# Are people being unreasonable in criticizing the government(s)response to Katrina? **URL:** \ **Category:** Great Debates\ **Created:** [September 2, 2005, 2:25am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/are-people-being-unreasonable-in-criticizing-the-government-s-response-to-katrina/319678 "2005-09-02T02:25:56Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 2
**Author:** ![Shagnasty](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/9dc877/32.png) [@Shagnasty](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Shagnasty)\ **Post date:** [September 2, 2005, 12:51pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/are-people-being-unreasonable-in-criticizing-the-government-s-response-to-katrina/319678/21 "2005-09-02T12:51:31Z")
Everbody has good points all around. However, I am most appalled by the lack of response from the Department of Homeland Security. It seems like they have no idea that they are supposed to be in charge. FEMA and all the other agencies are supposed to work for them. They are supposed to coordinate all the involved personnel in a crisis exactly like this one. They have completley and utterly failed. ---
**Author:** ![Eve](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/9e8a1a/32.png) [@Eve](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Eve)\ **Post date:** [September 2, 2005, 1:11pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/are-people-being-unreasonable-in-criticizing-the-government-s-response-to-katrina/319678/22 "2005-09-02T13:11:05Z")
I saw the head of FEMA being interviewed by the Attack Chipmonk on _Today_ this morning and he insisted that there _were_ National Guard on the ground in New Orleans, that food _was_ being supplied, that people _were_ being gotten out—then they cut to news footage (current? A day or two old? I dunno) of people begging for food, water, protection, escape. Who do we believe? Are we just not _shown_ footage of people being fed and rescued because it’s not “sexy” enough? Or is Mr. FEMA lying about what’s going on because he can’t excuse why it’s not going on? Here we are giving money to the Red Cross (the Red Doublecross, according to some), we’re volunteering our services and our apartments and clothes—but is that any _use_ at all when our own government seems incapable of pitching in? ---
**Author:** ![asterion](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/4da419/32.png) [@asterion](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/asterion)\ **Post date:** [September 2, 2005, 1:22pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/are-people-being-unreasonable-in-criticizing-the-government-s-response-to-katrina/319678/23 "2005-09-02T13:22:27Z")
> [@Snakescatlady](#): > > I’ll be interested to see if any heads roll at FEMA after this colossal clusterf&$k. This agency is funded by tax dollars to be prepared to handle emergency situations. They have so far shown nothing of the sort. Just what do they do? > > And Bush saying “don’t buy gas if you don’t need it.” Well, duh. And don’t forget to turn down the thermostat and wear a sweater. This is truly bizarre. Put food, water, medical supplies, and chemical toilets in the places your going to use as shelters. Hell, any Boy Scout could tell you that. Make sure that, if you call a mandatory evacuation, that you get the people to get the hell out. Sure, New Orleans is a big city, but you couldn’t put police and fire going door to door to get people out and take them to one of the shelters? Hopefully FEMA will get its ass handed to it. I don’t know how much to blame President Bush (or any president) for this–bueracracy is bueracracy and I get the feeling that they would’ve been this incompetent no matter who was in charge. ---
**Author:** ![Tapioca\_Dextrin](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/3d9bf3/32.png) [@Tapioca\_Dextrin](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Tapioca_Dextrin)\ **Post date:** [September 2, 2005, 1:38pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/are-people-being-unreasonable-in-criticizing-the-government-s-response-to-katrina/319678/24 "2005-09-02T13:38:09Z")
According to [some random guy](http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20050902/ap_on_go_pr_wh/bush_katrina) > [@](#): > > WASHINGTON (Reuters) - Relief efforts after Hurricane Katrina are “not acceptable,” If this guy thinks something is wrong with the way things are going, I think we are allowed to critisize the government’s response. ---
**Author:** ![slaphead](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/e9bcb4/32.png) [@slaphead](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/slaphead)\ **Post date:** [September 2, 2005, 2:06pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/are-people-being-unreasonable-in-criticizing-the-government-s-response-to-katrina/319678/25 "2005-09-02T14:06:49Z")
I think criticism is entirely warranted. Bear in mind that: [ol] [li]A major hurricane hitting New Orleans has been on the shortlist of ‘terrible things that are certain to happen in the near future’ for a long long time[/li][li]Having one of more levees fail was pretty much a given[/li][li]What has happened isn’t even a worst-case scenario. What would things be like if Katrina had stayed as a 5 and run straight over the city?