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Member (Idle past 6076 days) Posts: 7405 From: satellite of love Joined: |
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Author | Topic: Help Lizard Breath Save Bush from Hurricane Katrina | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||
Coragyps Member (Idle past 991 days) Posts: 5553 From: Snyder, Texas, USA Joined: |
I'm speechless, Jar. That's outrageous.
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jar Member (Idle past 96 days) Posts: 34140 From: Texas!! Joined: |
I'm furious.
AbE: More info. A more recent but pre-Katrina summary of what was found.
From LSU This indicates that it was not just a report filed away but actually was circulated. Please look over some of the predicted aftermath.
One important result of the exercise was the understanding among agencies at all levels of the seriousness of such an event. “A White House staffer was briefed on the exercise,” said van Heerden. “There is now a far greater awareness in the federal government about the consequences of storm surges.” So there is a direct connection to the White House. This message has been edited by jar, 09-10-2005 01:24 PM Aslan is not a Tame Lion
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jar Member (Idle past 96 days) Posts: 34140 From: Texas!! Joined: |
Please read this year old report from The Louisiana Office of Homeland Security and Emergency Preparedness.
In Case of Emergency Brownie writes: "It's going to be situation-dependent on the ground available after such a catastrophic storm," he said. "The bottom line is that a lot of people are going to be inconvenienced." Inconvenienced my Ass. Aslan is not a Tame Lion |
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jar Member (Idle past 96 days) Posts: 34140 From: Texas!! Joined: |
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Cthulhu Member (Idle past 6108 days) Posts: 273 From: Roe Dyelin Joined: |
Unfortunately for us all, I just heard that Brown has been promoted. Don't have a link for it at the moment, but I'll look for one.
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Silent H Member (Idle past 6076 days) Posts: 7405 From: satellite of love Joined: |
Care to have a wager on the answer? All bets are closed...
Firms tied to the White House (Halliburton yet again) snag contracts to rebuild damage from Katrina. holmes "...what a fool believes he sees, no wise man has the power to reason away.."(D. Bros)
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Peal Member (Idle past 4955 days) Posts: 64 Joined: |
For those of you that are interested, this is the timeline for Hurricane Katrina.
Bush Button News Hannity and Limbaugh were both saying that Louisiana state homeland security officials blocked the Red Crossfrom entering into New Orleans and this prevented them from helping the victims of the hurricane. The link below shows what really happened and why. They spin half truths and people buy it as fact. http://mediamatters.org/items/200509090002 |
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Silent H Member (Idle past 6076 days) Posts: 7405 From: satellite of love Joined: |
Okay, now where have all of you guys gone? Here are the updated list of issues that need to be dealt with:
1) The timelines which have been provided (both by me and Pearl) which show a lot of inaction by Bush during the time of "gathering threat" by Katrina. 2) The facts (by jar and others) that FEMA had good knowledge of what could happen, and was likely happening, and in fact happening... where was Bush's concern in this? 3) The newly revealed facts that key appointees by Bush to FEMA were patently political cronies with little to no expertise in the areas of disaster management. 4) The latest actions by the Bush administration, awarding major contracts to cronies of the White House (already controversial recipients of lucrative grants in Iraq which have had financial discrepencies) to rebuild devastated regions, while issuing an emergency executive order so that those same contracting orgs may UNDERPAY anyone hired to actually do the physical labor of rebuilding. You guys have any problems with this stuff? Or is it mana from heaven as always? holmes "...what a fool believes he sees, no wise man has the power to reason away.."(D. Bros)
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Nuggin Member (Idle past 2749 days) Posts: 2965 From: Los Angeles, CA USA Joined: |
1) The timelines which have been provided (both by me and Pearl) which show a lot of inaction by Bush during the time of "gathering threat" by Katrina. Hey now, the man was on vacation. You can't expect him to just cut short his vacation for every little event. It's only a 5 week vacation, and only his second one of the year. Show a little respect!
