Mike Brown Out?

[The Ressurrected One]

Is there a record of how members of Congress voted on DHS?

Yes. Every heard of the Congressional Record?

[RandomGuy]

Other than being unable to answer the lying, projected, rhetoric of blame from the left, no one has given me a concrete example of what FEMA did wrong in its response to Hurrican Katrina.

Give me one. Just one.

On the Monday of the Hurricane, as the hurricane was raging, 500 Florida Airboat pilots volunteered to assist in the search and rescue. Most filled their boats with supplies and water. They are still waiting for approval to enter the area from FEMA. From every report I've heard, they are still short boats in the disaster zone.

In Atlanta, there are 100s of highly skilled resue workers waiting to be assigned to the disaster zone, and FEMA has them taking Sexual Harrassment courses. The did send some into action as a backdrop for the presidents visit.

Over 600 Illinois firefighers, EMTs, Paramedics, etc... including pumper trucks, ladder trucks and rescue equipment are sitting outside Baton Rouge, because FEMA can't figure out how to deploy them... This represents 1.5% of the total emergency capacity of the State of Illinois... and they are sitting around playing football... because some idiot can't figure out how to use the available resources. **Update** At least some of these have been deployed to cover for Baton Rouge, but I believe the bulk are still waiting for deployment.

And for the record, I'll list Aaron Broussard's accusations, which were never refuted:
"Walmart delivered 3 trucks of water, FEMA turned them back, said we didn't need them."

"We had 1000 gallons of diesel fuel on a Coast Guard vessel, the Coast Guard said "come and get the fuel." When we got there with our trucks, they got a word, 'FEMA said don't give you the fuel.'"

"FEMA comes in and cuts all of our emergency communications lines [without notice]. The Sherriff ... came back in and re-connected them, and posted armed guards on the lines"

However, in the eyes of the public, is biggest problem was the complete disconnect between what he was telling the press while we were watching images of what was really happening on the ground. It appeared (right or wrong) that he had no clue what was going on. I prefer my public officials to know more than I do about things like this, not less....

Just my .02

Ride Safe,
Ken


http://www.beginnerbikers.org/showthread.php?t=3187

[ChumpDumper]

Yes. Every heard of the Congressional Record?

So is there a record of who voted for the last pay raise, too?

How many Republicans voted for DHS?

[RandomGuy]

Careful what you wish for there, R.O.

[RandomGuy]

So is there a record of who voted for the last pay raise, too?

How many Republicans voted for DHS?

The real question is how many Republicans voted to balloon the federal budget deficit, but THAT is another thread...

[boutons]

FEMA officials said that the big mistake they made was not imagining the case where effectively ALL the first responders would be incapacitated. Like FEMA was only setup to handle "easy" catastrophes in their playbook. Sounds like FEMA was setup to backup the first responders and were flummoxed when the first repsonders weren't there.

Jerktoff used the word "mega-catastrophe" to suggest that Katrina was such a big mother ing Whopper that FEMA's two hands couldn't handle it, let alone their bureaucratic brains imagine it.

FEMA admits there was considerable dithering by FEMA with lawyers and political operatives about the demarcations of federal/state/city responsibilities, legal implications, political conserations of doing whatever, like take initiative that the poor, corrupt, small NO/LA could be overwhelmed. I read where in was also hesitating quite late, Sat or Sun, about evacuation orders because of legal liabilities.

The country is so ing hog-tied by its 1 million lawyers, and 300 million lawyer wannabes, that common sense and timely action are damn near impossible. Nobody can do ing anything because they're worried about getting sued. The lawyers really hold all the power and knowledge. Nobody knows WTF is going on without having a lawyer explain the legalties to them. ie, legalities and lawyer-think have become the primary reality that people subscribe to.

