Ok, so NOW we know why the people in NO starved!

Dan, no, its not BS.LOUSIANA HOMELAND SECURITY was the agency that turned down the Red Cross. Guess what? That agency is NOT part of, nor run by, the federal government.Second, there is NO FEDERAL INVOLVEMENT until the STATE ASKS FOR IT. This is how our govenrment works.Yes, the Red Cross does not conduct search and rescue operations. That is not the point. The point is that they are a RELIEF organization, they had supplies position and READY TO DEPLOY in the affected area, and the LOUSIANA GOVERNMENT told them NOT TO BECAUSE THEY WERE AFRAID IT WOULD ATTRACT MORE PEOPLE TO THE SUPERDOME.This was not and is not about safety. There WAS no humanitarian crisis in the hours immediately after the storm, and there was no levee problem either. The Red Cross could have EASILY brought in food, water and sanitary supplies to the convention center and superdome in the hours after the hurricane - BEFORE the levee breaks. The LOUSIANA HOMELAND SECURITY department (that is, the GOVERNOR'S office) refused access because they did not want to "attract" additional people to those sites!Further, the federal government has tried to get Blanco, the governor, to federalize the guard (SHE must do so - the feds CANNOT "take" it from her.) She has REFUSED. This is also not widely reported, but it IS out there if you go look.Bottom line here Dan is that the Governor and Mayor DID obstruct the relief effort. The Red Cross was ready, willing and able to deliver relief supplies before the storm for staging purposes to the convention center and superdome and immediately after the storm as well. They also had supplies that the Lousiana National Guard could have delivered by airdrop (chopper) after the storm as well. The offers were REFUSED because the Lousiana Government wanted conditions to be miserable there so people would be willing to evacuate.

Ah, but here's the problem Dan.The written hurricane plan for New Orleans calls for the Mayor to use the City transit and school buses to remove those who are unable to use private conveyance (e.g. personal automobiles) from the storm area.The Mayor refused. He instead parked the city transit capability - resulting in it being destroyed by the floodwaters.So now, you create a human emergency by giving people no way out, and forcing them to a "shelter of last resort" - an invention entirely your own.A relief agency comes along (the Red Cross) and asks for permission to go in there, BEFORE the storm (before security has degraded!) and stock the place with food, water and sanitary supplies. You refuse.Now remember Dan - this is an emergency that you created - not one that God created. YOU did, by your refusal to follow your own written plan to deal with this potential catastrophe.Then you compound it by refusing to allow aid in there, under the rubric that "it will attact more people to what are supposed to be refuges of last resort."And by the way, the Red Cross did ask, repeatedly, to be allowed in - both before and after Katrina. They have repeatedly been refused.IF the city had implemented their evacuation plan and removed all the people from the city who would leave but could not, as they committed to in that plan, THEN your position would be defensible.However, it is not - they created this mess, and then refused help in preventing people from being harmed as a consequence of their malfeasance.Blanco and the Mayor should be brought up on manslaughter charges.

First off, there is no "monday morning quarterbacking." The mayor refused to order evacuations in a timely manner, and only when Bush called him twice did he finally do so - after having wasted the time he had to do so in an orderly fashion.Second, he was involved in writing the plan! If he couldn't implement it, why would he write it? For grins and giggles? Or to assuage people that he could do something - when he had no intention of doing so? As for who drives the buses, well, if you call for an evacuation in enough time, you pay the usual people to do it, don't you?Second, "Dittoheads"?Maybe you need to watch some news, and see some actual reports - from actual reporters.Right now you can find this on radioblogger.com, but I'm sure it will be subsumed eventually with later news. Since Major Garrett has promised to get PAPER confirmation, you can bet it will be forthcoming.It took Major Garret all of about an hour to get the truth from the American Red Cross and Lousiana Homeland Security once he put his nose to the story and he got confirmation LIVE on camera. I actually SAW the original interviews he conducted - live - and was flabbergasted.You might want to actually watch some news some time Dan - the truth IS out there on this storm and the various government agency's responses, and its NOT a pretty picture for the leaders of Lousiana - all of whom are, by the way, Democrats.

