I don't think anyone anticipated the breach of the levees

[davefoc]

I don't think anyone anticipated the breach of the levees

- George Bush to Dianne Sawyer on Good Morning America, September 1, 2005

Many of us that were regular Republican voters winced a bit when it was clear that the party elites had picked him as the guy. We winced again as we realized that he was a marginal public speaker with a penchant for strange statements. We weren't real happy when we realized that he was a religiously oriented social conservative that at best payed lip service to fiscal conservatism. The lack of ethics that he displayed when it came to fulfilling his national guard duty was worrysome. But we overlooked all of this and voted for him anyway, because we thought he must be better than some big spending Democrat controlled by the unions and the lawyers.

We even trusted him to make the right decision when it came time to make the decisions about the war with Iraq.

But at what point do we admit to ourselves that country would have been better off with that Democrat that we voted against.

Certainly his "bring it on" taunt to the potential Iraqi insurgents must have convinced a few people that this guy was way not smart enough to be the president of the US, even if he belonged to the party that we usually vote for.

For me the non-existant WMD was more than reason enough to vote for anybody but Bush. But this obviously wasn't enough for a lot of people.

So now we have the above statement coupled with bizarre early on inaction in the face of this storm. Is this enough to end doubt in the minds of the Bush supporters that the US would have been far better off with somebody else as president?

http://www.nytimes.com/2005/09/04/opinion/04rich.html
http://www.nytimes.com/2005/09/03/opinion/03dowd.html?incamp=article_popular
http://news.yahoo.com/s/latimests/2...tewarningswashingtonfailedtofundleveeprojects

 

[crackmonkey]

I'm sorry? It WAS unexpected that the levees would breach. There was anticipation that the floods would top the levees, but the ACoE were surprised that they failed - particularly one that had just been improved.

 

[davefoc]

I am not sure CM, but are you making some sort of semantic point?

After each hurricane that has narrowly passed by New Orleans over the years there have been news articles about the vunerability of New Orleans to storm surges.

This is an article from Scientific American from more than three years ago discussing the vulnerability of New Orleans to Storm Surges which could cause the levies to be topped.
http://www.sciam.com/article.cfm?articleID=00060286-CB58-1315-8B5883414B7F0000

Is your point that people understood that the levies were not high enough but that they expected them to not fail when they were topped? Perhaps this is true. I was under the impression that it was very bad for levies to be topped and complete failure is likely when the levy is topped substantially.

If your point is that people didn't expect the levy to be topped then I wonder what people you are talking about. Certainly not the Army Corps of Engineers that have argued that the levy height should be increased for years.

It just occurred to me that you have made a sarcastic post and I have fallen for it. OK, I can see some humor in that.

 

[Mojo]

There was anticipation that the floods would top the levees, but the ACoE were surprised that they failed

Once the floods top the levees, and water is actually flowing over them, there is a greatly increased likelyhood that they'll collapse or be otherwise eroded. They're designed to hold water back, not to have it flowing over them.

 

[crackmonkey]

As I said earlier - no one - including the Army Engineers - expected the levees to be breached. Breached - as in bust open. Pretty much everyone expected the floodwaters to surge over the top, but that's a far cry from having them actually collapse. There's an enorous and important difference between the two... having some storm surge top the levees would cause some flooding, but would be relatively minor and temporary. Having the levees collapse would be (and was) catastrophic. Ther was no sarcasm here - no one anticipated that the levees would fail.

 

[davefoc]

I am sorry CM, I was slow to understand your point.

Frankly this is news to me. All the dire predictions over the years involved the topping of the levies but people thought the levies would actually hold and the only damage would be from water that exceeded the height of the levies?

I am from a part of the country where we don't have levies and my ideas on this were based on years of looking at pictures of broken levies during miscellaneous floods. I was under the impression that when substantial water flowed over the levies that they generally failed. Is this not the case? Maybe the Lake Ponchatrain levies were considered particularly safe because they were holding back water that wasn't flowing?

 

[RandFan]

This disaster was high on the list. Whether it was levee's being breeched or topped doesn't really mater.

