As we speak, former FEMA Director Michael Brown is testifying before Congress, and so far it has been a little testy, but not that shocking. Meanwhile, the NY Times reports that the White House knew about the levee breaches earlier than previously believed:
In the aftermath of Hurricane Katrina, Bush administration officials said they had been caught by surprise when they were told on Tuesday, Aug. 30, that a levee had broken, allowing floodwaters to engulf New Orleans.
But Congressional investigators have now learned that an eyewitness account of the flooding from a federal emergency official reached the Homeland Security Department’s headquarters starting at 9:27 p.m. the day before, and the White House itself at midnight.
The Federal Emergency Management Agency official, Marty Bahamonde, first heard of a major levee breach Monday morning. By late Monday afternoon, Mr. Bahamonde had hitched a ride on a Coast Guard helicopter over the breach at the 17th Street Canal to confirm the extensive flooding. He then telephoned his report to FEMA headquarters in Washington, which notified the Homeland Security Department.
“FYI from FEMA,” said an e-mail message from the agency’s public affairs staff describing the helicopter flight, sent Monday night at 9:27 to the chief of staff of Homeland Security Secretary Michael Chertoff and recently unearthed by investigators. Conditions, the message said, “are far more serious than media reports are currently reflecting. Finding extensive flooding and more stranded people than they had thought — also a number of fires.”
Michael D. Brown, who was the director of FEMA until he resigned under pressure on Sept. 12, said in a telephone interview Thursday that he personally notified the White House of this news that night, though he declined to identify the official he spoke to.
White House officials have confirmed to Congressional investigators that the report of the levee break arrived there at midnight, and Trent Duffy, the White House spokesman, acknowledged as much in an interview this week, though he said it was surrounded with conflicting reports.
Certainly this does not bode well for the White House or the DHS response. As usual, though, Democrats will probably overplay their hand. Last night on Hardball, Rep. Barney Frank stated the administration was committing “ethnic cleansing through inaction.” I guess they just can’t help themselves.
*** Update ***
Rick Moran comments.
Geek, Esq.
Well, the Dems will either overplay it or fail to take sufficient advantage of it.
ppGaz
Maybe they’re as good at trolling the righty crapheads as you guys think you are at trolling the lefties?
You guys don’t even know when you are being played like a damned violin.
neil
I guess that means those of us who were blaming the federal government while it was ‘too soon to be sure’ were right. I tell you, I never get tired of being right too soon.
ObRaceCardSnark:
Last night on Hardball, Rep. Barney Frank stated the administration was committing “ethnic cleansing through inaction.” I guess they just can’t help themselves.
Not as bad as Mary Matalin claiming that civil rights leaders were, quote, “keeping their African-American brothers enslaved.” Let’s see if anyone who objected to Hillary’s ‘plantation’ comment brings this up.
Slide
I congratulate John for posting the NYT’s article showing that when Chertoff said,”we all thought we dodged the bullet” the day after Katrina hit, he was just lying through his teeth (surprise, surprise). Just to recall what the lying sack of shit Chertoff said:
Many of at the time said that that smelled like bullshit to us. We were branded as “bush haters” by Cole and the other Bush apologists on here (you know who you are). Is there ANYTHING that this adminstration doesn’t lie about? They are the most dishonest bunch of incompetents that we have ever had running our country. .
John Cole
Actually, I believe if I am correct, Brown just testified that he never informed Chertoff- he informed someone at the White House. The Senator claimed that was ‘astounding.’
Marcus Wellby
Yes, yes — because what Barney Frank says is the most damning thing to come out of Katrina’s aftermath.
LITBMueller
The BIG thing is that Brown is spilling his guts regarding convesation he had with the White House – something that this Administration has completely blocked, but now has not. Brown, being a private citizen, is free to talk – and is doing so!
So, we are going to learn alot at this hearing today, as long as the right questions are asked.
Marcus Wellby
Brownie seems both arrogant and stupid enough to think he can survive the coming Rovian assualt.
neil
I will personally enjoy the kabuki dance over the next few days as Democrats try to put Brown forward as a refreshingly honest and responsible public servent and Republicans try to explain that his incompetence was what screwed up the federal disaster response so badly.