Again Dan, do you actually watch the news?Major Garrett had an on camera interview where it was admitted that Lousiana Homeland Security refused the Red Cross (and, as it turns out, the Salvation Army) access, both before and after the storm. There was no security issue BEFORE the storm Dan!As for the Mayor, you state that the original plan was written in 2000? No, this problem was first identified more than thirty years ago. The hurricane plan has been continually revised since then, and oh, by the way, one of the Mayor's duties is to go through, understand, and come up to speed on (and revise if necessary!) disaster planning. I suggest that two years is more than enough time from your election to do it.If what you are really saying is that Mayor Nagin is incompetent to be the mayor of New Orleans, then we agree - he is and was.I don't suggest that you don't watch actual news, I STATE that you don't.BTW, if the story is false, how come none of (1) the Red Cross, (2) Lousiana's Homeland Security Department, or (3) any other credible media organization has stood up and said so?I'll suggest one reason - at this point, knowing that a congresional subpoena is damn near certain on the matter, to do so might constitute obstruction of justice!Here's reality for you Dan - the upcoming congressional investigation is damn near CERTAIN to include a well-placed subpoena into the Red Cross, Salvation Army, and the Lousiana Homeland Security department.I bet even after that happens and it shows up in the congressional record, you'll try to claim that its "biased reporting", right?As for the evacuation call there were multiple calls to the Mayor and Governor Blanco by the Federal Government reported by CNN, along with Fox, in the days before the hurricane. Indeed, President Bush made a federal disaster declaration two days prior to landfall, an unprecedented event, precisely to underscore the seriousness of the matter and to permit the federal government to release aid and funds ahead of the storm should the State Government request it.The fact is, Dan, the state and city governments not only refused the assistance from the federal government, they ALSO refused assitance from non-government organizations (the Red Cross, etc) AND they refused to implement their own hurricane evacuation plans - the very ones that THEY authored and THEY said they would use.First, you came here to claim that there was a "security" problem. When you got caught LYING about that - the Red Cross offered to provide supplies BEFORE THE STORM HIT, WHEN THERE WAS NO POTENTIAL SECURITY ISSUE instead of ADMITTING your attempted misdirection and apologizing you went off in a different direction like a rabid dog unable to contain himself after being kicked in the nuts.How long 'ya gonna keep it up Dan? For every straw man you set up, it gets knocked flat by the facts.

