"I'm being very patient here."
I appreciate that you think that way, Tom, But I feel the same way you do.
"I have links to AP photos showing National Guardsmen feeding Superdome refugees, on the night of Sunday the 28th. I have linked to the news releases from the "Bataan," which had helicopters out Tuesday night, and rescues going on Wednesday morning."
Look, you can't use some response to cover for the failures here. Nobody is going to claim that nothing was done. Thats, forgive me, a strawman. The point is that not enough was done. The point is that that FEMA, DHS and the Executive were running around acting completely clueless days afterwards. The point is the response, preparation, planning and coordination was piecemeal, inept, inadequate and obviously, even to the most naieve observer, faulty.
Now let me object to something entirely dishonest that you are doing here. You quote me out of conext here:
"4 to 5 days" is a lie. Still. Sorry.
Here is what I said, in fact, from where you quote me
Before you call me a liar. Now to me thats key- you are misrepresenting what I said and calling me a liar at the same time:
Its not like they sat there playing Eskimo Nose Flutes- they got 100,000+ people who had no way to get out of town into the superdome and convention center, and evacuated 300,000+ people out of the city.
Thats a hell of a lot more than what the feds did all the way up[ through 4-5 days after the storm.
No its not a lie. Did the feds move 300,000+ people out of the city? Did the feds get 100,000 people into temporary shelter? No.
Did I claim that there was NO response whatsoever from the feds for 4-5 days?
NO
I said that the local people, the local authorites did more before, during and after the storm than the response mustered up by FEMA for 4-5 days. The same local authorities you paint as complete incompetents while holding up FEMA, whose department head has been fired as some paragon of expediency and efficacy.
Now, if you want, we can broaden that 4-5 days to the NO convention center without any dishonesty. It was 4-5 days from the time of people taking shelter there to the time there was a full federal response to their plight. To say that the city of NO should have been doing that: THERE WAS NO COTY OF NEW ORLEANS LEFT at that point; if you hadn't of noticed, it was a LAKE.
Now, I have just about had it with you trying to play wizned, gristled political vet- disengaged, impartail, trying to bravely portray the truth to 'the left' who you cast as the only partisans here with your 'facts' (which are largely links to blogs that often can be shredded in 5 minutes with basic reason or google). Enough. At the end of the day, no matter how much mud you try to kick up, things are clear: There was a failure at all levels here, and if we don't fix it, we will pay for it again and again and again.
Davin L.