As I watch the documentary, Surviving Katrina on the Discovery Channel, I’m impressed that this program shows the flooded buses, that is, the school busses that Mayor Ray Nagin failed to use to evacuate the 100,000 citizens of his city who did not have cars. This is the first time I have seen a non-conservative news/information outlet show a picture of those vehicles, an image of the failure of the New Orlean city government to deal with the hurricane.
In their eagerness to use the Katrina disaster as fodder for their increasingly negative reporting of the Administration, all too many in the MSM neglected numerous facts, like the flooded busses which demonstrate the failure of state and local governments to respond to Katrina. So far, this documentary seems to be the exception to so much I’ve seen in the MSM on Katrina. It makes clear that government officials on all levels blundered in responding to the disaster.
Perhaps, that’s because of the size of the disaster. It was one of the largest natural disasters in U.S. history. (I even heard one pundit call it the largest natural disaster in our history.) And given the size of the storm and its impact on one of America’s largest cities, it’s remarkable how well relief officials, at all levels, did. Glenn Reynolds (aka Instapundit) has referenced (e.g., here) a Popular Mechanics report which found that “response to Hurricane Katrina was by far the largest–and fastest-rescue effort in U.S. history, with nearly 100,000 emergency personnel arriving on the scene within three days of the storm’s landfall.“
Contrast the destruction Katrina wrought and that of the Hurricane that struck Galveston, Texas in September 1900. A city which then at had 38,000 residents lost between 6,000 and 8,000 people. If New Orleans had lost the same percentage of its citizens, somewhere between 75,000 and 100,000 people would have died in that city alone.
That said, there were problems with the evacuation and relief of the city. All too many are all too eager to point the blame at President Bush. During the coverage of the storm, people kept saying that if President Clinton’s Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA) director, James Lee Witt had been in charge, he would have done a better job of providing relief to the city. Yet, they fail to point out that during his tenure, Mr. Witt never had to confront a natural disaster of the size of Katrina.
And while there is little doubt that Mr. Witt did a fine job, in most cases, his job was made easier by competent local officials. It’s not FEMA’s job to manage disaster relief, but to assist state and local governments who, rather than the federal government, have the “primary responsibilty” to respond to such catastrophes.
Yet, a bill the president supports might change that. It would allow the president to “take control of the National Guard in emergencies without consent of governors.” Had that bill been law before Katrina, the president critics and their supporters in the MSM would be right to hold the Administration responsible for much of went wrong.
While this legislation would give the federal government greater authority to respond to a catastrophe like Katrina, I fear it would too centralize relief efforts whereas local officials, who know their jurisdiction better than the federal government, can better address their plans to the peculiarities of their region. And who are more directly accountable to the citizens affected by any disaster.
It would be a shame if the president’s reaction to the mistakes made in Katrina — and all the hullabaloo over his performance — would be to take responsibility away from the states. Yes, Louisiana State and local New Orleans officials failed their constituents in this crisis, but they are accountable to the citizens whose needs they did not meet. The citizens of New Orleans chose to reelect Mayor Nagin. I doubt the citizens of the Pelican State will reelect Governor Blanco.
These state officials seem to be the exceptions to the rule. As governors in other states prone to hurricanes, particularly the president’s brother, have done remarkable jobs preparing their states for — and responding to — such catastrophes.
The president alas seems to share the media’s disdain for federalism. As the proposed legislation he supports to prevent further Katrinas is yet another sign of his failure to follow the Gipper’s legacy of federalism.
-Dan (AKA GayPatriotWest): GayPatriotWest@aol.com
Aaaaah……..help……GP post….makes ….too….much ….sense….too fact-based………. …obliterates my script……that says conservatives never attack Bush……..must……find…. .way……….to…….reject…..information… ………..ignore points………..change subject…….allege torture………demean conservatives……….make cites that undercut me if read……………
Hurricane Katrina was a grim, embarrassing chapter in American History. Unfortunately, it brought into focus the insane politics, the agenda-driven divisiveness, and the media insanity that are the zeitgeist of our current era.
In times past, a disaster like this would have brought people together. But this time, because people’s political agendas were more important than relief and rebuilding, it only succeeded in driving us further apart.
VdaK, that’s a fair analysis of what happened and continues to happen in the Katrina disaster. Did you notice how quickly the press moved off the stories about invalid patients being killed by medical staff… we rarely hear about survivors successfully relocated… and never about the utter failures of Nagin and state officials to spend the BILLIONS of federal tax dollars efficiently or wisely in the clean-up.