John Cole
Ditto. This should be rich.
Richard Bottoms
Hmm, 3,000 missing and the White House knew the levees were breeched? What’s that now, a .5% black vote for the next Repbulican presidential candidate.
And how many people watch Hardball, on a good night? About 500,000 folks? And how many of them think Barney Frank sits at the center of the Democratic party?
And, isn’t New Orleans ethniclly cleansed anyway? Not through some plan where Bush ordered up a storm (De Jure), but in fact (De Facto). Eighty percent of the black population is gone.
A fact I am sure the Republicans have no plans at all to capitalize on.
Right. Now say that again like you really believe it.
LITBMueller
I’m not seeing a kabuki dance at all – it is more of an attempt by members, both Dem and Republican, to get at the heart what went wrong, not just put all the blame on one guy.
Specifically, there is clearly problems with having FEMA being part of the massive DHS. Brown has also testified about how the White House was insisting he go “up the chain of command” in terms fo making requests for Katrina relief. But, Brown felt that the “chain” through DHS was way too slow – hence his “astounding” comment about going around Chertoff and appealing directly to guys like Andy Card.
This doesn’t make Brownie faultless, but it certainly raises perpelexing questions about the whole structure, and about how effective it would be in any future disasters. Hopefully, this will be the focus of the whole hearing.
So far, it is. In fact, Brownie just testified that FEMA should not be part of DHS, and is explaining why.
Marcus Wellby
Richard Bottoms, not sure if you got it, but my post was sarcasm.
Steve
Talking about thousands of dead people is so depressing. Let’s talk about whether the Democrats are dissenting responsibly instead.
Lines
Somehow I think that Barnie Frank quote has been taken out of context enough that it appears damning, but probably was much more limited than what John has posted.
VidaLoca
No, it’s not that shocking. In fact by now it’s almost to be expected.
I give John credit for printing this too, and I can even see how in the first week of September last year as the media brouhaha began to unfold it could make some sense to say, wait a minute: let’s see what the facts are before we form our opinions. Because it just seemed almost unbelievable that something could have been handled so badly.
So here we are, five months — just five months! — later, and it hardly seems unbelievable at all. What’s coming next? Five months from now, will it even make the news?
John, you tease Barney Frank for hyperbole for calling it “ethnic cleansing”. If you don’t think that’s what it was — if you don’t like the Kosovo analogy — how do you explain this stuff then? Is it possible for an administration to be so thoroughly incompetent and inept and mendacious, without some underlying plan or purpose?
Word.
t. jasper parnell
Mr. Cole,
Mr. Brown just said, if I heard him correctly, that he tried to convince DHS to engage in more disaster planing focused on New Orleans and was rebuffed. And even now he seems to be claiming, although these claims must be read against earlier claims of his mendacity, stupidity, and general incompetence, that the DHS was and is a mess, at least in terms of its disaster management.
Pb
Richard Bottoms,
I was going to post something about the definition of ethnic cleansing, and the history of inaction here, but it got eaten. However, your post was pretty good, so I don’t feel so bad about it.
I will merely add that Bush was so on top of things that Dan Bartlett had to make him a DVD of news coverage so he could see the anarchy that he had been oblivious of during his previous four days on auto-pilot–photo-ops, avoiding Cindy Sheehan, hard work, etc.
Ancient Purple
Not to mention Bill O’Reilly telling Al Sharpton he wanted to see him in chains. Link.
Blue Neponset
You know John, it isn’t always about politics. If the response to Katrina is the best we can do, then our country is in trouble. Also, it is sad that Bush & Co. seem more interested in fixing the political problems that have come from his Katrina response as opposed to the actual managerial problems related to his Katrina response.
I have never understood your dismissive attitude toward people who think the response to Katrina was not adequate. I am starting to think that the Katrina scandal is just a political football to you.
ppGaz
Relax, Richard. This is just another BJ troll thread.
After a few righties get in their talking points, the lefties come in and jack the thread and make ’em all look frigging ridiculous.
