Katrina relief question: OT

[riverman]

I know that hindsight is 20-20 (and that threads here can decay into
partisan mud-slinging (not that President Rove doesn't deserve it, mind
you)), but can anyone tell me why there weren't 10,000 national
guardsmen, the FEMA organization and a huge supply of relief goods
waiting in the wings in central Lousiana and Mississippi for the
aftermath of Katrina? We have known for years of the potential of
disaster from such an event as this, and we all knew for days that
Katrina had the very real potential of causing unprecedented mayhem.
The mayor of NO was astute enough to order a total evacuation well
enough in advance to get close to a million people out. FEMA should
have had a plan that could have been implemented to have relief ready
and waiting, prepared to descend on NO the very next morning.

As it stands, it sounds like it will take up to 7 days for the USNS
ship 'Comfort' to get on site, and several days even for the convoys of
vehicles to get organized to bring people out. The lack of supervisory
oversight after the fact makes me think that there was no previous plan
in place at all, and that they are making this up as they go along.

--riverman

[asadi]

"riverman" > wrote in message
ups.com...
> I know that hindsight is 20-20 (and that threads here can decay into
> partisan mud-slinging (not that President Rove doesn't deserve it, mind
> you)), but can anyone tell me why there weren't 10,000 national
> guardsmen, the FEMA organization and a huge supply of relief goods
> waiting in the wings in central Lousiana and Mississippi for the
> aftermath of Katrina? We have known for years of the potential of
> disaster from such an event as this, and we all knew for days that
> Katrina had the very real potential of causing unprecedented mayhem.
> The mayor of NO was astute enough to order a total evacuation well
> enough in advance to get close to a million people out. FEMA should
> have had a plan that could have been implemented to have relief ready
> and waiting, prepared to descend on NO the very next morning.
>
> As it stands, it sounds like it will take up to 7 days for the USNS
> ship 'Comfort' to get on site, and several days even for the convoys of
> vehicles to get organized to bring people out. The lack of supervisory
> oversight after the fact makes me think that there was no previous plan
> in place at all, and that they are making this up as they go along.
>
> --riverman
>

There's a lot of truth to that, but as far as FEMA is concerned, a lot of it
is made up of various teams. Dayton's search and heavy rescue team, the
survivor/body dog team out of Columbus. A lot of these folks are various
home town teams. Their logistics are different.

john

[Tim J.]

riverman typed:
> I know that hindsight is 20-20 (and that threads here can decay into
> partisan mud-slinging ... <snip>

....or they can just start out that way. They'll be plenty of time for
placing blame later. How about you hold off making this a political issue
until after they finish fishing dead bodies from the aftermath?

BTW, for those trying to get through to make a donation to The Red Cross,
I've had no problems getting through first thing in the morning Eastern US
Time. My roffian friends who are still asleep will just need to get up a
little earlier. ;-)
--
TL,
Tim
------------------------
http://css.sbcma.com/timj/

[[email protected]]

Right on, Tim. Also FEMA is a reactive organization, not proactive.

[Scott Seidman]

wrote in news:1125665495.652434.256940
@g49g2000cwa.googlegroups.com:

> Right on, Tim. Also FEMA is a reactive organization, not proactive.
>

Apparently, not reactive enough. Right now, there are diabetics going into
insulin shock, and cardiac patients going into congestive heart failure
because they can't get their meds. There are dialysis patients with no
hospitals. There are people with no food and water. There is no
communication to refugees. There's no place to put people. There's an
underwhelming military presence.

There's little evidence that the US can adequately handle an emergency of
this scale in a timely fashion in the 21st century. This has zero to do
with politics--I'm not sure any administration could have done better.
Certainly, every administration since Kennedy has done little to beef up
the levee system. That said, the underwhelming Guard presence can be traced
to current policy, and much of our other military services have their eyes
elsewhere.

It is comforting to know, though, that those flying commercial airlines to
go down and lend a hand, will not be able to clip their toenails while in
flight. Unfortunately, it takes a disaster to show us just how misplaced
our institutional priorities are. The irony is that the TSA is the result
of an overreaction to another disaster.

--
Scott
Reverse name to reply

[Jack Barnett]

> riverman typed:
>> I know that hindsight is 20-20 (and that threads here can decay into
>> partisan mud-slinging ... <snip>

>and Tim J. answered: ...or they can just start out that way. They'll be
>plenty of time for placing blame later. How about you hold off making this
>a political issue until after they finish fishing dead bodies from the
>aftermath?

