Remember this Meet The Press moment:
BROUSSARD: … The guy who runs this building I’m in, emergency management, he’s responsible for everything. His mother was trapped in St. Bernard nursing home and every day she called him and said, “Are you coming, son? Is somebody coming?” And he said, “Yeah, Mama, somebody’s coming to get you. Somebody’s coming to get you on Tuesday. Somebody’s coming to get you on Wednesday. Somebody’s coming to get you on Thursday. Somebody’s coming to get you on Friday.” And she drowned Friday night. She drowned Friday night.
RUSSERT: Mr. President…
BROUSSARD: Nobody’s coming to get us. Nobody’s coming to get us. The secretary has promised. Everybody’s promised. They’ve had press conferences. I’m sick of the press conferences. For God sakes, shut up and send us somebody.
Didn’t happen like that, it turns out:
New details and interviews with the son whose mother died in the flood show that the tragedy unfolded from Saturday through Monday, Aug. 29 — not Monday through Friday, Sept. 2 as recounted by Broussard. The owners of the nursing home were indicted Tuesday for the deaths of more than 30 residents, which officials say occurred on Aug. 29.
August 29th was the date the Hurricane hit. That doesn’t make it less tragic that a woman drowned, and there is simply no excuse for the nursing home not cmplying with the mandatory evacutation, but it just another one of those ‘known facts’ that has turned out to be neither known nor factual. Probably a whole lot of corrections like this in the next couple of months.
Mark
If the only thing he got wrong was the date, I don’t see what the big deal is. The guy was in a bit of a stressful situation, to say the least.
John Cole
Umm. Think about it for a second. Better yet, go back and look at what the response to the Broussard interview was…
John Cole
You could also look at the rest of the charges made by Broussard in the Meet the Press interview:
TallDave
Yellow journalism: alive and well in 2005.
That “10,000 dead” has been revised down to “less than 1,000.”
For reference, that compares to 35,000 dead in Europe from… a heat wave. That’s right, a natural “catastrophe” that can be handled with air conditioning killed more than 35 times as many people among our oh-so-enlightened socialist transatlantic neighbors as a Category 5 storm here in the US did in a deathtrap city built below sea level, even with an incompetent disaster response.
Let’s see, 35,000 people times $179 each for their own, personal 8,000 BTU air conditioner gives me… $5.5 million. That’s what it would have cost to save every single person who died from excess heat. And that assumes no one was willing to share.
And people think America has problems.
ppGaz
Right, Dave. You meant “yellow cake”, didn’t you?
ppGaz
Wrong. They died because they didn’t know how to handle a heat wave. I assure you, if the power went off in my town, which has about 100 days of 100F per summer, thousands would not die. Because we know how to handle it here. Nobody in my house would die for lack of air conditioners. I can instruct you on how to survive in the desert with nothing but shade and water. But you would have to follow instructions. Come to think of it, you might die.
ppGaz
Earth-shaking! People will be shocked, and moved, as they were when no WMDs were discovered in Iraq, say. Eh?
Wrong. Nobody will notice. That scene has already been played. Time to move on.
Will Prince George be injured by this misperception, uncorrected? Aw, gee, how awful. To think that a nice boy like him would be hurt by people gettin’ the wrong idea about something!
I’ll be back, I have to go and cry uncontrollably for an hour or two ……..
Slide
Teh perennially clueless TallDave said:
Yellow journalis? To report what the Mayor of New Orleans said? Guess they should have ignored what the Mayor had said right? Like I said previously, the Mayor probably came up with that number based on the modeling they had done with a cat 4/5 hurricane hitting New Orleans (hurricane Pam). We should all be thankful that it was not as high as it was feared to be but it is not a case of yellow jounalism to report what the mayor in NO had said anymore than it was yellow journalism when it was suggested that perhaps 50,000 had died in the WTC.
ppGaz
Has anybody noticed that it is well within the realm of possibility that the NOLA area could be struck by another strong hurricane before the end of this week?
Even if not impacted by the winds and storm surge, heavy rains could imperil the levee system and cause a reflood of the areas just now dried out.
I’m watching this unfold, and watching the reactions of the various layers of authority …. and wondering, what the hell are they thinking?
Bob
Broussard isn’t the mayor, but I’m not sure what TallDave’s yellow journalism riff is about if it isn’t some defense mechanism out of the Rove noise machine. The initial estimates, which TallD has read around here before, were based on what the feds put out, including the FEMA order for 25,000 body bags.
The problem to worry about now is if the numbers are inflated by whatever companies got the FEMA contract for body disposal.
docG
Haarrgh, matey. Hope they makes the bilge rat walk the plank! (Sorry, didn’t want to miss out on Pirate’s Day.) On a serious note, keep the corrections coming, there surely will be a million of them.
ppGaz
Whoops … NO Reentry Halted …. MSNBC.
Well, maybe these guys actually have learned something.
The president out ahead of Ray Noggin on this.
Wasn’t I bashing the mayor 3 weeks ago? Off with his head!
TallDave
slide,
Re “yellow journalism”: I was referring to Cole’s post, not the 10,000.
I see ppGaz is spewing more nonsense that, again, I won’t bother wasting my time with.
Emma Zahn
Did anyone commenting here watch Broussard’s interview on Meet the Press when it first aired?
I did.
If he was faking, he deserves an oscar for best actor.
…
Emma Zahn
Oh, forgot to add. There will also be a lot of corrections to corrections over the next few months.
I got a Katrina timeline by e-mail from factcheck.org followed quickly by two separate corrections.
…
slide
That makes even less sense. That was a live, unscripted interview of a government official describing his personal experiences. Yellow journalism? For an example of yellow journalism think of Fox’s Natalee Holloway coverage.
Nikki
The thing that gets me is that so many are so gleefully pointing out that “GASP! Broussard is a liar!” when in the long run, it matters not one damn bit. 34 people died in that nursing home and people seem more concerned about how much of a liar Broussard is rather than the tragedy of 34 people dying in a nursing home.