The following was written in Oct 2004:

National Geographic

The Federal Emergency Management Agency lists a hurricane strike on New Orleans as one of the most dire threats to the nation, up there with a large earthquake in California or a terrorist attack on New York City. Even the Red Cross no longer opens hurricane shelters in the city, claiming the risk to its workers is too great.

We knew that the danger from a hurricane was real. Technicalities about breeching or being topped are meaningless.

I don't see Bush quite the same way Dave does but I do respect him (Dave). But what is important is that we DID fail. 9/11 was supposed to be a wake-up call and we were supposed to get ready for large disasters. We aren't ready and no one is talking about when we will be ready. I hope the dialog turns to emergency preparedness and how we have been caught with our pants down after having been warned. There shouldn't be another time. The money we will spend on New Orleans will dwarf any money spent to prepare for this event.

 

[davefoc]

Randfan wrote:

I don't see Bush quite the same way Dave does..

Well, I am far from sure that I am right about Bush. I have become quite uneasy over what I see as a continued series of gaffs which suggest to me that the guy is just not all that informed on a wide range of issues. I think it is arguable that he is highly unqualified for his job, but I can see some reason to argue the opposite. I think back to early in his administration when he seemed to favor CO2 emmissions controls. Apparently he failed to remotely understand the implications of this and reversed himself (and embarassed the secretary of interior) almost immediately when somebody took him aside and explained what they were to him.

Is it possible what we have here is a child of privilege who showed little discipline during his college years to learn any fundamental facts about the nature of the world who then went on to successfully exploit his privileged position to achieve political success without ever needing to demonstrate the kind of discipline necessary to do well at the positions he obtained?

Incidentally, I just realized your avatar is Janeane Garofalo. She is my favorite liberal babe also. Matchmaker is one of my favorite movies. Have you heard her talk show? Two or three hours a day of non stop Republicans eat babies type stuff. I haven't actually eaten a baby in a few days but perhaps I should get cracking to fulfill Ms. Garafalo's expectations.

 

[joe1347]

- George Bush to Dianne Sawyer on Good Morning America, September 1, 2005

Many of us that were regular Republican voters . . . this enough to end doubt in the minds of the Bush supporters that the US would have been far better off with somebody else as president?

Amen. I never thought that I would say it, but I wish Clinton was still the president. Plus Bush has been able to do something that I never thought was possible and that is to make Clinton look good (at least to this now former conservative Republican).

 

[RandFan]

Well, I am far from sure that I am right about Bush. I have become quite uneasy over what I see as a continued series of gaffs which suggest to me that the guy is just not all that informed on a wide range of issues. I think it is arguable that he is highly unqualified for his job, but I can see some reason to argue the opposite. I think back to early in his administration when he seemed to favor CO2 emmissions controls. Apparently he failed to remotely understand the implications of this and reversed himself (and embarassed the secretary of interior) almost immediately when somebody took him aside and explained what they were to him.

No question he has made more gaffes than most. I guess it is not much much of a compliment to say your not as bad as Dan Quayle.

Is it possible what we have here is a child of privilege who showed little discipline during his college years to learn any fundamental facts about the nature of the world who then went on to successfully exploit his privileged position to achieve political success without ever needing to demonstrate the kind of discipline necessary to do well at the positions he obtained?

Sure it is possible. George Bush isn't Chance the gardner but he isn't Einstein either. I have no complaints of his handling of 9/11 and the initial response. There are a number of other things that have bothered me though. I don't know whose fault this current mess is but I know that ultimatly Bush must take responsibility. There simply is no other option. We are a Democracy and one of Bush's chief responsibilities is to see to it that we are prepared for such disasters. FEMA knew this was a posibility and we were not prepared. There will be no simplistic answer for the many failures but Bush has to be the one who bears the brunt of responsibility.

Incidentally, I just realized your avatar is Janeane Garofalo. She is my favorite liberal babe also. Matchmaker is one of my favorite movies. Have you heard her talk show? Two or three hours a day of non stop Republicans eat babies type stuff. I haven't actually eaten a baby in a few days but perhaps I should get cracking to fulfill Ms. Garafalo's expectations.

