Katrina Report Spreads Blame

[cal04]

Hurricane Katrina exposed the U.S. government's failure to learn the lessons of the Sept. 11, 2001, terrorist attacks, as leaders from President Bush down disregarded ample warnings of the threat to New Orleans and did not execute emergency plans or share information that would have saved lives, according to a blistering report by House investigators. A draft of the report, to be released publicly Wednesday, includes 90 findings of failures at all levels of government, according to a senior investigation staffer who requested anonymity because the document is not final. Titled "A Failure of Initiative," it is one of three separate reviews by the House, Senate and White House that will in coming weeks dissect the response to the nation's costliest natural disaster.

The 600-plus-page report lays primary fault with the passive reaction and misjudgments of top Bush aides, singling out Homeland Security Secretary Michael Chertoff, the Homeland Security Operations Center and the White House Homeland Security Council, according to a 60-page summary of the document obtained by The Washington Post. Regarding Bush, the report found that "earlier presidential involvement could have speeded the response" because he alone could have cut through all bureaucratic resistance.

The report, produced by an 11-member House select committee of Republicans chaired by Rep. Thomas M. Davis III (R-Va.), proposes few specific changes. But it is an unusual compendium of criticism by the House GOP, which generally has not been aggressive in its oversight of the administration. The report portrays Chertoff, who took the helm of the department six months before the storm, as detached from events. It contends he switched on the government's emergency response systems "late, ineffectively or not at all," delaying the flow of federal troops and materiel by as much as three days.

The White House did not fully engage the president or "substantiate, analyze and act on the information at its disposal," failing to confirm the collapse of New Orleans' levee system on Aug. 29, the day of Katrina's landfall, which led to catastrophic flooding of the city of 550,000 people. On the ground, Federal Emergency Management Agency director Michael D. Brown, who has since resigned, FEMA field commanders and the U.S. military's commanding general set up rival chains of command. The Coast Guard, which alone rescued nearly half of 75,000 people stranded in New Orleans, flew nine helicopters and two airplanes over the city that first day, but eyewitness reconnaissance did not reach official Washington before midnight.

more
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2006/02/11/AR2006021101409_pf.html

[DoYouEverWonder]

1. OK, I'm holding my breath waiting

for Chertoff to resign.

Oh that's right, I forgot. Bush will probably give him a medal instead.

[VegasWolf]

4. For bush, a screwup of this magnitude deserves a Medal of Freedom!

[babylonsister]

2. Sounds like they're letting dimson off the hook a bit, which

sucks, but I look forward to the compendium of criticism!

[rodeodance]

9. "It was a failure of leadership,"--this means at the top! (to me at least)

"If 9/11 was a failure of imagination then Katrina was a failure of initiative. It was a failure of leadership," the report's preface states. "In this instance, blinding lack of situational awareness and disjointed decision making needlessly compounded and prolonged Katrina's horror."

[babylonsister]

11. But this troubles me; sounds like he's getting a pass:

From the article:

"The White House did not fully engage the president or "substantiate, analyze and act on the information at its disposal," failing to confirm the collapse of New Orleans' levee system on Aug. 29, the day of Katrina's landfall, which led to catastrophic flooding of the city of 550,000 people."

[rodeodance]

13. yes, your are right--as the poster ealier said-'dimson' gets a pass!

[rodeodance]

14. not good is it!

[CTyankee]

49. They were afraid to "engage" the prez!

They knew he'd blast their butts if they so much as whimpered. It was the Imperial Chimp that did that!

[proud2BlibKansan]

24. Oh I don't think so at all

[Wash. state Desk Jet]

3. The Big Picture

If you have ever talked to people in areas where nuclear power plants are,and heard their fears and expressed nightmares about the government leaving them to be contaminated by waste, and all the accidents or inncidents ,you would than look further into what is happening. We and this country do indeed have serious issues to confront.And we are in serious need of a president that can lead.