Oh I know, his performance reflected poorly on the administration, so of course we must work, work, work to tear down this liar rather than focus on the more important issues.
Broussard lied, Broussard exaggerated, Broussard didn’t get it right. In the post-Katrina scheme of things, who really gives one big damn shit?
ppGaz
Uh, if you say so.
I’ll put you on the same list as DG for today:
$10 to anybody who can explain what the hell you are talking about.
slide
Yep. It’s called DISTRACTION 101. Right out of the Rove play book.
Just John Cole doing his part yet once again.
Richard Aubrey
Nikki has figured out that Broussard’s breakdown is no longer useful. So now it’s unimportant.
Let me explain it to you, not that you don’t know, but to convince you that others do, too.
Since the lady and her friends died just hours after the levees broke, there is no blame for anybody but the state or parish government which left the evacuation decision to the invididual nursing home operators. Blame the operators.
Blame inadequate information–the operators will at their trial.
But, unfortunately for Nikki, there’s no way to blame Bush. Hence the move-along suggestion.
The point is not that Broussard lied. It’s that the facts he got a lot of people to believe aren’t so.
Well, it does matter that he lied, or got his timeline wrong, or something. But that’s secondary to the change in what is known about the situation.
slide
Richard Aubrey said:
I for one don’t think he was “lying” but lets assume for argument sake that he was. Ok. But on that same Meet the Press there were a few other lies that I would think you would be more concerned about.
Example:
Well, that was proved a lie. No paper had that headline. In fact all the morning papers had pretty devastating headlines, Like Catastrophe !. Funny though how Bush, General Meyers and Chertoff all used exactly the same term, “Dodged the Bullet” . Funny ain’t it?
Another one for you:
But the truth was:
So the US Weather service knew…Governor Blanco knew… city hall officials knew.. and anyone that read the Times-Picayune knew that, by Monday afternoon at the latest, the levees had been breeched but the head of Homeland Security was relieved by the fictional Tuesday morning papers that NO “Dodged the Bullet”?
Now either that is a bold faced lie or they are even more clueless and incompetent than our worst fears.
But lets not focus in on the lies of Chertoff, lets go attack the emotionally distraught Broussard for getting his time line wrong. Very interesting and selective indignation on the right.
jill
Correction? When are we getting a correction from Bush and company for no WMD in Iraq, for Iraq not paying for its own reconstruction, for the cake-walk, for lying in every instance and using patriotism to goad others into making bad decisions.
scs
You know how the article said that bloggers questioned him first? Well they were possibly referring to ME. I broke that on this blog weeks ago. I knew even when I saw him “crying” that it looked fake. And what happened? You all crucified me (and I believe Slide called me a “piece of shit”), even AFTER I referenced the NYT article conflicting with his timeline. You people are pathetic. At least redeem yourselves somewhat by apologizing to me, but I know you all don’t have the guts to do so.
And I not only blame you all, but the gullible media, who played that guy, who wanted his 15 minutes of fame, over and over, on national TV, and never ONCE thought to call the guy Broussard was talking about and ask him if the story was true. And I’m sure the man was available for interviews, because as a parish official he was probably around after the flood. Now I know how people like Hitler get to power. It’s cause of easily brainwashed, unquestioning people like the ones who type on this blog.
Stormy70
scs, I remember your comment and I defended it the day you made it. I also have commented at other blogs that a commenter here on Balloon Juice questioned this story first, before anyone else connected the dots. Good job!
slide
did I? well let me add asshole as well. To say that he was “faking” is just so asinine. After the horrendous experience he had gone through, surrounded by death and utter destruction, you think he premeditatedly faked being upset at his friend’s mother’s death? Right. and you call others brainwashed? And you knew this because you felt it in your “gut” that he was acting? lol Yes, piece of shit is still quite operable.
scs
SLide, are you typing from a mental institution? Cause if you aren’t, you ought to be.
jill
if that was acting get that man an Emmy!
Ancient Purple
This is just pure bullcrap. You can pat yourself on your back all you want. Congratulations. But you are sadly mistaken in your polemic that despots rise to power because of things like this. No one’s convictions were erradicated or solidified because of Broussard crying.
After that aired on MTP, I heard maybe one or two mentions of it at the water cooler the next day at work and that was about it. People are not actively engaged in their debates about Katrina and the governments’ failed responses because of Broussard’s appearance or tale on MTP.
I, along with just about everyone else, thought the clip showed tragedy in its rawest form. If Broussard was wrong or embellished, then he deserves to be slammed.
Outside of that, what is your point?
scs
Thanks Stormy70, I didn’t mean you. Always appreciated your well-expressed and humourous comments.
ppGaz
This is the inimitable Stormy at work. Stormy, the death of whose cat caused a bigger outpouring of sympathy here than did the death of Casey Sheehan. Stormy, who wants to “light up” the Palestinians, because “all the good ones have left.”
This is Stormy, folks, talking about a story that involves the drowning deaths of 30+ old people, who thinks it’s great that the guy on tv GOT THE DROWNING DATE WRONG because it makes her look better.
Welcome to Balloon-Juice. You couldn’t invent this place, if it didn’t exist.
anon
Check out the big mouth on Joe Albino! Or Slide/Slug or whatever else he’s calling himself these days.
Dkos/DU BIG Talker!! Macho moonbat!!
scs
My point, AncientPurple, is that NO ONE checked up on the guy’s story, which they used as a rallying cry, and which should have been easily ‘checkable’. The media is supposed to check on stories, remember? I cannot consider this anything else but indicative of left-wing media bias I hear so much about, I’m sad to say. (And don’t call me a right-winger in your reply, still consider myself a centrist.)
The point is not Broussard, who’s an idiot, the point is a media and a nation so willing to believe anything if it fits their idea of the world.
scs
.
Sorry to say PPgaz, you are in denial as well. This is not the case of a man ‘getting the dates wrong’. This is a man who purposefully manipulated the media in a cold and calculating way, for what ends, who knows.
slide
anon sputtering:
I love you too sweetie.
slide
I agree, Chertoff should be ashamed of himself.
slide
I agree again. Has any in the MSM asked either Chertoff or General Myers exactly what newspaper they read on Tuesday morning that said, New Orleans Dodged the Bullet? Anybody? Especially, as I demonstrated EVERYONE knew on Monday morning that the levees have been breeched. Must be that right wing bias in the media.
