Video Proves that GWB was warned about Levees and LIED

[Betsy]

Neocons should no longer be able to cover their eyes and ears and deny, deny, deny the truth, when there is action video of a conference held on August 28th between disaster officials and the disaster president.
Bush didn't ask a single question during the final briefing before Katrina struck on Aug. 29, but he assured soon-to-be-battered state officials: "We are fully prepared."

According to the Associated Press,

The footage — along with seven days of transcripts of briefings obtained by The Associated Press — show in excruciating detail that while federal officials anticipated the tragedy that unfolded in New Orleans and elsewhere along the Gulf Coast, they were fatally slow to realize they had not mustered enough resources to deal with the unprecedented disaster.

A top hurricane expert voiced "grave concerns" about the levees and then-Federal Emergency Management Agency chief Michael Brown told the president and Homeland Security Secretary Michael Chertoff that he feared there weren't enough disaster teams to help evacuees at the Superdome.

"I'm concerned about ... their ability to respond to a catastrophe within a catastrophe," Brown told his bosses the afternoon before Katrina made landfall.

Some of the footage and transcripts from briefings Aug. 25-31 conflicts with the defenses that federal, state and local officials have made in trying to deflect blame and minimize the political fallout from the failed Katrina response:

_Homeland Security officials have said the "fog of war" blinded them early on to the magnitude of the disaster. But the video and transcripts show federal and local officials discussed threats clearly, reviewed long-made plans and understood Katrina would wreak devastation of historic proportions. "I'm sure it will be the top 10 or 15 when all is said and done," National Hurricane Center's Max Mayfield warned the day Katrina lashed the Gulf Coast.

"I don't buy the `fog of war' defense," Brown told the AP in an interview Wednesday. "It was a fog of bureaucracy."

_Bush declared four days after the storm, "I don't think anybody anticipated the breach of the levees" that gushed deadly flood waters into New Orleans. But the transcripts and video show there was plenty of talk about that possibility — and Bush was worried too.

The National Hurricane Center's Mayfield told the final briefing before Katrina struck that storm models predicted minimal flooding inside New Orleans during the hurricane but he expressed concerns that counterclockwise winds and storm surges afterward could cause the levees at Lake Pontchartrain to be overrun.

"I don't think any model can tell you with any confidence right now whether the levees will be topped or not but that is obviously a very, very grave concern," Mayfield told the briefing.

Other officials expressed concerns about the large number of New Orleans residents who had not evacuated.

"They're not taking patients out of hospitals, taking prisoners out of prisons and they're leaving hotels open in downtown New Orleans. So I'm very concerned about that," Brown said.

Despite the concerns, it ultimately took days for search and rescue teams to reach some hospitals and nursing homes.

Brown also told colleagues one of his top concerns was whether evacuees who went to the New Orleans Superdome — which became a symbol of the failed Katrina response — would be safe and have adequate medical care.

"The Superdome is about 12 feet below sea level.... I don't know whether the roof is designed to stand, withstand a Category Five hurricane," he said.

Edited by Savonarola, 18:40 01Mar2006: Fixed quote tag

[JamesH]

The neocons seem to be doing a good job of covering up important stories and I hope that this one does not get burried. The really sad part is that Bush may not have remembered the meeting even though it was only 4 days earlier.

[Savonarola]

Betsy, can we get a link for that story?

[Betsy]

http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20060302/ap_ ... rina_video

[Hogeye]

It's time to assess the massive government failure in the Corps Catastrophe aka "Katrina Disaster." Does centralized government do a better job than local voluntary initiative? If we compare the 1871 Chicago Fire, the 1900 Galveston Hurricane, and the 1906 San Francisco earthquake, which rebuilt with little or no federal aid, the current abject dependence on the central State is seen to be a gross failure.

It's funny to me how people can look at obvious government failure, and then suggest, not disbanding the incompetent corrupt agencies, but throwing more money at them. What a perverse system! In the market, when a firm <language removed> up, it loses money and/or goes out of business. (Enron, Exxon...) But when a govt agency <language removed> up, it gets more loot. That's statism!

Edited by Savonarola 15:37 02Mar06: Removed inappropriate language

[Barbara Fitzpatrick]

I don't know about the Chicago Fire, but both the Galveston Hurricane in 1900 and the San Francisco earthquake of 1906 didn't require federal money to rebuild because the federal response to the disaster was so rapid and so complete that rebuilding money was available at the state and local levels, as well as privately. Within 48 hours of the San Francisco earthquake, not only was the army protecting the place from looters, but every army tent west of the Mississippi was in Golden Gate Park to shelter the homeless, and the largest military hospital train ever put together was crossing the Rockies (having left Arlington, VA 30 hours before) heading west. As for Galveston, not only did the feds show the same kind of rapid, efficient response, but the COE built the seawall that protected Galveston a century hence, and helped with the raising of the entire city by 20 feet (using sand dredged from Galveston Bay). Governments don't have to be corrupt and inefficient, just because this administration is.

