Tag: Hurricane Katrina

2005: Year One

Trish

Ten years ago, what American would have believed they’d someday be living in a country that denies global warming and evolution? In 2005, nature provided all the proof of herself we need.

The Sierra Club is calling it Year One. Bill McKibben:

So far we’ve raised the temperature of the planet by about one degree, and that’s been enough to set the poles to melting and the winds to roaring. Even if, right now, we started doing all that we could to overhaul our energy economy, we’d probably still be stuck with a couple more degrees of warming, and the world would change more profoundly than at any time in human history.

…a month before Katrina hit, [the] Massachusetts Institute of Technology…published a landmark paper in the British science magazine Nature showing that in the past half century tropical storms have been lasting 60 percent longer and spinning winds 50 percent more powerful. Two weeks after Katrina struck, Science published another paper, by a Georgia Institute of Technology team, demonstrating that Category 4 and 5 hurricanes have become twice as likely in recent decades… Katrina, a Category 1 storm when it crossed Florida, roared to monster size in the abnormally hot waters of the Gulf. Within a day, a million people were homeless. That’s far too many, we soon found out, for the federal government to cope with. And it’s just the beginning…

Katrina cast up ironies like so much flotsam and jetsam. The storm, for instance, wreaked particular vengeance on Mississippi, a state governed by Haley Barbour (R), who in an earlier incarnation as a GOP power broker and energy lobbyist helped persuade President George W. Bush to renege on his promise to treat carbon dioxide as a pollutant. Thanks to Barbour and the other lobbyists-turned-administrators who throng the White House, the federal government has done exactly nothing to slow the progress of climate change. Today we’re emitting 20 percent more carbon than we were in 1990, when scientists were first issuing their prescient warnings. […]

Gov. Blanco Releases Katrina Docs That Show Bush Disengagement

Jon Ponder

Whitewash: The Republicans in Congress promised a thorough investigation into the federal government’s tragically negligent response to the Hurricane Katrina disaster in New Orleans. They were lying, of course. Their intent then, as now, was to sweep this lowest benchmark in the Worst Presidency Ever under the rug.

Blanco’s request from FEMA of 40,000 more troops; ice, water and food; buses, base camps, staging areas, amphibious vehicles, mobile morgues, rescue teams, housing, airlift and communications systems never materialized.

The Republicans have succeed in this – and probably will prevail. But Louisiana Gov. Kathleen Blanco has launched a broadside at them in the form of a document dump of over 100,000 pages of emails, notes and other correspondence from the days before and immediately after the hurricane hit the Gulf Coast:

“We need everything you’ve got,” Blanco is quoted in a memo as telling President Bush on Aug. 29, the day Katrina made landfall. But despite assurances from the Federal Emergency Management Agency that 500 buses were “standing by,” Blanco’s aides were compelled to take action when the FEMA buses failed to materialize, documents show. “We need buses,” Andy Kopplin, chief of staff to Blanco, said in an e-mail to Blanco staffers late on Aug. 30, the day after the storm hit. “Find buses that can go to NO [New Orleans] ASAP.”

Two days later, on Sept. 2, Blanco complained to the White House that FEMA had still failed to fulfill its promises of aid. While cloaked in customary political courtesies, Blanco noted that she had already requested 40,000 more troops; ice, water and food; buses, base camps, staging areas, amphibious vehicles, mobile morgues, rescue teams, housing, airlift and communications systems, according to a press office e-mail of the text of her letter to Bush.

“Even if these initial requests had been fully honored, these assets would not be sufficient,” Blanco said. She also asked for the return of the Louisiana Army National Guard’s 256th Brigade Combat Team, then deployed to Iraq.

Tensions between state leaders and the White House seemed at times near the boiling point. At 3:49 p.m. on Sept. 2, after spending three hours to appear with Bush at a Mississippi news conference, Rep. Charlie Melancon (D-La.) wrote Blanco’s staff, “I am returning home to baron[sic] rouge in hoping I can accomplish something for the people I represent other than being occupied with PR.”

He added that Bush’s “entire effort on behalf of the federal government has been reflected in his and his people’s nonchalant attitude to the people of LA. You may give him this to read.”

Gov. Blanco Releases Katrina Docs That Show Bush Disengagement

Jon Ponder

Official apathy: The Republicans in Congress promised a thorough investigation into the federal government’s tragically negligent response to the Hurricane Katrina disaster in New Orleans. They were lying, of course. Their intent then, as now, was to sweep this lowest benchmark in the Worst Presidency Ever under the rug.