What we're seeing now is, with TRO and others here participating, is the Repug network of talking heads, Fox Cable, conservatinve consultants, lobbyists, political operatives, bloggers, etc set in motion the Rove fog machine to hide/deny all accountability at the (Repug) federal level, while slimming and pushing all accountability onto the NO/LA (democratic) level.

Shrub will probably give Brown a Medal of Freedom, since he no less worthy or less competent than "slam dunk" Tenet.

It may take awhile, which is also to Repug advantage, since attention spans are so short, but it seems there's enough pissed off, disappointed people that the truth, not the Repug fog, will come out eventually, and the feds will be a guilty of ing up as much as NO and LA.

[Nbadan]

[RandomGuy]

Having pointed out what specific things FEMA got wrong at first, I would say that they got things rolling after the category 5 -storm hit them, and did rather well.

Too bad it took a humanitarian disaster to get things rolling.

[RandomGuy]

Nobody knows WTF is going on without having a lawyer explain the legalties to them. ie, legalities and lawyer-think have become the primary reality that people subscribe to.

....the truth, not the Repug fog, will come out eventually, and the feds will be a guilty of ing up as much as NO and LA.

I would point out that the administration has had 3 years since 9-11 to get this straight,and it is still f***ed up. Thank God it was something that people had a couple of days worth of warning about.

Could you imagine the extra loss of life had a meteor (or worse) nailed a major US city because of dithering?

This administration has demonstrated exactly what disengaged, disinterested, and mediocre leadership costs us.

[The Ressurrected One]

I would point out that the administration has had 3 years since 9-11 to get this straight,and it is still f***ed up. Thank God it was something that people had a couple of days worth of warning about.

Could you imagine the extra loss of life had a meteor (or worse) nailed a major US city because of dithering?

Hey, Einstein, a meteor would have given much more warning than did Katrina. But, you raise a valid point. Had Nagen and Blanco listened to the President on Saturday before the storm or, to NOAA on the Thursday before the storm, they could have implemented their 40 page emergency response plan that would have included utilizing those school buses to empty the city and no one would have died in New Orleans.

This administration has demonstrated exactly what disengaged, disinterested, and mediocre leadership costs us.

Surely, you're referring to the Blanco or Nagen administrations, right?

[The Ressurrected One]

On the Monday of the Hurricane, as the hurricane was raging, 500 Florida Airboat pilots volunteered to assist in the search and rescue. Most filled their boats with supplies and water. They are still waiting for approval to enter the area from FEMA. From every report I've heard, they are still short boats in the disaster zone.

In Atlanta, there are 100s of highly skilled resue workers waiting to be assigned to the disaster zone, and FEMA has them taking Sexual Harrassment courses. The did send some into action as a backdrop for the presidents visit.

Over 600 Illinois firefighers, EMTs, Paramedics, etc... including pumper trucks, ladder trucks and rescue equipment are sitting outside Baton Rouge, because FEMA can't figure out how to deploy them... This represents 1.5% of the total emergency capacity of the State of Illinois... and they are sitting around playing football... because some idiot can't figure out how to use the available resources. **Update** At least some of these have been deployed to cover for Baton Rouge, but I believe the bulk are still waiting for deployment.

And for the record, I'll list Aaron Broussard's accusations, which were never refuted:
"Walmart delivered 3 trucks of water, FEMA turned them back, said we didn't need them."

"We had 1000 gallons of diesel fuel on a Coast Guard vessel, the Coast Guard said "come and get the fuel." When we got there with our trucks, they got a word, 'FEMA said don't give you the fuel.'"

"FEMA comes in and cuts all of our emergency communications lines [without notice]. The Sherriff ... came back in and re-connected them, and posted armed guards on the lines"

However, in the eyes of the public, is biggest problem was the complete disconnect between what he was telling the press while we were watching images of what was really happening on the ground. It appeared (right or wrong) that he had no clue what was going on. I prefer my public officials to know more than I do about things like this, not less....

Just my .02

Ride Safe,
Ken


http://www.beginnerbikers.org/showthread.php?t=3187

How about something other than from a bikers forum, eh?