[Hogeye]

Both the Galveston Hurricane in 1900 and the San Francisco earthquake of 1906 didn't require federal money to rebuild because ... rebuilding money was available at the state and local levels, as well as privately.

I agree with that part totally, but not:

... because the federal response to the disaster was so rapid and so complete...

Looking up the SF Earthquake, I see that the federal "assistance" was basically using the guys from the Presidio and Fort Mason, both in SF, to force citizens into slave labor. These military goons were criticized in contemporary accounts for looting, shooting people, etc. (link)

Here's an article about Galveston recovering from the hurricane. There is a lot about local voluntary rebuilding, and hardly a peep about federal aid.

Despite the unimaginable devastation and what must have been a hard realization that it could happen again, the city immediately began pulling itself out of the mud.

By 10 a.m. Sept. 9, Mayor Walter C. Jones had called emergency city council meetings and by the end of the day had appointed a Central Relief Committee.

Ignoring advice from its sister paper, The Dallas Morning News, that it move temporarily to Houston, The Galveston Daily News continued publishing from the island and never missed an issue. Sept. 9 and 10, 1900, were published together on a single sheet of paper. One side listed the dead. The other reported the devastation of the storm.

In the first week after the storm, according to McComb's book, telegraph and water service were restored. Lines for a new telephone system were being laid by the second.

"In the third week, Houston relief groups went home, the saloons reopened, the electric trolleys began operating and freight began moving through the harbor," McComb wrote.

Residents of Galveston quickly decided that they would rebuild, that the city would survive, and almost as soon, leaders began deciding how it would do so.

The two civil engineering projects leaders decided to pursue - building a seawall and raising the island's elevation - stand today and are almost as great in their scope and effect as the storm itself. - Post-storm rebuilding considered 'Galveston's finest hour'

To be fair, here is the federal govt's part:

The next section, which runs from 39th Street to 53rd Street, was built by the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers to protect its property at Fort Crockett and was completed in 1905. ...
While Galveston received financial help from the county, state and federal governments, a large portion of the burden had to be carried by the city itself, at the expense of other projects.

The bottom line is that back then federal assistence was negligable while local, voluntary initiative predominated. They did better without FEMA.

[Barbara Fitzpatrick]

How you regard martial law in emergencies depend on whether you're the looter or the lootee - San Francisco had shelter and food within 24 hours because every army post west of the Rockies divested themselves of what they had and put it on the nearest train. The military also sent in all their munitions making supplies for the utilities people to turn into TNT. Within 3 hours of the quake (amount of time it took them to march from the barracks to City Hall) the soldiers from the Presidio were put under the direction of the mayor, who issued the "shoot looters" order. If soldiers were necessary to force the citizenry to deal with the massive outbreaks of fire, then your theory that gov't is unnecessary fails. However, largely "slave labor" wasn't required as soldiers and civilians voluntarily worked side by side to pump water and create firebreaks (the quake broke both gas and water lines, so manual water pumps were used close to the bay, and firebreaks further in, to put out the fires - which raged for 3 days, and weren't totally out for weeks). The federal port people at the request of the mayor made themselves responsible for a ferry service across the bay to Oakland where the Western Union wires were still up. Four hours after the quake, the Mayor authorized a wire to President Roosevelt that basically said people are dying and the city's on fire, send help. Within 6 hours all the above mentioned stuff was either on its way or being loaded. Within less than a day a military hospital was disassembled and reassembled on the longest train ever seen and was pulling out of Arlington, VA. Yes the state and local authorities worked with businesses (BofA got its start as an 8' table set up in Golden Gate Park) and civilians of all stripes to meet this emergency - but so did the fed, and without the fed the locals would not have had the materials to do the job, medical treatment for the survivors, nor food and shelter while they were doing it.

Galveston was pretty much the same way - most of the work was actually performed by locals - some civilians, a lot of governmental workers including military - but the food, shelter, medical services, and the equipment to rebuild with came from the government, a sizable chunk from the fed.

This is what I meant when I said government response to the disaster was so rapid and complete that federal rebuilding money and assistance wasn't necessary. It's the old "a stitch in time save nine" routine - which saves everybody time, energy - and lives.

