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BIAS ALERT: Media that ripped Bush on Katrina ignores Obama on La. flooding

You know how hard it is to get a decent Tee Time on the Vineyard this time of year? Why fly over LA just to point and say, "Look. Water."
 
Visbek said:
With Katrina, the federal response was an unmitigated disaster.

With this flood, the federal response is doing pretty much what it's supposed to do.

This is also not the first time we've heard this nonsense. E.g. conservatives screeched about Katrina when Sandy hit, and it didn't work -- because the responses were night and day. Instead, they lost their minds because Christie actually worked with Obama, which most conservatives vindictively mischaracterized as a "hug."

So, as I wrote elsewhere:

FEMA has been on the ground, doing its job, from very early on. They've got at least 1000 people on the ground, medical resources are deployed, they have participated in the rescue of 30,000 people, and signed up 70,000 people for federal assistance. Almost all the displaced people have moved from shelters to temporary housing situations. They've already provided over 600,000 gallons of water and 800,000 meals to the state. The federal response is significant.

Louisiana's governor is pleased with the federal response. He also doesn't want Obama to show up for another week or two, since the logistics of getting the President around would complicate relief efforts -- e.g. diverting police to cover a President's driving route would be, to put it mildly, counter-productive.

Bush's incompetence was not that it took him a few days to show up and eat some beignets. It was a failure to prepare in advance; a failure to recognize the magnitude of the storm for several days; the failure to take it seriously; the failure to properly work with state and local governments; it was a continued failed response throughout the entire episode, resulting in a disaster of epic proportions.

Let's get real. FEMA, under Obama, has performed admirably throughout his term.

Let's also be accurate about the criticisms. No one on the ground is saying that the federal response is absent, that it's compounding the disaster. They primarily want media attention, which is lacking. NOLA wants the President there to raise the public profile of the flooding; the Advocate wants him there to express solidarity with the victims.

I do think these are valid criticisms -- but they are also minor ones. It is part of a President's job to bring attention to a major disaster, and for something of this scale comfort the victims. Comparing this to the inept response of the Bush administration to Katrina, though, is mere partisan nonsense.
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If you actually knew what you were talking about, that would help. The Army Corp of Engineers warned the Congress decades ago to appropriate sufficient funding to rebuild the entire levy system in New Orleans; and the can was kicked down the road by every President thereafter. Don't even go there on Bush. FEMA has buses down in New Orleans but that idiot mayor failed to get the drivers out there to evacuate people. Not only that, the levy system wasn't designed for a hurricane like Katrina.

This is beside the point, where is Obama? Democrats criticized Bush for not showing up.
 
Tanngrisnir said:
It's already been answered and your ridiculous premise dismantled and thrown back in your face.

I can see why you'd run from it.
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Face it, your man doesn't care about "flyover" country.
 
Harshaw said:
Would have been better with a current (today) photo of Obama on the golf course instead of an old one.
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Would be easy to do since he spends so much time on the golf course -:(.
 
American said:
Face it, your man doesn't care about "flyover" country.
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Sorry that you can't stand it when your premise has been ripped apart and shown to be utter absurd. And 'my man'? Who?

He was asked not to come just yet, and he's complied with that.

Don't let reality frighten you.
 
Tanngrisnir said:
Sorry that you can't stand it when your premise has been ripped apart and shown to be utter absurd. And 'my man'? Who?

He was asked not to come just yet, and he's complied with that.

Don't let reality frighten you.
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Imagine if Bush had made this excuse. Leftwingers heads would have exploded.
 
If Obama did a fly over then bitching would be about him wasting tax payer money on jet fuel and claim FEMA is doing fine without him getting in the way. ;)
 
American said:
If you actually knew what you were talking about, that would help. The Army Corp of Engineers warned the Congress decades ago to appropriate sufficient funding to rebuild the entire levy system in New Orleans; and the can was kicked down the road by every President thereafter. Don't even go there on Bush. FEMA has buses down in New Orleans but that idiot mayor failed to get the drivers out there to evacuate people. Not only that, the levy system wasn't designed for a hurricane like Katrina.