[/li][/ol] This was a long-foreseen event that was not nearly as bad as it might have been, and still a complete catastrophe has ensued. A reasonable person might have assumed that somewhere there existed a big lever-arch file labelled “Hurricane hits New Orleans: Plan A” with fairly detailed, well worked-out list of things that needed doing, stuff that was available to do it with and who should do what. One might even posit the existence of additional volumes titled “Hurricane hits New Orleans while Mississippi is in flood: Plan B” , “Complete Levee Breach in New Orleans: Plan C” and so on… Instead it appears that there were some Post-Its with crayon scribbles. On top of that, there seem to be considerable difficulties reaching the city because no-one took account of the fact that in the event of a hurricane hit and/or river flood, being able to reach the city easily was important enough to maybe warrant building some extra-beefy elevated roadways there. And maybe locating a couple of above-sealevel warehouses full of food, water and medical supplies IN the city would have helped? In hindsight it’s all obvious, but I cannot believe professional planners couldn’t have worked this out beforehand, so why the fiasco? I know the best-laid plans go astray etc., but surely getting enough components in place before H-Hour and then improvising throughout the chain of command can’t be THAT hard. Instead everyone outside the area seems to have been running around like headless chickens tripping over each other while the city regresses at the rate of approximately one century per day. So criticism of the preparation, execution and leadership of the response seems well in order. As an aside - I appreciate that tropical heat and humidity don’t make physical exertion easy, but surely some of the able-bodied would have been able to walk/wade out of the city by now, leaving the rescue services to concentrate on the sick/elderly/injured and their carers? I know I can clock up 10 miles or more during an afternoon stroll by the Thames with my girlfriend, and over the course of a couple of days I would have thought I could get 15-20 miles out of the city even in the local conditions. Would that get me out of the immediate disaster area or are things so badly messed up relief isn’t even getting to the approximate area? ---
**Author:** ![Atrael](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/6a8cbe/32.png) [@Atrael](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Atrael)\ **Post date:** [September 2, 2005, 2:08pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/are-people-being-unreasonable-in-criticizing-the-government-s-response-to-katrina/319678/26 "2005-09-02T14:08:23Z")
As one of the other posters said above, I cannot possibly understand the thinking that is preventing them from just dropping pallets of food and water at different locations around the city. The statement of “too many chiefs, not enough indians” is exactly right. There should have been 5,000 troops on the ground there at the most 2 days after the hurricane hit to help restore order. Get the stuff there. I’m willing to be that if you get the food, water, and medical supplies to central locations in New Orleans, some smart guy on the ground would figure out how to distribute it. I do think that the sheer scope of the relief efforts is what is causing the slow response. The smart guys getting paid lots of money are trying to figure out every single problem, and plan it’s solution down to the nat’s ass, rather than just doing something fast. I was heartbroken to see a man interviewed that had been sitting on the bridge right next to the Astrodome state that some woman had just had her baby die the night before. That man could see the damn dome from where he was, the news media is obviousely able to get to that spot, so why could medical assistance get there? Why arn’t ambulance and fire crews from other places in the country being flown in to help? Load a shit load of ambulances on a c-5 and fly them to the airport. Even if they can’t handle everything, at least the people that are in danger of dying because they can’t get a hold of fairly common medicine like insuline would be able to get some help. I was willing to give them the benifit of the doubt for the first day or two. No way should this level of incompetance been going on for four damn days. ---
**Author:** ![plnnr](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/p/7ea924/32.png) [@plnnr](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/plnnr)\ **Post date:** [September 2, 2005, 2:25pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/are-people-being-unreasonable-in-criticizing-the-government-s-response-to-katrina/319678/27 "2005-09-02T14:25:12Z")
When you have people dying at the New Orleans convention center when photographers and news people are otherwise able to get there and document the event (see this morning’s Washington Post for an example - there’s a picture of an elderly man dead in a lawnchair just sitting there), any criticism of the government is warranted. ---
**Author:** ![Kent\_Clark](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/kent_clark/32/105_2.png) [@Kent\_Clark](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Kent_Clark)\ **Post date:** [September 2, 2005, 2:28pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/are-people-being-unreasonable-in-criticizing-the-government-s-response-to-katrina/319678/28 "2005-09-02T14:28:17Z")
> [@Eve](#): > > I saw the head of FEMA being interviewed by the Attack Chipmonk on _Today_ this morning and he insisted that there _were_ National Guard on the ground in New Orleans, that food _was_ being supplied, that people _were_ being gotten out—then they cut to news footage (current? A day or two old? I dunno) of people begging for food, water, protection, escape. Not to go entirely off-topic with this, but you should have seen the head of FEMA being interviewed on _Nightline_ last night. It looked like he got a prison initiation. When your best defense is “We didn’t know anyone was in the Convention Center. We thought everyone was in the Superdome.” there’s obviously a communications problem, which sits at the bottom of this whole mess. ---
