Or at least point me to the thread I might be duping that explains it?

Seems to me if anyone is to blame it's the mayor of NO and governor of LA. I seem to remember Jeb Bush managing things in FL just fine and dandy.

Did I miss something?

Bush finally got his hurricane machine working, that's how he created Katrina

Buck stops here.  I don't in anyway think it is his fault, I think the blame lays squarely on local govt.  Being the head honcho though...  Still refreshing to see someone man up.  You think the worthless fingerpointers in NO will do the same?

Bush Takes Responsibility For Blunders


Bush Takes Responsibility for Blunders

By LARA JAKES JORDAN, Associated Press Writer Tue Sep 13, 3:04 PM ET
WASHINGTON - President Bush said Tuesday that "I take responsibility" for failures in dealing with Hurricane Katrina and said the disaster raised broader questions about the government's ability to respond to natural disasters as well as terror attacks.


"Katrina exposed serious problems in our response capability at all levels of government," Bush said at joint White House news conference with the president of Iraq.

"To the extent the federal government didn't fully do its job right, I take responsibility," Bush said.

The president was asked whether people should be worried about the government's ability to handle another terrorist attack given failures in responding to Katrina.

"Are we capable of dealing with a severe attack? That's a very important question and it's in the national interest that we find out what went on so we can better respond," Bush replied.

He said he wanted to know both what went wrong and what went right.

As for blunders in the federal response, "I'm not going to defend the process going in," Bush said. "I am going to defend the people saving lives."

He praised relief workers at all levels. "I want people in America to understand how hard people worked to save lives down there," he said.

Bush spoke after R. David Paulison, the new acting director of the Federal Emergency Management Agency, pledged to intensify efforts to find more permanent housing for the tens of thousands of Hurricane Katrina survivors now in shelters.

It was the closest Bush has come to publicly finding fault with any federal officials involved in the hurricane response, which has been widely criticized as disjointed and slow. Some federal officials have sought to fault state and local officials for being unprepared to cope with the disaster.

Bush planned to address the nation Thursday evening from Louisiana, where he will be monitoring recovery efforts, the White House announced earlier Tuesday.

Paulison, in his first public comments since taking the job on Monday, told reporters: "We're going to get those people out of the shelters, and we're going to move and get them the help they need."

Homeland Security Secretary Michael Chertoff introduced Paulison as the Bush administration tried to deflect criticism for the sluggish initial federal response to the hurricane and its disastrous aftermath.

Chertoff said that while cleanup, relief and reconstruction from Katrina is now the government's top priority, the administration would not let down its guard on other potential dangers.

"The world is not going to stop moving because we are very focused on Katrina," Chertoff said.

Paulison, named to the post on Monday, said he was busy "getting brought up to speed."

He replaced Michael Brown, who resigned on Monday, three days after being removed from being the top onsite federal official in charge of the government's response.

Paulison said Bush called him Monday night and "thanked me for coming on board."

Bush promised that he would have "the full support of the federal government," Paulison said.

Chertoff said the relief operation had entered a new phase.

Initially, he said, the most important priority was evacuating people, getting them to safety, providing food, water and medical care.

" And then ultimately at the end of the day, we have to reconstitute the communities that have been devastated," Chertoff added.

He said the federal government would look increasingly to state and local officials for guidance on rebuilding the devastated communities along the Gulf Coast.

"The federal government can't drive permanent solutions down the throats of state and local officials," Chertoff said. "I don't think anyone should envision a situation in which they're going to take a back seat. They're going to take a front seat," he said.

Chertoff said that teams of federal auditors were being dispatched to the stricken areas to make sure that billions of dollars worth of government contracts were being properly spent. "We want to get aid to people who need it quickly, but we also don't want to lose sight of the importance of preserving the integrity of the process and our responsibility as stewards of the public money," Chertoff said.

"We're going to cut through red tape," he said, "but we're not going to cut through laws and rules that govern ethics."

Meanwhile, Defense Secretary Donald H. Rumsfeld said that some military aircraft and other equipment may be able to move out of the Gulf Coast soon.

