# A Pitting for the numerous armchair disaster managers skilled at bitching **URL:** \ **Category:** The BBQ Pit\ **Created:** [September 3, 2005, 7:08am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/a-pitting-for-the-numerous-armchair-disaster-managers-skilled-at-bitching/319875 "2005-09-03T07:08:02Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 17\ **Page:** 3
**Author:** ![Vooodooochile](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/v/0ea827/32.png) [@Vooodooochile](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Vooodooochile)\ **Post date:** [September 5, 2005, 10:54pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/a-pitting-for-the-numerous-armchair-disaster-managers-skilled-at-bitching/319875/41 "2005-09-05T22:54:26Z")
The only thing that bothers me about the bitching is the partison nature of half of it. Repubs tend to blame the governor and mayor most, dems of course then chime in about fema, homeland security, la la la. The lengths people will go to to excuse a fucking political party is fucking sick and twisted. There is no fucking onus of responsibility on any one agency or level of govt. It was a cluster fuck all the way up the line, repulsicans, demoscats all. ---
**Author:** ![KidCharlemagne](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/k/ed8c4c/32.png) [@KidCharlemagne](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/KidCharlemagne)\ **Post date:** [September 5, 2005, 11:04pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/a-pitting-for-the-numerous-armchair-disaster-managers-skilled-at-bitching/319875/42 "2005-09-05T23:04:29Z")
I don’t get it. FEMA makes it abundantly clear that states shouldn’t expect their contribution until 72 hours after the disaster happened. Whether or not that’s reasonable is another issue, but that’s a structural problem, not necessarily one of incompetence. I think people should quit placing blame until they know who is to blame. ---
**Author:** ![Hentor\_the\_Barbarian](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/h/8edcca/32.png) [@Hentor\_the\_Barbarian](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Hentor_the_Barbarian)\ **Post date:** [September 5, 2005, 11:38pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/a-pitting-for-the-numerous-armchair-disaster-managers-skilled-at-bitching/319875/43 "2005-09-05T23:38:21Z")
> [@KidCharlemagne](#): > > I don’t get it. FEMA makes it abundantly clear that states shouldn’t expect their contribution until 72 hours after the disaster happened. Whether or not that’s reasonable is another issue, but that’s a structural problem, not necessarily one of incompetence. > > I think people should quit placing blame until they know who is to blame. Wow! Fucking unbelievable. If this is how far things have fallen under Bush, our country is truly fucked. The FEMA of Clinton and James Lee Witt believed in providing support _prior_ to the landfall of a hurricane. I’d say the “wait three days” policy should be abandoned. Hopefully, a bipartisan investigation will find as much obviously wrong (if not criminally negligent) with this policy as the common layperson must. Of course, presuming that **KidCharlemagne** knows anything at all about what the fuck he is talking about. ---
**Author:** ![buns3000](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/c89c15/32.png) [@buns3000](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/buns3000)\ **Post date:** [September 6, 2005, 1:25am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/a-pitting-for-the-numerous-armchair-disaster-managers-skilled-at-bitching/319875/44 "2005-09-06T01:25:11Z")
All of the posts I’ve read in this and the many other threads about Katrina that cry foul over the critical response to the Bush administration’s handling of the disaster have been made by Dopers who’ve previously shown their conservative political leanings at this board. Why am I not surprised? ---
**Author:** ![danceswithcats](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/9e8a1a/32.png) [@danceswithcats](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/danceswithcats)\ **Post date:** [September 6, 2005, 3:17am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/a-pitting-for-the-numerous-armchair-disaster-managers-skilled-at-bitching/319875/45 "2005-09-06T03:17:46Z")
**Merijeek** and **rjung** : you are both cordially invited to go fuck yourselves, and then one another. Reason with you two is a waste of time. You see things in a black and white world where those who don’t support your viewpoint, and those who wait for answers are apologists. Please go away while the big folks are talking. To **DocCathode** : I don’t believe I’ve said anywhere on (or off) these boards that I’m satisfied with the response. That said, I’ve learned that one of the few products of anger is loss of objectivity. Along with others, I’m willing to wait for a bipartisan investigation into the matter. Shouting and beating my breast will accomplish naught at this juncture. When one makes up their mind about the causal factors