Ancient Purple
You will not get any disagreement from me that the story should have been fact checked. But I think you are giving the story more legs than it has. Honestly, scs, people really did not see this as more than a tragic story. I doubt you could find more than a handful of people who would claim that Broussard’s appearance on MTP was the tipping point for them.
I haven’t heard a single person bring it up in conversation, and, in fact, I bet if you brought it up to someone, they would say, “Oh, yeah, I remember that,” thus indicating that this was not the “big story” of Katrina’s aftermath.
I am certain that one photo of a body floating in the flood waters was exponentially more powerful than Broussard’s appearance on MTP.
anon
That is too fucking gross, Albino.
Mac Buckets
Compare it to 800 dying in a heatwave in 1995 Chicago! Katrina will be finally known for the property damage it caused, not its human toll, which frankly is not of historic proportions.
Heatwaves are no joke (they cover massive areas at a time, you can’t go to higher ground, you can’t really evacuate), but they don’t get big press, because they don’t produce pretty pictures of nature’s fury and destruction. And that’s what’s important to TV…pictures, not lives.
A business partner was in Paris during the heat wave, and he told me that many elderly and infirm in his neighborhood died simply because they couldn’t do anything about their homes becoming ovens for two weeks. You couldn’t buy a window AC unit or an electric fan anywhere, and the department stores wouldn’t order more, even though my friend offered $200 bucks for a fan. All the roads were packed because everyone who had a car was driving around with the AC on to say cool. He’d go to his building’s swimming pool every day, but he couldn’t swim because it was so jammed with people — so everyone just stood in the water, shoulder-to-shoulder.
And talk about government inaction! The French government did nothing for a week, and then added more hospital beds for the second week — that was their emergency response to a heatwave that was killing thousands of Parisians. No A/C in the hospitals, no shipments of ice, no A/Ced evacuation centers — but they added beds! After it cooled down, the government first said that only about 1000 or so people died in Paris, but the eventual number turned out to be over 15,000. The French Parliament blamed the deaths on their complex healthcare system and failure of government agencies.
scs
Slide, you’re dodging the issue. Seems to be a common argument tactic on here when people are wrong. Just because I give an example of left-wing bias does not mean there are no right-wing biases ever too. I’m trying to stick to the point at hand here – not engage in obfuscation.
Mac Buckets
So slide IS Joe Albanese? I think I actually commented in jest recently on the, ummmmmm, “intellectual similarities” of the “two” posters. Too funny!
scs
I agree, the Europeans are quick to criticize. I wonder how ANY country would or could handle the response to a disaster of that size. I also think it’s funny how Europeans were SHOCKED to find out the US has poor people, as if they didn’t have any either.
slide
scs:
No, you didn’t give me an example of left wing bias you gave me an example of poor journalism perhaps, but not left wing bias. You don’t really think that any reporter won’t have loved coming up with the fact that his story didn’t match up do you? Are you really that delusional that you think reporters, across the spectrum, don’t go after stories because of their political biases? Did Fox come up with the story? Did the Wall Street Journal? Is EVERY reporter liberal? Its just such a stupid argument. I used the Chertoff counterpoint just to make that very point. I don’t think the failure to question Chertoff was due to right wing bias, just piss poor journalism.
When Broussard made that statement on MTP you will recall there was still a little news going on in NO? Katrina was/is a HUGE HUGE story, spanning three states and all levels of government. If you think the priority of the media should have been to track down Broussard’s story, with all that was going on at the time, is just plain idiotic. But, making it a left wing conspiracy makes it oh so much more juicy doesn’t it?
Steve S
It’s always interesting how Republicans pick apart any story until they find the lone inconsistency, and then claim the whole story is false as a result of that.
I never really picked up on this particular story, and never thought it was that big of a deal. apparently it scared some Republicans like Instaidiot Reynolds.
Mac Buckets
When the Katrina-whiners saw Europe laid low by a couple of weeks of 100-degree weather, they must’ve realized that the UK, France, Italy, Germany, et. al., were all weak, third-world countries guided by inept, heartless and stupid leaders, and that the economic policies of their governments had produced inequities that had doomed many of their citizens to die. Those deaths were on Chirac’s and Schroeder’s hands! Right? Or is that rhetoric reserved only for American Republican presidents?
I was watching a travel show last night where a European made the comment that many Euros think that all Americans are rich. Stereotypes are funny.
anon
Yeah, Cole called him out one day a week or so back, when he started posting as slide
This was after he ranted as J. Albino, that he would NEVER, EVER com back to balloon-juice.com because of some post John put up. EVER!! AND HE MEANT IT!!
Unfortunately, Albino/slide didn’t realize that Mr. Cole can see the IP addresses of all of the commenters here.
BWAHAHA!!!
scs
Steve S, It scared me that I heard a story repeated over and over again, especially on MSNBC and on Hardball, and it was never investigated. It makes me wonder what else the media is doing this with. This was not some little news blip, this was a big deal for some channels, with lots of air time. And the whole time I first heard it, I was wondering, how could a lady drown several days later in a home? What did she do for the first few days, stand in the water? That sounds odd, I thought. Anyway, I had lots of questions on it, and there was no attempt to answer it until weeks later. The inept and gullible media should scare Dems and Republicans alike.
slide
Another brilliant statement. So you think that one million Americans displaced is not a historic human toll? that there are currently 2000 missing children weeks after the hurricane is not a historic human toll? Imagine if you were missing your child, not knowing if she is alive or dead. Families separated. Homes and lifelong possessions gone forever for hundreds of thousands. Human misery is not measured in the number of deaths alone.