**Author:** ![slaphead](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/e9bcb4/32.png) [@slaphead](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/slaphead)\ **Post date:** [September 2, 2005, 2:33pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/are-people-being-unreasonable-in-criticizing-the-government-s-response-to-katrina/319678/29 "2005-09-02T14:33:14Z")
> [@Tapioca Dextrin](#): > > According to [some random guy](http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20050902/ap_on_go_pr_wh/bush_katrina) > > If this guy thinks something is wrong with the way things are going, I think we are allowed to critisize the government’s response. I don’t know if it’s firefox, yahoo or just me but that link is seriously ODD! I get a different version of the story almost every time I reload it. Anyhow, from one version, which it took a dozen attempts to get a second time: > [@](#): > > Seeking to deflect rising criticism of the federal response, Michael Brown, director of the Federal Emergency Management Agency, asserted Friday: “In this catastrophic event, everything that we had pre-positioned and ready to go became overwhelmed immediately after the storm.” Or to paraphrase Mr Brown for most negative effect: “We were all ready to deal with the hurricane, butonly if it was small and everything went well” Nice work there, Mr Professional Disaster-Aftermath Preparer :rolleyes: And a big round of applause for all those other senior apparatchiks who have stepped up to the mark and helped by all pulling together as a team and using their experience, contacts and training to create order out of chaos. Oh, er, hang on… :mad: ---
**Author:** ![slaphead](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/e9bcb4/32.png) [@slaphead](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/slaphead)\ **Post date:** [September 2, 2005, 2:54pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/are-people-being-unreasonable-in-criticizing-the-government-s-response-to-katrina/319678/30 "2005-09-02T14:54:46Z")
> [@Atrael](#): > > … I cannot possibly understand the thinking that is preventing them from just dropping pallets of food and water at different locations around the city. > … > Get the stuff there. I’m willing to be that if you get the food, water, and medical supplies to central locations in New Orleans, some smart guy on the ground would figure out how to distribute it. > > … The smart guys getting paid lots of money are trying to figure out every single problem, and plan it’s solution down to the nat’s ass, rather than just doing something fast. … the news media is obviousely able to get to that spot, so why could medical assistance get there? Why arn’t ambulance and fire crews from other places in the country being flown in to help? Spot on - improvisation is vital in a situation like this, because you can’t plan for chaos, only anticipate it. I would bet if you just called for volunteers with military/fire/police experience, gave them a radio and a pallet of supplies per group and told them to just improvise their way into the city and help out where they could, it would make a huge difference. No-one’s asking for perfection, just some semblance of authority and coordination, and bottom up would work just as well as top-down. I’d think Joe Redneck the ex-cop or Mohammed Sharecropper the ex-marine would be able to improvise the last few miles if you could just get the supplies to them. ---
**Author:** ![Eve](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/9e8a1a/32.png) [@Eve](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Eve)\ **Post date:** [September 2, 2005, 2:55pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/are-people-being-unreasonable-in-criticizing-the-government-s-response-to-katrina/319678/31 "2005-09-02T14:55:47Z")
From the AP: > [@](#): > > WASHINGTON (AP) - A second Navy hospital ship, the USNS Mercy, was preparing to respond to the Gulf Coast Friday, as the Pentagon continued to send resources to the battered region. Lt. Gen. Steven Blum of the National Guard said 7,000 National Guardsmen arriving in Louisiana on Friday would be dedicated to restoring order in New Orleans. That’s very nice, but _today?_ Why the bloody hell wasn’t this done two or three days ago, when it was obvious to Ray Charles (who’s blind and _dead!_) that things were bad and getting worse? ---
**Author:** ![fessie](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/f/c37758/32.png) [@fessie](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/fessie)\ **Post date:** [September 2, 2005, 2:55pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/are-people-being-unreasonable-in-criticizing-the-government-s-response-to-katrina/319678/32 "2005-09-02T14:55:49Z")
Since everything’s pretty much been said already, I’ll just throw out one more point that occurred to me this a.m. – Do you realize none of these people have not had their coffee? Just think of the crazy caffeine headaches, on top of everything else. That alone would make me want to shoot at something. ---
**Author:** ![Eve](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/9e8a1a/32.png) [@Eve](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Eve)\ **Post date:** [September 2, 2005, 2:57pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/are-people-being-unreasonable-in-criticizing-the-government-s-response-to-katrina/319678/33 "2005-09-02T14:57:37Z")
> [@slaphead](#): > > I’d think Joe Redneck the ex-cop or Mohammed Sharecropper the ex-marine would be able to improvise the last few miles if you could just get the supplies to them. Oh, lordie, but then we’d have to see the reality show, “Redneck and Sharecropper—Disaster Heroes!” ---