2) The facts (by jar and others) that FEMA had good knowledge of what could happen, and was likely happening, and in fact happening... where was Bush's concern in this? You can't expect Bush to react to stuff he doesn't know about. Just because something is "happening" and people have "predicted it" doesn't mean that the president needs to give any weight to that "reality". Frankly, the levees were not big donars to his campaign, in fact, levees don't vote. And, as far as I can tell, none of the levees sits atop an oil field. There's only so much attention one man can give.
3) The newly revealed facts that key appointees by Bush to FEMA were patently political cronies with little to no expertise in the areas of disaster management. If you don't think that an Arabian Horse organization has similiarities to a national emergency response organization, then I would suggest that you haven't spent much time around Arabian horses. Frequently the horses run wild destroying whole cities, causing billions of dollars worth of damages.
4) The latest actions by the Bush administration, awarding major contracts to cronies of the White House (already controversial recipients of lucrative grants in Iraq which have had financial discrepencies) to rebuild devastated regions, while issuing an emergency executive order so that those same contracting orgs may UNDERPAY anyone hired to actually do the physical labor of rebuilding. There's no law that says that the people controlling the government can't take all the money and give it to their friends. The whole point of fixing the election in the first place was to be able to insure that the incredibly rich people in the country get a bigger and bigger slice of the governments tax income. What are you some sort of commie?
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Modulous Member (Idle past 241 days) Posts: 7801 From: Manchester, UK Joined: |
an emergency executive order so that those same contracting orgs may UNDERPAY anyone hired to actually do the physical labor of rebuilding. Well, its not really underpaying these people, it's merely suspending the The Davis-Bacon Act which allows the contractors to pay lower wages, reducing costs and allowing the contractors to employ more workers to get the job done. As Bush said this "will result in greater assistance to these devastated communities and will permit the employment of thousands of additional individuals." Thus, those that have lost their jobs to the disaster have a greater chance of getting employed by the contractors until such time that they can find other employment. Of course this is the classic 'does minimum wage help or hinder things' debate. Both sides have fair points, but its generally all about opinion rather than hard facts. The anti-minimum wagers point out that that it lowers employment rates and drives costs up for everybody...to the point where increased minimum wages means an increase in costs to the consumer, so the cost of living increases, negating the point of having minimum wages. These same people argue that the market should decide what the wages are, and that if an employer is proposing too low a wage, people will work elsewhere - and with the increased amount of employment opportunities they will have that choice.
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Nuggin Member (Idle past 2749 days) Posts: 2965 From: Los Angeles, CA USA Joined: |
These same people argue that the market should decide what the wages are, and that if an employer is proposing too low a wage, people will work elsewhere - and with the increased amount of employment opportunities they will have that choice. We're drifting off topic, so lets start a minimum wage thread but... When Walmart drives out the other businesses and gas costs $3.00 a gallon, there really aren't that many employment opportunities. Not everyone lives in a city where there are many jobs clustered together. There is a definite threshhold which says, if you don't make enough to own and maintain a car, you probably aren't ever going to make enough to own and maintain a car
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crashfrog Member (Idle past 1723 days) Posts: 19762 From: Silver Spring, MD Joined: |
The anti-minimum wagers point out that that it lowers employment rates and drives costs up for everybody...to the point where increased minimum wages means an increase in costs to the consumer, so the cost of living increases, negating the point of having minimum wages. Right, but they've never been able to present any data to that effect, as far as I've seen. On the other hand the other side can point to a significant body of data that suggests that increasing the minimum wage actually drives profits up. Mostly, the anti-wage crowd seems to make the crucial blunder of forgetting that, at most places that pay the min wage, the employee is also generally the consumer - people who work at McDonalds usually eat at McDonalds, or places like them. If you pay a pizza delivery boy more, he usually spends it on pizzas.
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MangyTiger Member (Idle past 6610 days) Posts: 989 From: Leicester, UK Joined: |
To quote Buffy:
Well color me stunned... I wish I didn't know now what I didn't know then
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Silent H Member (Idle past 6076 days) Posts: 7405 From: satellite of love Joined: |
Yeah, I know you are not a Bush defender, but I do think you are allowing theoretical analysis of a larger issue, interfere with a very practica; analysis of an immediate issue.