Mac Buckets
Meant to add, “After all, they’ve never seen an American homeless guy on the streets of Monte Carlo or Rome!” And now I realize I shouldn’t have bothered.
slide
guys this is no big secret. Cole has been reponding to me by that name for weeks now. Not trying to hide anything. No gottcha here. Decided to be somewhat more anonymous like 95% of the posters here.
scs
Yes I have many cousins from Germany, (and some from Italy too, but they aren’t so bad) and the things they say about Americans would make you cringe. But they say it so innocently, like it is just a fact. Kind of makes me wonder about their media there. It has got to be bad if it makes their citizens believe in generalities as facts.
Mac Buckets
Yes, that is what I think. Historically speaking, the destruction of the physical city and the making of a new city will be the headline. The deaths will be a subhead. Displacements will be a footnote, just like they always are.
2000 missing or separated children is indeed tragic (we’ll see what the final number turns out to be), but no, it’s not historic. Compare it to the human toll of the Christmas Tsunami, and Katrina isn’t even the Storm of the Last Nine Months.
Mark
I see a lot of comments criticizing the media for being lazy or sloppy or partisan. But isn’t this whole discussion revolving around the MSNBC/NBC story linked above? Maybe it was bloggers who raised questions about this guy’s story, but it was the mainstream media that dug up the truth.
scs
Yeah, like a month later, when it should have taken them an hour.
slide
Taken them an hour? they didn’t even get to the nursing home until days later. Who should have jumped on this story? What other stories should have been put aside to research this? For what purpose? Was this story more pressing than the dozens and dozens of much more important stories that needed to be followed at this time. You know the right always finds deep sinister motives behind everything. I guess that tells you something about their character when they think everyone else is involved in political dirty tricks.
You know had the media gone after the story and had it turned out exactly as described, the scs’s of the world would have pointed to THAT as liberal bias. Why are they doing this story again? Why are they making such an issue of this one woman? Why are they sensationalizing her death? yada yada yada. You can’t win with the kool-aid crowd.
Mark
“Yeah, like a month later, when it should have taken them an hour.”
If you were so sure the story was wrong, you could have gotten yourself a big scoop with just one phone call to the parish.
anon
Pot, meet kettle.
You’re just too much entertainment.
slide
How original.
anon
About as profound, witty, and original! as you are, Joe Slide.
If you want to disagree with a poster, can’t you do any better than calling them assholes, Nazis, etc….?
You’re a mess, Jose Slide
Go to bed.
donald
Well Nikki, seeing as how the Broussard interview was plastered on MEET THE FUCKING PRESS as yet another democratic screed against the current administration in an effort to PROVE that George Bush is a murderous bastard, I give a shit. And I give a shit that you people have to make every single damned thing a POLITICAL WAR. I mean, you know, eat shit. You people can’t remember all of your lies.
Shygetz
Yeah, donald, and where is Osama bin Laden? Oh yeah, Bush doesn’t really care.
Where are the weapons of mass destruction? Oh yeah, it’s not important, we are there to export democracy now.
Where is that government report we were promised on how the Bush administration handled the intelligence about Iraq? Oh yeah, it doesn’t matter now.
Amazing how much wingnut rage there is over some nobody getting a little bit of airtime, yet no rage about the terrible lies and abuses of power from an administration that supposedly represents their world viewpoint. If a political party that I associated myself with closely were to be this underhanded and screw up this badly, you wouldn’t be able to hear the opposition over my screams of outrage.
Nikki
Oooo, did I strike a nerve?
slide
anon at 11:15 pm:
anon at 1:12 am:
To use your phrase; Pot, meet kettle.
Oh, and btw, I never used the term Nazi. Ever. In any post. Search to your heart’s content. As a matter of fact, the only reference to the Nazi regime was made against my “side” of the argument by scs who said:
Defense Guy
ShyGetz
That’s known as changing the subject. Good for ‘winning’ the argument, and not much else.
Don’t worry, your hate the president creds are intact. Shall we just go ahead and mark you down as wishing harm to all those who are Republicans as well?
As to the subject of this thread. The man was lying, I feel bad for his loss, but what a scumbag.
Mike
“ppGaz Says:
The announcement came after repeated warnings from top federal officials — and the president himself — that the city was unsafe.”
I think that’s what happens when you put a Coast Guard Admiral in charge of something vice an empty suit like Brown. You get good advice and you get action. Glad to hear this.
jobiuspublius
It wouldn’t surprise me if someone died in a manner similar to the one Broussard described. Incidentaly, was NOLA still flooding on friday sept. 2nd? Broussards errors are miniscule and they may have helped people get off their ass and do something, even if only donate.
p.lukasiak
on the correction front….
http://www.2theadvocate.com/stories/091805/new_blanco001.shtml
of course, John can’t be bothered with exposing the lies that constitute his right-wing talking points….
Patrick Lightbody
OH man, the “left wing media bias” thing came up again. Can we please stop pretending that is true? Yes, the media is bad, but it is neither left nor right. It is just lazy. See here.
slide
p.lukasiak don’t you realize that when John uses a heading like this:
it’s going to be the “debunking” of some minor insignificant point to support his insane, and very lonely, position that the federal government did “all they could possibly be expected to do”.(we all remember his earth shaking debunking of the Wallmart water truck don’t we?)
Don’t ever expect however, any “debunking” of the misstatements (lies) of Chertoff, Brown or Bush regarding the federal government’s response. (think “Dodge the Bullet”, “no one anticipated the levees to breech”, etc. etc.
Rove would be so proud.
kl
How’s Bill Burkett doing these days?
donald
Yes, you did. I’m no George Bush fan. Except for the terror business (He’s way too fucking soft) and tax policy he’s as crappy a president as Clinton and Carter (Two odius people as you’ll ever find). And all of your bullshit is ok with me, except when stupid people want to play Viet Nam protesters when we’re involved with an actual threat (Viet Nam was not threat to this country). The politicizing of everything is sickening and you should all be ashamed of yourselves.
Weapons of Mass Destruction have been found on a regular basis. Actually read the data out there. And more will be found. In addition, a quick invasion of Iraq, instead of fucking around with the UN would have turned up more. Even your simple brain may concede that it’s probable that mass amounts of this material has been moved to Syria and Iran. Your inability to follow simple logic astounding folks.