[Nbadan]

[RandomGuy]

Hey, Einstein, a meteor would have given much more warning than did Katrina. But, you raise a valid point. Had Nagen and Blanco listened to the President on Saturday before the storm or, to NOAA on the Thursday before the storm, they could have implemented their 40 page emergency response plan that would have included utilizing those school buses to empty the city and no one would have died in New Orleans.

Surely, you're referring to the Blanco or Nagen administrations, right?

Actually a meteor would have given LESS warning than Katrina, hence my point. Don't take my word for it, ask any astronomer. We have cataloged very very few of the the Near Earth Objects that threaten us. If you recall the Shumacher-Levy comets that punched Earth-sized holes in Jupiter, they were discovered by pure chance so that we had enough warning to watch them do their damage.

Most near earth objects are relatively dark, with a low albedo (reflectivity) and unless you are looking in the right place at the right time, BAMMMM!!!

Our solar system and it's environs is another reading hobby of mine. I would be willing to bet I know more than you do on this too, so before you step up, you better read up, punk.

[RandomGuy]

How about something other than from a bikers forum, eh?

It is a collection of anecdotal evidence supported by the first hand account given in the first post. I would put it up as pretty reliable if you had posted similar.

First you won't admit ANYTHING, then I find something, and you doubt a good faith effort. I realize intellectual honesty isn't something you practice much or are used to in these boards, but roll with it.

[boutons]

Jerktoff = Nosferatu!!

[The Ressurrected One]

It is a collection of anecdotal evidence supported by the first hand account given in the first post.

Okay, here's what I found in the first post...

Well, shoes keep dropping in the hurricane relief fiasco. It always takes some kind of disaster to find out what kind of public officials have been elected. It's just like buying insurance. You never know how good it is until you have a claim. It doesn't matter how much money people save buying Geico if they screw you when it's time to pay off. Governor Blanco and Mayor Nagin have their flaws as well. There were two hundred school buses in New Orleans that could have been used to evacuate people that are now just sitting in water butt hole deep to a tall Indian and are worthless. He was doing the loudest screaming on TV. When the ball is dropped, don't complain which way it bounces. Mike Brown, the momentary head of FEMA, turns out to have lied on his resume and is in the process of being removed. He was evidently a political appointee with no disaster emergency experience at all. Wow. There's going to be plenty of blame to go around.

Hmmm...nothing about where FEMA failed at anything. Glad he mentioned the busses though.

So, let's move to post number #3, also by Zixxer -- your "first hand accounter" -- in response to the question of what has FEMA done wrong, posed by another poster in that forum.

Where are you located? It took four days for helicopters to show up in New Orleans. That's FEMA. It doesn't take four days to get to New Orleans by helicopter from anywhere in the continental US.

There were federal agencies, The U.S. Coast Guard to be precise, who were slinging in water and MRE's BY HELICOPTER from the moment the wind subsided. I saw them flying around in the background in some of Monday's televised news accounts. Then, after the levees broke, the numbers were increased steadily. Some first person account.

I would put it up as pretty reliable if you had posted similar.

Well, of course, that's your problem...you'll believe anything apparently.

First, you won't find me passing off forum posts as being verified fact. Second, That guy could be posting from Bangladesh for all you know...nothing in any of his posts establishes his location or his position to be in the know about squat.

First you won't admit ANYTHING,...

What's to admit? The federal government has executed the swifted, most efficient, most effective disaster response in the history of this country and you're nitpicking over dubious, unverified anecdotes that, even if true, don't come close to defining the scope and breadth, or the success, of the operation.

...then I find something, and you doubt a good faith effort. I realize intellectual honesty isn't something you practice much or are used to in these boards, but roll with it.

Boo hoo, I don't believe you...get over it.