Dan, on the issue of JLWitt; I appreciate that is what Democrats did… heck, JohnFKerry does it every day in his “If I had been President” speeches. But the truth about JLWitt lies elsewhere.
James Lee Witt is a consumate PR wizard, self-promoter and tireless advocate of James Lee Witt. As Clinton’s FEMA director, he was a failure of the first order… in 1998 he put forward a sweeping reform proposal for the agency –essentially privitzing it and shifting responsibilities onto the back of local, regional and state govts who weren’t meant to carry that load– and NO had to bear the net effect of all those “reforms”.
JLWitt is a lot like his former boss –Slick Willy… if it doesn’t advance my immediate interest, why be concerned? Why get involved? Claim credit for any success; quickly distance yourself from your own mistakes.
The truth: JLWitt created the modern, pre-Katrina FEMA. He destroyed its cohesive unit morale, he subjected it to social engineering experiments, and he stripped agency leaders of responsibility and accountability while insuring his own flag was at the top of the pole at all times. Like Nagin and Clinton, the man has no shame. He is a razorback huskter still selling snake oil.
As the top federal emergency management official, he was a failure. As a tireless self-promoting businessman he’s terrific –and doing a great job feeding at the trough of state govts across the land… especially those troughs controlled by Democrat governors. I haven’t done it yet but was once told that if you Google on JLWitt, you’ll get about 200,000 hits and the first 199,000 are planted by James’ staff and family. LOL
I find it striking that people like JL Witt, Jimmy Carter, and others who did so much damage to our country are praised and fawned over in the media and by the decadent elite. But when I read scripture, it tells us that this is exactly the way of the world, that evil is made popular and and people who are just trying to live a good and decent life will be mocked and ridiculed. That’s why the world seems upside-down, so much of the time. It’s always been this way.
So, are you guys saying that Witt was just taking credit for local officials who were just doing their jobs?
So, are you guys saying that Witt was just taking credit for local officials who were just doing their jobs?
That was a recurring theme of the Clinton presidency. For example, they took credit for foiling the Y2K terror plot when it was really the work of a single customs agent who (gasp! horror!) profiled a suspicious-acting Muslim male. If the guy hadn’t been carrying half a ton of explosives in his trunk and plotting to blow up the Space Needle, she probably would have been reprimanded for racial insensitivity.
GPW, I think the picture is a little more complex than what you say above. Its not all “media bias”, its human bias.
I think if during Katrina you had replaced all the journalists with GOP PR consultants, you would have gotten a more similar result than you might think.
What happened to the media is that they got caught up in the emotions of moment, and of the particular people they were talking to at the time.
To the people in dome, it probably really did feel like the end of the world. What happened is that one part of the disaster got magnified above the others. Simply because the journalists happened to be in that particular location.
And also because we are not capable as human beings in the midst of such large-scale mayhem to see the overall picture, to really grasp the scope of something that was so large as what took place during Katrina.
So the journalists concentrate on human interest, as do their viewers, and the emotional tone of the moment start to feed itself into a loop and it just intensifies.
Perspective, objectivity, gets thrown out of the window. That is a large part of the explanation for what happened in the media. Its due to the human nature of journalists, not their political affiliation.
It’s no longer the days of network news. There is no longer an appreciable gap in most cases between the moment an event occurs as to when it is is reported on and broadcast. There is an immediacy about everything, with no real gatekeeper to provide objectivity. Editors are now just as caught up in the emotions of the moment as the reporters are.
There is always going to be this kind of distortion during these kind of events.
I thought Russ Pitts’ profile of Nagin on last night’s 60 Minutes wasn’t very kind to the mayor.
#6: But Gryph, don’t you think the media ought to come clean with the public, and maybe subject themselves to the same level of scrutiny and retribution they inflect on everyone else?
Paul over at Wizbang has an interesting take plus videos of the levy breach. He’s got no patience for assigning blame while there is work to be done except for blaming the Army Corps of Engineers (I believe) for flooding the city. Today he rather shockingly said that he believes that the levy was set to fail even without the hurricane and that it was only chance it failed during the hurricane which means that an incredible number of lives were actually saved because of the storm. It’s worth checking out his pictures, video, and arguments.