[ogradda]

5. This administration ignoring warnings?

I just can't believe that.:eyes:

[rodeodance]

6. Is this a dream?---They really smacked Chertoff--WHOW

......The 600-plus-page report lays primary fault with the passive reaction and misjudgments of top Bush aides, singling out Homeland Security Secretary Michael Chertoff, the Homeland Security Operations Center and the White House Homeland Security Council, according to a 60-page summary of the document obtained by The Washington Post. Regarding Bush, the report found that "earlier presidential involvement could have speeded the response" because he alone could have cut through all bureaucratic resistance.

[Little Star]

43. I thought the report took a pretty

good swing at bush when they said he alone could have cut through all bureaucratic resistance. Am I reading that wrong? I know that nothing will come of this report but it is good to keep people focused on NOLA and the complete failure of this administration.

[rodeodance]

7. "report lays primary fault with the passive reaction and misjudgments:

of top Bush aides!!!!!--too good to be true.

[rodeodance]

8. nominated

[rodeodance]

10. "Bush had full confidence in his homeland security team,"--Bush would

do well to fire the whole crew! but he defends them!!




.....White House spokesman Trent Duffy said Bush had full confidence in his homeland security team, both appointed and career. "The president was involved from beginning to end," implementing emergency powers before the storm and taking responsibility afterward, Duffy said.

Duffy objected to a leaked draft of an unpublished report, and said the White House is completing its own study. "The president is less interested in yesterday, and more interested with today and tomorrow," he said, "so that we can be better prepared for next time."

[rodeodance]

12. "The president is less interested in yesterday"--looks like WH just will

ignore the past (mistakes).

Duffy objected to a leaked draft of an unpublished report, and said the White House is completing its own study. "The president is less interested in yesterday, and more interested with today and tomorrow," he said, "so that we can be better prepared for next time."

[flyarm]

15. the buck stops at the top..everyone else is only as effective as the boss!

[rodeodance]

16. lets hope that the Dem response says that loud-over and over!

[rodeodance]

17. Thisis the hearing that most Dems boycotted- I remember now.

....The report puts the government response in a larger context and offers a few new details. In months of hearings, House and Senate investigative committees have already revealed the lack of White House awareness of events on the ground, political infighting between federal and state leaders, delays in ordering evacuations and the meltdown of FEMA operations.

The review, launched Sept. 15, suggests that federal funding be used to update state evacuation studies. It proposes making commercial airliners available in an emergency and creating a database to provide a national clearinghouse of shelter data. It also suggests naming a professional disaster adviser to the president, akin to the military's chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff.

[rodeodance]

18. Dems: holds "no administration officials accountable".

Democrats, whose leaders considered the investigation a partisan whitewash and boycotted it, called for Chertoff's removal. Reps. Charlie Melancon (D-La.) and William J. Jefferson (D-La.),who informally participated in the inquiry, renewed calls for an independent commission styled after the one that investigated the Sept. 11 attacks, saying that the investigation, while comprehensive, was rushed, failed to compel the White House to turn over documents and held no administration officials accountable.

[rodeodance]

19. "All the little pigs built houses of straw,"

DAH

.....House investigators acknowledge that after reviewing nine hearings, scores of interviews and 500,000 pages of documents, they "will never know" what would have happened had federal, Louisiana and New Orleans officials activated plans and called on the military before the storm, and evacuated the city sooner than Aug. 28. However, the committee found U.S. disaster preparedness -- individual, corporate, philanthropic and governmental -- remains dangerously inadequate.

"All the little pigs built houses of straw," it wrote. "Katrina was a national failure, an abdication of the most solemn obligation to provide for the common welfare."

The report reconstructs a chronology of events over a three-week span from Aug. 22 to Sept. 12. It focuses primarily on failures by Chertoff and the rest of the administration to execute a year-old National Response Plan and set up a related command structure, designed to marshal resources in the critical first 72 hours after a catastrophe.

[nolabels]

26. No bucks left, Chimpy and company traded em in for I.O.U.'s

http://www.angelfire.com/moon/frank0/flyers/

[sabra]

20. reco'd

:kick:

[bvar22]

21. *

[Up2Late]

22. "The White House did not fully engage the president???" REALLY?!?

