why does donald rumsfeld hate the troops? http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20050909/ap_on_re_us/katrina_national_guard_4 Lt. Gen. Steven Blum, chief of the National Guard Bureau, said that "arguably" a day or so of response time was lost due to the absence of the Mississippi National Guard's 155th Infantry Brigade and Louisiana's 256th Infantry Brigade, each with thousands of troops in Iraq. "Had that brigade been at home and not in Iraq, their expertise and capabilities could have been brought to bear," said Blum. Asked on Tuesday about critics who said the commitment of large numbers of troops to the Iraq conflict hindered the military's response to Hurricane Katrina, Rumsfeld said, "Anyone who's saying that doesn't understand the situation."
Thank god somebody solved it for us. So now the fact that the Bush Administration decided to have a Federalist society caucus about the posse comitatus act while chaos reigned is now excusable. The buck stops there! Hey FEMA guy, stop cleaning out your office!
Hardcore Bush supporters blame the local gov ~ hardcore liberals blame the feds. Friends, there were huge mistakes made by all areas of our government.
This comes down to people who are so inefficient and don't know how to communicate. Blame is all over the place on this one. This isn't a competition where one side wins by managing to place to the blame on a different part of govt. The fact is that everyone already lost. Blanco should have known exactly what she needed to do get the help. If she didn't know before she should have started looking that stuff up when it seemed like there was going to be landfall of Katrina near NO. There is no excuse for that and it is a huge mistake. When she requested "EVERYTHING". The person handling that request should have taken her at her word that she wanted "EVERYTHING". At that point they should have double checked, and clarified the specific types of help she was requesting to make sure that she got everything she needed. They didn't do that. There is absolutely no excuse for not doing that. I think most of the pre-planning that didnt' happen falls in the lap of state and local govts. The handling of the rest is the fault of the fed. govt. The president of Jefferson parish was correct. The hurricane killed people, and an ineffective bureaucracy killed people. It is petty, and meaningless to try trumpet which side deserves more blame, when both sides are so guilty that any difference between them is like finishing 199,999th in a race, and finishing 200,000th in a race. It is pointless.