surrounding an incident right away, why have any investigation at all? My initial feelings are that mistakes were made on many fronts. I’m no meteorologist, but when the storm began to gather strength on the gulf side of the Florida peninsula, people in LA and other gulf coastal states should have been paying better attention. Had the Mayor of NO and the Governor of LA gotten to work on the mandatory evacuation, many of those persons could have been removed from harm’s way _well_ in advance of the storm. Studies suggested they would get whacked and many thousands would be unable to evacuate on their own, Georges in 1998 confirmed those problems, and a hypothetical storm was tabletopped to do almost identically what Katrina did. Angry isn’t the right word **Doc**. I’m frustrated as part of the emergency response community when a plan goes in the crapper. Yet I’m willing to wait to learn how and why things didn’t work, and what steps we’re taking to avoid a repeat screwup. ---
**Author:** ![Scott\_Plaid](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/258eb7/32.png) [@Scott\_Plaid](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Scott_Plaid)\ **Post date:** [September 6, 2005, 3:29am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/a-pitting-for-the-numerous-armchair-disaster-managers-skilled-at-bitching/319875/46 "2005-09-06T03:29:09Z")
> [@danceswithcats](#): > > **Merijeek** and **rjung** : you are both cordially invited to go fuck yourselves, and then one another. Reason with you two is a waste of time. You see things in a black and white world where those who don’t support your viewpoint, and those who wait for answers are apologists. Please go away while the big folks are talking. Check again. You are projecting your own faults onto them. They have admitted that the local gov. screwed up. Sure, so they blame the feds too, but that is supported by the evidence, not by knee-jerk feelings. ---
**Author:** ![cornflakes](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/9d8465/32.png) [@cornflakes](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/cornflakes)\ **Post date:** [September 6, 2005, 4:47am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/a-pitting-for-the-numerous-armchair-disaster-managers-skilled-at-bitching/319875/47 "2005-09-06T04:47:30Z")
> [@danceswithcats](#): > > 1. Tabletop exercises (Hurricane Pam) are limited by the imagination of the participants. Mother Nature has many wildcards, and may choose to play a hand of them at once, including ones that weren’t thought of. > > 2. It is not possible to cover all bases at all times under all circumstances. A good plan may not be executable owing to unanticipated factors. (See #1) > > 3. People don’t do what you think they’ll do, what they’re urged to do or ordered to do. It’s a wonder we’re not extinct owing to our own stupidity. > > 4. Time is bendable. The amount of time to prevent a problem or escape a problem stretches infinitely, but shrinks to negative levels when one expects an outside agency to fix the now ugly situation. 1a, 2a. Reponse plans should be in place that take all expected contingincies into account. People have been arguing for years about how to repair New Orleans’ levees and have argued for decades about how to restore the wetlands. These were not unforseen problems. Any fool would know that any set of plans would need to address the very possible need to respond to a hurricane in a flooded New Orleans. 3a. People can’t follow orders until those orders are given and, from FEMA to the La. governor to the mayor, the people running the show clearly weren’t working together. Your “Hey, I’m only human” excuse is not valid for anyone who claims to be in management. 4a. Perhaps we can blame the decades-long marginalization of FEMA, perhaps we can blame disorganization within Louisiana, but the time to act came, and the various entities that should have been working together weren’t and seemed to still be caught up in denail and finger-pointing. Apparently, they didn’t even have a general idea, much less a plan. And if I may add another… 5. The time to develop a strategy for a complex or high-risk operation is before the operation begins. Once the show begins, you will be more than busy enough adjusting that plan. You won’t have time to reinvent the wheel. I may be wrong, but I don’t think that anyone has complained about the average responder, and I don’t give a shit who is president WRT this event. It does seem to me that the people in charge of mnaging this operation screwed the pooch. For what it’s worth, I don’t have a relevant background in emergency response and incident command. I just have a decades-long career in operations. I have also lived on the Gulf Coast since birth amd have seen politicians drummed out of office for far less than what was done here in the face of _their_ hurricanes. I am also volunteering in this one as well. See you in La. once they start letting civilians help out there. ---
