And Kathleen Blanco wanted to keep the guard under her control instead of federalizing it. I remember we had a lot of discussions here at the time. It is almost like Bush refused to cooperate with Blanco, Democrat, unless she did it his way.
The same problem over federalization did not even come up with Republican governor Haley Barbour..according to him there was no problem over it.
Louisiana governor defends decision not to federalize Guard unitsLouisiana Democratic Gov. Kathleen Blanco on Thursday defended her rejection of President Bush's request to federalize the Louisiana National Guard in the wake of Hurricane Katrina, taking issue with New Orleans Mayor Ray Nagin's description of chaos surrounding the decision.
"The mayor was not in the meeting ," Blanco told the Senate Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs Committee. "I told the president that the proper way is for me, as governor, to remain in control of the National Guard," Blanco said.
She said while she was "pushing" for more federal troops to come into her state, she was adamant that she would have control of the Guard.
The panel was holding its 15th hearing on hurricanes Katrina and Rita in an effort to determine what went wrong and what the federal government can do now to prevent similar circumstances in times of natural or man-made disaster.
Mississippi Republican Gov. Haley Barbour, who also testified before the panel, said the question of federalizing his state's National Guard never came up with the administration because he made it clear beforehand that he would not be amenable to such a suggestion.
Playing favorites?
And then I did a search for something I remembered...sadly enough. What Tom Tancredo put in writing about withholding aid to the politicians in Louisiana and appointing a special group to handle it instead. Political, you say? I agree.
Here is the
pdf version of Tancredo's letter to Denny Hastert.Here is the html version, from which I quote.
This is the html version of the file
http://finance.baylor.edu/weblogs/riskmgmt/docs/Katrina/Louisiana_Politicians.pdf.9/7/2005
Dear Mr. Speaker,
Given the abysmal failure of state and local officials in Louisiana to plan adequately for or respondto the effects of Hurricane Katrina on the city of New Orleans, and given the long history of public corruption in Louisiana, I hope the House will refrain from directly appropriating any funds from the public treasury to either the state of Louisiana or the city of New Orleans.
Instead, reconstruction and relief funds dedicated to the people of New Orleans should be administered by a private organization or a select committee similar to the historic Truman Commission.Public corruption is a well known problem in Louisiana. The head of the FBI in New Orleans justthis past year described the states public corruption as "epidemic, endemic, and entrenched. No branch ofgovernment is exempt."
Over the last thirty years, a long list of Louisiana politicians have been convicted of crimes; the list includes a governor, an attorney general, an elections commissioner, an agriculture commissioner, three successive insurance commissioners, a congressman, a federal judge, a State Senate president, six other state legislators, and a host of appointed officials, local sheriffs, city councilmen, and parish police jurors. Given the documented public corruption in the state, I am not confident that Louisianaofficials can be trusted to administer federal relief aid.Clearly the federal response from FEMA in the aftermath of the hurricane was hampered bybureaucratic ineptitude.
Making matters worse, the Mayor of New Orleans and the Governor of Louisiana have demonstrated mind-boggling incompetence in their lack of planning for and response to this disaster. According to one recent media report, "A year ago, as Hurricane Ivan approached, New Orleans ordered an evacuation but did not use city or school buses to help people evacuate. As a result many of the poorest citizens were unable to evacuate. Fortunately, the hurricane changed course and did not hit New Orleans, but both Gov. Blanco and Mayor Nagin acknowledged the need for a better evacuation plan...but did not take corrective actions. In 1998, during a threat by Hurricane George, 14,000 people were sent to the Superdome and theft and vandalism were rampant due to inadequate security. Again, these problems were not corrected."The city of New York, by comparison, had no advance warning of 9/11.
Yet Mayor Giuliani andGovernor Pataki displayed tremendous leadership in managing a chaotic situation in the city. Their leadership inspired confidence in their ability to manage the emergency and coordinate federal aid.
The federal government, it sounds to me, played some political games with the officials and citizens of Louisiana in 2005.
Now they are turning their pathetic little convention into a Gustav relief session.
Blame could have been placed everywhere in that sad situation, but pardon me for feeling a little sick inside. A year before Katrina they were praising Jeb Bush to the heavens for how well he handled the Florida hurricanes that year. It was not true, we saw inefficiency in action while seeing it praised on national television.
Double standard, playing politics.
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