I’m still betting Osama’s dead, I could be wrong on this one.
Bottom line, you people are giving aid and comfort to an enemy. You are prolonging a religious war. How? Rest assured, that had the corrupt governments of Russia, France, and Germany (Anybody paying attention to the Oil For Food program?), decided at the time of this invasion to do the right thing (Crush Islamist terrorism) there would be a whole lot less of this bullshit going on. Also, if Al Gore had followed the exact machinations of Bush you would call him a hero. Why? Because you’re shitheads.
slide
Is Donald one of those fake posters? Guys that make incredibly stupid remarks to bring discredit to the side he pretending to be on? Nobody could possibly be as ill informed as he is right? A joke?
Well, in case anyone actually believes he is legit I guess a few points are in order:
the Donald:
Oh, yeah we all know that NOW but at the time, people like you, were saying that Viet Nam was very much a threat. The domino theory. Today Viet Nam, tomorrow California. The great Red Menace. But to you, Iraq was a threat? And how were they a threat to the USA? With what? To use Zel Miller’s words, “with spitballs”?
the Donald:
the data out there:
the Donald:
The experts:
the Donald:
Of course Donald must know that there are audio and video tapes of OBL that have been concluded to be authentic by CIA voice analysis.
the Donald:
FOX News thinks you should add the USA to those corrupt governments involved in the oil for food scandal:
the Donald:
Saddam may have been a lot of things, but an Islamic Terrorist was not one of them. As a matter of fact Saddam was quite successful in preventing the type of Islamic extremism from gaining a foothold in his country as it would not have been in the interest of the secular dictator that he was.
Good work Donald, you have conclusively demonstrated that you don’t know diddly.
Mac Buckets
I’d probably lay off the hypocrisy charges, if I’d just written those sentences, but that’s just me and my shreds of decency.
jobiuspublius
Oh, donald.
TallDave
slide,
It’s really not that complicated. Before airing a sensational story, you should check whether that person is actually telling the truth.
TallDave
And I not only blame you all, but the gullible media, who played that guy, who wanted his 15 minutes of fame, over and over, on national TV, and never ONCE thought to call the guy Broussard was talking about and ask him if the story was true
Exactly. Yellow journalism.
Ancient Purple
Ah, the battlecry of the people who long for the day of the House Subcommittee on Un-American Activites.
Next, you will be stating that criticizing the President in a time of war is sedition.
slide
buckets:
mac you dont’ see the substanitive difference between Broussard and the Head of Homeland Security telling the nation that he thought everything was honky dory on TUESDAY morning because of what he read in some fictional newspaper when it had been reported EVERYWHERE that the levees had been breeched on MONDAY morning? Those two things are of equal importance to you? Ok.
Mac Buckets
Let’s all make fun of Joe Slide’s inability to tell the difference between a private company and a government. I’ll go first: “LOL! That slide guy thinks that “a Texas businessman” is the US government! What a clown! If he’s wrong about that, I’ll bet he’s wrong about every single thing he’s ever said in his life!”
…and so forth.
slide
TallDave:
They weren’t “airing a sensational story”, it was a LIVE INTERVIEW. The reporter, Tim Russett did not REPORT anything, he asked questions of a government official who then said what he did. Its really not that complicated TallDave.
TallDave
slide,
It wasn’t live when it was re-run over and over on other networks.
Also, Russert should be vetting his guests better, and investigating their lurid claims.
Stormy70
Right. First laugh of the day. The press can’t report itself out of a paper bag.
Nikki
Like the ones stating all the newspaper headlines showed that NO had dodged a bullet?
slide
Wouldn’t you wish buckets. Just upset because I demonstrated how wrong you were about the “16 words in the State of the union speech”. Aren’t you? lol.
Donald was talking about the corrupt governements of France etc. etc. I would be cautious about throwing around words like corrupt with the bush record. Last estimate I saw is that 8.8 Billion dollars of Iraq oil money, managed by Bremmer and company, is “missing”. Eight BILLION dollars. Does that make the American government courrupt? You guys are always so very very selective in what outrages you. I still have not seen any EVIDENCE that the governments of the listed countries were offically involved in the oil for food scandal but rather individuals that may have worked for the government. By that same standard America is corrupt because they just arrested his head of procurement policy at the Office of Management and Budget
Mac Buckets
Are you seriously disputing that Tuesday morning, most people thought NO had gotten off lucky when the storm veered east? I certainly thought so, becuase we were watching the media. My wife had the hurricane coverage TiVoed (she had relatives there) and the first shot she recorded on CNN Tuesday morning was some reporter walking through the French quarter saying almost the exact words, “New Orleans dodged a bullet,” noting the far greater damage in Misissippi.
Yes, the levees had been breeched Monday AM. No, it was not common knowledge, even in NO (as some brilliant videoblogs of the hurricane point out) until midday Tuesday, nor had it been reported “everywhere” Monday or even Tuesday morning that New Orleans was about to fill up like a cereal bowl. The media largely ignored the few reports of the breaks, so to say that reports were “everywhere” is just your own fantasy.
A little proof? On the 50-odd archived front pages of Tuesday papers at Newseum, guess how many even mentioned the levees or the fact that the NO bowl was about to fill up and drown the city (which would certainly have been the big headline)? Zero.
Should the FEMA head have gotten reports from somewhere beside newspapers? Absolutely, but that’s another question.
Broussard lied, Brown was uninformed.
BillS
Oh, yes for those who don’t think that
any country could have coped with a Katrina-like hurricane there’s this article from La Prensa-San Diego.
I have no love for Castro or Communism but if a relatively impoverished Caribbean island can save the ALL the people (and pets/livestock) then I’m sure the U.S. could— if we really wanted to.
Defense Guy
Yes because the Castro regime is to be believed.
Slide
Yes. And ESPECIALLY the head of homeland security which should have known better. Why? Well, here is why:
.