**Author:** ![Zoe](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/z/a4c791/32.png) [@Zoe](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Zoe)\ **Post date:** [September 6, 2005, 6:22am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/a-pitting-for-the-numerous-armchair-disaster-managers-skilled-at-bitching/319875/48 "2005-09-06T06:22:23Z")
I have little doubt that failures came at all levels of the government. When a failure becomes glaring and obvious, there is no need to wait until all of the failures have been made, investigated, cataloged, labelled and filed away for future reference. I can see why some of you had rather not talk about the obvious. > [@](#): > > **KidCharlemagne** : …FEMA makes it abundantly clear that states shouldn’t expect their contribution until 72 hours after the disaster happened… Then it would seem reasonable that the Director of FEMA would _know_ about the thousands of people dying of thirst and lack of medications at the Convention Center in New Orleans **before Thursday** wouldn’t you? The rest of us had known for two days before he did! He told Paula Zahn on Thursday that he and the federal government just found out about it that day! For the love of God, couldn’t someone at FEMA at least be assigned to watch the news or read a newspaper? Neighborhood _children_ were collecting food and money to help those people and the Director of FEMA didn’t know about them for two more days??? > [@](#): > > **Psycho Pirate** : It feels good, pretending that you know more about how to handle a disaster than POTUS/FEMA. I don’t know how to handle a disaster. (That’s not my job. It’s theirs.) But at least I knew where one of the problems was two days before Brown and Bush did. I would have immediately ordered helicopters in to the Convention Center to drop water first, then food (military rations for a start), insulin, heart medications, and other medical supplies.) That would have gone on night and day even if it meant that I didn’t get to do my Air Force One fly over or my helicopter tour. And there have been books written that describe the scenario that actually happened. Federal funding that might have helped to prevent the disaster was drastically cut within the last year or two. Do we need to wait to criticize those who approved the cuts? Be sure to let us know when the government committee determines when and whom we should criticize. ---
**Author:** ![Merijeek](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/f05b48/32.png) [@Merijeek](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Merijeek)\ **Post date:** [September 6, 2005, 12:34pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/a-pitting-for-the-numerous-armchair-disaster-managers-skilled-at-bitching/319875/49 "2005-09-06T12:34:08Z")
> [@danceswithcats](#): > > **Merijeek** and **rjung** : you are both cordially invited to go fuck yourselves, and then one another. Reason with you two is a waste of time. You see things in a black and white world where those who don’t support your viewpoint, and those who wait for answers are apologists. Please go away while the big folks are talking. That’s hilarious. It really is. I’m pretty sure my ironometer just blew into little bitty bits. Of course, you never said I was wrong. I assume you’ve just flipped into “obfuscate but don’t lie, just in case you get called on it” mode. -Joe ---
**Author:** ![dre2xl](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/34f0e0/32.png) [@dre2xl](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/dre2xl)\ **Post date:** [September 6, 2005, 1:30pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/a-pitting-for-the-numerous-armchair-disaster-managers-skilled-at-bitching/319875/50 "2005-09-06T13:30:59Z")
I think _everyone_ got too used to the spate of so-called “false alarms” wherein monster hurricanes in the last couple of years magically weakened just before landfall. Evacuating is a pain, and it also builds up a “boy that cried wolf” mentality in people. Of course they should have evacuated 72 hours before the hurricane struck–but I can sort of see why they stalled. If the hurricane turned out to be no big deal, those forced to evacuate would have complained big time. Also, many people cannot grasp the difference between a Cat 2 and a Cat 4/5. They think, “winds are going to be XX miles per hour faster. Big deal.” A friend of mine had gotten a job in NO and moved there a week before the hurricane struck. He was supposed to start last Monday. He wanted to ride it out in his apartment. His mother pleaded otherwise, and at the last minute he decided to drive out with his computer & guitar (without telling anyone first–we were wondering where he was for several days). As it turned out, his apartment was completely submerged. He’s lost everything he owns, except for his computer & guitar, and he has no more job… his company is “closed until further notice”. Luckily he had a mother in another state to beg, cry, and scream for him to evacuate. Many, many of the victims probably would not have evacuated short of being dragged out by a soldier brandishing a gun, which rises obvious 4th Amendment issues. I hate it that everyone is Monday-morning quarterbacking all the decisions made. ---