The Republicans have succeed in this – and probably will prevail. But Louisiana Gov. Kathleen Blanco has launched a broadside at them in the form of a document dump of over 100,000 pages of emails, notes and other correspondence from the days before and immediately after the hurricane hit the Gulf Coast:

“We need everything you’ve got,” Blanco is quoted in a memo as telling President Bush on Aug. 29, the day Katrina made landfall. But despite assurances from the Federal Emergency Management Agency that 500 buses were “standing by,” Blanco’s aides were compelled to take action when the FEMA buses failed to materialize, documents show. “We need buses,” Andy Kopplin, chief of staff to Blanco, said in an e-mail to Blanco staffers late on Aug. 30, the day after the storm hit. “Find buses that can go to NO [New Orleans] ASAP.”

Two days later, on Sept. 2, Blanco complained to the White House that FEMA had still failed to fulfill its promises of aid. While cloaked in customary political courtesies, Blanco noted that she had already requested 40,000 more troops; ice, water and food; buses, base camps, staging areas, amphibious vehicles, mobile morgues, rescue teams, housing, airlift and communications systems, according to a press office e-mail of the text of her letter to Bush.

“Even if these initial requests had been fully honored, these assets would not be sufficient,” Blanco said. She also asked for the return of the Louisiana Army National Guard’s 256th Brigade Combat Team, then deployed to Iraq.

Tensions between state leaders and the White House seemed at times near the boiling point. At 3:49 p.m. on Sept. 2, after spending three hours to appear with Bush at a Mississippi news conference, Rep. Charlie Melancon (D-La.) wrote Blanco’s staff, “I am returning home to baron[sic] rouge in hoping I can accomplish something for the people I represent other than being occupied with PR.”

He added that Bush’s “entire effort on behalf of the federal government has been reflected in his and his people’s nonchalant attitude to the people of LA. You may give him this to read.”

New Orleans’ Missing Six Thousand

Jon Ponder

Karena:

6,664 people are still reported missing twelve weeks after Hurricane Katrina, but Kym Pasqualini of the Center for Missing Adults says most of them are probably alive and well! That’s great news, Kym!!!! Tell that to the folks who reported them missing.

Yup, they are probably off somewhere having a jolly old time! They are out there somewhere, working at a new job, setting up their new house, fit as fiddles they are! They are so alive and so well they just can’t be bothered to check in with their families or have their names removed from those pesky old government lists. Jeez.

Bush’s Broken Promises to Katrina Victims

Pensito Editors

He really does not care: President Bush only roused himself to become engaged in the wake of Hurricane Katrina because it would have been political suicide to do anything less. But he has moved on, and, predictably, so has his government, leaving the citizens of the Gulf Coast to fend for themselves:

Officials from both parties say the bottlenecks have occurred in large part because of a leadership vacuum in Washington, where President Bush and Congress have been preoccupied for weeks with Iraq, deficit reduction, the C.I.A. leak investigation and the Supreme Court.

Less than three months after Hurricane Katrina ravaged New Orleans, relief legislation remains dormant in Washington and despair is growing among officials here who fear that Congress and the Bush administration are losing interest in their plight.

As evidence, the state and local officials cite an array of stalled bills and policy changes they say are crucial to rebuilding the city and persuading some of its hundreds of thousands of evacuated residents to return, including measures to finance long-term hurricane protection, revive small businesses and compensate the uninsured.

“There is a real concern that we will lose the nation’s attention the longer this takes,” said Representative Bobby Jindal, a Republican from Metairie, just west of New Orleans. “People are making decisions now about whether to come back. And every day that passes, it will be a little harder to get things done.”

Officials from both parties say the bottlenecks have occurred in large part because of a leadership vacuum in Washington, where President Bush and Congress have been preoccupied for weeks with Iraq, deficit reduction, the C.I.A. leak investigation and the Supreme Court.

Congressional leaders have been scrambling to rein in spending, and many in Washington have grumbled that Louisiana’s leaders have asked for too much, while failing to guarantee that the money will be spent efficiently and honestly.

By contrast, many say, Washington’s response to the Sept. 11 attacks seemed more focused and sustained.

Now, with the holiday season days away and the 2006 midterm elections just around the bend, many Louisiana officials say they fear the sense of urgency that spurred action in September is swiftly draining away.

By the way, weren’t the Republicans going to investigate the fatal fumbling of the government’s actions during the story? What ever happened with that?

Study: Katrina Didn’t Make Us More Prepared

Buck Banks

Unprepared for the worst: Remember how, in the wake of Hurricane Wilma, Florida Gov. Jeb Bush castigated South Floridians for being unprepared for the storm, despite having three full days’ warning? Well, a new study by New York University’s Center for Catastrophic Preparedness and Response found that witnessing such disasters as Hurricane Katrina does not tend to make us better prepared to handle them when they hit us.