"We've got to the point where most if not all of the search and rescue is completed," said Rumsfeld, who is attending a NATO meeting in Berlin. "Some helicopters can undoubtedly be moved out over the period ahead."

He also said there is a very large surplus of hospital beds in the region, so those could also be decreased. The USS Comfort hospital ship arrived near the Mississippi coast late last week. Rumsfeld added that nothing will be moved out of the area without the authorization of the two states' governors, the military leaders there and the president.

Elsewhere, workers with the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention aren't finding many sick people, even though the specter of diseases has alarmed relief and rescue figures. Instead, between 40 and 50 percent of patients seeking emergency care have injuries. The CDC has counted 148 injuries in just the last two days, Carol Rubin, an agency hurricane relief specialist, said by telephone from the government's new public health headquarters in New Orleans' Kindred Hospital.

While she couldn't provide a breakdown, Rubin said chain saw injuries and carbon monoxide exposure from generators are among them. Those are particularly worrisome because they're likely to become more common as additional hurricane survivors re-enter the city in coming days, she said.

The message: Those injuries are preventable, if people take proper precautions, Rubin stressed.

He's not to blame. Anyone who says he is is an idiot flat out, and they were probably born that way sad to say.

"To the extent the federal government didn't fully do its job right, I take responsibility," Bush said.

Expect that Brother Bush has his ducks seriously in a row set down by multiple survey parties after he said that.  Now that he has accepted responsibility for the federal action, now let's see Blanco and Nagin step up to face the muzak and accept responsibility for the state and local inaction.  Blanco is going to get bitch slapped by the truth when it is all said&&done.

You heard it here first.

wganz
¶

There is no sensible explanation.  Logic does not appeal to, nor is it needed by the libs.

Can you imagine the hysteria and outcry if Bush did all that these people want?  Firstly, it would have required that he federalize, that is, the national government take over, the State of Louisiana.  A step like this has not been taken since the War Between the States, as best as I can tell.  (Marylanders, mostly Baltimore).  The scream about dictatorship and Imperial President would never stop.

And, even if he survived that, frankly he can do no right as far as the libs are concerned.  Use a thing like Streisand as a barometer!  If he said the sun would rise tomorrow, there would be a tirade from her ilk.

Pay close attention - and don't spill your kool-aid.

In every case, in every incident, no matter where, no matter what, no matter who...

It's Bush's fault!!!!

He caused it because he did something; he didn't do something; he lives and breathes; because he hates blacks; because he wants to give breaks to the rich; because its a war for oil; because he gave a no-bid contract (personally) to Halliburton because he's Cheney's bitch; because he's a moron; because he's an evil genius out to destroy civil liberties; because... because... because....

It's Bush's fault!!!!

Because... that way, the libtard Demonrats don't have to think.

BigDozer66

It's Bush's fault because he isa republican, and the media is anti-republican.

If there was a democrat in office, everything would have been all sushine and happiness, even if things were handled the same way.

No matter what happens in this country, someone will put a political spin on it.

(sarcasm)It rained today and got my clean truck all dirty, must be Bush's fault that I was too stupid to put it inside.(sarcasm)  
 

Well, I can say this...  Since this happened I have been flying my ass off hauling food, supplies, Seabees too.  We stopped in Pensacola and picked up 28k of MRE's and dropped them off in New Orleans and the flew back and picked up 23k more and took those to MS.  NAS New Orleans is alive with .gov assistance.

It is the local and state governments responsibility to prepare and react.  People need to read the National Incident Management System and the Incident Command System to understand what should have happened before pointing fingers.

When you sit in the big chair, blame will always find you.

Some people on this planet, a good many of them in fact, really are so intellectually defiicient that they can look at the suffering caused by flooding after a hurricane and assign blame to President Bush. Why? Because it allows them to vent their emotions without requiring them to do any actual thinking, which seems to be how many Americans live their every day life nowdays.