**Author:** ![BMalion](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/e274bd/32.png) [@BMalion](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/BMalion)\ **Post date:** [September 6, 2005, 1:38pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/a-pitting-for-the-numerous-armchair-disaster-managers-skilled-at-bitching/319875/51 "2005-09-06T13:38:33Z")
> [@Pochacco](#): > > …See, I just assumed that the federal disaster response would be adequate, maybe even excellent. I figured that after a couple of days the news would be full of stories of heroic rescues and people thanking God and vowing to rebuild. That’s how natural disasters are supposed play out in the United States. However bad the tragedy, the emergency response is swift, people pitch in to help, and we come through it. > > I figure that Bush would get a few choice photo ops and get a (possibly deserved) bump in the polls and in political terms the whole nightmare would be beneficial to the President, distracting attention from Cindy Sheehan and the Rove / Plame affair. > > That’s not what happened. Instead the days wore on, and NOTHING seemed to be happening. People were stilll drowning in their attics and rotting at the Convention Center. This ISN’T how natural disasters are supposed to play out in the United States. There was clearly a massive fuck-up in progress. … > _snip_ > > …Politically, Katrina was a huge opportunity for Bush. If he had handled it well it would have concretely demonstrated the changes he has made since 9/11 have made the United States safer. Republicans could honestly have pointed to it as a vindication of a White House that has grown increasingly embattled over the last six months… > > _snip_ > > …So, no, it’s entirely appropriate that we pass judgement on our leaders. And appropriate that we do it quickly, while the memories of their actions are still fresh. Anything else is an abdication of our responsibilities as citizens. I just wanted to add that even though I’m a republican and a church-going guy, so that makes me obstensibly a supporter of the administration, this post sums up exactly how I feel. Well said, **Pochacco**. ---
**Author:** ![Clothahump](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/51bf81/32.png) [@Clothahump](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Clothahump)\ **Post date:** [September 6, 2005, 1:39pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/a-pitting-for-the-numerous-armchair-disaster-managers-skilled-at-bitching/319875/52 "2005-09-06T13:39:26Z")
Let me help make life a little easier for everyone: [Here’s who to blame](http://federalistpatriot.us/pub/05-36_Brief.htm) . Read the section under Culture. ---
**Author:** ![kidchameleon](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/k/898d66/32.png) [@kidchameleon](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/kidchameleon)\ **Post date:** [September 6, 2005, 3:13pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/a-pitting-for-the-numerous-armchair-disaster-managers-skilled-at-bitching/319875/53 "2005-09-06T15:13:47Z")
> [@GIGObuster](#): > > \*\*wring \*\* noticed also that you are really an idiot _I_ think **wring** just noticed your crappy grammar. ---
**Author:** ![Lakai](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/l/9de0a6/32.png) [@Lakai](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Lakai)\ **Post date:** [September 6, 2005, 4:12pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/a-pitting-for-the-numerous-armchair-disaster-managers-skilled-at-bitching/319875/54 "2005-09-06T16:12:48Z")
> [@danceswithcats](#): > > To **DocCathode** : I don’t believe I’ve said anywhere on (or off) these boards that I’m satisfied with the response. That said, I’ve learned that one of the few products of anger is loss of objectivity. Along with others, I’m willing to wait for a bipartisan investigation into the matter. Shouting and beating my breast will accomplish naught at this juncture. When one makes up their mind about the causal factors surrounding an incident right away, why have any investigation at all? > > [snip] > > Angry isn’t the right word **Doc**. I’m frustrated as part of the emergency response community when a plan goes in the crapper. Yet I’m willing to wait to learn how and why things didn’t work, and what steps we’re taking to avoid a repeat screwup. Without the shouting there would be no bipartisan investigation. Shouting is what makes our congressmen do things. We have to let them know that we are upset about certain things, because if we don’t then they will spend their time making sure that things that other people are upset about get taken cared of. All that the shouting does is indicate that there is a problem. An investigation will later show what that problem is. It looks as if you seem to think that all the angry people out there think that they have the solution and that they want the government to listen to **them** right away. While some might be ignorant enough to think that they have all the answers; no one is suggesting (except themselves) that we listen to them. What most (I hope) of the people who are shouting want, are answers and will continue to shout until they get answers. If this administration did not have a tendency to deny the public answers, then the public should wait till things settle down to shout. In this case however, the Bush Administration should be hounded all the way through, until they start talking. ---