The report was based on two surveys — one before and the other following Katrina’s landfall on the Gulf Coast. Here is a summary of the report’s findings:

According to the October survey, which repeated many, but not all of the questions asked in July, the “Katrina Effect” was mostly negative:

  • Americans did not receive a wake-up call from Katrina — more than half said they were no better prepared after watching the event than before.
  • Many Americans have lost confidence in their local government, police departments and local businesses to help those who need assistance following an emergency. Only fire departments and charitable organizations like the Red Cross and Salvation Army held on to their pre-Katrina levels of confidence.
  • Americans were generally split on who was to blame for the federal government’s lack of preparedness post-Katrina — 60 percent said it was impossible to be very prepared for hurricanes, terrorist attacks or a flu epidemic, while 40 percent blamed the government.
  • Among those who blamed government, the vast majority said that the problem was mismanagement, a lack of leadership, and an unwillingness to make preparedness a priority.

Key Recommendations:
CONGRESS SHOULD

  • give the president authority to create a new Citizen Preparedness Directorate.
  • give the president greater authority to strengthen the federal government’s human capital in the preparedness effort.
  • reform the presidential appointments process to assure that key positions are filled rapidly with qualified personnel.

STATE AND LOCAL GOVERNMENTS MUST

  • be clear about who “owns” the emergency preparedness task.
  • make their emergency management functions as visible as possible.
  • establish local command centers.

The Upside of Being Reamed by Big Oil

Trish

Corporate welfare: If oil companies hadn’t dropped prices after Congress threatened to not only withhold their tax breaks but take back a share of their ill-gotten gains, their profits could have stayed as high all year as they did in the heady, price-gouging days following Hurricane Katrina. In that case, here are their annualized gains over last year, along with the portion of the checks you and I are picking up:

Exxon Mobil — $9.92 billion (75 percent annual increase)
Royal Dutch Shell — $9.03 billion (68 percent increase)
BP — $6.5 billion (34 percent increase)
Conoco Phillips — $3.8 billion (89 percent increase)
Chevron Texaco — $3.6 billion (12 percent increase)

This year Congress handed oil and gas companies $2.6 billion in tax cuts as part of the Energy Policy Act of 2005. It also included funds for a $1.5 billion oil consortium (in Rep. Tom Delay’s Congressional District). The total payout in the energy act is over $4 billion.

In addition to the 2005 energy act, billions more in handouts are in effect, including: $5.1 billion credit for non-conventional fuels; a $2.8 billion depletion allowance; and $2.4 billion credit for “intangible drilling” costs.

In total, the U.S. government is subsidizing oil and gas to the tune of nearly $14 billion — at a time when profits are at record highs.

These breaks were meant to act as incentives for cutting edge exploration and alternative fuels. Even President Bush, who never met an oil man he didn’t like — said recently, “With oil at more than $50 a barrel, by the way, we do not need taxpayers’-funded incentives to explore for oil and gas.”

No, “we” don’t. But I can’t help but think that oil companies did us a favor by bleeding us dry. For the first time, we are hearing Congress – even some of its Republican members – calling for fossil fuel alternatives, and threatening to come up with a real energy policy (as opposed to a bundle of tax breaks and freebies for oil companies) that will encourage us to use less non-renewable resources. They are also starting to demand truthful answers from the lying liars.

I say to oil companies, keep the prices high and enjoy it while you can. The more you squeeze us, the faster you put yourselves out of business.

FEMA Given Green Light to Work in the Dark

Trish

A federal judge in Fort Myers, Florida has ruled that it’s none of our business how FEMA spends our money.

The case involved the efforts of three newspapers — The Fort Myers News Press, Florida Today and the Pensacola News Journal — to obtain the names and addresses of people who received disaster aid after the 2004 hurricane.

Judge John Steele rejected the request, ruling that releasing that information would violate recipients’ right to privacy…the information could cause the residents embarrassment or make them subject to identify theft. Unscrupulous contractors could use the information to scam people looking to repair their homes.

Exactly what is embarrassing about finding a tree in your dining room and accepting some government cash to remove it, I’m not sure. It’s not like it’s a big secret anyway. The FEMA guy (or gal, in our neighborhood’s case) pulls up in the white FEMA truck and stands in the front yard, interviewing you about your damage. If you’re lucky, he or she will issue you a FEMA roof (blue tarp). Then they go next door, and to the house after that, and the one next to that, and so on. No one has electricity during this process, so they are either sitting outside trying to catch a breeze or clearing debris from the yard. There are no secrets – and no shame – after a hurricane.

Except for the secret of who’s getting your tax dollars.