This is what you get when you scan the Intertrons and pick out the most asinine piece of information you can find and then use it to gin up page views. A city wiped out, people dead … who gives a shit? The important thing is some crack Barney made to jerk a few Republican chains. Yeah, that’s it. It’s The United States of Snarkamerica. Government of, by and for the frat boys and the bankers.
t. jasper parnell
Mr. Cole,
Your representation of Mr. Frank’s comments is not entirely accurate and in its current form hyperbolic. In your closing remark you leave the reader with the impression that the initial occurance of the “ethnic cleansing” was on Hardball. This is in err. Mr. Mathews asked Mr. Frank to come on the show to amplify or expand on a comment Mr. Frank had made the night before. As his comments make clear, he refered or intended to refer to the reconstruction of New Orleans, which appear to make more difficult the return of the poorer citizens, many of whom are black.
Don Surber
Old Liberal Talking Point:
Michael Brown is a hack who coulddn’t run a horse club
New:
Michael Brown is a Scapegoated Cassandra
gratefulcub
The fact that Brownie is talking about our disaster relief program is only giving aid and comfort to the hurricanes. Shame Shame.
Blue Neponset
Are you saying those two ‘talking points’ are contradictory?
Edmund Dantes
The sad aspect is Katrina should have been the payoff of all the money, time, and effort that was going into making sure we didn’t repeat the haphazard, chaotic, miscommunications, etc of Setpember 11th. Yet 4 years later we come to the realization nothing was accomplished. It’s kind of crazy listening to all the things that went wrong during Katrina, and realizing that there are a lot of carbon copies of what went wrong on September 11th.
But at least we can play political theater with it. Yippee!!!
gratefulcub
Don Surber,
How about, “Brownie was an incompetent political hack. It is now apparent that he was unqualified, but Bush appointed him anyway. Even though he was incompetent, he still informed the appropriate people of the seriousness of the situation. Their reaction was insufficient, on top of putting cronies in important positions.”
Anyone else notice that this is, once again, a situation in which they only listened to the good news and didn’t think about responding to the worst case scenario.
They didn’t plan for an insurgency, even though it was a legitimate possibility.
There was different reports about Katrina, some said it was serious (like the FEMA director), others said it wasn’t so bad. Do they react in way that deals with the worst case scenario? No, he stays on vacation and gets to bed at his regular 10 o’clock hour. Prezidentin’ ain’t so hard if you do it his way.
jg
Wow. I bet you thought you hit a homerun with that one. Too bad he is a scapegoat who is also a hack who couldn’t run a horse club. Incompetent crony thrown under the bus. Its ok. They’re just showing how ineffective governement is.
gratefulcub
Don Surber,
And what is Rove’s reaction going to be?
Then: “You’re doing a heckuva job Brownie.”
Now: i would be snarky and make something up, but I am honestly not capable of predicting Rove. It is always more brash than I think he will be, more dishonest, and even worse for political discourse than I can imagine. And, I’m not that funny.
Randy
Browie is a hack, who should have never been put in a position of power in the first place. The sick spectacle of him ratting out his superiors is appalling, but instructive. Anyone who thinks this is a happy day for Democrats is mistaken. It kind of sucks that the huge bureauocracy that was created to come to our aid in case of disaster is totally incompetent from the very top down.
That’s two strikes against Bush.
Strike one – his total and complete failure to provide any leadership on the issue of terrorism before 9/11 and the cynical use of the fear generated by 9/11 to misdirect us into an aggressive war of choice.
Strike two – Well, Katrina and the mess at Homeland Security obviously.
Can we afford a strike three?
Davebo
Gotta love John.
3 months ago. “Withholding judgement, we don’t have all the facts. You guys really hate Bush”.
Now. “What a laugh! Look at those Dems fawning over Brownie… What was he thinking communicating directly to thw White House. It’s vacation time! They’re at the ranch!
Lines
John, please post a link to the full transcript of Barney Frank saying “ethnic cleansing” or don’t talk about it at all. The only places I’ve found the quote are from NewsBusters (wow, can it get anymore nuts than that place?) and some nightly news place. Both of them leave out the context of the quote in an attempt to garner an emotional response, and I’m willing to give you the benefit of the doubt and say you were just suckered by it, but without the full quote, we’re all just suckers in this little game of out-of-contextual quoting.
