Homeland Defense vs. Disaster Response

I would hate to believe that Republicans would be so concerned about sexual harassment and the political correctness that has washed over this country since the 1960s. It would be interesting to know just who was responsible for such assinity and what his/her political preferences are, but anybody whose first concern at a time of national disaster is sensitivity training, doesn't belong in FEMA.

Still, was this incident typical? I doubt it. How much of the delay getting help into the city is reasonably attributed to FEMA. Compared to the absolute, almost perverse incompetence of city and state officials in New Orleans, it's annoying but not disastrous.

The NYTimes seems to be trying to rehabilitate Governor Blanco, by crediting her story that she couldn't get any buses because FEMA didn't have them there as promised. Instapundit and Tom Magquire readers, however, have reason to think otherwise. The Washington Post seems to be taking the Blame Aplenty tack. Time and Newsweek are still detailing "How Bush blew it." Jeff Goldstein scorches that version. All in all, it's another blown story for the liberal press.

The media focus has all been on the fact of people who were stranded inside the city when the levee broke and the roads became impassable, but, with the exception of Fox News, particularly Brit Hume and Major Garrett, they seem to have settled for the facile assumption that it must have been FEMA's, and therefore Bush's, fault. We all saw the people who couldn't evacuate on TV, and it is impossible not to be distressed by their plight, but it doesn't make sense to think that the Feds should have been there the minute the storm passed. The question should not have been, Why isn't FEMA here? It should have been, Where's the Red Cross, Salvation Army, etc.? And that would have revealed, via some questions to the private groups who are normally first responders, that they were not allowed into the city and that local and state government were in total disarray.

I do think that it was difficult to realize the size of this problem if you weren't there with a helicopter. It really takes a panoramic view and the ability to go miles and miles without seeing any dry ground to get the true impact of such a thing. It really is the sort of job that ultimately only the military could deal with. Previous experience with hurricanes in other areas couldn't prepare people for this scale of this result. But that's no excuse for One must wonder how much of that was slow to dawn because noof the confusion among local authorities.

So I don't feel like looking for people to blame just because of the kind of dumb things that always happen. What really bothers me, however, is when people don't try to help themselves, and when those who are responsible, like Governor Blanco and Mayor Nagin, behave as though they're in a stupor or act contrary to common sense. Whoever decided to waste the time of volunteer emergency workers by giving them sensitivity training should be fired, but it's probably in the manual dictated by OEO or Congress, so they'd be justifiec.