Ya Think!?!?:sarcasm: :banghead: :mad:

They make it sound like someone forgot to flip a switch to turn on "The President" :rant:

You know what I think happened, someone forgot to tell "the President" that when a U.S. city is about to be DESTROYED by a the Largest, most powerful Hurricane to EVER to hit the U.S. Gulf Coast, that he's going to have to cut his 33 DAY VACATION short!!!

In fact, I think ALL of "the Presidents" should have cut their vacations short! Remember? Condi was shopping for Shoes, V.P. Dick was AWOL in Wyoming or Texas, shopping for real estate, and KKKarl was having a Boil on is butt lanced or something! :rant:

[ninkasi]

45. Exactly

Why should anybody have had to "engage" the president? Can you imagine Clinton being so oblivious to the potential disaster that his aides would have had to alert him to the consequences? I imagine he would have been far more engaged and would have taken charge without anybody having to tell him to do so.

They all treat Bush like what he is...a spoiled little brat, who doesn't want to be bothered with anything to do with people who are not the "have mores"...his base.

[proud2BlibKansan]

23. Wow that really slams the feds

You have to read all the way to the end (and it is long) to find any mention of state and local authorities. And that is a vindication, IMO, since so many RW bloggers have excused dubya and laid all the blame on Nagin and Blanco.

And when you consider this investigation was by REPUBLICANS, it looks even worse.

Now if this was enough to impeach el pretzeldente, I'd be really happy.

[rodeodance]

25. but Jr is left out of this article--Chertoff gets slamned.

[Judi Lynn]

27. US federal gov't disregarded Katrina threat-Post

US federal gov't disregarded Katrina threat-Post
Sat Feb 11, 2006 11:13 PM ET

WASHINGTON (Reuters) - A congressional report will show the U.S. government from President Bush down disregarded the threat of Hurricane Katrina and failed to take live-saving countermeasures, the Washington Post reported on Sunday.

The report includes 90 findings of failures at all levels of government but proposes few specific changes, the Post said, citing a summary of the report and an interview with a senior investigator.
(snip)

It portrays Chertoff as detached from events and says he switched on the government's emergency response systems "late, ineffectively or not at all" and delayed the flow of federal troops and supplies by as much as three days.

The U.S. military, Federal Emergency Management Agency director and FEMA field commanders set up rival chains of command, the Post said.

Bush could have but did not speed the response because he alone had the power to cut through bureaucratic resistance, the Post said.
(snip/...)

http://today.reuters.com/news/newsArticle.aspx?type=politicsNews&storyID=2006-02-12T041314Z_01_N11166222_RTRUKOC_0_US-HURRICANE-CONGRESS.xml

[rodeodance]

28. Wash Post article on this report is here:

http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=show_mesg&forum=102&topic_id=2101972&mesg_id=2102210

[PhilipShore]

29. Is that not an impeachable crime and/or crime in general?

I am not a lawyer, but if Bush administration -- had a duty -- to provide services to the public, and the public relied on them to provide those services, and they knowingly knew or they should have known that they had a responsibility -- and failed to perform it, is that not fraud on the people of America or constructive fraud?

[rodeodance]

37. "from President Bush down disregarded the threat"--good, this Reuters

article included Bush in the blame.



WASHINGTON (Reuters) - A congressional report will show the U.S. government from President Bush down disregarded the threat of Hurricane Katrina and failed to take live-saving countermeasures, the Washington Post reported on Sunday.

[Drum]

30. WaPo: Katrina Report Spreads Blame From Top Down

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2006/02/11/AR2006021101409.html

Katrina Report Spreads Blame
Homeland Security, Chertoff Singled Out

By Spencer S. Hsu
Washington Post Staff Writer
Sunday, February 12, 2006; Page A01


Hurricane Katrina exposed the U.S. government's failure to learn the lessons of the Sept. 11, 2001, terrorist attacks, as leaders from President Bush down disregarded ample warnings of the threat to New Orleans and did not execute emergency plans or share information that would have saved lives, according to a blistering report by House investigators.

snip

"If 9/11 was a failure of imagination then Katrina was a failure of initiative. It was a failure of leadership," the report's preface states. "In this instance, blinding lack of situational awareness and disjointed decision making needlessly compounded and prolonged Katrina's horror."

snip

The report puts the government response in a larger context and offers a few new details. In months of hearings, House and Senate investigative committees have already revealed the lack of White House awareness of events on the ground, political infighting between federal and state leaders, delays in ordering evacuations and the meltdown of FEMA operations.