This is beside the point, where is Obama? Democrats criticized Bush for not showing up.
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Right now he should be on the 10th hole.
 
American said:
BIAS ALERT: Media that ripped Bush on Katrina ignores Obama on La. flooding | Fox News


So what's the reason for the different treatment?
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Probably because the Governor of LA got on tv and said that although Obama was always welcome, the sheer logistics required for a presidential visit would take away first-responders and resources still needed to deal with the current emergency. He asked that Obama wait a couple of weeks so the state would better be able to handle the visit.
 
DiAnna said:
Probably because the Governor of LA got on tv and said that although Obama was always welcome, the sheer logistics required for a presidential visit would take away first-responders and resources still needed to deal with the current emergency. He asked that Obama wait a couple of weeks so the state would better be able to handle the visit.
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Amazing how the "logistics" have changed in 11 years enough to matter.
 
Harshaw said:
Who's to Blame for Delayed Response to Katrina? - ABC News
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Try again.

That article was from September 2005. Around the same time, Snopes was pointing out that "Blanco delayed!" was wrong:

Blame Blanco : snopes.com

The real clincher for proving she was demanding help came in December 2005. Blanco's office released tens of thousands of documents and memos, which clearly show that despite major damage to power and communications systems, Blanco did try to push Nagin before the storm hit, and after it did, she was constantly demanding federal assistance.

Blanco Releases Katrina Records

"We need everything you've got," Blanco is quoted in a memo as telling President Bush on Aug. 29...

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.

"You can see the requests that were made, day after day, hour after hour," Bottcher said.

And of course, the alleged delays doesn't change the fact that FEMA deliberately did all sorts of bone-headed choices, such as refusing all sorts of aid, holding up volunteer firefighters in Atlanta for two days and making them take a sexual harassment course, turning away water from Walmart and the US Coast Guard, and so forth.

Seriously, FEMA's response was such an utter disaster, based in incompetence, that it is stunning for people to try and excuse it.

Equally important is that other disasters, with equally unprepared local resources, have gone well. The current flood is precisely case in point. This was massive flooding that no one expected, with little warning, in areas that never flood, it's even the same state. FEMA is right on top of it.
 
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roughdraft274 said:
You didn't address my post. And your response is stupid. The difference means EVERYTHING. You want to bitch about insignificant **** while ignoring the deeper reasons why Bush was bashed over Katrina. Because he and his people did a ****ty job.
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Probably because the difference is not the changes at the federal level but the actual state itself isn't all dicked up? I mean, LA majorly screwed the pooch on their own operations and the responsibility lies on their shoulders.

It would be like me getting a moving company to come in to move me but I had done nothing to prep for it and didn't really have any idea of how to do it and then complaining about how horrible of a job they did.
 
Visbek said:
Try again.

That article was from September 2005. Around the same time, Snopes was pointing out that "Blanco delayed!" was wrong:

Blame Blanco : snopes.com

The real clincher for proving she was demanding help came in December 2005. Blanco's office released tens of thousands of documents and memos, which clearly show that despite major damage to power and communications systems, Blanco did try to push Nagin before the storm hit, and after it did, she was constantly demanding federal assistance.

Blanco Releases Katrina Records

"We need everything you've got," Blanco is quoted in a memo as telling President Bush on Aug. 29...

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.

"You can see the requests that were made, day after day, hour after hour," Bottcher said.
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Point conceded.

And of course, the alleged delays doesn't change the fact that FEMA deliberately did all sorts of bone-headed choices, such as refusing all sorts of aid, holding up volunteer firefighters in Atlanta for two days and making them take a sexual harassment course, turning away water from Walmart and the US Coast Guard, and so forth.
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Oh, I couldn't POSSIBLY imagine any of THAT happening under the current administration.

Seriously, FEMA's response was such an utter disaster, based in incompetence, that it is stunning for people to try and excuse it.
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I didn't try to "excuse" anything.
 
American said:
If you actually knew what you were talking about, that would help.
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:roll:


The Army Corp of Engineers warned the Congress decades ago to appropriate sufficient funding to rebuild the entire levy system in New Orleans...
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Yes, I never denied that was a factor, and absolutely nothing I said put that on Bush 43.