Thanks Tim..

Jack Barnett

[[email protected]]

Right on Jon.

[Jeff Miller]

Tim J. wrote:

> BTW, for those trying to get through to make a donation to The Red Cross,
> I've had no problems getting through first thing in the morning Eastern US
> Time. My roffian friends who are still asleep will just need to get up a
> little earlier. ;-)

you can make donations by internet at the red cross web site...no delays.

jeff

[[email protected]]

On 2 Sep 2005 13:21:13 GMT, (Jonathan Cook) wrote:

>riverman > wrote:
>
>> I know that hindsight is 20-20
>
>I don't care about left-right politics, but I certainly wouldn't
>lay this at the feet of the feds. The first line is the city and
>the state, and it appears they had no real plan at all, just
>crossing their fingers and hoping it would never happen. A city
>half below sea level should have been prepared for this for years...
>
>Jon.

agreed...

this area of destruction is 90,000 square miles! Not just NO

[BJ Conner]

Around here the feds run the COE. I didn't know the locals had the
option of building levees, dreging channels etc. I thought there was
something about interstate commerece in the constitution. It's not
really a federal problem anyway. All those farmers who ship corn etc.
out of New Orleans could just as well truck it over to Baltimore or
somewhere.

Jonathan Cook wrote:
> riverman > wrote:
>
> > I know that hindsight is 20-20
>
> I don't care about left-right politics, but I certainly wouldn't
> lay this at the feet of the feds. The first line is the city and
> the state, and it appears they had no real plan at all, just
> crossing their fingers and hoping it would never happen. A city
> half below sea level should have been prepared for this for years...
>
> Jon.

[Wolfgang]

> wrote in message
oups.com...
> Right on Jon.
>

See, there's the thing about cans of worms......once it's been opened, it
can be beastly difficult to get them wiggly little critters back in.

And so.......

Jon got it about as wrong as he possibly could have. Once the levies let go
(and probably even before) "the city" pretty much ceased to exist as any
kind of effective entity......let alone in the suddenly acquired role of a
first line of defense against something that it had undoubtedly never
prepared for and beyond a possibility of doubt was beyond its capacity even
under the best of circumstances. No electricity, no land-line phones, no
mobile phones....e.g. NO communications, no potable water....NO ****ING
STREETS! WHAT, exactly, could or should the city have done?

The state of Louisiana, on the other hand, presumably has considerably
greater available resources (even given its well documented history of pork
barrel politics, graft, cronyism, and all around corruption and waste) which
quite possibly could have been.....and, if so, most certainly SHOULD have
been.....brought to bear in a more timely fashion. However, the entire
coastline of the state got hit (some places harder than others, to be sure)
and it's safe to assume that its resources were stretched as well.

The Feds.......well, Katrina didn't just jump up out of the shrubbery and
say boo without any warning. There was no doubt that this was going to be a
bad one. There was time.....LOTS of time.....to prepare an appropriate
response. There are five uniformed services whose members are highly
trained and well equipped to respond to emergency situations with, among
other things, a rapid mobilization of personnel, equipment and supplies. In
addition, there is a whole (grossly bloated if history has anything at all
to teach us) federal agency devoted to nothing but responding to civil
emergencies. FEMA has by now had a pretty good deal of experience in
dealing with the devastation left in the aftermath of hurricanes in the
southeastern United States. Furthermore, the feds have a variety of
precedents for mobilizing various National Guard units in times of national
(and, yes, even regional) crisis.

What's happened in Louisiana in the past few days is yet another monumental
moral, economic, intellectual, legal and logistical ****up that should be
laid at the same morally, intellectually, legally, economically, and
militarily bankrupt doorstep as all the rest of the astounding and
unconscionable debacle that has been the last half decade. The address, in
case anyone should be inclined to deliver, is 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue,
Washington, D.C. I'll do you the courtesy of assuming you've got sufficient
native wit to look up the zip code for yourselves.

Wolfgang
and, as always, there's more.......LOTS more.

[Scott Seidman]

(Jonathan Cook) wrote in news:df9jk9$mf1$1
@bubba.nmsu.edu:

> riverman > wrote:
>
>> I know that hindsight is 20-20
>
> I don't care about left-right politics, but I certainly wouldn't
> lay this at the feet of the feds. The first line is the city and
> the state, and it appears they had no real plan at all, just
> crossing their fingers and hoping it would never happen. A city
> half below sea level should have been prepared for this for years...
>
> Jon.