She is really on the edge politically. I have listened to her a few times and I can't quite wrap my head around her politics. It wouldn't be quite accurate to simply say she is the mirror opposite of Anne Coulter but such a charachterization isn't too far for from the mark either.

I would say I have seen most of what she has been in. I loved her on the Ben Stiller show, Mystery Men, Matchmaker, Truth about Cats and Dogs, Clay Pigeons as well as others.

Sorry for the derail but here is a more flattering picture of her.

 

[crackmonkey]

Bush has to be the one who bears the brunt of responsibility.

Uh... why, exactly? For the things he is responsible for, certainly. For the things others are responsible for - no. The city and state bear far more of the burden here than the feds.

 

[RandFan]

Uh... why, exactly? For the things he is responsible for, certainly. For the things others are responsible for - no. The city and state bear far more of the burden here than the feds.

I'm sorry but that is my opinion. FEMA was put in place to deal with the aftermath of such a scenario. FEMA is a federal agency. We knew what was going to happen. Bush should ensure that a subordinate is continually monitoring the most serious and more likely concerns and addessing them. This was just such a threat.

National Geographic / 2004

The Federal Emergency Management Agency lists a hurricane strike on New Orleans as one of the most dire threats to the nation...

It doesn't get any more blunt than that.

 

[crackmonkey]

Do you even know what FEMA does? It liasons with local and state agencies to coordinate relief. WHat do they do if the state doesn't liaise with them?? The feds aren't in the lead here - the locals and state lead the way. Maybe you think that shouldn't be the case - you'd have a good argument. Tell that to the states' right folks.

 

[jay gw]

For those posters that said the breach of levees was not anticipated were you aware that last year a FEMA conference made computer models and scenarios of a breach of the levees in a hurricane?

the story

Unlike with September 11, it's quickly becoming known that the government could have acted to limit the scope of the disaster. NBC's Bob Windrem reports that in July 2004, FEMA and the Louisiana homeland security agency ran an exercise predicated on a Category Three hurricane striking New Orleans head on.

The exercise, named for a mythical "Hurricane Pam," was very similar to the reality of earlier this week, involving breached levees and flooding in most of the city. The exercise also included recommendations of steps to help Louisiana prepare for such a storm, none of which appear to have been followed, or followed adequately.

http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/3626796/

Here is the internal FEMA document about the hurricane scenario in New Orleans. It is dated July of 2004:

Hurricane Pam Exercise Concludes

Release Date: July 23, 2004
Release number: R6-04-093


BATON ROUGE, La. -- Hurricane Pam brought sustained winds of 120 mph, up to 20 inches of rain in parts of southeast Louisiana and storm surge that topped levees in the New Orleans area. More than one million residents evacuated and Hurricane Pam destroyed 500,000-600,000 buildings. Emergency officials from 50 parish, state, federal and volunteer organizations faced this scenario during a five-day exercise held this week at the State Emergency Operations Center in Baton Rouge.

The exercise used realistic weather and damage information developed by the National Weather Service, the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers, the LSU Hurricane Center and other state and federal agencies to help officials develop joint response plans for a catastrophic hurricane in Louisiana.

"We made great progress this week in our preparedness efforts," said Ron Castleman, FEMA Regional Director.

http://www.fema.gov/news/newsrelease.fema?id=13051

 

[crackmonkey]

I see nothing about a levee breach in the FEMA document. It looks to me as if the news report mistakes the term 'tops' for 'braches' in regard to the levees. As I've mentioned, they're quite dictinct. A breach is a magnitude more serious than storm surge topping a levee.

 

[joe1347]

Do you even know what FEMA does? It liasons with local and state agencies to coordinate relief. WHat do they do if the state doesn't liaise with them?? The feds aren't in the lead here - the locals and state lead the way. Maybe you think that shouldn't be the case - you'd have a good argument. Tell that to the states' right folks.