Pooh
I saw Frank on hardball, and he was very clear that he was using the term “ethnic cleansing” as it’s real meaning as opposed to the euphemistic (Milosovician) meaning.
Genocide is a tactic used to achieve ethnic cleansing, but the two are not co-equal. (Consider Kirkuk in Iraq, Saddam didn’t “cleanse” by killing the Kurds, he did it largely by kicking them out of their homes and moving Baathists in, in order to “Arabize the city.” not making the comparison. Using the example strictly to demonstrate a non-genocidal ethnic cleanising. And not to say that Saddam didn’t kill a lot of Kurds.)
On Hardball, Frank was explicit that he was saying that as a result of the lack of action on the part of the administartion, N.O. is going to be a much smaller, richer, whiter city. (Which, oh by the way, is good for the GOP in an electoral sense, which he described as “the icing” on the cake).
So, before you get your knickers in a twist, John, A) have a glass of wine. B) See what he actually said not what your corporate overlords told you he said.The Other Steve
What are you talking about?
This is all Brown’s fault. Now that he’s off the reservation, expect him to hang.
neil
To be fair to Don Surber, it really is true that they are lavishing praise and defense on Brownie over at Kos. Don’t take my word for it, go read for yourself.
Also to be fair, just because you’re a scapegoat doesn’t mean you’re actually free of blame. Anyone who knows the first thing about scapegoating knows that you choose the guiltiest party who is less powerful than you, and try to get them to take your share of blame to.
The Other Steve
http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/11272739/
Honestly, I don’t see anything wrong with what he said. It is clear that if/when they rebuild New Orleans they aren’t going to put the slums back in place.
Randy
Barney Frank may or may not have said the words “ethnic cleansing through inaction”. If he did, good for him. I’ll bet that in 10 years, New Orleans will be 90% white. I also applaud Hillary for saying the Republicans run the Senate like a plantation. It’s true, and guess what, black people understood what she meant by that. The Republicans have really jumped the shark on their version of political correct speach. Fuck em. Keep speaking truth to power.
Pooh
Though I will agree that “ethnic cleansing” is a very charged term. Though if his factual claims about the changed demographics in N.O. are correct, it is probably applicable. Now, what that means normatively is up to you.
Mr Furious
I don’t view any of this as good for the White House or vindicating for Brown. I also don’t think it’s a smoking gune either, and the Dems aren’t going to get very much mileage out of it. Try as they might.
t. jasper parnell
The full transcript of the Hardball program is here
http://msnbc.msn.com/id/11272739/
As later comments have made clear Mr. Cole’s representation is not entirely accurate.
Randy
Mr. Furious, everything doesn’t always have to be about political milage and smoking guns. You Repulicans need to take a long, hard look at yourselves.
Randy
Neil, heres my take on it. Brown was made a scapegoat, and he was responsible for his inaction. The two aren’t mutually exclusive. I have nothing but contempt for the man. It’s kind of like the reprehensable peons who took the fall for torture at Abu Grahaib.
Lines
So essentially John Cole is trolling his own website by using a small snippet of a quote taken out of context and adding his own context to it?
Did you think you wouldn’t get caught with this group, John?
muddy
I also saw Barney Frank, and he made pains to say that there was a large difference between ethnic cleansing and genocide. He said genocide was killing the people outright, ethnic cleansing was making them move away from the area.
Seemed plain enough to me. But then I am not scrambling to find something someone else said that makes the Administration look better by comparison.
Words = deeds? I don’t think so. No matter what Barney Frank has to say, the actions of the Administration are worse.
The Other Steve
It’s interesting. In Richard Clarke’s book he describes Homeland Security as a stupid idea. Especially since they told them to transform and then provided no additional funding.
The lack of support for FEMA is just the tip of the iceberg in terms of incompetence here.
The Other Steve
It’s Gotcha politics. They can’t debate on the actual issues, they have to turn to arguments of Political Correctness to try to score cheap points.