[gratuitous]

31. Uh oh, blame goes right to the very top?

When do we start impeachment proceedings against Ted Kennedy, then?

Oh come on, you just KNOW the popular media will find a way to translate "the U.S. government's failure" into "Democrats." You know that, don't you?

[rodeodance]

32. here the top is only Chertoff--The WH not included in the blame.

[lovuian]

33. Homeland Security is a dismal failure!!!

Katrina showed us that!!!

[snot]

34. Proof's in pudding: the f----ups continue

Just spent evening with a couple from New Orleans who have been there through most of it. They are Republican, but they see the Feds as mainly to blame, and the nightmare totally continues. FEMA etc. remain every bit as disfunctional (best interpretation) as during the first days of the disaster. Nothing has been learned from "mistakes". I got the impression that the vultures are just waiting, withholding relief, until many segments give up.

[garthranzz]

35. Either Way...Bush Bears Responsibility

1. When he was told, he did nothing, exacerbating the problem and, in a sense, actually creating it. Had the levees been fixed (temporarily) within the first few hours, most of the central city (not the east) would have been spared.

2. If no one told shrub, why not? Did his staff, learning from experience, not trust him with the information? Or were they, based on past encounters, afraid to present him with the truth? Whatever the reason, the critical question must remain, if no one told shrub, why not? For if "employees" are unwilling or unable to inform their superior of problems, it must be because of the atmosphere the superior creates. And ignorance is no excuse. The responsibility remains his.

3. Why wasn't shrub interested anyway? Why didn't he ask what's going on and make sure everything was under control? Everyone knew that a major hurricane might devastate New Orleans. And all the sources (National Weather, etc.) warned that Katrina might be it. Any reasonable person would want updates on the event, even if it was assumed or reported, wrongly, that the city had 'dodged the big one.' The local news reported the breach of the levee. A reasonable, responsible leader would have said, Monday morning, after the storm had passed New Orleans, "OK, sounds like the city escaped this time. Keep me updated about the storm, where it is, what it's done, any after effects from its passing."

4. Ultimately, he's supposedly in charge. Anything that happens, "the buck stops here." And that means more than saying "I take responsibility," "owning it" as they say in athletics and then forgetting it. That means taking action immediately, action that both corrects and compensates. One has to be accountable to be responsible.

[lsulib]

38. Everyone State, Local, and Feds messed up

really. I pretty tired of the blame game in this honestly. Find out what went wrong and correct the problem.

[garthranzz]

40. Degrees

Until we learn who messed up, how they messed up, and what percentage of the mess up their negligence (deliberate or inadvertent) caused, we can't fix the problem. And living in New Orleans, experiencing the evacuation and having friends who stayed, it becomes clear that those with the most resources - and the most responsibility - messed up the most.

"blame game" has been a Bush code word for shifting or avoiding responsibility.

There's a website devoted to Katrina, put together by a DUer. Check it out.

[sweetladybug]

47. Isulib, It appears to me that the local and state officials were BEGGING

for help and it fell on deaf ears (THE FEDERAL GOVERNMENT) I really don't see how Bush and members of his crime family (or anyone that voted for Bush)can live with them self. But I guess if you have no conscience, it won't bother you. And these people are SUPPOSE to be compassionate conservative and religious (WHAT PHONIES)

[garthranzz]

51. What gets overlooked

is that the evacuation plan, coordinated between the state and city, worked. Even using the Superdome as a refuge for those who could not or would not leave worked. What did not work were the levees - thanks to ShrubCo's budget slashing. What did not work was the Federal response, which was delayed. Had ShrubCo not dithered - had the response been the same as when FL got slammed the year before - even the breached levee would have been fixed, even temporarily, fast enough to spare most of the city.

[rodeodance]

36. k and r.