V – I think you’re slipping đ …you let this go by:
“…if during Katrina you had replaced all the journalists with GOP PR consultants, you would have gotten a more similar result than you might think… What happened to the media is that they got caught up in the emotions of moment…”
Let’s do a thought experiment then, shall we? Just sit back and imagine that proven liar Bill Clinton were still President during Katrina.
Gov. Blanco would have been just as unprepared and incompetent. Nagin would have still refused evacuation pleas, refused to use those buses, and holed himself up in a hotel when the levees broke. And Federal actors, considering how QUICKLY they did respond to the unprecedented disaster for the most part, would not have done much better in reality – if any better at all.
But would the news media, under Clinton, have trumpeted way-off claims of “10,000 dead!!!”? claims that, even at the time, were just hysterical rumors with no sourcing or evidence except Nagin’s nervous breakdown? No possible way.
Would the news coverage have been 180 degrees different? Come on, let’s not kid ourselves (or let Gryph kid us).
“What happened to the media” is that the majority of the individuals who make it up WANTED to get caught up in the emotions of the moment, because of their documented 12-to-1 pro-Democrat bias, as we’ve seen in story after story these last 4-6 years.
As a rule, human beings have to WANT to get “caught up in the emotions of the moment”, before they can be.
I think Gryph’s basic thrust is that the media should be let off the hook for the PARTISAN element in its unbelievably derelict, biased reporting at this time a year ago. Letting the media off the hook (or denying its bias) is one of his usual agenda items.
In exactly what way are they not? Who buys the newspaper? Watches the TV? Subscribes to the cable channel? Who is ultimately responsible for the paycheck that pays Geraldo?
I just find a great deal of the dramatics over the “liberal media bias” to be basically people complaining about TV always showing car wrecks, – yet while still tuning in every week. These media organizations are businesses, not non-profit orgs. They need your dime to survive. They commit no great betrayal of the American Public by giving them exactly what they want to see.
Does FOXNEWS do well in the ratings because of accurate reporting or because it simply screams louder?
The other issue that I think really needs to be looked at is the basic monopoly that a few media empires have on information.
What you think of as group media bias is often really just media groupthink, regardless of political leaning. And a lot of this happens because there are only two newswires of any substantial size in the world, Reuters and the AP. 99.99 of the stories you see on television, in the newspaper, on the internet, even in blogs, come from just these two sources.
So the person who writes that story that appears on the wire wields a great deal of disproportionate power. That person’s biases, whatever they may be, get magnified and echoed across the planet every time they publish an article.
Even blogs, rather than providing new sources of information, more often than not simply analyze the ones that already are out there. Even when they are complaining about the stories from the mass media, they are still nevertheless talking about those same stories, not reporting new ones.
________________
As for Caralato’s little missive, well, as usual, Caralato’s creates his own narrative of what he decides are my opinions and then addresses those instead. Sometimes its interesting reading, but do remember that generally we are listening in on a conversation that he is having with himself. Can that be called One-Sock Puppetry?
Gryph, let the record show that I quoted you accurately and addressed what you said.
I feel sad that you don’t seem to handle responsibility for your words.
#12 P.S. – Having said that:
I had meant to thank and compliment you, Gryph, for writing a comment #6 wherein you didn’t make insults on your hosts or their other guests.
Regarding #11:
“I just find a great deal of the dramatics over the âliberal media biasâ to be basically people complaining about TV always showing car wrecks, – yet while still tuning in every week.”
Since I don’t tune in to the networks, I am forced to wonder (or not know) how you find that.
“In exactly what way are they not [coming clean] with the public?”
Oh, where to begin?
The hideous accusation against our Republic and/or its President will always be on page A1, above the fold. The factual correction is always handled trivially by comparison – that is, if there even is a correction.
Katrina myths: Little or no repentance; still being repeated by many in the MSM to this day.
NSA terrorist surveillance “domestic spying” myths (e.g., that Congress somehow wasn’t involved or given oversight): Little or no repentance; still being repeated by many to this day.
Guantanamo “torture” falsehoods – No repentance; still being repeated by many in MSM to this day.
Haditha exaggerations and premature condemnations – ditto.
Plamegate exaggerations and distortions – ditto.
Outright manufacture of supposed Israeli massacres – ditto. (See here: http://www.zombietime.com/fraud/ambulance/)
Qaqaagate, the huge manufactured non-scandal they tried to spring in the last week of the 2004 election – No repentance; though perhaps not still being repeated, as it has simply gone down the memory hole.
