Blanco’s refusal at the core of the chaos

Northside Journal News has a timeline that – finally – focuses keenly on Governor Kathleen Blanco and her absolute refusal to allow the Federal Government into New Orleans either after Katrina hit, or even after the levees broke.

On the afternoon of August 29, in downtown New Orleans and the French Quarter, the brunt of the high winds had passed. Residents began to peek out and discovered the city was mostly intact. There was wind damage, and some water in the streets, but they had seen this before and weren’t concerned. Sometime during the night of the 29th or early morning of the 30th, water
began to poor through the 17th Street Canal levee. New Orleans began to flood.
By Tuesday, August 30, the federal relief effort began shipping food, water and medical supplies toward Louisiana for use in New Orleans. The same operation was underway in Mississippi and Alabama. The governors of those states had a already signed on to federal help and relief was pouring in. Governor Blanco was the lone holdout. She had still not made a decision. The Department of Defense sent search and rescue experts, doctors, nurses and support personnel. FEMA was there to help as much as they could but local and state officials would not allow them to participate because Governor Blanco still had not given her permission .
Residents of New Orleans watched as the flood waters continued to poor through the breach in the 17th Street Canal levee and by Wednesday their frustration began to boil. The summer sun baked survivors on rooftops. Those who made it to the Superdome were now wandering through the gutted building, waiting for relief supplies and help which never came. Mayor Ray Nagin cursed everyone who failed to move fast enough, but Kathleen Blanco toured the stricken city in a helicopter while she conducted a news interview for CBS. On the ground, state officials were struggling with the magnitude of the disaster, but were rapidly being overwhelmed. Federal officials were on standby, ready to move, but Governor Blanco had still mot made a decision to ask for federal help.
That evening, Blanco watched as reports of rapes and looting poured into the command center. National news agencies began to run video of looters breaking into stores and making off with garbage bags of goods. One policeman was shot in the head. Other rescue workers reported hearing bullets zinging around them as they tried to save lives. New Orleans was out of control, and the media was wondering who was in charge.
On Thursday, September 1, amid a growing clamor of questions about the lack of action being taken in New Orleans, Blanco finally signed Executive Order KBB-2005-23, giving permission for the federal government to enter Louisiana with military assistance. FEMA began to move supplies into the stricken parishes along the path of Katrina. The Red Cross was finally given permission to deliver the food and water it had stockpiled in the area. Lt. General Russel Honore arrived and began to take command of the military assets which were already in place. As he barked orders, things began to happen, rapidly.

That is the clearest and most concise rendering I have yet read of what it was that kept FEMA from doing its job, kept the troops from coming and doing their jobs, kept relief services from coming in and doing their job. The dithering of Kathleen Blanco has GOT to be looked at in all of this.

There are some theories running around now, about WHY BLANCO SLEPT – figuratively speaking. Some are suggesting that her testy relationship with Mayor Ray Nagin contributed to her lack of action. I think that’s nonsense. You’d have to be the stupidest and sorriest sort of human being in the world to allow political nitpickery to intrude on doing your duty for the citizens under your protection.

Some are saying – at the paranoid edges that live on the periphery of the blogosphere – (both right and left wing) that Gov. Blanco refused to put through the usual, normal, “this is how it is DONE” request for Federal help because there was this vast left-wing conspiracy to allow NO to drown so that it could all be blamed on Bush and the racial element could be introduced. This theory suggests that Ray Nagin also did not deploy 500 buses to help evacuate people as part of the plan. I think that’s nonsense as well. You’d have to be downright evil to put your fellow human beings through such torture, such fear, such deplorable conditions, such risk-to-life-and-limb, just to “get the president,” that you hate so very, very much. I don’t buy it. I know some do. I know some believe that this sort of evil is part and parcel of how the left planned to use Katrina to take down George W. Bush. But I do not believe it. Call me naive if you like, but I choose not to believe this – I do not think that Nagin and Blanco are evil any more than I think George W. Bush is evil.

The last theory is the one that I believe. Absenting motivations of true malice (or the chance that Blanco’s staff advised her poorly because they didn’t want to “co-operate with the hated Bush” (which I CAN see as plausible, and very, very sad…I CAN see people hating the president so much that they make bad decisions just to “spite him” when in actuality they would be spiting themselves and their state…because irrational hate can make you do such things, and you WILL have to account for it) what I think really happened is this: Gov. Blanco already had a reputation of being indecisive – of “thinking through” her options to a stultifying degree, during which time, the world continues to swirl around her and she does not react. It is a real weakness in a “leader” – one that really should have precluded her ever being voted in to her very responsible seat of government. I think Katrina simply overwhelmed her and threw her weakness into sharp focus, and her advisors – who should have KNOWN the procedures and protocols for Emergency response and services – let her down. SERIOUSLY let her down. This schoolteacher was not up to the job of Governorship, and her unsuitability for the position, abetted by a staff comprised of apparent non-thinkers, allowed things to get supremely out of control.

I think Ray Nagin – a former Cable TV Executive – was also way out of his league. I will go to my grave not understanding why he did not deploy buses to help evacuate his citizens…he says he had no drivers? You call the city bus drivers in, you call the USUAL school bus drivers in, you call troops in if you have to, and you get the buses driven.

There has been a lot of noise made about “Brownie” being unsuitable for the job of FEMA director, but he was put into the job by a voice vote back when the senate was run by Democrats. And as we see in Nagin and Blanco, he was not the only one not cut out to lead in this emergency.

Somehow, I get the impression that Mayor Nagin was worrying about potential lawsuits…he’ll have plenty to worry about now, I’d say. Were I a resident of New Orleans, I’d take those photographs of undeployed buses, and all of the information Jason has collected here and mount a huge suit against Nagin, the City of New Orleans and the Governor – and maybe I’d sue the Senators, as well, for using money that could have been spent on strengthening levees on the usual pork, instead.

Yesterday, I called all of the huffing and puffing about how “Bush hates black people” a “champertous connivance.” This is what I meant by that. That Katrina and its aftermath are being used by grasping opportunists is indisputable – the usual race baiters are doing their usual thing, and the press, because it wishes to see Bush destroyed, is allowing these harmful, HARMFUL people their screedtime, giving them credibility where they deserve none, because the press sees this as one means of taking down the president. The other means is to blame literally EVERYTHING that has or has not been done on the president. Why? For two reasons:

1) It will (they hope) destroy President Bush.

2) It will create a consensus opinion that Bush was at fault for everything and therefore…lawsuits against Ray Nagin (D), Kathleen Blanco (D), the City of New Orleans (D), the State of Louisiana (D), and all possible leadership in between (D)…will be that much less convincing. Hey…you can’t sue them…it was all Bush’s fault.

Everybody gets what they want – the press and the Democrats being “everybody.” Everybody gets what they want except the people of Louisiana, who get to keep their incompetant leadership and their failing schools. Unless they do something, themselves, to change that.

UPDATE: Sensible Mom has some more thoughts on Kathleen Blanco, and her charges, yesterday, that the government (Fed) was not retreiving bodies fast enough. It is an eye opener you’ll want to read and send around.

Also, Protein Wisdom was on this track a few days ago.