**Author:** ![rjung](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/45deac/32.png) [@rjung](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/rjung)\ **Post date:** [September 6, 2005, 7:11pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/a-pitting-for-the-numerous-armchair-disaster-managers-skilled-at-bitching/319875/55 "2005-09-06T19:11:05Z")
Are we actually getting a bipartisan investigation? Or are we going to get one chaired by one of Bush’s close personal friends who will guarantee the results are whitewashed to deflect blame away from his Administration, like the 9/11 Commission was? ---
**Author:** ![GIGObuster](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/gigobuster/32/421_2.png) [@GIGObuster](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/GIGObuster)\ **Post date:** [September 6, 2005, 7:21pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/a-pitting-for-the-numerous-armchair-disaster-managers-skilled-at-bitching/319875/56 "2005-09-06T19:21:13Z")
> [@kidchameleon](#): > > _I_ think **wring** just noticed your crappy grammar. Better to have crappy grammar than crappy justifications to quiet dissent. And once again, that day I was in a hurry and sick; feeling better now. **Clothahump** , The complains are not for the disaster, but for the promised reaction to it, once again: all elements of government will have to be taken to task. One of those elements is the leadership that needed to appear in cases like this. [http://www.herald-sun.com/durham/4-643298.html](http://www.herald-sun.com/durham/4-643298.html) > [@](#): > > DURHAM – A trio of Duke University sophomores say they drove to New Orleans late last week, posed as journalists to slip inside the hurricane-soaked city twice, and evacuated seven people who weren’t receiving help from authorities. > > The group, led by South Carolina native Sonny Byrd, say they also managed to drive all the way to the New Orleans Convention Center, where they encountered scenes early Saturday evening that they say were disgraceful. > > “We found it absolutely incredible that the authorities had no way to get there for four or five days, that they didn’t go in and help these people, and we made it in a two-wheel-drive Hyundai,” said Hans Buder, who made the trip with his roommate Byrd and another student, David Hankla. > > … > > By about 7 p.m., the students made their way back to the boy on Magazine Street. He directed them to some people “who really needed to get out.” The resulting evacuation began at a house at the corner of Magazine and Peniston streets. > > The first group included three women and a man. The students climbed into the front seats of the four-door Hyundai, and the evacuees filled the back seat. They left the city and headed back to Baton Rouge. There they deposited the man at the LSU medical center and took the women to dinner. The women later found shelter with relatives, and the students got about four hours’ sleep inside the LSU chapel. > > At 6:30 a.m. Sunday, they made their second run into New Orleans, returning to the house at Magazine and Peniston streets. This time they picked up three men and headed back to Baton Rouge. Two of the men were the husbands of two of the women evacuated the night before. The students reunited them with their wives and put the two families on a bus for Texas. > > Buder is from Martha’s Vineyard, Mass.; Byrd is from Rock Hill, S.C.; and Hankla is from Washington, D.C. Yes, a reckless act, and they ignored chains of command. But I have seen elsewhere justifications on the inaction of the feds based on “following rules” or that “Bush would have been dammed if he had ignored the local authorities” Sorry, that excuse would barely fly if Republicans had no control of congress. It is good to keep in mind that old saying that “It’s easier to ask forgiveness than it is to get permission” when lives are on the line. In New Orleans, leadership was missing. And forgive me for the crappy grammar. 🙂 ---
**Author:** ![fessie](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/f/c37758/32.png) [@fessie](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/fessie)\ **Post date:** [September 7, 2005, 2:29am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/a-pitting-for-the-numerous-armchair-disaster-managers-skilled-at-bitching/319875/57 "2005-09-07T02:29:29Z")
Just wait 'til the fine folks at Hyundai get wind of this. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/a-pitting-for-the-numerous-armchair-disaster-managers-skilled-at-bitching/319875.md?page=2)