[JamesH]

Someone needs to be in-charge. We can not allow everyone or each community to just do as they please. Human nature being what it is some will be prepared and some will not. We are all told from the time we get our first job that we should put money away for retirement. But look at the number of people that retire and have very little to retire on.

Public works such as levees, bridges and roads need to be a public endevor not private-everyone benifits from such projects. But that does not mean that government officials should not be held accountable when this works are managed poorly. As you mentioned business going bankrupt for poor managment. It still comes down to the individual. If the individual will inform themselves with facts and vote on important issues concerning a community, we should minimize the mis-managment of public/government resorces.

If we had a real president they would stand up and say "I am responsible. I appointed an un-qualified person or persons and I will fix the problem to avoid such a problem in the future." But you know who we have and that will not happen.

[Hogeye]

Barbara, I think we agree pretty much on the facts. Thanks for the info about the train from VA, etc. I am puzzled by your comment, "government response to the disaster was so rapid and complete that federal rebuilding money and assistance wasn't necessary." The damage of quake and fire was done; I don't see how rapid response made rebuilding money unnecessary - at best it reduced the costs somewhat.

So here are the critical questions: How much did the US govt spend to rebuild SF in '06? How much is expected to be spent on New Orleans? When these amounts are corrected for inflation, how do they compare in dollars/head? My prediction before trying to find this info: the amount in SF '06 will be found to be miniscule compared the the amount NO-2005.


James, your first paragraph simply claims that order is better than chaos. No one disputes that. The dispute is about whether a monopoly organization is necessary.

Public works such as levees, bridges and roads need to be a public endevor - not private - everyone benefits from such projects.

You seem to assume that public goods can only be provided by government. This is, of course, totally false. Many public goods are produced privately - TV shows for instance. Furthermore, good government itself is a public good; governmentizing public goods leads to even bigger public goods problems. I.e. The benefits of good laws are dispersed among the public, while the benefits to special interests of bad laws accrue mainly to the special interest. If a drug piss-test firm or a munitions firm or Riceland Foods stands to gain $50 million from a sweet deal, they might spend up to $50 million to get it. Meanwhile, private citizens may stand to lose fifty cents each, so it is not worth their while to study up, lobby, bribe politicians, and everything else required to get decreed law passed. This public goods problem makes government a system in which special interests with focused potential benefits win out over the general public with dispersed potential benefits nearly every time. To paraphrase that other Bill who didn't inhale: It's the incentives, stupid!

[Barbara Fitzpatrick]

In San Francisco not only were there aftershocks, there were fires (they weren't all put out for weeks), and there were buildings rendered unsafe (the Presidio lost a wall - but was build so sturdily that all they had to do was drill a couple of holes to run some phone cable through, wench it back into place, and mortor it), medical facilities were destroyed or not operating & medical staff didn't have supplies - a lot of food was destroyed, safe water supplies were destroyed, people were injured and homeless.

The homeless were sheltered in army tents and fed army rations (water was ferried over in fed port authority boats, which were also the information service to route messages to the still operable telegraph in Oakland), the fires were put out using (among other things) army munitions. Injuries and illnesses were being addressed with army supplies within 1 day, and the hospital train got there in 4 - and it was pretty much the last of the federal aid to arrive. This was the action that kept the disaster natural and didn't add human caused catastrophy to it.

We know what happened in NOLA - if the response had been of the caliber of federal response to San Francisco 1906, there wouldn't have been hungry, thirsty, sick people smished together for days in the stadium - there wouldn't have been people drowning in their own attics and nursing homes and hospitals 4 days after reaching someone and reporting their positions - (I don't remember if the winds were too high for helicopters to get in just before they did - if the winds were not too high, helicopters would have been bringing in sandbags and shoring the levees up), if the levees broke auxilliary pumps would have been working by the next day - the hospital ships would have left the Atlantic ports immediately and been offshore as soon as the winds died, instead of leaving the Atlantic ports 7 days after. Basically, a lot of people who died or lost everything or have been shuffled around the country hundreds of miles from the rest of their families would have been spared this mess, if the fed had acted with the same timeliness and efficiency as they had 99 years earlier.

I don't know the cost in dollars of the federal response to San Francisco '06, but it would be a whole lot less in equivalent dollars to what is necessary to deal with NOLA - because the fires were put out, the people were housed and fed, the medical treatment was timely - all the kinds of things that prevent major problems from becoming worse were done in 1906 - and weren't in 2005.