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Originally Posted by DaddyHalbucks
Thanks for your suggestions, but many of us are very happy with GWB. Many of us realize that the press and the hard left would execute him for the slightest infraction.
When you REALLY look at the disaster in New Orleans, you will see that the governor and the mayor provided very weak leadership. Most of the problems and human suffering stemmed from their failures to order forced evacuations, both before the hurricane and immediately after the flood.
The Democrats are having a field day blaming Bush for every problem that ever went wrong. It's a disgrace.
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Both hurricane victims and public officials have given multiple accounts of US authorities actively turning back aid and blocking rescue attempts in the days that followed the breaching of the city?s levees.
Aaron Broussard, president of Jefferson Parish, for example, broke down in tears Sunday during an appearance on the NBC television program ?Meet the Press,? declaring, ?It?s not just Katrina that caused all these deaths in New Orleans here. Bureaucracy has committed murder here in the greater New Orleans area.?
He cited repeated actions by FEMA (Federal Emergency Management Administration) that involved the deliberate sabotage of relief efforts. He reported that FEMA turned back trailer truckloads of water sent by Wal-Mart, claiming the city didn?t need them. He also said that the Coast Guard?s offer of fuel urgently needed to power generators was countermanded by FEMA.
Finally, he said that just a day earlier FEMA agents had come in and ?cut all of our emergency communication lines? without any warning. The local sheriff, he added, had the lines reconnected and then posted armed guards to see that they were not cut again.
This last, and most sinister, example is in keeping with the Pentagon?s ?information war? doctrine, which demands the complete control of communications in an area targeted for invasion and occupation.
Denise Bottcher, press secretary for Governor Blanco, also charged that FEMA deliberately blocked offers of aid from Chicago Mayor Richard Daley, New Mexico Gov. Bill Richardson and others.
And a spokesman for Sen. Mary Landrieu (Democrat, Louisiana), told the media that FEMA held up aid from both public and private agencies, withholding approval for the US Forest Service to use water tanker aircraft to put out fires and delaying the arrival of Amtrak trains to evacuate people from the city. Offers by private companies to provide communications equipment were also held up by the agency. There were also reports that the Red Cross was prevented from going into the city and that FEMA refused to allow the unloading of food, water and medical supplies brought by ships into New Orleans harbor.
The apparent aim of this organized obstructionist behavior by the agency that is supposedly charged with coordinating relief was to block any significant aid until the military could intervene in the city with overwhelming force.
This came on Friday, with military commanders treating New Orleans as a combat operation. This was the term used by Brig. Gen. Gary Jones, commander of the Louisiana National Guard?s Joint Task Force, in an interview with the Army Times.