Would you like to see the Bush Derangement Syndrome gone a few steps too far? I give you David Scott Anderson in his own words on a poll showing Bush’s poll numbers down….
…this poll shows that the majority of Americans… It seems a majority that is growing weekly, has woken up. I celebrate that fact, even if belatedly, and even at the cost of thousands of lives lost.
Liberalism at its finest. Killing a few thousand poor people is fine with David and long as Bush’s poll numbers go down.
This man is clearly sick.
Way to twist my words dude. Almost as impressive as you claiming I was stealing money from the Costa Rican Red Cross when the flood hit last year. Know what I find sick? It’s you blaming the victims in new Orleans and gloating about your success, kind of makes me wonder why Jay and Kevin were doing “Paul Aid” the first couple of days to raise money for you. Anyway, thanks for the link Dawg, I sure do appreciate it.
Again, I fail to see what the obsession with Bush poll numbers are for these idiots. BUSH ISN’R RUNNING AGAIN.
Do they think Bush poll numbers will negatively impact the mid-term elections? That is doubtful at best given the nature of the seats up for grabs. Do they think Bush won’t be able to get his SCOTUS picks through? Again, very doubtful.
Or maybe it’s something like they want to see his legacy ruined. Well, since Bush himself noted (to paraphrase) “History is being written by people who don’t like him” these polls don’t mean much (plus Bush will be at his ranch and probably laughing his head off at these fools)
My guess? They’re spiteful pricks.
David who?
Those words weren’t ‘twisted’, those words are twisted, regardless of whether they are in or out of the original post.
The reason a President’s poll numbers matter is because he can only control his party in the legislature if they think there’s a risk to going against him. If Bush is seen as possessing tremendoous personal popularity, then Senators and congressmen will go along with whatever he wants, in hopes of benefitting from his support when they run for re-election. If the President is a liability, congresspeople are more likely to go out on their own, and do what’s necessary to protect their own electability. That’s why people like Hagel are becoming more emboldened, and why Frist split with Bush on stem cells. These guys will be lapdogs, but only if they feel they have to. And if you haven’t seen the splintering, you haven’t been paying attention.
And yes, for liberals there is some satisfaction in seeing the comeuppance of a President who tried to claim a three point victory as a landslide and a mandate, even though it was the smallest margin of victory ever for a sitting President. So yeah, there is some satisfaction in people finally seeing what many of us saw all along.
David, c’mon. grow up. own up. those are your words. defend ’em, but don’t blow smoke up our ass saying they were twisted.
Sadly, it is President Bush’s ineptness has caused the death of thousands. What’s worse is that it can only get worse. The War on Error continues and there appears to be no end in sight.
Bush lacks vision and competency, two vital requirements of any successful leader. It’s odd how many Republicans rail against Affirmative Action but this Administration makes appointments using this very practice. There’s no way Michael Brown should have been appointed to head FEMA lacking the necessary credentials. This alone should result in the President’s impeachment.
You head-in-the sand folks can’t handle the truth and it’s sad that for too long the media was silent. Cindy Sheehan and Katrina revealed Bush’s cowardice and many (approx 52%) don’t approve.
Sadly, it is President Bush’s ineptness has caused the death of thousands. What’s worse is that it can only get worse. The War on Error continues and there appears to be no end in sight.
Bush lacks vision and competency, two vital requirements of any successful leader. It’s odd how many Republicans rail against Affirmative Action but this Administration makes appointments using this very practice. There’s no way Michael Brown should have been appointed to head FEMA lacking the necessary credentials. This alone should result in the President’s impeachment.
You head-in-the sand folks can’t handle the truth and it’s sad that for too long the media was silent. Cindy Sheehan and Katrina revealed Bush’s cowardice and many (approx 52%) don’t approve.
President who tried to claim a three point victory as a landslide and a mandate, even though it was the smallest margin of victory ever for a sitting President
You mean as opposed to claiming a mandate with only a plurality of the vote, as Clinton did?
You mean winning with a majority of the votes, something a Democrat hasn’t done in a long time?