FEMA has buses down in New Orleans but that idiot mayor failed to get the drivers out there to evacuate people.
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Nagin did, without question, screw up on the evacuation. I've explicitly stated as much, including crediting Bush for personally calling Nagin to call for an evacuation.

As I wrote in that another thread:

New Mexico was ready to send 200 National Guards right away; Washington didn't authorize it for 5 days. Hundreds of volunteer firefighters were sent to Atlanta for 2 days, to receive sexual harassment and "history of FEMA" training before being sent on. This was typical of the response; cities and states were offering resources, and ignored or rebuffed. FEMA turned away water offered by Walmart, fuel offered by the Coast Guard, civilian pilots offering to transport people stuck in hospitals, Amtrak's offer to help with the evacuation, US Forest Service with another water transport, offers of medicine and communications equipment. They redirected shipments of ice away from the disaster area. (This is not a comprehensive list of their mistakes btw)

Cheney personally directed electrical crews to redirect power to a pipeline; those crews, by the way, were trying to restore power to 2 local hospitals.

Michael Brown, head of FEMA at that time, was basically an incompetent crony of Bush. He apparently expended more effort excusing his disastrous performance, and blaming everyone else (including Homeland Security and the White House) than he apparently spent on the effort itself. E.g. He told a bunch of students that the Bush administration deliberately wanted to embarrass Blanco because she was a Democrat, and they wanted to rub her face in it.

Brown didn't even know there were people in the Convention Center for 3 days after the storm. He found out by Brian Williams asking him about it.

FEMA had recently been put under Homeland, and it seems like someone there realized that Brown was as useful as a bag of cats. However, it doesn't seem they did much better once they started stepping in, as they didn't know what they were doing either.

No matter how you slice it, no matter how much of the disaster was a result of improper preparation, the fact is that the federal response to Katrina was an utter ****ing disaster all its own. That is absolutely NOT the case with this flooding, or pretty much every disaster during the Obama administration. While not every single last thing is perfect, the reality is that Obama has definitely turned FEMA around, and made them into an effective agency.


This is beside the point, where is Obama? Democrats criticized Bush for not showing up.
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No, no, no, no, no. Incorrect.

Bush DID show up. He was criticized, by pretty much everyone, for doing a **** job.

In this case, FEMA is doing a good job. Obama just isn't on site.

See the difference?
 
American said:
BIAS ALERT: Media that ripped Bush on Katrina ignores Obama on La. flooding | Fox News

So what's the reason for the different treatment?
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The media has actually ignored or downplayed it in both cases.

It just shows that La is a low priority for the White House because it's mostly throwing money into a black hole. There is a clear upper level desire to just let the state rot. Nobody wants to deal with the cost of relocating hundreds of thousands of people because their neighborhoods are about to be annexed by nature to the bayou.

I mean, where is FEMA right now?
 
American said:
If you actually knew what you were talking about, that would help. The Army Corp of Engineers warned the Congress decades ago to appropriate sufficient funding to rebuild the entire levy system in New Orleans; and the can was kicked down the road by every President thereafter. Don't even go there on Bush. FEMA has buses down in New Orleans but that idiot mayor failed to get the drivers out there to evacuate people. Not only that, the levy system wasn't designed for a hurricane like Katrina.

This is beside the point, where is Obama? Democrats criticized Bush for not showing up.
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No one criticized bush* for not showing up. He was criticized because FEMA screwed up
 
Northern Light said:
The media has actually ignored or downplayed it in both cases.

It just shows that La is a low priority for the White House because it's mostly throwing money into a black hole. There is a clear upper level desire to just let the state rot. Nobody wants to deal with the cost of relocating hundreds of thousands of people because their neighborhoods are about to be annexed by nature to the bayou.

I mean, where is FEMA right now?
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1) FEMA is in Louisiana, managing a huge relief effort, and doing its job. They're helping rescue people, providing supplies, and trying to find housing.

2) This is happening in areas that have never flooded before. Rivers were getting up to 6 feet above record highs.

3) The media isn't paying much attention to this flooding. Suggesting they didn't pay attention to Katrina is beyond ridiculous.
 
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