About FEMA Outside of Louisiana
Debbie Elliott is the new host for All Things Considered on the weekends and she is a good choice for hurricane coverage because she is a long-time resident of Orange Beach, Alabama.
This evening she interviewed Trent Lott about his book and the response to the hurricane in Mississippi.
Even though he agrees that FEMA shouldn’t have been under the Department of Homeland Security and wasn’t receiving all that it asked for in funding, he says they flat messed up providing assistance to Mississippi. He also supports using Medicaid to provide hurricane victims with access to medical care.
Old Trent and his constituents are not a happy with the Federal response.
[Listen to the report – Debbie gets in some digs about Lott’s attitude toward “big government” and Medicaid prior to the hurricane.]
In Florida the Palm Beach Post added it voice to several other Florida editorial writers suggesting: As FEMA looks at 2006, repay Florida for 2004.
I don’t want people to forget this: FEMA did not do a competent job in 2004 and they are still holding up reconstruction. Congress gave them the money, but they aren’t covering their obligations.
The “response” was another charade, because after the election FEMA did everything it could to screw over local governments.
What happened in New Orleans was not an aberration, that is the way FEMA does its job: badly. It hasn’t been noticed before because Jeb was covering for the Shrubbery last year. People avoided making their complaints until after the election.
The scope of the disaster caused by Katrina made it impossible to hide and the Louisiana officials didn’t even make the attempt.
A small statistical aside – the death rate in Louisiana is only slightly ahead of Mississippi when you look at the numbers as a percentage of the population.
October 2, 2005 Comments Off on About FEMA Outside of Louisiana
A Stable Persian Gulf?
In response to remarks made by Prince Saud al-Faisal, foreign minister of Saudi Arabia, about ties between Iraq and Iran, Iraqi Interior Minister Bayan Jabor, an honors graduate of the John Bolton School of Diplomatic Tact, said: “This Iraq is the cradle of civilization that taught humanity reading and writing, and some Bedouin riding a camel wants to teach us. This talk is totally rejected.”
Iraq blasts Saudi Arabia for anti-Shi’ite remarks, the article on the exchange at AlertNet, doesn’t portend smooth relations between these neighboring, oil producing countries.
I’m sure that Karen Hughes and Condi Rice can fly in and help these countries see the benefits of cooperation. It’s not like the current disturbances are going to degenerate into a regional conflict with Saudi Arabia and the Iraqi Sunni at the throats of Iran and the Iraqi Shi’ia. I mean the Shrubbery would never allow anything that would stop the flow of oil from the Persian Gulf for an extended period.
I’m sure the White House has a plan, right?
October 2, 2005 Comments Off on A Stable Persian Gulf?
Let’s Outsource the US Government
California has been having a busy wildfire season and needed some help. Who you gonna call? Canada .
The CBC reports: Quebec sends waterbombers to help fight California wildfires
The Quebec government is lending a hand to help fight massive brush fires on the edge of Los Angeles.
The province’s forest fire prevention agency has sent two CL-415 waterbombers to help combat the flames. The crew includes eight pilots and three technicians who might remain on site until the end of December, depending on the situation.
Quebec said if the fires get worse, it will be ready to send more help.
Last month I talked about the Vancouver Rescue Teams that were first outside assistance St. Bernard parish received, and about the Canadian Ships that brought people and supplies to the Gulf Coast.
The Canadians have been helping a very long time. Many may have missed the story of the Canadian embassy getting 6 Americans out of Teheran during the Iranian Hostage Crisis in 1980.
They do these things and yet the Canadian budget is running a surplus and they are paying down their national debt.
They think that a single-payer national health system is a good thing and they manage to provide health care to everyone. This system as well as their educated work force convinced Toyota to build its newest North American auto plant in Canada, rather than in the United States despite major tax giveaways offered by several states.
General Dynamics has also moved several manufacturing plants to Canada, including one of the plants that build the US Army’s Stryker armored vehicle.
Obviously the Canadian government delivers a better product than the US government, so we should fire the current mismanagement team and outsource our government to Canada.
October 2, 2005 Comments Off on Let’s Outsource the US Government