Is it possible to simplify the issue regarding the federal response? I don't think even the most ardent right wing Bush supporter can deny that a Cat 4 Hurricane hitting New Orleans falls into the dire (and very possible) threat category. Maybe I'm assuming too much from the Feds, but shouldn't a fairly detailed plan have already been prepared - in advance - documenting (in excruciating detail) the required response (both Federal and State) to prevent or at least mitigate the disaster that unfolded? If no plan existed, then the characters in charge are just imcompetent But what if there actually was a plan describing exactly what to do - and it (the plan) was either ignored due to incompetance or even worse - the pre-existing disaster response plan was unable to be implemented because the men and material required were shipped to Iraq?

I'm thinking that a plan exists and it's been hidden under the biggest rock in D.C. - otherwise why was the administration claiming that the flooding of New Orleans was unforseen? Because if it was (i.e, planned for), then the Administration is in even bigger trouble. So am I being skeptical enough?

 

[SezMe]

Uh... why, exactly? For the things he is responsible for, certainly. For the things others are responsible for - no. The city and state bear far more of the burden here than the feds.

Who gets the responsibility if a ship goes aground in the middle of the night when the captain is asleep. Yep, the captain.

As your man (I assume) Reagan said, "It happened on my watch."

 

[crackmonkey]

Actually, there was a plan. It appears that the fed response was slated to come a few days after the initial response by the locals and state.. but the local and state authorities appeared not to have done anything according to the plan they'd laid out.
As this is dissected, it may be that the feds are in for some deserved criticism; so far, though, it appears that the city and state response was utter chaos. Negligence at best.


http://www.cityofno.com/SystemModules/PrintPage.aspx?portal=46&tabid=26
As to the 'ship' question... first of all, I think that analogies are a pisspoor substitute for facts and reasoned discourse abou tthe topic. To respond to your scenario, though, I'd say that the person responsible for running a ship aground would be the person tasked with making sure that the emergency plan for aground-running is followed. To translate into the real world, that would mean the people who didn;t follow the plan laid out for emergencies like this should bear the brunt of the blame. That would be the mayor and, to a greater degree, the governor.

 

[Regnad Kcin]

Many of us that were regular Republican voters winced a bit when it was clear that the party elites had picked him as the guy. We winced again as we realized that he was a marginal public speaker with a penchant for strange statements. We weren't real happy when we realized that he was a religiously oriented social conservative that at best payed lip service to fiscal conservatism. The lack of ethics that he displayed when it came to fulfilling his national guard duty was worrysome. But we overlooked all of this and voted for him anyway, because we thought he must be better than some big spending Democrat controlled by the unions and the lawyers.

We even trusted him to make the right decision when it came time to make the decisions about the war with Iraq.

But at what point do we admit to ourselves that country would have been better off with that Democrat that we voted against.

Certainly his "bring it on" taunt to the potential Iraqi insurgents must have convinced a few people that this guy was way not smart enough to be the president of the US, even if he belonged to the party that we usually vote for.

For me the non-existant WMD was more than reason enough to vote for anybody but Bush. But this obviously wasn't enough for a lot of people.

So now we have the above statement coupled with bizarre early on inaction in the face of this storm. Is this enough to end doubt in the minds of the Bush supporters that the US would have been far better off with somebody else as president?

To answer your last question first, no; staunch Bush supporters are a breed apart. (Of course, many if not most were Clinton/Gore haters, so they're perhaps merely being consistent.)

Regarding the remainder of your post, it is largely what many have been saying since the campaign leading up to Election 2000. The man really, really is out of his depth.

Thankfully, no one person can inflict catastrophic damage on a country as large and complex as any modern state, much less ours. But I wish we weren't being so provocatively ill-led.

...Is it possible what we have here is a child of privilege who showed little discipline during his college years to learn any fundamental facts about the nature of the world who then went on to successfully exploit his privileged position to achieve political success without ever needing to demonstrate the kind of discipline necessary to do well at the positions he obtained?

Yes. I take no pleasure in agreeing with your assessment, but yes.

 

[crackmonkey]

What an excellent display of discipline. After all that quoting and commentary, not once did you contribute to the thread topic.
I salute you, sir.