That’s the shortest list. I’m sure I’m leaving out hundreds of examples, large and small. When can we expect the MSM to set the public consciousness straight on these things?
“What you think of as group media bias is often really just media groupthink, regardless of political leaning.”
And I’m saying: let’s look at the particular content of that groupthink. It’s been documented that in 2004, reporters personally supported Kerry over Bush by a ration of 12 to 1.
“So the person who writes that story that appears on the wire wields a great deal of disproportionate power. That personâs biases, whatever they may be…”
Once again, Gryph, you oh-so-conveniently ignore the question of WHAT the person’s biases almost invariably turn out to be in practice.
Hint: For that bias to cut in either a pro-Israel, pro-U.S., conservative or pro-Bush direction, is rare indeed. Gee…….. Why?
“Does FOXNEWS do well in the ratings because of accurate reporting or because it simply screams louder?”
Answer: Because of more accurate reporting. A large number of those who do tune in (again – I don’t) apparently prefer a news network in which the liberal and conservative points of view are at least placed onto a more equal footing.
(final P.S. – I shouldn’t have to explain this, but please note that I selected the word “repentance” above for color, and what I really meant in this context was a process of media self-examination and self-improvement of the standards of their profession, after their derelict errors; as well as more significant or effective efforts to correct the record with the public they claim to serve)
Y’all love to spend a lot of time blaming people who’ve been gone from the government for years. Sorry, but Bush’s idea of leading in a disaster was to have a good photo op of himself looking concerned at the devastation out of Air Force One as it glided by on its way back to DC. give it up…Bush and his administration and that moron who ran FEMA screwed up big time.
3: by the way, you seem to forget that the seeds of recession during the Jimmy Carter years were sown int eh nixon years…you remember Nixon, the crook who tried to bring down the presidency?
Considering the magnitude of the Katrina disaster across three states — and some obvious mismanagement in the Department of Homeland Security — I can’t fault the response of the federal government to Katrina. If you look at any disaster plans, it’s clear that local and state governments are responsible for the initial response and for telling the federal government what assistance is needed. Again considering the magnitude of the disaster, I think it was remarkable that federal resources could be mobilized, and many be on the scene, within 72 hours.
I’m not a fan of George W. Bush, but I’ve defended his handling of the Katrina disaster. His problem wasn’t incompetence. His problem was that he contributed to a perception of incompetence and indifference. President Bush needed a Michael Deaver. Can anyone imagine Ronald Reagan staying on vacation, making a scheduled trip to San Diego, where he played a guitar, flying at low altitude over the Gulf Coast in Air Force One, instead of going to the scene, etc. The fact that Bush was in touch with the situation and the fact that cabinet secretaries and agency directors were mobilizing federal resources were forever overshadowed by the PR mistakes he made in the early hours and days of the disaster.
#15 – “Yâall love to spend a lot of time blaming people whoâve been gone from the government for years.”
That comment doesn’t make sense. Sorry Kevin, but I can’t find a single trace of that in Dan’s post.
There could be a bit when Matt reminds us that FEMA’s management problems began in the ’90s, but that’s one comment… not justifying a plural “y’all”.
“by the way, you seem to forget that the seeds of recession during the Jimmy Carter years were sown int eh nixon years…”
Actually, no, they were sown in the Johnson years. The guy who made the big Vietnam War that Nixon closed down, remember? But regardless: gee Kevin, look who’s really harping on way-irrelevant past stuff.
#16 – Well Ashley, you know I (for one) can’t argue with that. đ
Signing off for the night – here is a good summary piece on how the media isn’t just biased, rather, it has been actively faking our current Middle East news. Always in an anti-Israel (and, by extension, anti-U.S.) direction, of course.
Kevin writes: “…you remember Nixon, the crook who tried to bring down the presidency?”
I don’t know, he WASN’T impeached like your crooked land speculating President Slick Willy who WAS IMPEACHED and used the White House as a bachelor pad to lure big-haired women his daughter’s age into performing hooker services for him. Hmmm, who brought down the White House? Who put the “ho” back into White House by renting out the Lincoln Bedroom as a political favor for contributors? Hmm, crook indeed.
Kevin, you really need to watch that projecting thing you do… it’ll bite your hero-Democrats on the butt every single time and make you the fool or the tool, your choice.
Gryph’s implication that the only defense against dishonest media is to not buy their product is insufficient to me. If that were all we had, we would never have found out Dan Rather’s TANG memos were frauds, nor would we have found out Reuters was letting Hizbullah stage photo shoots for propaganda purposes, nor would we know when a Middle-East “expert” quoted by the NYT or the WaPo was in fact a member of a radical jihad group.