It has nothing to do with left-right politics, but this is what FEMA is
supposed to be covering. Even Bush is saying that the Fed's response is
less than acceptable.


--
Scott
Reverse name to reply

[[email protected]]

On 3 Sep 2005 00:27:37 GMT, Scott Seidman
> wrote:

(Jonathan Cook) wrote in news:df9jk9$mf1$1
:
>
>> riverman > wrote:
>>
>>> I know that hindsight is 20-20
>>
>> I don't care about left-right politics, but I certainly wouldn't
>> lay this at the feet of the feds. The first line is the city and
>> the state, and it appears they had no real plan at all, just
>> crossing their fingers and hoping it would never happen. A city
>> half below sea level should have been prepared for this for years...
>>
>> Jon.
>
>It has nothing to do with left-right politics, but this is what FEMA is
>supposed to be covering. Even Bush is saying that the Fed's response is
>less than acceptable.



I think the scope of this thing is beyond most of us .The logistics
alone are just huge.
I will say when all is said and done, blame, if any is required for
some reason, will be liberally spread around NO, the State Capital and
DC.

[David Snedeker]

Count on Tim to cut to the party line when the Bushies once again **** into
the wind. None of the Wingnuts want to own up to the budget rip-offs,
corruption and mismanagement on their watch. Its just, . . . "now that I
stepped in the **** we all need to stick together". . . and "lets not play
the blame game." and "I stole it fair and square, so I want to keep it" and
"lets all pray together (that we don't get caught)."

Bull****. Adults own their mistakes. And thats one of the main reasons I
believe that right-wing politics is less of an adult belief set, and more of
a personality disorder.

Dave

[Sarge]

"BJ Conner" wrote; "All those farmers who ship corn etc. out of New Orleans
could just as well truck it over to Baltimore or
somewhere."

Good news BJ the corn that is shipped out of New Orleans is actually not in
New Orleans but upriver. The grain elevators are all okay and not damaged.
I would be more worried about not getting coffee. The good news as far as
coffee is concern though the Port of Baton Rouge has a large facility and it
was not damaged.

Dominos sugar lost a facility on the intracoastal canal and Proctor and
Gamble lost a coffee plant.

Sarge

[B J Conner]

People have been looking for reading material in other threads, these two
are interesting but have little to do with fishing fly or otherwise. The
first is about the pumps in New ORleans and the second is the history of New
ORleans and the drainage system. The COEs been at 100 years.
http://www.slideruleera.net/NewOrleansPumps.pdf
http://www.mvn.usace.army.mil/pao/history/NO_Drainage/NewOrleansDrainage.htm


"Sarge" > wrote in message
...
> "BJ Conner" wrote; "All those farmers who ship corn etc. out of New
Orleans
> could just as well truck it over to Baltimore or
> somewhere."
>
> Good news BJ the corn that is shipped out of New Orleans is actually not
in
> New Orleans but upriver. The grain elevators are all okay and not
damaged.
> I would be more worried about not getting coffee. The good news as far as
> coffee is concern though the Port of Baton Rouge has a large facility and
it
> was not damaged.
>
> Dominos sugar lost a facility on the intracoastal canal and Proctor and
> Gamble lost a coffee plant.
>
> Sarge
>
>

[riverman]

Sarge!
I expect I'm a day late and dollar short with this, but the word here
was that you are in that region, and I'm glad to see you posting. Hope
you weathered the storm alright.

--riverman

[Tim J.]

David Snedeker wrote:
> Count on Tim to cut to the party line
<snipped pure typical Dave S. bull****>

I said nothing about who was right and wrong. There is no doubt this
wasn't handled right, and the buck stops at the President's door. There
needs to be a long hard look at what got screwed up and what can be done
to make it better the next time. It's obvious this country wasn't ready
for anything of this magnitude, and corrections must be made. But first
things first - EVERYONE needs to concentrate on helping those in need
now, and do the (sigh) postmortem later.
--
TL,
Tim
---------------------------
http://css.sbcma.com/timj/

[[email protected]]

And when did he say this? After the 4th day, given that the first 3
days he was on vacation?

[Wolfgang]

"Jonathan Cook" > wrote in message
...
> Wolfgang > wrote:
>
>> Once the levies let go
>> (and probably even before) "the city" pretty much ceased to exist as any
>> kind of effective entity
>
> Of course. Levees letting go is hardly the time to start action, though.

You're right, of course, better to wait a few weeks.