Whether contractors can get humongous contracts and stretch the work further by underpaying (and that is exacty what we are talking about when discussing less than min wage) employees, such that they can employ more hands, will not in any way shape or form reflect on nor answer the issue of "does minimum wage help or hinder things." It could be that you have not worked in an area of gov't contracting. I have. This is practical and temporary and immediate and about the gov't trying to get something done, the other issue is about macroscale economics and what role the gov't should have in trying to guide it.
suspending the The Davis-Bacon Act which allows the contractors to pay lower wages, reducing costs and allowing the contractors to employ more workers to get the job done. As Bush said this "will result in greater assistance to these devastated communities and will permit the employment of thousands of additional individuals." Thus, those that have lost their jobs to the disaster have a greater chance of getting employed by the contractors until such time that they can find other employment. This is the crux of the argument that must be addressed. And look at this carefully... 1) Allowing contractors to pay lower wages will reduce costs and therefore employ more workers. 2) Allowing for employment of more workers will result in greater assistance, and... 3) employ those within the region who have lost jobs because of the disaster, until they can find other employment. I am sort of taken back if anyone cannot spot the logical flaws within this argument at all three points. And indeed there is a fourth unstated point which is not being addressed. But here we go... 1) Gov't contractors work by fixing overhead to employee salaries. Giving a contractor 1 billion dollars and telling them that they may now pay employees 1 cent an hour instead of 15 dollars, does not in any way guarantee that they will actually buy more employees. They may simply hire the same number at lower cost and take a greater cut of the overhead. And exactly how will anyone know the difference? Are we having them bid on contracts with plan specs and manpower required and how many more they can use and so finish the job sooner if they can pay less? The nature of contracting with the gov't is to extend work as long as possible, at the highest rate (for owners and upper management) as much as possible. The specific orgs who just got the contract have already been shown to be doing that very thing in Iraq. Why would this be different? If the goal was to employ as many people as possible, the actual route would have been to sign an executive order removing overhead charges and capping profit to any contractor awarded a contract, with perhaps additional profit allowed (and must be shared by employees) with work finished in a certain time frame. 2) Allowing more hands to be employed does not mean greater assistance at all. Again, we can go back to what I just said above with overhead. Contractors would love to hire more people who they can take a massive chunk of overhead cost on their salary. The only guarantee of greater assistance is a plan which shows how people will be used in an efficient and coordinated way to get the work done. More people standing around, or simply being on the payroll does nothing. For example if they only have ten trucks, and their work requires trucks, wtf good is an extra 1000 employees? 3) This last point is especially galling to me. If the intention is to help those who have lost homes and employment within that region, paying them less than they could have earned before is the most scandalous piece of price gouging I have ever seen. Yeah, pay Halliburton execs the same, but pay the people who desparately need extra money to get over what has just happened, much much much less. This also raises the question of WHO will now be enticed to doing this dangerous, back breaking, shit work. The only people likely to run out and get paid less than they could at any other job, will be poor, unskilled people unlikely to find other employment. So it will be price-gouging of the most vulnerable. In fact I am finding very little difference between that and slavery. 4) From the last point, comes the next point... getting the job done right. Underpaying a workforce is hardly going to encourage anyone, even those desparate enough to work exhausting labor which they could get paid more for by moving 100 miles in any direction, to work fast nor work well. The infrastructue needs to be rebuilt BETTER than it was previously. Paying a person less is unlikely to get it back to the way it was before, much less better than the way it was before. Please do not allow a business man give you a snake-oil speech, which was exactly what Bush did. Let rich contractors pay EMPLOYEES less, and everything will be BETTER! I am not sure whether gov'ts should be regulating wages or not in the private sector. But I know damn well that this is another issue, and the goal is not to get more done faster. holmes "...what a fool believes he sees, no wise man has the power to reason away.."(D. Bros)
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Monk Member (Idle past 4181 days) Posts: 782 From: Kansas, USA Joined: |
Hi Holmes,
Been away for awhile and haven’t had a chance to respond.