**Author:** ![Arwin](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/51bf81/32.png) [@Arwin](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Arwin)\ **Post date:** [September 2, 2005, 2:59pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/are-people-being-unreasonable-in-criticizing-the-government-s-response-to-katrina/319678/34 "2005-09-02T14:59:12Z")
> [@plnnr](#): > > When you have people dying at the New Orleans convention center when photographers and news people are otherwise able to get there and document the event (see this morning’s Washington Post for an example - there’s a picture of an elderly man dead in a lawnchair just sitting there), any criticism of the government is warranted. I’ve read this before but is this true? The impression I’ve been getting is that most of the news you got the last few days was from reporters who went there before the storm, to report on the storm. Certainly one of the more active ones I’ve seen on Fox was there being blown away by Katrina when it hit, I saw him being knocked down by a gust of wind in earlier footage. Many of the roads and bridges have been washed away or are blocked by whole houses that washed upon them. There’s a lot of failure going on for sure, and the flooding could probably have been prevented, but let’s not exaggerate by saying you can just go ahead and drive up there. ---
**Author:** ![ratatoskK](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/ratatoskk/32/2987_2.png) [@ratatoskK](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/ratatoskK)\ **Post date:** [September 2, 2005, 3:02pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/are-people-being-unreasonable-in-criticizing-the-government-s-response-to-katrina/319678/35 "2005-09-02T15:02:39Z")
Today’s editorial in the NY Times, [The Man-Made Disaster](http://www.nytimes.com/2005/09/02/opinion/02fri1.html) – here is an excerpt > [@](#): > > The situation in New Orleans, which had seemed as bad as it could get, became considerably worse yesterday with reports of what seemed like a total breakdown of organized society. Americans who had been humbled by failures in Iraq saw that the authorities could not quickly cope with a natural disaster at home. People died for lack of water, medical care or timely rescues - particularly the old and the young - and victims were almost invariably poor and black. The city’s police chief spoke of rapes, beatings and marauding mobs. The pictures were equally heartbreaking and maddening. Disaster planners were well aware that New Orleans could be flooded by the combined effects of a hurricane and broken levees, yet somehow the government was unable to immediately rise to the occasion. > > Watching helplessly from afar, many citizens wondered whether rescue operations were hampered because almost one-third of the men and women of the Louisiana National Guard, and an even higher percentage of the Mississippi National Guard, were 7,000 miles away, fighting in Iraq. That’s an even bigger loss than the raw numbers suggest because many of these part-time soldiers had to leave behind their full-time jobs in police and fire departments or their jobs as paramedics. Regardless of whether they wear public safety uniforms in civilian life, the guardsmen in Iraq are a crucial resource sorely missed during these early days, when hours have literally meant the difference between evacuation and inundation, between civic order and chaos, between life and death. > > The gap is now belatedly being filled by units from other states, though without the local knowledge and training those Mississippi and Louisiana units could supply. The Pentagon is sending thousands of active-duty sailors and soldiers, including a fully staffed aircraft carrier, a hospital ship and some 3,000 Army troops for security and crowd control (even though federal law bars regular Army forces from domestic law enforcement, normally the province of the National Guard). ---
**Author:** ![ratatoskK](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/ratatoskk/32/2987_2.png) [@ratatoskK](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/ratatoskK)\ **Post date:** [September 2, 2005, 3:09pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/are-people-being-unreasonable-in-criticizing-the-government-s-response-to-katrina/319678/36 "2005-09-02T15:09:37Z")
> [@Eve](#): > > I saw the head of FEMA being interviewed by the Attack Chipmonk on _Today_ this morning and he insisted that there _were_ National Guard on the ground in New Orleans, that food _was_ being supplied, that people _were_ being gotten out—then they cut to news footage (current? A day or two old? I dunno) of people begging for food, water, protection, escape. I heard the head of Homeland Security (Chertoff) being interviewed on NPR radio yesterday afternoon (Thursday), and the interviewer kept telling the guy that there were at that moment thousands of people in the convention center with absolutely no water, food, etc., and they had been told to go there, and there were dead bodies on the ground, etc. And the Homeland Security guy kept insisting that they were sending help to everyone, basically trying to make it sound like everything was under control. The reporter kept insisting and asking when help would get to the convention center. Finally the Homeland Security guy said he had no heard anything about any people in the ocnvention center. He sounded like he practially didn’t believe the reporter that anyone was there. Thank God for a free press!!! ---