You mean winning with the highest number of votes cast in favor in history?
You mean winning an election that was a referendum on his policies and conduct?
OOOOPS! I guess that does equal a mandate.
But please don’t get offended when I question your patriotism….
I tend to ignore fat, disgusting, ignorant pigs.
I tend to ignore fat ignorant pigs who have an idea of Utopia that includes a banner of things built by Jewish slaves. He’s so pissed about what you said about cotton I figure it’s only fair to call him an anti-Semitic prick.
…The indesputable fact is that FEMA is manned by a bunch of rank amateurs, and even if I was buying that they are not responsible for the failures in the Gulf, which I am not, this is an outrage that Jay and his ilke continue to ignore or at worst pooh pooh… [via David Anderson – September 11, 2005 05:19 PM blogged response]
Indisputable fact? Really? And you started conducting personnel reviews when? How many concrete evaluations have you performed? And everything they have done to date has been amateurish? Starting what date? And at which levels? And using what specific criteria? Have you ever commented on the agency’s “indisputable” amateurism before Katrina? Have you ever participated or managed in a search, rescue, and resurrect project on the scale of a Katrina before? You know squat on facts.
I’m not going to address the BDS symptoms, but your damning of the agency sans reasonable qualification pretty much discredits this critique. You speak out of ignorance despite the “knowledge” (my quotes) storming through the blogosphere and MSM.
David-
He didn’t twist your words, he bolded them for all the world to see.
OK, you’re both being childish. Frankly, all he would have to do is say, “You know, I didn’t express that well,” and you’d be the only one looking like a 3-year old. But you’re in luck! He won’t do that. So you have company.
Is this guy the new Ward Churchill?
ANONYMOUS DRIVEL –
Yes, Bush put political hacks in the top 3 positions at FEMA.
Michael Brown was an estate planning lawyer who spent 11 years being a commissioner of judges and stewards for the International Arabian Horse Association.
The Chief of Staff is a guy named Patrick Rhode. He planned events for President Bush’s campaign. Rhode has no emergency management experience whatsoever. From Rhode’s official bio:
His first position with the Bush Administration was as special assistant to the President and deputy director of National Advance Operations, a position he assumed in January 2001. Previously, Mr. Rhode served as deputy director of National Advance Operations for the George W. Bush Presidential Campaign, in Austin, Texas.
The Deputy Chief of Staff is Scott Morris. He was a press flak for Bush’s presidential campaign. Previously, he worked for the company that produced Bush’s campaign commercials. He also has no emergency management experience. From Morris’s official bio:
Mr. Morris was also the marketing director for the world’s leading provider of e-business applications software in California, and worked for Maverick Media in Austin, Texas as a media strategist for the George W. Bush for President primary campaign and the Bush-Cheney 2000 campaign.
That’s some nice work digging up bios Steve J. However, the usefull information is how FEMA performed pre-Katrina versus how it performed now. Until that’s done, your arguement consists solely of ad hominem attacks on the appointees.
JSCH –
LOL – The top 3 guys are unqualified.
If the guys in charge of FEMA are such idiots, why is it actually performing better than against previous hurricanes? In fact, if these guys were so stupid, why did FEMA perform well during the hurricanes in FL last year?
And why aren’t we hearing about FEMA fuckups in MS? Oh yeah, that’s right. MS has a competant Governor.
Just asking is all. Why let inconvenient things like past performance etc. get in the way of your rantings?
FEMA isn’t the magic genie people. If FEMA was so fucking phenominal why is it so urgent we all contribute to the Red Cross, Salvation Army, etc. Why not just let FEMA handle it all?
FEMA can only work with the situation left to them by the people at the local level. Haley Barbour knows his job, hence FEMA is helping the people of MS in a timely manner. Blanco and Nagin allowed New Orleans to deteriorate into a warzone almost instantly. Hence, FEMA has difficulties.