City Hall knew. Governor Blanco knew. The New Orleans Times-Picayune knew. The National Weather service knew. Even FOX news reported by 5pm on MONDAY that the levees were breeched adn that NO was filling up with water. But the Head of Homeland Security wakes up and reads the papers on TUESDAY morning and basis his assesment on what is going on by them? Even if true, which it clearly is not, that would be incredible negligence on his part.
Lol… kool-aid for sale. Kool-aid for sale.
Krista
The Castro regime’s trustworthiness notwithstanding, I don’t think that the IDSR consists of a bunch of closet Communists who think Castro’s just swell, and who would make this stuff up just to make him look good.
Mac Buckets
You have a rich fantasy life, Joe.
That’s some typically desperate straw-grasping to gloss over your ridiculous (and now-abandoned) argument that an unnamed Texas businessman is the US government, but I’ll grant it this one time.
No, missing money just makes us bad accountants of a huge bureaucracy, and if that surprises you… If we find out the money was stolen by government officials at the expense of the people of Iraq, that would warrant a corruption charge. But nothing like that has happened yet.
Funniest. Sentence. Ever. Talk about selective outrage some more… please?
Now you are just being retarded. You are reduced to trying to equate an obstruction charge against a former GSA official (which resulted because the US government investigated it), to “Oil-for-Fraud,” which would still be going on if not for the US actions in Iraq and would be unknown except for the US’s involvement in bringing the case to light. Tell me, how did this GSA guy kill thoudands of Iraqis by denying them medicine and food?
Your weak attempts to excuse corruption and what could easily be called murder are as revolting as they are pathetic.
Mac Buckets
Of course. He should’ve gotten reports directly from the National Weather Service, and it’s clear he did not. We’ll find out why in the coming investigation.
But again, it’s easy to dispute your notion that reports “everywhere” (I know you were just being hyperbolic) said the levees had been broken. Why did the CNN reporter say NO had “dodged the bullet” on Tuesday if “everyone” knew that NO was about to fill up with water? Why wasn’t the upcoming flooding of New Orleans the lead story of every TV news and newspaper account on Tuesday morning, instead of being unmentioned? The fact is, the media largely ignored the reports of the levee breaks. Whether they didn’t think it was important, or whether they had problems with the info, who knows?
Darrell
Regarding those who died in the NO nursing home, I was talking to a structural engineer friend of mine about the horror of those deaths, and his response was interesting. In CA, he worked on a project where it was discovered a primary girder in a hospital was so severely damaged, that even a mild seismic event would likely trigger a large scale collapse.. and that a wing of the hospital needed to be evacuated immediately for repair. When informed of this, the hospital owners/mgmt. responded that if they had to make such an evacuation, they would lose 2 – 3 patients at a minimum, and they made the decision that repairs must be done without evacuation even if doing the repairs in that fashion would take much longer, putting patients in danger if an earthquake hit.
My engineer friend insisted that the nursing home owner almost certainly went through a similar calculus as the hospital regarding the sudden evacuation of elderly patients, many(most?) of whom can’t even sit up in a bus seat or walk, and others who could not survive such an ordeal. Since prior hurricanes had left New Orleans relatively unscathed, the nursing home owners made a cold, reasoned risk assessment of the consequences of such an evacuation. They made the wrong decision. But had they evacuated and the storm not done so much damage, the nursing home owners would have been criticized for killing & injuring patients who shouldn’t have been moved. Interesting point I thought. One that hadn’t occurred to me before my friend raised this perspective
jobiuspublius
So, your friend is implying that it would have been impossible to evacuate those people. I find it hard to believe that it would be impossible. They should have had a good plan. Naggin evacuate 80% of NOLA, a record, maybe they should have asked him for advice. Didn’t the other nursing homes in the area evacuate?
jobiuspublius
Cornyn and Hutchison: Modern Day Segrationists
Darrell
Nagin didn’t issue mandatory evacuation orders until Sunday evening just befor the storm hit. And with all those buses underwater, I can certainly see why those on your side now assert that we should rely on his advice on matters of emergency evacuatin
Great question.. Anybody know? I can’t imagine many people permitting their parents and grandparents to stay in nursing homes below sea level in hurricane alley so my guess (and it’s only that) is that few nursing homes were built there
slide
clueless mac buckets:
Huh? Even our Leader , John Cole was reporting that the “worst case scenario” had happened by Tuesday morning. Wonder where he got the info from?
I don’t know what papers Chertoff was talking about but I assume he gets the Washington Post. This is what they were reporting Tuesday morning:
How about the Washington Times what were they reporting:
Yes, I can see how the head of Homeland Security, the individual responsible for National disasters, as per the National Response Plan, didn’t know 24 hours after the levees were breeched that such a dastardly thing had happened.
Kool aid…. get your Kool aid
Com Con
I knew that guy was a liar the minute he started crying.
Face it, Nagin and Blanco screwed up. Bush and FEMA did their best to pull their asses out of the fryer, but in the end incompetence kills. The blame game is going to come back to bite the Democrats on the ass, when all the blame is fixed on them. I can’t wait until the White House probe comes back with the straight dope on this. Just don’t start whining about the blame game when it does, my lefto friends.
Com Con
It’s all his and Blanco’s fault more or less. That’s what the probe will show. I feel bad that Brown had to lose his over this. I know his resume didn’t look so good, but I haven’t seen anyone point to one thing he did wrong.
The people of New Orleans should be grateful this happened under Bush. I shudder to think what would have happened if Clinton had been overseeing things when a disaster like this hit.
Darrell
Just curious whether ‘Com Con’ has the same IP address as ‘DougJ’
slide
Com con:
I haven’t had such a good laugh in quite a while.
Here is some more of FEMA bailing out the locals:
Ya gotta read the whole article. FEMA bailing out the locals? lol..yeah…
Kool-aid… get your Kool-aid
Com Con did get one thing right:
How true it is.
Com Con
You think Clinton *would have* handled it better, Darrell?