Pooh
My recollection is fuzzy here, but didn’t most people think DHS was a bad idea? (including the administration before it became politically expedient to form DHS…)
John Cole
Taken his quote out of context? Here is the damned quote:
Yeah. I really took it out of context.
You people amaze me.
gratefulcub
Rick Moran comments:
Again, they got contradictory reports, and used the one they liked best. They were, at a minimum, getting reports that included the flooding of NO. But, since the reports were contradictory, they continued on with the vacation. Global Warming – need more research. Katrina – need more research, I’m going to bed, I have had a long day clearing brush, and I have to have my picture taken with a guitar tomorrow.
We should not look at this to see what went wrong, because what “good will it do for which ever city is next in line?”
Lines
Yes, John, you shorted the quote, grabbed the emotional words of “ethnic cleansing” and left out the link to the quote in order to generate posts from the liberals that inhabit your blog.
Did you care that Frank explained that he wasn’t talking about ethnic-cleansing as a body-count style issue, but just that forcing out blacks from the area might have been a goal for a few? or did you just want to play the emotional card?
ppGaz
Yeah, right. Imagine, people who don’t roll over like dogs when you issue the commands.
Gee whillikers.
Are all Republicans just allergic to the idea that not everyone agrees with them? Or is it just the bloghounds?
Republicans = Everyone should be just like me
Where the hell do you people learn this crap? Did your mommies teach you to be like that, or ?
jan van flac
In context or out, I think it’s appropriate.
mark
though, Democrats will probably overplay their hand
and this makes the White House response to Katrina and their lying in the aftermath ok, right John?
stickler
Who cares? They don’t control either house of Congress.
The Republican Party controls the Congress. The question should be: what are they going to do about incompetence that killed so many people and let an American city be wiped off the map?
Of course, once that question is asked, we all know the answer already. The Congressional GOP is going to do nothing to hold the Bush White House accountable. These hearings are just theater for the rubes.
t. jasper parnell
Mr. Cole,
As a “you people,” I find your comment odd. There is at least one factual error in your initial post, that Mr. Frank made the statement on Hardball last night. As a guick review of the Hardball transcript shows, what he said last night was an amplification or explanation of what exactly he meant. Last night, Mr. Frank sought to end any confusion that could or might result of using “ethnic cleansing by inaction” without making clear the charge had to do with rebuilding New Orleans in a way that made it more difficult or impossible for its poor, who are or in any event were, primarily black to return.
Simply posting the quote in a manner that suggest that context has thus been restored is not sufficient. As most any one knows, in Capital, Marx lays out a classical liberal definition of the freedom of labor, which he then proceeds to mock. Reproducing the snippet of text on free labor could lead an uniformed, or lazy, reader to assume that Marx thought labor was free to chose its place of employment in an advanced or advancing system of industrial capitalism, when the opposite was the case. In a similar fashion, one could reproduce Smith’s famous remarks about how working on a assembly line is brutalizing and then insist that see Smith hated industrial capitalism, when the opposite was the case.
t. jasper parnell
by making clear
Lines
you know jasper, I’m really starting to like you.
anonomous
You
anonomous
can’t
anonomous
go
anonomous
on
anonomous
defending
anonomous
the indefensable
anonomous
forever.
anonomous
Burma Shave
wilfred
I like it: Incompetent Political Hack v. Mindless Demagogue.
Anyone got an over/under on this?
Steve
I hope we all have a good laugh at Stormy’s expense when this “ethnic cleansing” ends up turning Texas blue.
Jorge
Ethnic cleansing?
I thought the politically correct term for that was “Urban Renewal.”
Or “Latino Removal”
peteathome
I think the above dialog is very much a microcosim of what is going on in Washington now. Both parties have destroyed their center and are allowing their shrill extremists to speak for them.
Rather than accomplish anything, they choose choice words out of context and use them to batter each other. One side is swift boating the other, and one is yelling “ethnic cleansing”. Meanwhile, there is absolutely no leadership from the top. So in between attacks on each other, the majority party is spending like drunken sailors with no Executive vetos.