Quoted: Well, I can say this...  Since this happened I have been flying my ass off hauling food, supplies, Seabees too.  We stopped in Pensacola and picked up 28k of MRE's and dropped them off in New Orleans and the flew back and picked up 23k more and took those to MS.  NAS New Orleans is alive with .gov assistance.

Indeed. Some staging areas have been overwhelmed with the sheer volume of stuff being brought to them.

Those in the .mil or who work logistics for a living realize how difficult it is to move supplies into a severely flooded area with few assets and a confused COC and all sorts of resources pouring in.

Our military has a hard time supplying far fewer people in a war zone with a lot more planning beforehand, which should tell you something about how difficult something like supply can be. Ask your very best logistics people to plan for something like Katrina, give them all the resources they ask for, give them 2 years to make the plan, and they will STILL complain about not having enough.

Katrina is just that big of a problem.

Expecting someone to wave a magic wand and fix it is just plain childish, and shows that there are a lot of children running around claiming to be adults.

Quoted: It is the local and state governments responsibility to prepare and react.  People need to read the National Incident Management System and the Incident Command System to understand what should have happened before pointing fingers.

Nobody gives a crap about stuff like that.

They just expect that if something bad happens, Uncle Sugar is supposed to fix it. Regardless of whether or not it exceeds human capability.

It's like this man.....If you voted for John (By the way, did you know I served in Vietnam?) Kerry..?...It's President Bushes fault.  If you didn't?  It ain't

John Wayne,

I fully agree.  The 2 people that should be familiar with it, Nagin and Blanco, are getting away with deflecting criticism from the media.  If accountability rises to the top, it must be shared at the top of each level.  Hopefully one day the record will be set straight.

"Zhorrrrrzh Boosh- ees oll hees folt. Hee mehk de horrrikehn. Ees oll hees folt!"

George W. Bush had the misfortune of being President when the inevitable happened.

The flood of New Orleans could have been prevented, but not by anything he could have done.  It took almost 100 years to set the city up for this disaster.

Quoted: Did I miss something?

www.townhall.com/columnists/thomassowell/ts20040609.shtml

... Why can't the talkers leave the doers alone? Perhaps it is because that would leave the talkers on the sidelines, with their uselessness being painfully obvious to all, instead of being in the limelight and "making a difference" -- even if that difference is usually negative.

Quoted: John Wayne, I fully agree.  The 2 people that should be familiar with it, Nagin and Blanco, are getting away with deflecting criticism from the media.  If accountability rises to the top, it must be shared at the top of each level.  Hopefully one day the record will be set straight.

Doubtful.

The press has no interest in covering the truth. Merely the sensation around the event and the initial fingerpointing doing their best to paint it all in one direction (Bush's) and then moving on to other more sensational stories when the truth comes out.

The only respectable person I have seen in all of this coverage is Brit Hume, who has come close to loosing his temper with a couple of the talking heads on his show (Mara Liasson, Juan Williams) who insist that Bush dropped the ball. Hume has repeatedly insisted that it is not the President of the United States' job to know the condition of every levie in the country and to handle every natural disaster that shows up as if the local and state authorities are completely unable to do so.

Further, he has insisted that the goobernor wanting to maintain her "control" despite WhiteHouse pleas (wait...But Bush was supposed to be on vacation not caring about what was going on...so he was instead on the phone trying to take pre-emptive action??? Where is the press reporting THAT little morsel???) to let them help is one of the reasons help was slow.

Frankly it all demonstrates the same old thing: The press is full of idiots, loons, goobers, and boobies with the IQ of dead moss and without the SLIGHTEST capability to tell reality from the fiction they invent in their diseased little brains.

They have no clue how anything works because they have never been forced to actually DO something in their entire pathetic lives, and instead sit around in safety and with no accountability and criticize how others do things. A Marine shoots an insurgent playing possum, and it is a horrific murder. They make up some story about a Koran getting flushed at Gitmo, and there must be an investigation. An Iraqi in Abu Graib gets his picture taken with some panties on his head, and they equate it to Sadaam killing people and torturing them to death.