Com Con
There were chaing of command problems, slide. If Blanco had coordinated with the feds better, this would not have happened.
jobiuspublius
Slide:
What Jerktoff meant was that NOLA got the weaker side of the hurricane, the west side, not the stronger side, the east. Dam, some one needs to higher me!
jobiuspublius
But, what if she had issued them a lap dance, with potty language?
Com Con
Have you seen Blanco, jobius? I don’t think she’s lap dance material?
slide
jobiuspublius:
? Relevance? The levees has been breeched nearly a full 24 hours before the Tuesday morning papers.
jobiuspublius:
Yes, especially for your spelling skills.
jobiuspublius
Good. It fits perfectly into my vengefull plans. MUAHAHAHAA
Mac Buckets
Do you even know what you are arguing anymore? You were arguing that Chertoff “lied” about seeing media reports Tuesday that NO had dodged a bullet, because you say “everybody knew” on Monday that breach had occurred, remember? Your keywords in Cole’s post should be “Tuesday morning.” Look at Newseum again — so many front page stories on Tuesday, but no one was talking about levees except the Times-Picayune.
Read the WSJ report:
Live hurricane blogs (one I read was by a Nicaraguan hotel worker) pointed out that most people thought that NO had gotten off easy on Tuesday morning…until the water kept rising.
Again, I want to know why FEMA didn’t have a direct line with the National Weather Service. But to say that Brown and Chertoff were “lying” about media reports that painted a rosier picture are pure fantasy. First of all, media reports verify their statements. Second, what on earth would be their motive to lie? We know what Broussard’s motives were — partisan blame-gaming.
jobiuspublius
I was mocking people who always “know” what their Dear Leaders mean to say. But, yes, why does FEMA have to depend on the “papers” when they have NWS, etc.?
That’s a cheap shot. You psycho.
Mac Buckets
Nothing is Blanco’s fault. She performed perfectly. She’ll tell you she had no responsibilities except to whine to the feds. Just ask her and her staff, like Joe Slide’s “where’s the buses?” source did.
jobiuspublius
So much for “having fun”(DeHammer Delay) and “they have it good here”(Babs Bush):
Prison?
jobiuspublius
Oops, link.
slide
mac buckets I don’t really understand how you can’t seem to “get it”. Chertoff was using the “Dodged the Bullet” defense to explain why the federal goverment had done such a terrible job responding to Katrina. I am pointing out that that is completely absurd. Am I asking too much of my government that the person in charge of disaster assistance knows what is going on? Should they have not been focused like a laser on the storm and its possible consequences? Should they not have been in constant touch with the weather service? the Governor’s office? the Mayor’s office. Isn’t that what FEMA supposed to do in these circumstance?
This was a Cat 4/5 hurricane heading straight for NO. The fed government had done simulations of just such an event. The simulatons predicted a death toll in the thousands. That scenario, to my mind, requires the Chertoffs, Browns and Bush’s of our government PAY FUCKING ATTETNION. 100% ATTENTION. That their JOB. To KNOW WHAT IS GOING ON. To suggest he didn’t know what happened Monday morning by Tuesday moring is an indictment of incompetence beyong words. What the fuck else should they have been doing but monitoring this? I dont’ care if one reporter for CNN didn’t know what had happened, the weather service knew, the governor knew, the mayor knew, NBC knew, the local papers Knew, Shep on Fox knew, John Cole knew damn it. but you are giving Chertoff a pass for thing… hey…. we dodged a bullet here.
Wow, talk about having blinders on.
DougJ
Jertkoff should go. He screwed up worse than Drownie. The whole thing is a disgrace.
I’m sure there’s plenty of people in LA that should go, too. But I’m not a citizen of the state of LA and that’s not my responsibility.
Mac Buckets
But you’re not just asking those questions, because I agree with those questions. Of course, FEMA should’ve gotten info straight from the National Weather Service, but they didn’t. Why not? We’ll find out during the investigation, and then we’ll fic it.
What I think is absurd is this statement, the first statement of yours to which I responded:
You put Chertoff’s “dodged the bullet” in the category of a “lie” to be “debunked,” like Broussard’s lie was debunked. I’ve clearly demonstrated that, while Chertoff was wrong to think that NO had gotten off lucky, he had every reason to think that, if he were going on media reports.
Again with that active fantasy life. I’m not giving anyone a pass — I’m just waiting for the facts as to why FEMA didn’t know what the National Weather Service was saying before I start handing out the blame.
slide
Yes. That is my opinion. I can’t belive for a MOMENT that Chertoff didn’t know the levee situation prior to that Tuesday morning. I can’t for the life of me imagine that they didn’t ask the people that would be monitoring the levees, “How are the levees holding up ?” before Tuesday morning. It is inconceivable to me that the very flood controls that they were worried about, which, if they failed, could have killed tens of thousands of Americans, would not have been discussed from Monday morning when the levees broke to the famous Tuesday morning papers. If that IS the case then that is far far worse than a lie about newspaper reading habits.
So, yes, I am going to be very very interested what the hearings bring out on this very point. Who knew what, when. And I’ll bet you anything that Chertoff was advised by SOMEBODY that the levees had been compromised prior to Tuesday morning and what he was saying on MTP was just obfuscation.
DougJ
Bullshit. If you believe that, I’ve got some Iraqi WMD I’d like to sell you.
The “investigation” will be a whitewash, CYA operation. If they weren’t trying to hide something, they’d convene an outside panel.
Here’s a fact you can take to the bank: when anyone insists on “investigating” themselves, it means they’ve got something to hide.
slide
Doug I agree with you but they may have to have an outside panel since the Dems are not cooperating. They will not sit on a hearing leaving the Republicans all by themselves. That won’t look very good on TV. So, thankfully, it seems as if the Dems are getting some balls and will force the Republicans to agree to an independent 911 type panel.
.
DougJ
That’s unusual that you see the Democrats in Congress show any guts at all. Maybe they’ll stop cowering in focus group fear and start doing their jobs.
I wouldn’t count on it though.
