Yes, Marie, sadly we are.
This isn't so different from the Bush White House response regarding the EPA's report on global warming in the 1st term: that W had read the report put out by "The bureauracy"...somehow at once distancing himself from his own administration's report and dissing government and the EPA, a hated republican bureau at the same time...
his administration isn't his until it gets the results it wants and is predisposed to in advance...
Posted by John B. at September 5, 2005 10:40 AMLest we forget: Bush & Co IS the bureacracy. If it has failed, it's their failure.
Posted by Michael at September 5, 2005 10:48 AMBu$h didn't read the report because it didn't have pretty pictures like My Pet Goat! And since his flunkies tremble that he would dismiss them from the halls of power, only to subject them to the Rove-ish Inquisition (think Valerie Plame and Bunnatine Greenhouse), ...
Posted by pessimist at September 5, 2005 10:54 AMMichael: Lest we forget: Bush & Co IS the bureacracy.
That's the reality but not what people believe. They believe that Bu$hCo is the party of small, effective government that doesn't burden the populace with high taxes. The GOP "small government; low taxes" meta-frame is so well established that frames that flow into it are more easily accepted than those that don't.
We saw how easy it was to sell the story that NO was out of control because of looters and shooters. Gangs and Guns. They never said "Black Gangs." They didn't need to because the footage from the city was almost exclusively Black. The whole war on crime started by Nixon is alive and well-- "Black people are violent predators." For all we know the crime in NO this week was created out of whole cloth. And used an excuse not to deliver aid that they couldn't deliver.
Posted by Marie at September 5, 2005 11:20 AMAs the Royal Flood-boy King Bush IV would say, "Hell is on the way." It seems that everything that Bush touches turns to shit. I think that those awful images of the Bush flooding of New Orleans shown on cable television this last week will never be erased by the Bush gang's endless lying and endless spinning. The end is near for this illegitimate Bush regime.
Yours,
James K. Sayre
James -- I hope you're right but Americans have the attention span of a gnat. I fear that these images and those most responsible for not acting will fade all too quickly and "GWB -- that nice guy" image will reassert itself all too quickly.
Posted by Marie at September 5, 2005 12:17 PM"Lest we forget: Bush & Co IS the bureacracy." Ahem, the WHOLE government is that way and it's was designed that way by both parties to slow knee jerk changes. Could things have been done better? Perhaps, but this diaster was on a scale never attempted before by State and Federal agencies. I know none here will believe it, but the lions share of any grief should be aimed at the local (city and state) officials and not the Feds. They are the FIRST resonders and THEN the feds are supposed to ASSISTS them. If the Mayor told people to go to the Superome and Convention center HE should have planned to have water/food there (FEMA doesn't have these resources and NEVER had them). Carp all you want about the budget to fix the levees in June but I doubt that it would have helped in this case. In California we had two levees break about TEN years ago and they just finished fixing them. Use that as a timeline for any work you think might have been done in the past two months.
Posted by Cyber Sarge at September 5, 2005 12:19 PMBureaucratic Failure - update:
Read it and weep:
The earthquake struck at 5:13 AM.
By 7 AM federal troops had reported to the mayor.By 8 AM they were patrolling the entire downtown area and searching for survivors.
The second quake struck at 8:14 AM.
By 10:05 AM the USS Chicago was on its way from San Diego to San Francisco; by 10:30 the USS Preble had landed a medical team and set up an emergency hospital.
Abstract from sensible shoes diary at dKos There’s more there.
Source material SF Museum
I don't want them to be in charge one minute more. However, my people in Washington--Lugar, Bayh, and Burton don't really give a shit what I think. They all think Bush is doing just fine, even now.
Posted by Hoosiercat at September 5, 2005 01:28 PMThat's the problem with being a blue-boy in a red area. I had that problem in a red area of California. My Congressman was incredibly patronizing when I wrote him about setting some goals for the war (not immediate withdrawal, either)). Something about "a unique viewpoint" It was pretty moderate too, I thought.
Posted by DukeRevolution at September 5, 2005 03:18 PMMarie, this is exactly what I've been thinking for a while now. The mantra "Government is the Problem" not only doesn't cause them problems when things go wrong, but actually helps them because they use it to whip up their cult to greater anger against the incompetent government and any who stand against them. I am sick at heart when I realize what people have come to expect from their government. To be beaten, robbed and abandoned by the "government" is now par for the course. The gang in charge is like a deadly parasite, eating away at the wealth and health of this country, leaving only an empty, looted shell for ordinary Americans and their descendents.
Posted by Mary at September 5, 2005 05:41 PMUnfortunately you can't see where the failures lay because of your visable hatred of Bush. Sad because your piece was headed in the right direction.
Posted by carosel at September 7, 2005 10:15 AM