The
criticism of FEMA is mounting. However, that is merely an apple, fruit borne from the tree of failure. It is the branch of the tree, and to stop the fruit of failure from ripening, you must simply cut down the tree. You must strike the root.
The tree is the White House. It is a second-rate White House, run by political hacks.
WASHINGTON - Michael Lindell knew things were going downhill at the Federal Emergency Management Agency when President George W. Bush appointed Joe Allbaugh as head of the U.S. federal agency responsible for disaster management in 2001.
"It was a political patronage job" for Mr. Allbaugh, who had no experience in emergency management but had been Mr. Bush's chief of staff when he was governor of Texas, said Mr. Lindell, senior scholar at Texas A&M University's Hazard Reduction and Recovery Center.
Soon afterward, Mr. Allbaugh hired his former college roommate, Republican lawyer Michael Brown, to be FEMA's general counsel. His experience in organizing the response to hurricanes and earthquakes? He ran the International Arabian Horse Association, a breeders' group that organized horse shows. (Read: NONE!)
Mr. Brown, who succeeded Mr. Allbaugh at FEMA in 2003, now finds himself at the centre of a storm of controversy over Washington's slow response to hurricane Katrina's devastating impact on New Orleans.
"Every official at the Federal Emergency Management Agency should be fired, Director Michael Brown especially," said The Times-Picayune, the leading New Orleans newspaper, in an open letter to Mr. Bush published on Sunday.
Critics allege that the Bush administration has undermined the effectiveness of the agency by turning it into a second-rate department run by political hacks.
"I think it's clear that they did drop the ball," said Susan Cutter, a professor of geography and director at the Hazards Research Lab at the University of South Carolina. "FEMA should have come in much, much sooner. . . . There is something wrong with emergency management that needs to be fixed." (Read: Cronies run it!)
...
Anticipating Katrina's impact, Mr. Bush declared a state of emergency in Louisiana on Sunday, a day before the storm hit. "Then, there was a black hole for five days. I don't understand it," Mr. Lindell said, noting that until last Friday, the federal response seemed scattered and unfocused.
...
"They gave FEMA a backwater position," said Michael Greenberger, director of the Center for Health and Homeland Security at the University of Maryland. "[The Bush Administration] didn't think it was important."
As for Mr. Brown, 50, his light has not exactly shone in the harsh atmosphere of post-Katrina New Orleans. On CNN last Thursday, he admitted he had been unaware that thousands of storm victims were marooned in horrific conditions at the convention centre.
...
Mr. Bush has been loyal to Mr. Brown, an Oklahoma Republican, declaring on Friday during a visit to the hurricane-hit region, "Brownie, you're doing a heck of a job." (Read: Failure)
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After criticism of the handling of hurricane Andrew, which ravaged southern Florida in 1992, then-president Bill Clinton named a professional emergency manager, James Witt, to run the agency. But Mr. Witt was shunted aside after Mr. Bush was elected President. The agency has an annual budget of $5-billion.
That's right - FEMA was poisoned and rotted from within, fed the seed of the tree of failure. Our nation is rotting from within, and there is only one source - George W. Bush and his failure administration
However, it isn't the first example of Bush's cronyism. Currently, he has convicted felons and traitors working in the Pentagon:
WASHINGTON -- In 1987, Robert L. Earl told a grand jury that he had destroyed and stolen national security documents while working for Lt. Col. Oliver L. North during the Iran-Contra scandal.
Now, he sits in one of the most coveted offices in the Pentagon as chief of staff to Gordon R. England, acting deputy secretary of Defense. Earl has clearance to review the kinds of classified documents he once destroyed.
...
President Bush nominated England to replace Paul D. Wolfowitz, who left the deputy secretary's post this spring to head the World Bank.
England's chief of staff is the latest figure from the Iran-Contra scandal to play a role in the Bush administration.
Elliott Abrams, who pleaded guilty to withholding information from Congress about the illegal funding of the Nicaraguan Contras during the Reagan administration, serves on Bush's National Security Council as head of the Mideast bureau.
And corporate helpers who worked with such felons and traitors as Democrats question their legitimacy:
WASHINGTON -- Fifteen years ago, Eagle Aviation Service and Technology Inc. helped Oliver North run guns to Nicaraguan rebels in what would become known as the Iran-Contra affair.
Today, the company flies State Department planes on dangerous drug eradication missions in Colombia. The work of EAST, as the company is known, has received little attention, even as lawmakers scrutinize the use of contractors in the Latin American drug fight.
One lawmaker who wants to ban the use of private contractors for antidrug missions in the Andean region said EAST's work in Colombia merits scrutiny.
"I think this kind of questionable background of being involved in covert, unapproved missions does add another level of questioning: Who are these people and who is holding them accountable?" said Rep. Jan Schakowsky, D-Ill.
And then there's Cheney's teddy bear, Halliburton, the wedding cake of no-bid contracts and government kickbacks:
This is not the first buck that Cheney's former company has made off military conflict and likely won't be the last. KBR currently has thousands of military support personnel on the ground in Kuwait and Turkey as part of a multi-year contract worth close to a billion dollars. The engineering subsidiary was also one of a select few firms invited to bid on an initial $900 million USAID contract for rebuilding post-war Iraq. Though it didn't get that job, Halliburton says it is still in the running for subcontracts and there will likely be plenty more opportunities. After all, the American Academy of Sciences estimates the rebuilding Iraq will cost between $30 and $105 billion dollars. At a recent investor conference call, Halliburton reported a 30% increase in year-over-year revenues, to $1.6 billion, for KBR. (Read: War profiteers)
Cheney, who served as CEO from 1995 to 2000, continues to receive as much as $1 million a year in deferred compensation as Halliburton executives enjoy a seat at the table during Administration discussions over how to handle post-war oil production in Iraq.
The cronyism of this administration is rampant, and has turned it into a second-rate white house, run by political hacks. These greedy scumbags will not rest until America has been bled dry and right into their own bank accounts. That's the mark of a traitor, my brothers and sisters. And it is downright evil.
The destruction and death of New Orleans, the evil committed by this sham of an administration, is the latest example.
No, wait - the latest example is the contract awarded to Halliburton to clean up New Orleans. Cronyism yet again.
The Navy has hired Houston-based Halliburton Co. to restore electric power, repair roofs and remove debris at three naval facilities in Mississippi damaged by Hurricane Katrina.
Halliburton subsidiary KBR will also perform damage assessments at other naval installations in New Orleans as soon as it is safe to do so.
Disgusting.