A storm hits and they watch looters and look compassionate and then turn and demand answers from the people trying to get some help to those who need it and dare to ask why it isn't going any faster.

Perhaps it would go faster if there weren't so many press fuckwits to deal with, but that thought never registered in their tiny little brains.

I am sick to DEATH with the press in this country. 90 percent of them could drop dead tomorrow and our nation would be much better off for it.

Quoted: Or at least point me to the thread I might be duping that explains it? Seems to me if anyone is to blame it's the mayor of NO and governor of LA. I seem to remember Jeb Bush managing things in FL just fine and dandy. Did I miss something?

It's yet another cheap political jab at Bush, it's their style

I'm from Goverment and I'm here to help you. Remember that's one of three most popular lies. We were ill prepared for something that we knew would eventually happen. I'm in Florida so a hurricane is a reoccurring disaster. I don't expect any goverment services group to come rescue me. That's why I have the choice leave or stay and it is my responsiblity to accept the consequences of my actions.

Having worked for Goverment for years, I have never ever seem them get anything right! Mostly another form of welfare and social service.

So whose fault is it. The populace of NO, they knew they lived below sea level and dykes were only rated for a Cat 3. They had days to leave and didn't.

Everybodys says sick, elderly well if that was all that was left in NO they wouldn't have had a problem getting those people out. Too many people with "Learned life long helplessness" that expect some else to take responsibility for them. Now they learned goverment isn't up taking real responsibility for anyone.

Quoted: it is not the President of the United States' job to know the condition of every levie in the country and to handle every natural disaster that shows up as if the local and state authorities are completely unable to do so.

Right. Isn't that the whole purpose of having governors? To delegate authority and control over the states so that the CiC doesn't have to devote all of his time to dealing with the affairs of all 50 states but instead focus more on the interests of the country as a whole?

If he has to control every state he isn't the president, he's a dictator. It's like saying the general of the Army is responsible for making sure that each individual soldier has a haircut and is getting paid.

If they honestly think this is a federal .gov shortcoming then I guess we really have no need for governors or mayors.

It has nothing to do with the facts. The Dems see SCOTUS nominations as the only game in town right now and were spoiling for a fight and any scandal that could drop the President's ratings to help them get a "moderate" (Media code for a flaming liberal) or two on the Supreme Court.

That's why they literally jumped out of the box on DAY 1 to accuse the President of botching the whole mess. They wanted to drop his ratings (successful) so he'd be on the defense, when nominating people to SCOTUS.

If they pounce on Roberts (a moderate "conservative") while fulminating against Bush as a arch-conservative (when he is a moderate), they will force him to avoid nominating guys like Thomas or Scalia who WOULD upset the liberal apple cart.

You have to understand: hurricanes come and go. No big deal. (for them). Even 9/11 was no big deal to them as terrorism didn't immediately threaten their persons or their power. Government would grow, which makes them more powerful. Budgets would grow...making them more powerful.

Only SCOTUS stands a chance to rein in their power. If Abortion was jettisoned as a "right" then IPPF stands to lose $100 million PER YEAR just from Title X funds alone! And guess which single issue people are by far the largest shakers and movers in the Democratic party? Abortionists.

If Gore was president the reaction time of FEMA would be hyped as evidence of the success of DHS by constant comparisons with all the other hurricanes where FEMA took up to a month to get on the ground.

So this is TOTALLY a politically motivated dog and pony show.

It means that as far as any miscommunication regarding Katrina went, he is accepting responsibility for his part in attempting to communicate with incompetant nitwits in the state of Louisiana.

It also means that Louisiana's incompetant Senator, Governor and New Orleans Mayor Nagin are NOT the sort of people Louisiana's residents should want at the helm. They need to take responsibility for their own fate and clean house.

We got one in the Governor's mansion here in Washington, as well. Our Senators in D.C. couldn't manage to do anything besides blame the Feds either, if the SHTF. Couple of useless twits. After the last budget was passed, they didn't have much bragging to do at home.