But hey, anything you can pin on BushhitlerchimpyMcHalliburton, go ahead. Nobody really listens to you anyway (see several polls taken showing that the majority of the adults in this country reject the Kos/MoveOn/DU moonbat echo chamber)
And remember, ChimpyMcBushhitler hates Black people!
Please keep talking. The entire country could flood under 30 feet of water, and if you kept talking, the GOP would still win in a landslide.
We’d rather an adult- even a flawed one- be in charge rather than a hysterical moonbat
RE: Steve J.’s post (September 11, 2005 11:32 PM)
And yet these incompetents managed to organize many dozens of disasters over the past years and the institution operated under yet another level of bureaucracy padded by the very Congress reflexively demonizing it now.
I ask again: what did these “hacks” do that was amateurish? What assigned responsibility can you provide the explicitly proves a dereliction of duty or a deviation from assigned procedures? Quoting a resume or bio is not the sine qua non of qualifications for employment nor of success. There are those who may have terrific technical expertise but who could not manage their way out of a paper bag. Likewise, there are logistics or finance managers who wouldn’t know a hammer from a screwdriver. And there is every color of the spectrum of capabilities in between that makes them entirely proficient at performing their constrained duties.
Did these three managers have a leg up on others due to previous associations? Yes. And obviously this is the first time that has ever happened in government.
It’s also possible that they were both supporters of the President and capable of performing their tasks. Until there is proof of specific failure, I’m not going to criticize their work. Evaluations will occur and I’ll change my perception based on real evaluation and not hysterical partisanship.
LOL – The top 3 guys are unqualified.
So Steve J., are you always this helpfull in proving your opponent’s point?
what did these “hacks” do that was amateurish?
Just one example:
On THR, “Brownie” said he just found out about the people at the Convention Center. Anyone watching TV would’ve known on Tuesday.
“On the September 1 edition of CNN’s Paula Zahn Now, Brown claimed, “Every person in that convention center, we just learned about that today [Thursday, September 1].” “
What assigned responsibility can you provide the explicitly proves a dereliction of duty
Read and learn:
In the event of a terrorist attack, natural disaster or other large-scale emergency, the Department of Homeland Security will assume primary responsibility on March 1st for ensuring that emergency response professionals are prepared for any situation. This will entail providing a coordinated, comprehensive federal response to any large-scale crisis and mounting a swift and effective recovery effort.
http://www.dhs.gov/dhspublic/theme_home2.jsp
Why would Michael Brown be watching TV during a national disaster?
If you want to criticize him in that area, a better way would be to say that he should have had a team monitoring the networks and cable channels and reporting pertinent info back to him.
Paul, I’m gonna violate one of the unspoken rules we have around here, and publicly disagree with you. It’s only fair; you did the same with Kevin and I over the Vegas trips.
“Never ascribe to malice that which can be adequately explained by stupidity.”
I’ll save the “crazy” or “sick” labels for those who truly earn it. David simply doesn’t know enough to spout anything credible.
And doesn’t want to learn — it would interfere with his prejudices.
J.
RE: Steve J.’s posts (September 12, 2005 12:48 AM/September 12, 2005 12:50 AM)
Um, “read and learn” some previous comments on this very topic:
FEMA Idiot Relieved of Duties (Thank God)
This was hashed on that previous post (and probably others), but if you’d like to cover the same material, I’d be glad to elaborate. I left some quibbles alone but have no reservations of continuing the thoughts.
I’ll ask again: What assigned responsibility can you provide that explicitly proves a dereliction of duty or a deviation from assigned procedures? You presented the agency’s aim and they have responded. The logistical operations are not done by magic and they are restrained by rules. Where did the national FEMA under their own unique failures and not those initiated or exacerbated by agencies beyond their direct control and authority fail? Understand this doesn’t mean some nebulous overarching hypothetical of “we’ll defend the public no matter the limitation” (my synopsis of institutional gobbledygook). This means real, by the book, definition of responsibility and a specific person who did not perform that mandated-by-law task.
