could always fall back on the Republic position of "See, government is incompetent!".

One thing in that Salon piece that stood out though: "In the middle of the worst disaster in American history," Adam Sharp says, "the president was nowhere to be found and was still clearing brush on the ranch, when the previous iconic image people had of him was standing in the still-smoldering rubble of the World Trade Center 24 hours after the attacks and saying, 'I can hear you.' People were asking, 'Where is that moment here?'"

I have bolded the part where Mr. Sharp tells an outrageous falsehood. One can only hope that he "misremembered" what really happened; if so, it is yet another illustration of how effective propaganda really is.

[malaise]

6. This was in the news before n/t

[tridim]

7. He probably wiped his ass with it as he was leaving.

[ColbertWatcher]

10. I didn't see your post before I added mine (#9)! n/t

[yardwork]

8. Barfed on it, maybe.

[ColbertWatcher]

9. He didn't lose it, he wiped his ass with it and flushed it down. n/t

[mrdmk]

11. That list was not part of the plan. Their plan was a coup of an area

that was left leaning, a bastion in the south were different people could get along and to remove all social safety nets. The plan was to make that city a stopping point for tourist. These tourist would leave their money to the wealthy few supported by willing pawns.

That was the plan. Bush Jr. thought the plan was beautiful and nobody had any choice but to follow the plan. That was Bush's confusion, he could not figure out why people were not going along with the plan.

[MissWaverly]

12. I am reading the book Rise and Fall of Karl Rove

Rove is described on page 49: "He is a formula guy in his campaign and he has other people do his dirty tricks. But his approach is dependent on having control of the money and being dominant on the money. When he didn't have dominance on the money-as with Clayton Williams-someone can come out of the blue and win." Since their WH was just one big campaign, that's how they handled Katrina, but when they could not control the spin, when the media went down and starting covering New Orleans day by day, they lost. The only thing that ever concerned them was their own agenda and how to spin everything else.

[2hip]

13. Bush* is a spiteful man

He threw the letter away to punish Blanco for her snippedy insubordination.

"Won't sign, eh, bitch? Well, fuck YOU!"

[underseasurveyor]

14. He can't read

He had no idea what it was he was throwing away. Pictures, he needs pictures.

[aint_no_life_nowhere]

15. Bush probably ran out of pieces of the Constitution to wipe himself with in the toilet

and Blanco's list was handy.