Politics

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.

Katrina Fall-OutPost + Comments (86)

The White House has released a clickable map of the 50 states which lead you to specific information for each state regarding the 2007 budget. That in and of itself is kind of cool, and an interesting use of technology to get a political message out. This, however, caught my eye when examining the points specific to WV:

$772 million for the Occupational Safety and Health Administration (OSHA) and the Mine Safety and Health Administration (MSHA) to strengthen workplace safety and health through strong enforcement and innovative partnerships and cooperative agreements with employers.

The Administration again calls on the Congress to pass legislation to increase civil monetary penalties for violations of laws administered by MSHA. The Administration proposes to raise the maximum penalty for egregious violations from $60,000 to $220,000, bringing its penalties more in line with those assessed by OSHA.

We shall see how that pans out, and I do not know the numbers for OSHA and MSHA last year.

Mine SafetyPost + Comments (40)

You have to wonder who exactly Bush thought he was helping with this bizarre stunt:

[T]his year, with no fanfare whatsoever, Bush stuck a big Social Security privatization plan in the federal budget proposal, which he sent to Congress on Monday.

His plan would let people set up private accounts starting in 2010 and would divert more than $700 billion of Social Security tax revenues to pay for them over the first seven years.

It’s all in there: the private accounts, the indexing, every other airheaded idea that you thought had already died months ago. Before anybody forgets Social Security privatization died an unmourned death, with every new Luntz-approved catchphrase (‘personalization,’ ‘personal accounts,’ ‘modernization,’ whatever) proving less popular than the last. By the end Republicans were reduced to denying, indignantly, that they ever supported such a ridiculous scheme.

I wouldn’t take this story too seriously because few Pubs come from safe enough districts to take on Social Security in the full light of day. This scheme died the moment it appeared in a newspaper.

Speaking of underhanded legislative gimmicks, here’s a new one from our friends Frist and Hastert:

“Senate Majority Leader Bill Frist and House Speaker Dennis Hastert engineered a backroom legislative maneuver to protect pharmaceutical companies from lawsuits, say witnesses to the pre-Christmas power play. The language was tucked into a Defense Department appropriations bill at the last minute without the approval of members of a House-Senate conference committee, say several witnesses, including a top Republican staff member.”

Travel back with me, if you will, to a day in 1987 when a long-ago campaigner for good government, Rep. Dick Cheney, reacted to that horrible Jim Wright holding a vote open for an additional 15 minutes:

Republicans denounced this as an outrageous departure from regular order. Then-Rep. Trent Lott (R-Miss.) railed against “Jim Wright and his goons.” And a Republican congressman named Dick Cheney denounced the move as “the most arrogant, heavy-handed abuse of power I’ve ever seen in the 10 years that I’ve been here.”

Cut to that selfsame campaigner standing on a windswept field, observing today’s congress and crying a single, silent tear.

***Update***

Yes, Cheney has stood on that field and cried that tear before. Some public service ads are too poignantly moving to run just once.

Think of this Cheney person, kids, the next time you litter wreck Congress.

The College TryPost + Comments (28)

Mike Brown is blackmailing the White House. Publicly:

Former disaster agency chief Michael Brown is indicating he is ready to reveal his correspondence with President Bush and other officials during Hurricane Katrina unless the White House forbids it and offers legal support.

Brown’s stance, in a letter obtained Wednesday by The Associated Press, follows senators’ complaints that the White House is refusing to answer questions or release documents about advice given to Bush concerning the August 29 storm.

Brown quit as director of the Federal Emergency Management Agency days after Katrina struck. He left the federal payroll November 2.

In a February 6 letter to White House counsel Harriet Miers, Brown’s lawyer wrote that Brown continues to respect Bush and his “presidential prerogative” to get candid and confidential advice from top aides.

The letter from Andrew W. Lester also says Brown no longer can rely on being included in that protection because he is a private citizen.

“Unless there is specific direction otherwise from the president, including an assurance the president will provide a legal defense to Mr. Brown if he refuses to testify as to these matters, Mr. Brown will testify if asked about particular communications,” the lawyer wrote.

Brown’s desire “is that all facts be made public.”

Hehe.

All joking aside, I am hoping they don’t defend him. I want to know all the facts.

A Heckuva Story To tellPost + Comments (24)