Let me present an example. When a given political division has an evacuation plan and it defines what resources to be used and when those resources are to be used in an evacuation, who has the responsibility of ordering the personnel to use those resources in a timely manner according to documented and reviewed procedure? Who is responsible for contacting the drivers of said resources? Who is responsible for keeping those resources secured and in operational order? Who is responsible for a particular resource to be in a particular rescue domain and where are they supposed to report after said domain has been evacuated? Who is responsible for the security of the personnel once their assigned evac routes have completed? Remember that a manager many levels up cannot react in a nanosecond to every event. A specific failure must occur, it must be observed to be a failure and reported to someone with proper access to corrective channels. The manager then must assess the whole of the event in view of exacerbating and unexpected failures and move the required corrective material/personnel into what is likely a worse situation. Such a response takes time despite our wishes that it didn’t. Such is the ordeal we are observing from afar with zero appreciation for its difficulty. Even experts can look “amateurish” in the face of such challenges.
This is the minutia where responsibility can be evaluated. The chain of command is very defined. Now imagine all of the events of a multistate operation. These need to be assimilated. This is how responsibility or the absence of it should be analyzed. Painstaking, time-consuming, tedious. And altogether necessary given our wont to use a noose on particular individuals. Such behavior is irresponsible and to continue with it exposes the rash partisanship of its standard bearers.
There has been a perceived “failure” perpetuated by the MSM and some in the blogosphere. To that end, some barriers to respond will be lowered because of the public pressure to do so but not because the individuals originally assigned to carry out mission directives necessarily failed. They just didn’t have the benefit of hindsight or the “obvious” endorsement by all of these armchair quarterbacks to disregard the written procedures. Politicians will certainly rush into action in view of new information and to deflect their own responsibility. They have that luxury. We’ll see the longterm wisdom of such a precedent should someone in the future deviate from the manuals and it cost lives rather than save them. At that point and after the fact, everyone will bring out their knives and carve them up too. Lather, rinse, repeat. Meanwhile, government at all levels will play the blame game and constituents will pile on without looking in the mirror at their own culpability. Worse, we’ll all act like we’re experts and pass blame without knowing a damn thing.
Step 1:
Sunday, August 28th
State of Louisiana Emergency Disaster Aid Request:
http://gov.louisiana.gov/Disaster%20Relief%20Request.pdf
“I have determined that this incident will be of such severity and magnitude that effective responses will be beyond the capabilities of the State and the affected local governments..”
Step 2:
Proactive Federal Response to Catastrophic Events
DHS MASTER PLAN http://www.dhs.gov/interweb/assetlibrary/NRP_FullText.pdf
The NRP establishes policies, procedures, and
mechanisms for proactive Federal response to
catastrophic events. A catastrophic event is any natural or manmade incident, including terrorism, that results in extraordinary levels of mass casualties, damage, or disruption severely affecting the population, infrastructure, environment, economy, national morale, and/or government functions. A catastrophic event could result in sustained national impacts over a prolonged period of time; almost immediately exceeds resources normally available to State, local, tribal, and private-sector authorities in the impacted area; and significantly interrupts governmental operations and emergency services to such an extent that national security could be threatened. All catastrophic events are Incidents of National Significance.
People keep saying “FEMA did great on past disasters.” Oh how how short the American memory is.
What was the response of FEMA back during the election year? It gave millions to republican-heavy counties in Florida that had NO DAMAGE and was deficient in the counties that actually got hit. How? Why? Who got caught? You can read about it here: http://www.yuricareport.com/Disaster/FEMAunderBushTrailOfCorruption.html
What is more a shame is that when the new bankrupcy act was passed by congress (written mostly by credit card companies) a few congress leaders who aren’t business whores tried to add a rider that would excempt those affected by a natural disaster from the newer rules (for example: you lose your house now – in the past you could keep it)
But the neocons resisted – they rejected the amendment. Now all the working people who have some property and have to file bankrupcy will lose it all. Their house, car, retirement fund, … gone … and they can thank the republican congress for insisting that large scale disasters are no excuse for filing for bankrupcy.