Holmes writes: 1) The timelines which have been provided (both by me and Pearl) which show a lot of inaction by Bush during the time of "gathering threat" by Katrina. 2) The facts (by jar and others) that FEMA had good knowledge of what could happen, and was likely happening, and in fact happening... where was Bush's concern in this? I doubt that Bush was overly concerned about this any more than he would be concerned about earthquakes in California or another major terror attack on US soil. These are all “concerns” that presidents have. There is a large list of potential disasters that could occupy a good measure of the president’s efforts and time. I don’t think it’s reasonable to ask whether Bush should have thought more about New Orleans over what could happen in other specific cities around the country. He is not clairvoyant. He delegates that responsibility (evacuation planning) to state and local officials working in concert with Homeland Security and FEMA. I don’t hold Bush responsible for preventing an act of nature. And I don’t blame Bush for not spending billions in south Louisiana to upgrade the levees or restore the wetlands. I don’t believe any single person is responsible for that. It’s the nature of politics. Without a major vocal champion to fight for the project in Washington, it wasn’t going to happen. I’ve discussed this in the Katrina thread regarding the politics of pushing a multi-billion dollar project in south Louisiana. Message 142 But I do hold Bush responsible for the reaction to the event. Yes, Governor Blanco was indecisive and yes Mayor Nagin made some key mistakes, there is plenty of blame to throw around as I've posted Message 39. They were the first responders from a governmental standpoint and they failed their responsibilities. So then working up the chain of command, FEMA and Mike Brown should have seen the confusion between state and local officials and stepped in. Bush declared a state of emergency before Katrina hit, so at that point FEMA should have been ready to take command. It didn’t happen. I understand about delegating authority. A good leader must have the ability to do that in order to run any organization. That holds true for the leader of the world’s only superpower as much as it does for any business. Once delegated, the leader, (manager), must step aside and allow the subordinates to do their job. That works great as long as everybody up and down the ladder is on top of their game. You can’t micromanage a large organization otherwise you get the Carter administration. But at some point, when it is clearly evident that your subordinates are not getting the job done, and the situation turns critical, then a leader must step up to the plate and take charge. Brown couldn’t do it, so Chertoff should have stepped in. Chertoff couldn’t do it so it was up to the President. In this regard, the buck does stop at the top. When the whole affair looked like a cluster f**k, Bush should have taken control. He didn’t and failed miserably as a result. He looked confused. His support of Brown was ludicrous as was the “reassignment” to Washington. I’m completely disgusted. Don’t they have TV’s on Air Force One? Wasn’t there anyone on that plane that could possibly discern the gravity of the situation by watching the friggin’ TV? And we are not speaking of minutes or hours, we are speaking of DAYS. I can understand minutes or hours. But days!!!? It could have been a defining moment in his presidency, a chance to rise above the mediocre, a chance to show critics they were wrong about him. He could have at least held a news conference and commented on what was going on at the Superdome and the Convention Center. Throw a bottle of water out of Air Force One as you pass over it. Stop eating cake. Something, anything to help. But no, that didn’t happen and it will define his presidency. Clinton will always carry Monica with him. Bush will always carry Katrina. He will be lame for the remainder of the term. It’s remotely possible, I suppose, that he could salvage his legacy. But it would take something big to counteract this debacle.
3) The newly revealed facts that key appointees by Bush to FEMA were patently political cronies with little to no expertise in the areas of disaster management. No doubt about this.
quote: Source Stunning, absolutely stunning. How could such an obvious thing be overlooked? Was there no one at FEMA watching the media? Aren’t there thousands of employees at Homeland Security and FEMA. Couldn’t just one of them have spent a little time in front of the tele to see what the world was watching? And if so, how much trouble would it be for someone to tell Brown during those hours and days? Doesn’t he carry a cell phone? The news is on 24 hours per day for Christ’s sake! How could Brown have not known? C’mon, it simply can’t be possible. But it was. Brown's resignation is a relief. Let me close this post by circling back to President Bush. Here is a Bush quote from 2000 that rings prophetic. It may be the epitaph on his presidency.
quote: Tested and failed.
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