…FEMA distributed close to $6 billion in Florida after last year’s hurricanes. Taxpayers deserve an accounting. Some questionable expenditures already have been uncovered…

Releasing the names of those who received FEMA dollars and how they were spent would guard against waste and abuse. If necessary, certain details could be excised from the public record.

…The likelihood of harm to recipients is small, whereas the likelihood of taxpayers being swindled if FEMA’s expenses are kept in the dark is great.

Chertoff: DHS Will Be the Next DHL

Buck Banks

Now here’s a good idea: Two weeks after Hurricane Wilma hit South Florida, where thousands of homes and businesses are still without power, heaps of debris remain on the streets and traffic lights are still inoperable in many areas, Department of Homeland Security Secretary Michael Chertoff is plotting to reinvent the Federal Emergency Management Agency. Chertoff said he plans to restructure FEMA to operate like a 21st century distribution company with the ability to track and locate supplies.

“We want to be able to do what UPS and DHL does,” Chertoff said in an address to the International Association of Fire Chiefs on Nov. 4. Experts from inside and outside the government are working with FEMA to build an “effective distribution of supplies and people” during an emergency, Chertoff added.

The retooling began last summer, before hurricanes ravaged the Gulf Coast, when Chertoff said he would remove FEMA from underneath layers of bureaucracy and have its director (remember Michael “Brownie” Brown?) report directly to him. Chertoff also took away the agency’s preparedness responsibilities to focus solely on responding to catastrophic events.

That last move has been a controversial one, with some lawmakers calling for FEMA to remain a stand-alone agency responsible for both disaster preparedness and response. But Chertoff is loathe to disconnect FEMA from the vaunted War on Terrorism that is DHS’s mission. After all, I’m sure you’ve seen the memo supplied by an Italian secret agent that al Qaeda has been releasing carbon dioxide emissions in order to increase global warming and thereby kick our collective butts with killer hurricanes — really!

So here we are, with one of the largest federal agencies with something like 20,000 employees, looking to become the DHL of disaster response. That sounds like a great business model, don’t it?

Sounds good, but given Chertoff’s checkered management track record, his staff stuffed with political cronies and the tendency of government agencies to behave like, well government agencies, perhaps Chertoff should just go ahead and add another “S” to “UPS.” My prediction is his retooling of DHS will more likely produce a bloated, lumbering, money-losing agency like the United States Postal Service.

Excuse me, I have to go track that bag of ice I was expecting nine days ago while the power was out. Last I checked, it was on a truck in Maryland somewhere.

Bush Administration Stonewalling Investigators on Katrina Documents

Buck Banks

House panel fed up with feds: In a scenario eerily reminiscent of the 9/11 Commission’s difficulty in piercing the administration’s cone of silence, a House panel investigating the government response to Hurricane Katrina may have to resort to subpoenas to shake loose neceaasry info.

According to GovExec.com, House lawmakers investigating the Bush administration’s response to Hurricane Katrina threatened Wednesday to subpoena the White House and key federal agencies for documents, saying a lack of information is hindering their already time-constrained investigation.

Lawmakers on a special House committee examining the events leading up to and following the hurricane said they have yet to receive key documents and e-mails from the administration. Chairman Rep. Tom Davis, R-Va, said the committee will use “whatever means possible” to get the documents.

“If we don’t get them, I’m not hesitant to issue subpoenas,” Davis said. “There are simply too many gaps in the picture we have at this point that we can’t draw complete conclusions.”

“We’re not going to be stonewalled here,” Davis added.

The commission investigating the 9/11 terrorist attacks had similar complaints about the administration’s failure to supply requested documents. The commission finally had to issue three subpoenas to the Federal Aviation Administration, the North American Aerospace Defense Command and the city of New York.

The House committee is scheduled to complete its work and issue a report on its findings and recommendations by mid-February.

The committee has yet to receive requested e-mail exchanges and communications involving White House Chief of Staff Andrew Card, Homeland Security Secretary Michael Chertoff, Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld, Army Corps of Engineers Commander Lt. Gen. Carl Strock and Health and Human Services Secretary Michael Leavitt, said Rep. Charles Melancon, D-La.

“The continued failure of administration officials to comply with these requests will impede congressional oversight of the federal response to Hurricane Katrina,” Melancon said. “The credibility and thoroughness of the congressional investigation into the response . . . will hinge on access to key documents and communications.”

Melancon technically does not serve on the committee because Democrats have refused to appoint members, saying that an independent commission is needed. Melancon and a few other Democrats, however, have been voluntary participants.

Rep. Steve Buyer, R-Ind., noted that the committee also has yet to receive requested communications from the governors of Louisiana, Mississippi and Alabama.

The committee originally requested all documents by Oct. 14, but Davis extended that deadline to Oct. 27. Davis said he expects to receive “a substantial production” of documents from the White House today.