On topic, who would have taken the media to task for exaggerrating the number of Katrina deaths or the conditions in the Superdome? No one, if the only form of criticism available to us was to not watch their product.
The media should be fact-checked and the blogosphere is the best tool yet developed for doing that. I know this puts the noses of elite journalists out of joint, but it’s true. The internet connects people in almost every area of expertise, many of whom are knowledgeable if not telegenic.
And when the media’s lies, biases, and distortions are uncovered, those who did so should be thanked for providing a public services, not derided and insulted by the blue-noses in the MSM.
I don’t think we actually disagree that much, my point is that policing the media is the job of the viewer. There simply isn’t anyone else to do it, unless you want the government to take a hand, and while that is what they are doing in Russia, I don’t think its a good idea to implement here.
As far as the blogosphere goes, it only adds two things to the mix, immediate response and an easy way to publish. But its no more reliable in fact-checking than anyone else. And in fact its just as capable as the MSM of making errors and being biased in its reporting.
This is illustrated clearly in Bruce’s previous post on Katrina, where he erroneously claims that:
When in fact even his own linked reference says exactly the opposite. He fails to correct his post, even when its errors are brought to his attention.
Most likely because the over-riding theme of almost every post he has ever made is that GOP=Good, Democrats= Evil. If facts don’t fit that narrative, he adjusts them until they do.
So why should I trust the vaunted “blogosphere” for fact checking any more (or less) than mass media? I don’t, and with good reason.
The blogosphere commits every error and sin of the mass market media and then invents some of its own. The overall “truth” of its reporting is exactly the same, and in many, many ways worse, than traditional forms of media.
“So why should I trust the vaunted âblogosphereâ for fact checking any more (or less) than mass media?”
You shouldn’t trust any one source. You should think for yourself.
The blogosphere enables that by providing points of information and expertise from disparate sources that the MSM won’t or can’t. Obviously.
By the way, Gryph – If your comments about Bruce are true, then why would you continually keep crawling back to his blog? But, this time, at least you didn’t go with playground-style insults. Thank you!
#110 Michigan-Matt — August 29, 2006 @ 8:21 am – August 29, 2006
For the record –and Bruce is a big boy…
Oh, so now you are going to vouch for his Body Mass Index (BMI)?
At some point, the MightyRighties become MightyRidiculous.
Matty, you’re the one who is not worth debating.
Gryph, my only point was that those who demand accountability from the media should not be derided as “whiners” or summarily dismissed as is the wont of the media elite.
I don’t want the Government holding the media accountable, I trust the market. And the fact of the matter, at least for now, is that media consolidation has so far led to a much broader range and availability of opinion and fact-checking than prevailed in the bad old days of the Fairness Doctrine and the Big Three Networks.
*Whatever* Up your nose with a rubber hose.
And – he’s back.
LOL đ
According to the WSJ, Bush and Congress have spent $112.5×10^9 on Hurricane Katrina, which works out to $252,000 per New Orleans resident (pre-Katrina). WTF, mate.
Showing that biased media coverage costs real dollars, V.
If Katrina had been reported sanely and seen in a reasonable perspective, Congress wouldn’t be under such a need to overcompensate – so to speak.
(P.S. And yes, it is chiefly Congress’ and Bush’s fault and not the media’s, because Congress and Bush did the financial deed and really ought to stand up to pressure from the insane, more aggressively. But that’s a larger issue for another time.)
You âblame the mediaâ folks are getting more and more shrill as you try to yell over each other.
Everyone knows the slant of NYT in the run up to Iraq II.
Or the soft ball questions Bush II got for about 2-3 years after 9-11
This same discussion could probably be found over at the Daily Kos as they complain of bias.
I have an idea try to take off your GOP partisan hack hat and look at what is happeningâŚ.
Wow! That was just blistering, keogh! If FEMA is supposed to do everything then we can just shut down all local and state government and let Czar Bush decide how everything will run. If the Fed has to clean it all up then the Fed should have a significant say in how things are run in the first place. If the Mayors and Governors “just work here” then let the Feds appoint the people they deem fit.
#20 Michigan-Matt — August 29, 2006 @ 6:51 am – August 29, 2006
I don’t know, he (Nixon) WASN’T impeached like your crooked land speculating President Slick Willy who WAS IMPEACHED and used the White House as a bachelor pad to lure big-haired women his daughter’s age into performing hooker services for him.
