Chopstork

CNN article highlighting a Times-Picayune editorial blasting FEMA. Chertoff’s response summarized: “Waaa waa waaa. We’re incompetent. Let me feed you weak excuses and pat my people on the back anyway.”

The Times-Picaune editorial (pdf)

Now Dad is getting mad. We still keep seeing on the news people with no water, no shelter, needing medical care, and for the last three days FEMA can’t even respond to an offer of assistance from the Japan Self Defense Forces international disaster relief teams. They could be on the ground in Alabama, Mississippi and Louisiana by now, actually helping people. These are the guys that went to help after the Indian Ocean tsunami, so they’re very experienced, and they’re good. They offered units of up to 1,000 people.

We’ve explained through the State Department Task Force to FEMA that they can provide medical care, sanitation, water purification, engineering, etc. They’re self-contained units and they bring their own supplies and equipment, and they transport themselves. And they can dispatch from Japan within 24 hours of Washington saying “go.” But for the last three days we can’t get FEMA to even make a decision. Even if they only help a few hundred people, that’s a few hundred people that aren’t getting helped now. How hard is it to figure that one out.

Talk about an organization that can’t make decisions. The Ambassador has been out of the country and doesn’t get back until later today — I think I’ll recommend he call his friend George and tell him to get on FEMA’s ass about this and get a decision made. It’s embarrassing looking at the news coverage. And I guess some people might be embarrassed about accepting help from foreign countries. But I grew up with poor Southern rural rednecks and black people, and these people need help. We should accept all the help we can get. It’s pretty obvious we’re not getting the job done on our own.

Some dude: Dad decided to join the blog world. You’re right, the response to Katrina pretty much seems to suck. Looking at the news coverage from here in Tokyo, the Gulf Coast looks kind of like Bangladesh after a cyclone. Seems nobody was prepared for the scope of the damage. On the other hand, it was probably not really possible to fully prepare. Apparantly FEMA in the beginning was saying they had it under control and didn’t need any outside assistance — yeah right. I’ve been working with my colleagues in the USG to try to get FEMA to tell us if they’re willing to accept an offer of help from the Japanese Self Defense Forces (they have international disaster relief teams, medical teams, reconstruction teams, etc). It’s frustrating because we can’t get an answer yet. Most likelly partially just lack of organization, but probably partly an ego probem as well. Given the number of people and the scope of the problem, I would think we should welcome help from anybody. Anyway, it’s nice to know other countries are offering to help.

What is going on? It’s been 5 days and it sounds like it’s still chaos in New Orleans. We’re the most powerful nation in the world? It’s scary to think our infrastructure is so fragile. Bush didn’t know where to send help? How about … uh … New Orleans?! Police and rescue have been powerless in the city because they have no stations and no communications. The military has communications - get them in there. And why don’t these local agencies and government offices have Iridium phones in the first place? They’re only a couple thousand dollars. Aren’t we always bragging that our military forces can be deployed anywhere in the world within 48 hours or something? And it’s not like it was a surprise - we knew the hurricane was coming.

This is America. If I needed medical supplies, I would have relaxed once I got to an “emergency shelter.” I would have thought I was going to be ok now that I’ve found the authorities. I would have thought they could get me oxygen or medicine. I wouldn’t have expected to sit in the Astrodome and die.