While all this fun is going on no progress seems to have been made in improving emergency response since 9/11.
This bodes very badly for all of us.
t. jasper parnell
Mr Jorge,
This posting might interest you. http://www.2blowhards.com/archives/002592.html
In the course of a discussion of Jane Jacobs, the author, with the impropable name of Michael Blowhard, observes:
(Small sidebar: I’m forever tinkering with, and never quite finishing, a posting about urban renewal. Major themes: what a horror it was, and how underknown it is today. I’m not entirely sure of my judgment in the matter, but I suspect that urban renewal may have been a self-inflicted American disaster on a par with the Vietnam War. Before laughing at me, consider the tally. Thousands of communities were destroyed. Millions of people were forcibly relocated. So many of these people were black that black people joked about urban renewal, bitterly calling it “Negro removal.” Tens of billions of dollars were spent in an almost entirely destructive fashion. We did this to ourselves — can you imagine? Anyway, we’re still living in the shadow of this gigantic mistake, just as we’re still living in the shadow of Vietnam.)
I cannot say I agree with the Viet-Nam aspect, but the fact of the matter does seem to have been that “urban renewal” led to increased segragation, for example in Milwaukee.
mark
peteathome said: While all this fun is going on no progress seems to have been made in improving emergency response since 9/11.
are you implying that Barney Frank is responsible for improving the emergency response to 9/11-like disasters? Because as I recall the democrats have been shut out of the decision making process in the house and senate.
Also I’m having trouble understanding this statement:
Rather than accomplish anything, they choose choice words out of context and use them to batter each other.
and then you go on to take as swipe at Barney Frank’s comment as part of the problem of the fringes controlling the dialog when it’s been shown that John took it out of the context of what Rep. Frank was saying.
ppGaz
I don’t agree. I think what is happening is that politicized media and the blogosphere has a vested interest in conflict. So, the blogs and the tv-heads sift through the day’s events and pick this stuff out just to get attention.
Outside the electronic beltway of tv, pols, blogs, and politics wonks, nobody really gives a shit about this stuff.
Steve
Boy, I sure as heck wish the elected Democrats were in the pocket of the far Left. Unfortunately, arguments to that effect never seem to get much farther than “you gave Michael Moore a good seat at the convention!”
When the Democrats have their Terri Schiavo moment, I will concede the point. Until then, just another false equivalence.
peteathome
Regardless of whether the parties have become extreme or it’s the media pulling comments out of context, how do we explain that no progress has been made on emergency response and, frankly, most issues of national security.
I realize that all three branches are controlled by the Republicans, but why haven’t the Democrats made an issue out of the lack of progress?
Is the argument that the media is also in the Republican camp and the Democrats can’t get this message out?
If so, we are in even more trouble than I’d like to think.
I’d rather believe that both parties are responsible.
ppGaz
Watch them try it, and then watch the blahsphere and the FauxNews heads flap their gums over “politicization” of the disaster. Watch the BJ type spaces find the most asinine or annoying blurb in a pile of text and blow it all up out of proportion.
What do you think is going on here? You are watching the operation of a full-on noise machine. This blog is part of it. Lock, stock and barrel.
John Cole
“You people” are missing the point whatsoever. I am not “OUTRAGED!” or “SHOCKED!” or even remotely “ANGRY!” about Barney Franks remarks. for the record, I like Barney Frank.
What I stated was that the Democrats will overplay their hand. Using loaded terms like ‘ethnic cleansing’ puts the Demcorats in a poisition of being dismissed for excessive hyperbole when, by all rights, they shoujld be in a position to gain politically from administration incompetence.
And for that, a ver y legitimate and accurate observation, you flail away at me as a spinner, or part of the noise machine, or pretend that I am ‘excusing’ the incompetence.
I have never in my life been surrounded by people who so intentionally attribute the most malicious meaning to what I say or write. It is like some of you willfully misinterpret things.
ppGaz
All due respect, is it okay if I don’t consider you the final aribiter of that?