Last time Dan:1. You claim that Fox doesn't qualify as news. Nonsense. Fox is one of a multitude of available news sources, and their reporters have been on the ground with this episode as have all the others.2. No, there was NOT a security issue BEFORE the storm Dan. There was indeed a HURRICANE coming, but in point of fact the Red Cross DID ask to be allowed to stage supplies, and was turned down. There was no lack of law and order, nor any risk, until approximately 12 hours before the hurricane hit - that's when winds reached tropical storm force. I was watching the entire storm, including LIVE webcams from the city (power was still on, and while it was raining, there was no flooding, nor any debris flying around, at that time.)3. You at least got part of it right - the Red Cross was directed by the city and state emergency management not to go into New Orleans. Of course the Lousiana National Guard COULD have supplied security for their convoys - if they were ordered to - but they were not. They weren't busy shooting looters either - indeed, the National Guard was conspicuously ABSENT.4. You cite Evans from the Red Cross, who conveniently omits that the Superdome should not have had 10,000 people in it in the first place! IF the Mayor had followed the city's disaster plan, those people would have not been there! Instead he PARKED over 500 city buses and left them to flood and be destroyed, rather than using them to transport 30,000 people (their carrying capacity for A SINGLE RUN) - three times that in the Superdome - to safety.The State Department of Homeland Security DID refuse permission; Evans even says so! Of course it was not safe to be in the city AFTER the State Officials through the National Guard abdicated their security responsibility! This does not excuse the lack of response - it just adds culpability on existing culpability.5. Of course the Mayor was involved in writing the actual evacuation plan. All plans such as this are under constant revision and review. As mayor for more than two years, he clearly sanctioned it - that makes it "his", just as if he wrote every word with his own pen. If a document is out of YOUR office, YOU wrote it - whether it was an aide or even a previous administration, so long as you have adequate time to either adopt or refute it. The Mayor knew good and damn well what the plan called for AND REFUSED TO EXECUTE IT.6. The current plan was NOT written in entirety in 2000. It is an ongoing effort in ANY municipality, and is subject to continual revision. To cite: "Under the direction of the Mayor, the Office of Emergency Preparedness will coordinate activities in accordance with the Comprehensive Emergency Management Plan to assure the coordination of training programs for all planning, support, and response agencies. Departments, authorities, agencies, municipalities, and all private response organizations bear the responsibility of ensuring their personnel are sufficiently trained." And: "The City of New Orleans government will conduct at least one functional or full scale training exercise annually, which will test the response capabilities of all functions of city government, as well as the private organizations, Parish school system and other agencies required to respond to disasters." So - where was the Mayor Dan? ABSENT, that's where! For two years running in executing HIS OWN PUBLISHED PLAN. It is HIS, it came from HIS office. He cannot escape this.7. The plan specifically states that the city WILL make arrangements to evacuate people unable to transport themselves. Specifically: " Special arrangements will be made to evacuate persons unable to transport themselves or who require specific life saving assistance. Additional personnel will be recruited to assist in evacuation procedures as needed." THIS WAS SIMPLY NOT DONE - HERDING PEOPLE INTO THE SUPERDOME IS NOT AN EVACUATION! You cannot claim to have EVACUATED people when they're still in the danger area!8. Bush did indeed issue a declaration of an emergency two days prior to landfall. That happened SATURDAY Dan. That's a fact and no liberal spin changes it. That declaration was unprecedented - and there are reports that he did this only out of frustration after more than 24 hours of fruitless requests to the State to get people the hell out of New Orleans! However, doing so DOES NOT subsume state authority on matters of relief. The State refused those offers - from the Red Cross and from others.The SHIPS and GFDL intensity models forecast this storm to be a Cat 4 or 5 at landfall.I live on the gulf coast (near Destin) and we boarded up Friday when it was clear that at least a Cat 4 was going to hit the coast, quite possibly a Cat 5, and that there was a possibility we would be close enough to require it.I was forecasting serious trouble in this general area (Gulf Coast) on THURSDAY. Emergency preparations should have begun THEN for anyone from New Orleans east to Appalachicola in "standby" mode, with the ability and willingness to go "full on" within 24 hours if necessary.By Saturday early morning it was necessary anywhere from Destin west to just west of New Orleans, and we did exactly that here at my home.I don't know where you live Dan, but we were brushed by this one, and I was posting on a local fishing forum hurricane storm updates along with my own track predictions. Your spin on what happened before and during the storm is just that - spin.That's being polite.Katrina was clearly forecast to be a monster VERY early, and it was known by early Saturday - more than 48 hours out - that it was almost certainly going to impact New Orleans in some fashion.At 11 AM on the 26th (Friday) the GFDL, which had been damn near spot-on with the call for the SW path from Ft. Lauderdale, had bracketed New Orleans for a landfalling CAT 5, along with one other superensemble model.Keesler and the local bases here were prepped up and ready to rock and roll Friday when they saw where THEIR meterologists thought this beast was going. If THEY got the message, how come New Orleans gave the finger to the NHC - and the federal government?By 8:30 PM on the 26th - Friday - every major model - NOGAPS, UKMET, GFDL and GFS had bracketed New Orleans within about 100nm. It was clear by that point that absent an act of God New Orleans was going to get screwed - the only question was "how bad?"At 10:05 PM on the 26th I posted on another forum the following:"Not for them its not. (a landfall in New Orleans)If they get a Cat5 the entire downtown will be under 10-20' of water. They're below sea level, as most of you probably know. If the levees are breached they're screwed. That's probably the worst possible place for a major to landfall out of all the cities on the gulf, simply because of the flooding situation."At 9:00 AM on the 27th (Saturday) my personal landfall prediction was on the MS coast - from the eastern to western edge. At this point some impact on NO was damn near certain, and what happened was looking increasingly likely.At 11:00 AM on the 27th (Saturday), the NHC officially targeted New Orleans.Escambia EOC went active at 1200 Saturday the 27th. Still no Evac from the Mayor of NO.At just after midnight on the 28th (that was Sunday VERY early in the morning) she was clocking 145 mph winds sustained, with gusts to 175.Just as predicted.New Orleans had plenty of warning. The state and local officials simply did not execute their plan as written - at all - and they ignored every reputable weather source for nearly [b]forty-eight hours.[/b]That was 48 hours they did not have.It will be interesting to watch the subpoenas start to fly on this one.....