> By then you're already a day late and a dollar short.

Oh. I see. Well, I've got a dollar. To whom shall I send it?

>> WHAT, exactly, could or should the city have done?
>
> Had a _plan_. If you read what I wrote, that's what I said.

Plans are good. Um.......well, if there's someone available to implement
them. But all the plans in the world don't do the city of New Orleans a
goddamn bit of good if there is no city of New Orleans. For the past
several days, THERE HAS BEEN NO ****ING CITY OF NEW ORLEANS!!! See what I
mean?

>> The state of Louisiana, on the other hand, presumably has considerably
> ...
>> and it's safe to assume that its resources were stretched as well.
>
> Check a map and see what else is on their coastline.

No thanks. I don't particularly care what else is on their cosatline.

>> The Feds.......well, Katrina didn't just jump up out of the shrubbery and
>> say boo without any warning. There was no doubt that this was going to
>> be a
>> bad one. There was time.....LOTS of time.....to prepare an appropriate
>
> EXACTLY!

Not that it really matters all that much, but do you have ANY idea of which
side of this "argument" you are on?

> And it is NOT just the feds who should have had a plan.

True, true.......theoretically at least, just about anybody could benefit
from a plan. Why, heck, even YOU might.

> I agree the
> feds dropped _a_ ball, but I think a bigger one was dropped at the
> city and state levels.

City? What city? State? What, Louisiana? O.k., I get it.......this is a
joke, right?

> All three levels are guilty of mishandling this.

Levels? Hm......chutes and ladders? I LOVE that game!!

> (So don't claim I'm letting the feds off the hook. I'm not.)

Never one to shrink from going out on a limb, I'm going to guess that they
don't much care.

> But my stomach turns to see a mayor curse out the feds when his own
> government did _nothing_ beforehand except "announce" an evacuation
> that only the rich people could comply with.

And they should have..........what?

> Yes, the COE is fed. Yes, they weren't getting funding to improve the
> levees. But in the meantime, the city should have been handling the
> condition it had. The city, in cooperation with the state, could have
> had a plan in place that would have had every schoolbus in the state
> in New Orleans by Saturday night when the mayor called for an evacuation
> but didn't provide any resources to help half his population evacuate.

What......does New Mexico have some sort of prohibition against the import
of reality or something?

> What, did he expect everyone to go find a bed and breakfast to stay
> at for a month?

Well, it's not as if there's any shortage.......****, we've got hundreds of
B&Bs that would have been delighted to have the business. Too late now, of
course, Labor Day weekend and all that.......you know.

> He and the state could have had a plan,

True, true.......theoretically at least, just about anybody could benefit
from a plan. Why, heck, even YOU might.

> could have
> commandeered every school in the state as a refugee camp and had every
> schoolbus take the people out by Sunday evening.

Well, aside from the inevitable turf war consequent on a mayor's
comandeering of every school in the state, this wonderful plan also seems to
overlook a niggling detail known in the trade as "logistics". Yeah, maybe
Dick Daley the first might'a could'a done it.......but he ain't
there.......or anywhere else worth mentioning in the current context, for
that matter.

> OF COURSE once it hit the city had no power to do anything.

City? What city?

> The federal government can't save everyone from everything.

True enough. It can't, for instance (and despite its valiant efforts in the
past couple of decades), prevent the profligate bestowal of doctoral
degrees.

> It can't go off preparing disaster plans for every city in America.

Not as problematic as it might appear at a glance. For example, there is
mounting evidence that several of those cities are NOT below sea level, NOT
in an area frequented by hurricanes, AND (strange but true) NOT built on the
delta of one of the world's greatest rivers. Not conslusive, I'll grant
you, but evidence is what it is.

> The people there have to take some responsibility.

Hm......as should university faculty committees? O.k., point taken.

> Call in the feds? You bet!

Pointless.......if the evidence (see above) is to be taken into
consideration.

> But lay the problem at their feet after you've let the problem go
> too far? I don't think so.

Um.......well......I've been awfully busy for the last week or so......what
with planning an invasion and all that.

> The sad fact is the mayor will probably get re-elected as the
> anchor-in-the-disaster you-tell-those-feds guy.

The sad fact is that people in America get re-elected. Assholes get elected
cuz assholes get to vote.

> If there's a city to run...

There are lots of cities to run. But there is little evidence that anyone
has been much interested in doing so since the halcyon (more or less) days
of the Little Flower.

> Jon.

Wofgang
well, hell, everybody else is doing it! :(