GRRRR. Now the AP has video of Blanco saying she thinks the levees are still intact. Of course that headline is as meaningless as yesterday’s nonsense about Bush being “warned” about Katrina.
The eye of the storm crossed New Orleans about 10:00AM Monday. Just 2 hours later -while the back side of the storm was still raging and would be for hours- Blanco tells Washington…
“We keep getting reports in some places that maybe water is coming over the levees.
“We heard a report unconfirmed, I think, we have not breached the levee. I think we have not breached the levee at this time.”
The AP follows up that quote with this nonsense:
In fact, the National Weather Service received a report of a levee breach and issued a flash-flood warning as early as 9:12 a.m. that day, according to the White House’s formal recounting of events the day Katrina struck.
No shit. They got a report at 9:12 that the levee *might* have been topped. Here’s a clue for the AP, that report was going to come into authorities even if the levee was fine… Just like the 50 erronous reports of tornados people would have claimed hit.
First reports are -duh- first reports.
Blanco told Washington she had the report but that it was unconfirmed. So the AP has Blanco “caught on tape” doing her job properly.
Here’s the point, I suspect:
Bush should have known.
Bush should have known that the levees weren’t holding, even if Governor Blanco tells him that they are.
Bush should have known that there were city school buses sitting in parking lots (and ordered them used), even if the Mayor didn’t use them.
Bush should have known that Saddam didn’t have WMD, even if Saddam himself didn’t know if he had them or not.
Bush should have known that there were planes diving into the Pentagon, even if the reporting on what was going on wasn’t clear at the time.
And from “should have known,” it’s only a little leap to “did know,” from which we can then conclude that Bush lied.
About everything.
The media sure is milking this one as slow as possible! A different headline everyday.
Hey Lurking Observer,
Mostly all good points. The left likes to find the president culpable in every questionable or unsuccessful outcome that comes as a result of complex situations for which he cannot be expected to have a measure of control.
You really should have left WMD off the list though. Even if Bush was “mislead” by intelligence, the intelligence he was mislead by was so shoddy as not to warrant the relentless surety with which he sold WMD as a pretext for war. Quote: “He’s got em'”.
Not every criticism of this administration is a partisan distortion by the left or MSM.
Bush Should have …
THe way this is heading…that Bush’s knowledge is supposed to be all knowing…all seeing…almost makes him out to be a God. Is that what the Left really thinks of Bush? That Bush is a Diety? LOL Kinda makes you wonder.
Hmmmm.
1. Looking back on this I’m rather curious as to why the levee boards didn’t take some of that federal money and install digital cameras. The levees always were a potential point of failure and the levee boards were instituted specifically to deal with the levees and that possible situation.
So wouldn’t digital cameras mounted to cover the levees be something that should have been done? Or am I missing something here?
2. Paul I have to disagree in part on your summary of Blanco’s report.
The endless criticisms of Bush is that he didn’t respond immediately to that weather service report of the levees being breached. On this subject Bush gets hammered constantly.
So I really don’t see how you can give Blanco a pass on this.
Rob,
I see. It was “so shoddy” that the Clinton administration believed it; UK, Russia and Jordan also believed it.
Not every criticism of this administration is a partisan distortion by the left or MSM.
Agreed. But the Bush lied about WMD pre-war intelligence meme is certainly a ‘partisan distortion’.
>Looking back on this I’m rather curious as to why the levee boards didn’t take some of that federal money and install digital cameras.
You know, I had forgotten about something until you said that… Sevral years ago the levee board wanted to put in a fiber optic run thru the levees to use as an early warning system.
(BTW- That would be far more effective than digicams.)
As I recall (fuzzy) they were laughed out of town. The cost was astronomical and the perceiced benifit was low.
I might have to dig something up on that…..
———
> On this subject Bush gets hammered constantly.
>So I really don’t see how you can give Blanco a pass on this.
Just because the liberals are iditos doen’t mean I have to be. I can’t hammer them for being disenguinious @$$holes if I do the same thing. lol
(typocity sorry)
Question: What do you expect from the current Superficial Administration in Washington?
Answer: Not Much.
Uh, folks, didn’t President Bush request an evacuation of New Orleans before Katrina hit? If New Orleans had been evacuated as the President requested, then would anyone have been trapped by the flooding that took place there?
Paul,
You’ve been bashing the Army Corps of Engineers pretty hard on the deficient levees. Over at Q&O, in the comments section for the post titled “Bush Warned of Possible Levee Breach?”, there is mention made of an article in Popular Mechanics about the myths of Katrina. One specifically mentions that the pilings that were supposedly too short were in fact the length called for in the specs. Had you seen that?
I agree with Robert, but see the problem with people who think Lurking Observer’s way believe that man is the highest form of intelligent life. Therefore the President should know all these things, even before they happen.
I’m sorry to say those type of people will always be disappointed.
We can argue all day about who said what and what did they mean, but we’re losing sight of the big picture. What did Bush DO while all this was going on? He stayed on vacation and did PR spots in AZ and CA.
Everyone else was pretty useless, so maybe even if Bush tried, it would not have been enough. But we pay him to at least put aside lesser matters and address the biggest natural disaster in American history. Step up to the plate and try to lead the federal govt’s response through this crisis. If he doesn’t do that, how anyone still believes this man is worthy of the nation’s trust is beyond me?