**Author:** ![Bosda\_Di\_Chi\_of\_Tricor](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/bosda_di_chi_of_tricor/32/16845_2.png) [@Bosda\_Di\_Chi\_of\_Tricor](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Bosda_Di_Chi_of_Tricor)\ **Post date:** [September 2, 2005, 3:12pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/are-people-being-unreasonable-in-criticizing-the-government-s-response-to-katrina/319678/37 "2005-09-02T15:12:01Z")
A quote from the Mayor of New Orleans. > [@](#): > > I am goddamned pissed. What the hell is that man in Washington doing? The only damned thing that man in the White House has done in this whole crisis is sending one great general down here who told people to get their damned asses in gear and stop screwing around. This is goddamned crazy. I got thousands of people down here who are starving and these jerks in Washington are sitting in their damned air conditioned offices and saying look at those poor black people, screw em. The (BLEEP) from FEMA is about as useful as fleas on a dog. That man needs to go work somewhere else. Homeland Security should be called White Homeland Security because they don’t care about our people." > > “Where the hell is FEMA. Where the hell are the busses? Every goddamned Greyhound bus in the country should be driving to New Orleans. And this (BLEEP) Hastert should just shut his mouth. Who the hell is this jerk to sit on his ass and tell the people of New Orleans that … well, why should we rebuild New Orleans. If his lily white country club friends were in peril, you’d bet your ass they’d have their butts in gear. But no. These jerks are doing TV interviews and spinning and mugging for the cameras. Bush goes on TV, like he cares about us poor folk down here, and says he’s doing all he can. Like accepting some guitar from some country singer while our people are drowning. I’m surprised he quit his brush clearing.” > > “I’ll tell you what. If it wasn’t for CNN and the other media, we’d all be dead. There are more reporters down here than FEMA. I’d give that Jeanne Meserve woman a damn medal because she’s done more for our people than damned FEMA. We need the army. We need the generals. We don’t need more stupid politicians coming down here to make speeches. Don’t come here unless you got troops or help with you. We don’t want you here.” :mad: :mad: ---
**Author:** ![asterion](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/4da419/32.png) [@asterion](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/asterion)\ **Post date:** [September 2, 2005, 3:12pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/are-people-being-unreasonable-in-criticizing-the-government-s-response-to-katrina/319678/38 "2005-09-02T15:12:53Z")
> [@Eve](#): > > From the AP: > > That’s very nice, but _today?_ Why the bloody hell wasn’t this done two or three days ago, when it was obvious to Ray Charles (who’s blind and _dead!_) that things were bad and getting worse? Besides, isn’t the _Mercy_ stationed in San Diego? I can see sending the _Comfort_ out of Baltimore, but they’ll never get the _Mercy_ there in time for her to do any good. ---
**Author:** ![Eve](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/9e8a1a/32.png) [@Eve](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Eve)\ **Post date:** [September 2, 2005, 3:18pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/are-people-being-unreasonable-in-criticizing-the-government-s-response-to-katrina/319678/39 "2005-09-02T15:18:01Z")
> [@](#): > > I am goddamned pissed. What the hell is that man in Washington doing? The only damned thing that man in the White House has done in this whole crisis is sending one great general down here who told people to get their damned asses in gear and stop screwing around. This is goddamned crazy. I got thousands of people down here who are starving and these jerks in Washington are sitting in their damned air conditioned offices and saying look at those poor black people, screw em. The (BLEEP) from FEMA is about as useful as fleas on a dog. That man needs to go work somewhere else. Homeland Security should be called White Homeland Security because they don’t care about our people." While I’m glad he’s tearing Washington a new one, I wish he wouldn’t make this a racial “evil white people don’t care if black people die” issue, which it is not. There are _plenty_ of white people stranded, starving and dying, in Louisiana, too. he’s only making things a lot worse by inventing an issue that doesn’t exist and pitting people against each other. ---
**Author:** ![ratatoskK](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/ratatoskk/32/2987_2.png) [@ratatoskK](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/ratatoskK)\ **Post date:** [September 2, 2005, 3:21pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/are-people-being-unreasonable-in-criticizing-the-government-s-response-to-katrina/319678/40 "2005-09-02T15:21:37Z")
Here’s a link to the [NPR interview with Chertoff (Sec. of Homeland Security)](http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=4828771) . Click on the link that says “Listen” just under the headline. It’s really worth listening to. The guy is in total denial. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/are-people-being-unreasonable-in-criticizing-the-government-s-response-to-katrina/319678.md?page=1) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/are-people-being-unreasonable-in-criticizing-the-government-s-response-to-katrina/319678.md?page=3)