So, why didn't you post the account of people resorting to cannibalism? It had as much corroboration as these accounts. Or, the story that the Army Corps of Engineers blew the levee? Huh? Those are floating around out there on the internet, told by persons who talked to people who were there when it happened...

And, what you did doesn't even approach intellectual honesty. You plucked a story from the web; from whence it came you did not know but, it supported your assumptions. Therefore, it's true.

So, you want to try out some real facts?

[The Ressurrected One]

Actually a meteor would have given LESS warning than Katrina, hence my point. Don't take my word for it, ask any astronomer.

We have cataloged very very few of the the Near Earth Objects that threaten us. If you recall the Shumacher-Levy comets that punched Earth-sized holes in Jupiter, they were discovered by pure chance so that we had enough warning to watch them do their damage.

I did. Okay, well, I didn't exactly ask an astronomer but, I did go to a verifiable web site to check your information...the University of Alabama Department of Physics and Astronomy. (Please note, this is not a forum for beginning bikers) Here's what I found.


This is a photograph of Comet Shoemaker-Levy 9 in a V-band image obtained 19 June 1993 with the Lowell Observatory 1.1-meter telescope. Seen about 13 months before Jupiter impact.

I also learned the comet was discovered in March of 1993...

Wow, you process information slowly if you think 13 to 17 months isn't much longer than several days.

Most near earth objects are relatively dark, with a low albedo (reflectivity) and unless you are looking in the right place at the right time, BAMMMM!!!

Our solar system and it's environs is another reading hobby of mine. I would be willing to bet I know more than you do on this too, so before you step up, you better read up, punk.

I'm guessing, (and please don't take this as an "ad hominem attack" because, well, it's based on your stupid answers in this thread), that with your grasp of astronomical phenomena, you have a similar position on global warming...alarmist and ill-informed by agendized "scientific" google finds.

Nice googling champ!

[Aggie Hoopsfan]

Quote:

Originally Posted by Zixxer10
Where are you located? It took four days for helicopters to show up in New Orleans. That's FEMA. It doesn't take four days to get to New Orleans by helicopter from anywhere in the continental US.

What? Choppers were pulling people off roofs as soon as the winds dropped enough for it be safe. And that wasn't four days. If memory serves right it was Monday evening after the storm went through on Monday morning.

[The Ressurrected One]

What? Choppers were pulling people off roofs as soon as the winds dropped enough for it be safe. And that wasn't four days. If memory serves right it was Monday evening after the storm went through on Monday morning.

Memory serves you right AH.

[xrayzebra]

Dan has a really good friend in RandomGuy. And the name is relevent too. He
really is Random in his thoughts. Forgot he is an expert on the heavens.

Dan congratulations, your reading habits are really improving. Next thing you know
real books or the editorial page. Yeah they have comics there too.

[The Ressurrected One]

Still unanswered:

Other than being unable to answer the lying, projected, rhetoric of blame from the left, no one has given me a concrete example of what FEMA did wrong in its response to Hurrican Katrina.

Give me one. Just one.

[RandomGuy]

Okay, here's what I found in the first post...


Hmmm...nothing about where FEMA failed at anything. Glad he mentioned the busses though.

We are getting our wires crossed here. By "first post" I meant this URL

http://www.roanoke.com/editorials/co...y%5C32074.html

This URL is a first hand account that I will quote from and put a few things in bold so that there is no confusion.

Micki Singer

Singer is a member of the Moneta Rescue Squad.

A contingent of College of Health Science students and Moneta Rescue Squad members was sent to Baton Rouge/New Orleans Sept. 1 with one ambulance and two trailers loaded with supplies to ensure that the group was self-sufficient. We also carried water and food to be donated to refugee centers...

Although told to report for assignments at 5 a.m., few units were dispatched until 3 p.m. or 4 p.m. even though the crews were ready and anxious to get going and to be of help wherever they were needed...

At the New Orleans airport, one FEMA medical worker told me that he was exhausted and had triaged 1,200 refugees that day.