The Federal response was correct and adequate. It’s the local and State response that was piss poor.
Perhaps the only thing left to do is disolve the State of Louisiana and the City of New Orleans and bring them under direct Federal Administration.
Any population idiotic enough to elect a Blanco and Nagin is too stupid for self-government. The list of the failures of the local and state governments is too long to mention here. Had they done there job in the first place the disaster could have been largely mitigated. Perhaps in the future, to placate the lefties and morons, any city under imminent threat ought to be immediately put under Federal control to mitigate against local and state incompetence and concentrate all the blame on the Feds.
Paul should be aware about the issue of the pilings being the specified length. I pointed it out last month.
Bush had all these warnings and still did not cancel the hurricane. He did not give the National Weather Service more time to inspect. He did not go to the UN. He rushed us unnecessarily into hurricane.
Impeach Chimpy for weather-crimes against humanity.
>Paul,
You’ve been bashing the Army Corps of Engineers pretty hard on the deficient levees. Over at Q&O, in the comments section for the post titled “Bush Warned of Possible Levee Breach?”, there is mention made of an article in Popular Mechanics about the myths of Katrina. One specifically mentions that the pilings that were supposedly too short were in fact the length called for in the specs. Had you seen that?
—
Yes I saw it and I blogged it. (seach the archives.)
Unlike what wonderchild Chad thinks, this is BAD news for the corp.
BTW- It was not so much a myth but it was all the info we had at the time. A quick explainer…
The Corps specs said the sheet pilings should be 17 feet. LSU came out with sonar equipment to measure them while still undergound and the sonar said it was only 10 feet. HAD THAT BEEN TRUE, it would have seriously damned the construction company.
BUT… (There’s always a but)
To confirm or deny this, a few weeks later they yanked a “good” section of the floorwall out and they measured the piles. (as I recell the exact figures,) The specs said the piles should be 17.2 feet and the piles were 17.3 feet. (I know it was 1/10 inch longer)
So the construction company built it EXACTLY like the Corps said.
So unlike the wonderchild’s interpertation of this, it damned the Corps of Engineers, not the construction company.
——
It should also be noted that the VERY NEXT DAY after it was confirmed the walls were built per spec, (and failed) the Bush adminstration announced billions of dollars to fix the levees.
The timing was not a conincidence.
>Any population idiotic enough to elect a Blanco and Nagin is too stupid for self-government.
Let’s zoom out a bit. Apparently, any population idiotic enough to elect Bush into the executive is too stupid to demand that the federal government implement and maintain a thorough communications network, nor insist that a safety net be established for catastrophic disasters with foreseeable consequences. Then that population is absurd enough to politicize the event: in the catastorphy’s wake, they’re proving themselves moronic and short-sighted enough to embed themselves in one of two established political camps, despite their proven and obvious irrelevance to events such as natural disasters.
Kaffir: you made me laugh.
Robert: I posted about how the deranged left (not all of the left, just the deranged part) does, in fact, view Bush as god, it kinda makes sense when you think about it (in the absence of traditional religion they need someone to blame, etc.). I won’t whore the link, but feel free to go find it on your own if you want.
Paul: thanks for the rebut on the pilings, I was a little thrown by the PM report and must’ve missed your earlier posts on that aspect.
Sorry, I have nothing to actually add 🙂
Actually Paul, that is not what I said or what the report said. Anyone who care can go to your February 8th post on this ubject and read my comments.
Chad, you are so amazingly stupid it is a wonder you can breathe.
So proud of your comment are you??? Here let me link it and quote it….
———-
The two sets of November tests conducted by the Army Corps and LSU researchers used non-invasive seismic methods. Both studies, it turns out, understated the length of the piles by about seven feet. By December, seven of the actual piles had been pulled from the ground and measured. The Engineering News Record reported on December 16 that they ranged from 23′ 31/8″ to 23′ 77/16″ long, well within the original design specifications, contradicting the early report of short pilings. The suitability of the original design specifications, however, continues to be contested.
———–
Now Chad YOU DUMBASS — you even bolded the part in question. You stupid moron.
The only difference is the way they give the numbers. I said 17 feet below sea level and they said 23 feet. (actual) It’s the same thing.
Everything thing else is EXACTLY what I just said above. LSU’s sonar said they were short but once they were pulled out the ground they were up to spec.
You stupid dumbass. This was the proof the Corps spec were bad. You stupid moron.
(sorry everyone Chad is uniquely stupid and aggressively vocal with his stupidity)
Please Chad, you are clearly not smart enough to speak on the subject…. You just proved provided the proof of my point. Please, spare yourself the embarrassment and my having to call you a dumbass.
Just drop it. You’ve tried REPEATEDLY to prove something (I don’t know what) but every time you just prove you are a dumbass.
So please, save yourself the embarrassment and me the bloodpressure.
Thanks for the answer. I hadn’t seen your post on the pilings before, and that was the first I’d heard of it.
So the AP has Blanco “caught on tape” doing her job properly.
… which appears to be unusual enough to be newsworthy.
.. which appears to be unusual enough to be newsworthy.
Give that man a cigar! That’s the best line I’ve heard today.
[Chad you are not smart enough to post on my threads. You’re done. I won’t ban you becasue that would make Jay Tea miss out on your special kind of stupidity. But please do not commet on my posts, they’ll just be deleted even if you manage to find a third grader to post something intelligent for you. Paul]