DougJ
I think the White House is doing their own bullshit “investigation” of themselves. That should be entertaining.
ppGaz
You are building upon facts not on the record. We don’t know what he knew about the nursing home. It wasn’t in his parish. Perhaps he was ill informed. He looked somewhat crazed during the interview, I took him to be a man who had been without sleep for days, and a little flipped out.
So without the facts, you lunge ahead and create a fiction around the story …. for your own purposes. Exactly how does that differ from what you are suggesting he did?
summr
Interesting article from the NYT: More Horrible Than Truth: News Reports
Consequences…
I find this more upsetting than the Broussard story.
Darrell
At the time, all the gullible moonbats were going on and on about how “riveting” and “powerful” Broussard’s Meet the Press interview was, despite that fact that there had been no interview with the man Broussard was talking about. Now that the story has turned out to be bullshit as Broussard told it, the left is too dishonest to admit how stupid they were, how they swallowed the story without question. It’s the leftist “faith based” approach to news. They seize upon everything that fits their predetermined beliefs without questioning
Com Con
And now it turns out the guy was a liar. Just like Michael Moore, Cindy Sheehan, and the rest. Anything that feeds into their predesitined beliefs.
It makes you wonder how many other of the FEMA “horror stories” the Dems have been telling were also fabricated.
Com Con
Is there a way this guy could be sued for libel? It’s really outrageous that he said those things. I hope that at least he was fired from his job.
ppGaz
You guys are so funny. A guy starts a war on the basis of bullshit, and you defend him.
Another guy tells a story about people drowning in a rest home, and misses the drowning date, and you’d think that he was a mass murderer.
No wonder people delight in shitting all over you people in here, you deserve it.
Com Con
It seems to me that Mayor Broussard is no longer fit to run the city of Jeffeson. Maybe suing is too much, after all we’ve got the right to free speech, but who would want someone like that for their mayor? Can’t he be recalled at least?
ppGaz
By whom? There’s nobody there.
ppGaz
We haven’t discussed the return to the moon thing … just as in his first term, Bush presides over a completely nutty proposal for a big space initiative. They suggest taking 13 years to “get back to the moon” which is considerably longer than it took to get to the lunar surface the first time around. About twice as long, and considering that a lot of the technology already exists, and we know how to do it, that’s just short of mind boggling. But not as mind boggling as the chutzpah of these guys making the suggestion now, of all times, in the first place.
Maybe they can put on a show about the new lunar mission during the actual landfall of Hurricane Rita?
donald
David Kays report says a lot of things…perhaps you’d like to read it. Theyhave found weapons, gas etc…(The key word you’re looking for is Stockpiles, which have not been found). The report also reports in copious detail that perhaps evidence collection could have been better had they not been barred from entering most of the sites they wanted to inspect, and that they found it disconcerting that they would repeatedly pull up to sites, and have to wait for days while trucks left the compounds before they were allowed to enter. Read, it ain’t that hard. You may also want to peruse the NY Times on the matter.
Vietnam – I not only have the luxury of hindsight, but also my principles which reject doing anything to help the French.
Osama – Like I said, I could be wrong, but in my gut I don’t think so. I bet you don’t think the CIA is so on the ball typically.
Russia, French, Germany oil for food corruption – That’s right a guy is getting prosecuted in Texas by the US government. That is not to say, because FOX, the UN, The BBC, The Guardian, and Al Jezeera for godsakes have reported no such thing at any time. Learn the difference between government complicity/corruption and American jurisprudence.
Saddam – When it became necessary, Saddam was preaching that he was a direct descendent of Mohammed and was a very pious Sunni. You knew that I’m betting, but it doesn’t fit his template. In addition, my understanding of islam is that one should feel free to form any alliance and do anything to kill infidels. Just to make you feel better stupid man, I am aware that the US had a huge hand in making him powerful. I am aware and despise the geo-politics the US has been engaged in in the last several decades. I do feel unlike many of you, that it was more a matter of wrongheaded/ham fisted efforts at economic trade and all, and it never should have happened.
Read more, open you fucking eyes.
donald
Whoops, on the corruption thing, I meant to say that none of those news organizations has reported any US govermental corruption in the Oil For Food Scandal.
I realize I’m showing palpable anger here, but this say anything bullshit is disgusting and I will never forget it. I suffered through 8 years of a rapist/Marxist-Leninist in the white house. I suffered through 8 years, going on 14 now of some shithead doing anything to drive wedges between groups of people…and that is how you look at people right? Groups, not individuals. I couldn’t even vote for Zell again after ya’ll crap.
ppGaz
Just to get this on the record here before the thread disappears into total obscurity ….
I am pretty sure now, having matched up the information being relayed through the press by the attorney for the owners of the rest home with the story originally told by Broussard on MTP … that what happened here is essentially a 2nd hand or 3rd hand telling of a story with a simple misunderstanding about the timeline …. by people who were in a state I’d describe as somewhere between hysterical, and exhausted.
The main factual difference between Broussard’s account and the official one is that according to officials, the elderly persons in the rest home probably drowned on the Tuesday after the storm, and were FOUND on Friday. Whereas, Broussard’s account had them DROWNED on Friday. But the other story points were roughly congruent with the official facts and the story being told by the attorney for the rest home owners, namely, that a frantic series of phone calls was made over several days in an effort to effect an evacuation of the residents, without success.
When the last word on this story is heard, I think it will be apparent that there was no deliberate misstelling of the story. Further, I assert that the really ugly story here is the manner in which the rightwing scum in this blog have treated this story from the beginning, without having, or bothering to explore, all the facts related to it. Their insistence that some sort of conspiratorial effort was made to “cook up” a false story is bizarre and troubling. Their attitude towards the story, which is a sort of hand-rubbing glee over finding discontinuities in the story line — without bothering to resolve them — is grotesque. Several dozen people died here, and you have people like Stormy laughing over this event because she is able, in the confusion over the details, to spin it into some sort of macabre “victory” for supporters of George Bush.
That’s the truth about this story. In time, a good deal more information is going to come out, because there is going to be a criminal prosecution of the rest home owners.
donald
Nope, A cheap political hack played politics with a natural disaster. Period.
ppGaz
Prove it.