I asked why they didn't utilize the hundreds of volunteer emergency medical technicians who were all trained in triage protocols and was told that they could only use FEMA personnel!..

I feel that the lack of efficiency, organization, planning and utilization of resources by the government agencies involved in this disaster should be noted and addressed.

This total waste of personnel and resources was obscene, perhaps even criminal. Doctors and nurses arrived at the center and were still there hours and hours later, even though a 1,000-bed hospital had been reopened, with electricity restored and was ready to receive patients.

The local shelters were overwhelmed with medically compromised patients, while hundreds of ambulances and trained personnel were available to help with transport and care, and none were allowed to do so.


Is this first hand and specific enough for you?

[RandomGuy]

(((Quote: Originally Posted by Random Guy
I would put it up as pretty reliable if you had posted similar.)))

Well, of course, that's your problem...you'll believe anything apparently.

First, you won't find me passing off forum posts as being verified fact. Second, That guy could be posting from Bangladesh for all you know...nothing in any of his posts establishes his location or his position to be in the know about squat.

The listing of those accounts jives with many reports of wasted resources that I have seen on CNN and elsewhere in which the person was relaying FIRST HAND what they saw. The tone of almost all of these reports paints a similar picture: "Resource X either sat there for days unrused or simply was turned away."

Did resources get there quickly? Yes. FEMA did get SOME stuff there pretty damn quickly.

BUT

FEMA was quite simply not prepared for the scope of the disaster. Part of which was addressed in one of my other posts about the GOP controlled federal government cutting their budget on a yearly basis.

What extra help WAS available wasn't accounted for by FEMA and could have made a world of difference, HAD IT BEEN USED.

[RandomGuy]

I pass off very little as "certified fact". You will notice my words were "pretty reliable", meaning it is safe to take the information into account to make decisions or follow along in a reasonable, logical discussion.

I don't believe everything I read. I really do some critical thinking about what I read, and to suggest otherwise is simple nonsense.

I am intellectually honest enough to admit when I make mistakes, and also readily admit to failings on my side of the political spectrum as you yourself have seen me do.

Fallacy: Personal Attack

Also Known as: Ad Hominem Abusive.
Description of Personal Attack

A personal attack is committed when a person subs utes abusive remarks for evidence when attacking another person's claim or claims. This line of "reasoning" is fallacious because the attack is directed at the person making the claim and not the claim itself. The truth value of a claim is independent of the person making the claim. After all, no matter how repugnant an individual might be, he or she can still make true claims.

Not all ad Hominems are fallacious. In some cases, an individual's characteristics can have a bearing on the question of the veracity of her claims. For example, if someone is shown to be a pathological liar, then what he says can be considered to be unreliable. However, such attacks are weak, since even pathological liars might speak the truth on occasion.

In general, it is best to focus one's attention on the content of the claim and not on who made the claim. It is the content that determines the truth of the claim and not the characteristics of the person making the claim.

[RandomGuy]

Quote:

Originally Posted by Random Guy
First you won't admit ANYTHING,...

What's to admit? The federal government has executed the swifted, most efficient, most effective disaster response in the history of this country and you're nitpicking over dubious, unverified anecdotes that, even if true, don't come close to defining the scope and breadth, or the success, of the operation.

And if these anecdotes add up enough to conclude that it wasn't the "swiftest, most efficient, most effective disaster response in the history of this country" would you admit it?

A simple yes or no would suffice.

I am not asking you to say that this was anything less than an unqualified success. I am asking if you would EVER admit the Bush administration dropped the ball on something. If I played a recording of GW saying "nah, don't worry about that hurricane" would you admit THAT might have been a mistake?

If no level of evidence is sufficient for you to admit that GW might make a mistake, say so, and I will stop wasting my time on it.

I have very rarely ever seen the ability of people at your end of the political spectrum to admit fallibility, so I am not holding my breath...