Steve J.,
I followed your link (http://gov.louisiana.gov/Disaster%20Relief%20Request.pdf) and she’s pretty specific about what she’s requesting. I don’t see anywhere where she asks for anything besides support for after the evacuation (counseling, unemployment, etc.) and money for generators and Louisiana State Police costs, etc. I think she meant response in general terms wihout implying that she couldn’t handle the evacuation.
Based upon the LA Democratic Senator(Mary Lambreau, something) on yesterday’s Sunday broadcast on FOX News, and Nancy Pelosi’s after-the-fact outrage and blustering refusal to “allow” Democrats to participate in any investigation of the Katrina damage events, I am even more certain that liberals are suffering emotional and mental disorders. I mean that with all sincerity, since none of them can ever organize effectively to deliver representation from elected office (Byrd and Kennedy seem to deliver the pork to theirs, by comparison, as do the two Democratic Senators from CA) and they cannot even respond lucidly to straightforward questions.
Lambeau trailed all over the universe yesterday rather than answer very easy and direct questions (“why weren’t the school buses in N.O. used to bus the people out of N.O.”) (Lambeau actually said that “the buses were flooded” — while that happened AFTER the levees broke, as everyone else is aware except for the Senator), and, worse, that was the most sense that she made about anything, wandering all over issues here, there, anything possible other than what she was asked and yet never even making any point otherwise.
I don’t read the blogger in question here. Based upon the abstracts I’ve read here, it’s more than enough to know to devote available reading time elsewhere.
bullwinkle…the object to which you refer wasn’t built by “slaves” — based upon current archaeological record, was constructed by theuse of salaried workers – the “Big Build” of several generations but still paid workers and fed (fed well, it looks like, what with fish beds and large scale kitchens adjacent to the building) and housed mostly on sight. But I agree with everything else you write about the other issues here.
The funny part about the psychotic desire of liberals to blame Bush is the long-overdue admission from Louisiana governor Kathleen Blanco that she did NOT ask for troops in her 1st phone call to Bush, which is why they weren’t sent in right away… after all, they don’t have the authority that National Guard troops do against looters and such, so why would Bush order them sent in unasked for? Choke on THAT, liberals!!
Reading everything that has been said here, I have a simple question. Are YOU ready to cope with a disaster if it hits in YOUR area? Whether it is a blizzard, flood, tornado, earthquake, etc. Are YOU going to rely on the Gov. to bail your behind out after the fact? Or are you going to be one of the sensible people who do something to save your own behind? Most of whom you do not see being reported about, who took some sensible action BEFORE the disaster struck?
I am sitting here watching Ophelia about to strike my home. I am prepared to survive. We have all had ample time already to be prepared, even the most poverty stricken. Who you gonna blame if a similar disaster to Katrina happens here in the Carolina’s.
Are YOU going to rely on the Gov. to bail your behind out after the fact?
There are actually fairly simple clues to whether someone is willing to depend on government when they find themselves in extremis.
One of the starkest — and most likely, I’m sure, to attract opporobrium from the kind of lefties we usually get around here — is, “Does he or she know how to use a gun safely and effectively?”
McGehee, blunt but true. Unfortunately.
So, hypothetically speaking, if President Bush personally lined up thousands of Americans against a wall and mowed them down, would it be considered good or bad by BDS folk? It comes down to which axiom is greater:
1) Anything that chimpyBushMcHilter does is bad
2) Anything that hurts chimpyBushMcHilter is good
Gotta love that relative moralism of the left!
mcg said:
OK, you’re both being childish. Frankly, all he would have to do is say, “You know, I didn’t express that well,” and you’d be the only one looking like a 3-year old. But you’re in luck! He won’t do that. So you have company.
The only way to have expressed those concepts well would be to say, “I celebrate that fact, even if belatedly, but unfortunately it cost of thousands of lives lost.” To say, “even at the cost of thousands of lives lost,” puts David one step away from the Timothy McVeigh logic of “if I kill a thousand people, then they will wake up.”
While David’s words do not necessarily indicate that he supports the death of innocents to score a political point, it sure makes it seem like it.