No, Nixon wasn’t impeached, because responsible Republicans from Capitol Hill marched up to the WH and told him that if he didn’t resign he would be impeached, and, not only that, he would be convicted and removed from office. So Nixon, ever the party man, chose to resign rather than be impeached and convicted and removed from office.
Unlike you, some of us actually do know something about history.
Your continual blathering about Clinton is becoming a tiresome farce. The supposed land deal, which was speculated upon by the Scaife-supported American Speculator and (shudder!) the NYTimes. You know, the NYtimes, the part of the MSM that you MightyRighties love to villify, unless they agree with you of course. Your lapdog prosecutors didn’t find anything there regarding the Clintons, did they? No, they didn’t.
What your lapdog Republican prosecutors–primarily Ken Starr, who was going to become–get this–dean of the law school at the far right-wing Pepperdine college in California–did find was a bit of hanky-panky going on, between two consenting adults. I read Ken Star’s soft-core porn novel when it was first released on the Internet in 1998, and was literally rolling on the floor laughing.
And, what was even more amusing, after Starr produced his soft-core porn novel (no allegations regarding Whitewater, Travelgate, Vince Foster, or anything else in the novel), the Republicans in the House who were leading the anti-Clinton impeachment efforts were–get this–Henry Hyde (you know, the Republican rep from IL who, at the ripe old age of 39, had a “juvenile indiscretion” that broke up a marriage), Helen Chenowith (you know, the Republican rep from Idaho who also broke up a marriage), Newt Gingrich (you know, the Republican speaker of the House, who had been through how many marriages?), Bob Barr (you know, the three-time loser in the marriage race, who was the primary sponsor of the Defense of Marriage Act) and, most interesting, Robert Livingston, the designated heir of Gingrich’s post as speaker of the House, who resigned in ignominy for reasons that have not yet come to light.
That’s only a short list of the number of Republicans who were tainted by Ken Starr’s soft-core porn novel. I understand that you really don’t want to address the issues relating to Star’s soft-core porn novel, so, let’s just say that you’ve been had.
But of course, puppet RajIan, you ignore and spin past the fact that Clinton lied under oath and deliberately obstructed a grand jury.
If Clinton’s story had only been about an affair, you might have a point. But unfortunately for leftist liars such as yourself, not only did he have an affair, he lied about it deliberately and repeatedly — both in public and private testimony.
raj/Ian/blah –what part of “you are not worthy of debate” didn’t you get the last time? Atone, sockpuppets.
Why it is so bloody hard for you to admit you were wrong in calling the hosts liars… I know you’ll feel better if you just atone.
#34: Hm, you’d think someone in the legal profession would have a problem with a president who commits perjury and obstruction of justice. But, hey, if it’s all right for lawyers to let other lawyers discriminate against gay clients, it must be all right for lawyers to let other lawyers commit perjury and obstruction of justice.
VdaK, there you go gettin’ all “moral” with us and ‘xpecting people to be fair… I think the sockpuppets were just pointing out that when their side lies, it’s ok. They’re just doing the Peoples’ Business.
When someone on the other side operates on the basis of faulty information, the sockpuppets can scream “liar”. Well, if it was PatrickGryph it would be “liar, liar pants on fire” –but you get the idea.
Yeah, expecting people to be fair and decent has always been my downfall.
Back on topic, Ace of Spades brings back another enduring image of Hurrican Katrina.
http://ace.mu.nu/archives/seanpennnawlins.jpg
Also, Doug Brinkley makes the point that New Orleans was broken long before Katrina hit:
http://sixers.nationalreview.com/post/?q=YWIyZDQ1ZTY0N2UzYWEyNzZlMDQ5YzRlNGE2MGI0YzU=
VdaK, I think the Democrats –like Saddam’s henchmen in Iraq– had hoped the waters would have flushed the evidence of NO’s shady, corrupt, inefficient past down the sewers… or out to sea.
Like with Saddam’s rule of terror, the record and truth will be the undoing of the Democrat MSM news-doctoring. Unfortunately, it won’t happen until the historians start writing and the glorified “newsreaders” return to the comestic station at the MSM networks.
NO was broke long before Katrina hit. And after the last tens of billions of federal tax dollars are finally spent there, it’ll still be broken, just as corrupt and America will be no better off.