Max Mayfield, director of the National Hurricane Center, briefed FEMA head Michael Brown and Homeland Security Secretary Michael Chertoff about Katrina flooding New Orleans by overtopping levies, prior to Katrina making landfall last week. They repeated the lie that “nobody could have foreseen this” all weekend long. This administration’s lies are killing people in Iraq and now on the Gulf Coast. At what point do Americans decide that enough is enough?
Link to the Newhouse wire story at the Seattle P-I.
tags: fema| hurricanekatrina| hurricanerelief| journalism| katrina| michaelbrown| politics
http://www.spectator.org/dsp_article.asp?art_id=8693
Much as I like Ben Stein (always fun to see him in films and my sister was a contestant on his game show then tutored his kid for the SAT), his piece misses the point completely. Nobody blames the president for the hurricane. That would be silly. No, he’s being blamed for placing incompetent fools like Michael Brown in positions of extreme importance. He’s being blamed for bartering with people’s lives in order to gain political advantage. He’s being blamed for a stunning lack of leadership. When President Clinton was caught being weak and stupid, Democratic leaders sucked it up and said so. Republicans should stop defending the indefensible and ask him to display the leadership skills he claims to have.