[pitohui]

39. if everyone is to blame no one is to blame

another whitewash

[rodeodance]

42. yes, that is true--too much difussion is dangerous.

[stepnw1f]

41. The Busck Stops at Bush

Enough said.

I'm frickin sick of this sick frat fuck destroying my country and having so many whitewash the severity of his destruction by passing around the blame.

[Kablooie]

44. Bush pushed up Chertoff's place in presidential succession recently.

[Coastie for Truth]

46. COASTIE checks in - Chertoff screwed up and people died

<>
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First, Mikie, read here and then read here Mikie, , third Mikie, read your own mandatory training,

You dudes screwed up - and people died.

You didn't follow your own Incident Command System/National Incident Management System -- but you are forcing the Boy Scouts and Girl Scouts and Campfire Kids, and Civil Air Patrol, and Coast Guard Auxiliary, and Red Cross and Salvation Army to study, learn, and follow your -- and you are forcing not just cops and fire fighters and rescue medics - but geriatric center social workers and librarians and meter maids to study and learn and follow

Clean up your own act - I live between the San Andreas and Hayward Faults, between the Guadalupe River and Coyote Creek in the Alviso Spillway Flood Plain -- I pay my Condo owner's Insurance and my Flood Insurance and my Earthquake Insurance -- and I don't trust you or Chertoff.

BTW - I am a United States Coast Guard veteran (HazMat Officer in New Orleans), a Red Cross Volunteer, a FEMA-Community Emergency Response team member, and a Radio Amateur Civil Emergency HAM Radio Operator, and an Eagle Scout - and I have taken at least four times. And at this point I am arrogant enough to honestly say that I could do Chertoff's job better then Chertoff, and Brownie's job better then Brownie (but no way could I do Russ Honore's job or Thad Allen's job).

"Coastie"

Lieutenant, United States Coast Guard (Honorable Discharge)
Red Cross Disaster Assistance team Captain/Shelter Manager
Community Emergency Response Team Captain
Radio Amateur Civil Emergency Service - Extra Class Operator
Eagle Scout, Boy Scouts of America

[Up2Late]

48. Did you read any of the Ham Radio web sites back in September?

I was checking them, when I kept hearing the locals say they couldn't communicate.

I was wondering where the Hams were, and when I went to the most popular sites, they had notices posted to stay out of the area. I think it said that the Feds had told the Hams to keep out for a few weeks.

Did you hear about that?

[Coastie for Truth]

50. Yes.

The first Hams into NOLA were:

1. Members of the Coast Guard Air Station Corpus Christi (TX) Amateur Radio Club - a MARS affiliate. They were flown into CGAS New Orleans (Belle Chase, LA) and staged from there.

2. Those HAMs personally nominated by their local Office of Emergency Services to FEMA and subsequently invited in by FEMA based on having completed a FEMA National Agency Check and Police Record Check and Fingerprint Check prior to the 2004 Hurricane Season.

But that was it - ARES/RACES from the south east were told to stay home. I followed in on www.arrl.org

[rodeodance]

52. Damning report says Katrina response a 'national failure'

http://news.yahoo.com/s/afp/20060214/wl_afp/uspoliticshurricane_060214003339;_ylt=Aswb7wkWWgFTnqmJLG8NVDes0NUE;_ylu=X3oDMTA3b3JuZGZhBHNlYwM3MjE-


1 hour, 29 minutes ago

WASHINGTON (AFP) - The US administration led a "national failure" in its response to Hurricane Katrina, while millions of dollars was lost to fraud after the disaster, Congress said in an upcoming report.

Emergency planners failed to act on warnings before Katrina laid waste to New Orleans and the surrounding region last August. They then failed to give speedy help, said House of Representative lawmakers in excerpts of a damning report to be released in full on Wednesday.

President George W. Bush's administration also faced scathing criticism from a Congress watchdog which said millions of dollars in Katrina aid was given to people who provided false identities and addresses.

"In many respects, our report is a litany of mistakes, misjudgments, lapses and absurdities all cascading together, blinding us to what was coming and hobbling any collective effort to respond," said the lawmakers......