Thx in advance ….. yore pal, PG.
jg
By posting this you are enabling the people who will dismiss the dems. You’re providing the reason. Rather than help point out why what Frank is saying is correct you play along with the other side while wishing the dems would give you a reson to vote dem. Mind boggling. Then you whine that you’re misunderstood when you send mixed signals.
Andrei
Which of course backfires so often on the GOP when they do it over and over. That of course when the GOP uses “excessive hyperbole.”
At this stage of the game, I’m not sure I even care anymore what you mean or don’t mean. All I know is that you, John Cole, voted for George Bush.
*TWICE.*
And you want to lecture us about all measure of things political? Uhh… Yeah… Right. Sure… Go right ahead.
[/hysterical laughter]
mark
Amen. it doesn’t matter WHAT your message is if it is distorted beyond all recognition by the time it gets to the masses. A prime example is the King funeral. I’ll bet 99.999% of the people offended and outraged about it were not watching it and have never seen it. They are depending on a few talking heads like O’Reilly, Hanity, etc. to give them their impressions of that is happening in the world.
ding, ding,ding….we have a winner. I wouldn’t say the media is in the Republican camp per se. They are in the unfettered corporate power camp. If dissing democrats and building up republicans friendly to their cause helps then, then that’s what happens. It’s not a mainstream media MSM, it’s a CORPORATE media.
Paul Wartenberg
Can I just post something about ‘Brownie’s’ testimony today before Congress?
I can’t accept it. He positioned himself as a go-getter and do-gooder who got stymied by his DHS superiors. Did he ever get asked about the emails and calls from the people actually IN New Orleans during the storm and flooding where he showed no interest other than his dinner plans and fashion sense?
While the reports DHS and WH lack of initiative fits a good amount of evidence (basically, that the whole thing broke down between local and state and fed alike), how believable is Brown’s self-serving testimony to fit all that evidence together?
Perry Como
In all fairness, some of us may just be taking the lead of the White House. Rovian politics does have its consequences.
Bruce Moomaw
Kevin Drum now says that, judging from Brownie’s testimony so far, he was seriously overstating his ability yesterday to pin the blame for the Katrina disaster on other Bushites than himself. Quite possibly; but I still have no objection to his digging up whatever real dirt on them may actually exist.
Remfin
Sorry John, but you keep missing the point. Go back through your old posts and see the difference between how lefties are referenced and righties are (or however you want to to divide it).
You claimed to be against Alito at the start. I don’t know your philosophy but to me one must prove you are worthy to be on the SC, and nothing in his confirmation hearing changed my mind. Yet the NYTimes puts out an editorial against his confirmation (which most editorial boards did, left or right, the big difference was “filibuster or not?”) and talking about what was actually said in the article was not the subject – the subject was “boy how dumb is an EDITORIAL page to print an EDITORIAL! They’re playing right into the hands of the Republicans! Obviously they should have used that space to print a top 10 list of makeup tips from Paris Hilton”
Compare/contrast with whoever that Republican was (was it Boehner? I honestly can’t remember since it wasn’t much at the time) who was renting the apartment from a big-time lobbyist. “Ho hum, non-story, much ado about nothing”. If you followed the pattern you did for the NYTimes you should have been posting pages and pages calling him stupid for giving his political opponents fodder even if there was no meat to the actual allegation
Here we are again with a Democrat and you’re front-paging an out-of-context quote and calling him stupid again, when as far as I can tell he was right and not being crazy in some way in his hyberbole. In fact you practically admitted it too
MMM
Maybe President Bush was right…Brownie was doing a good job, he was just either ignored or unaware of his President’s agenda (and this is by no means a defense that Brownie was qualified to begin with)
Devil's Advocate
The House (sic!) has come up with a damning report about the mishandling of the Katrina hurricane. It is scathing to the whole chain of command, from the White House down. Check out the MSM (which is not the “liberal” press like you people to the right of Attila-the-Hun like to call it, but rather what I call the corporate media whores).
Gee! The most corrupt, mendacious, greedy, and thieving, politicians in the history of the U.S., must be getting an earful from their constituencies, and peeing their pants ahead of the November elections! Time to raise funds for some adult diapers!