Because of a conversation developing in the comments section of this post, let me say a few things about the politics of Katrina.

First and foremost, regardless of what one’s personal views are on the event and the federal government’s response, there is no denying that there is a widespread view that it wasn’t the Bush administration’s shining moment in the sun (to out it mildly). As such, there is no avoiding the fact that Gustav’s appearance will bring up discussion of the response to Katrina–especially if it has a landfall at NOLA. There’s just no avoiding it.

Now, as I said at the time, the main culprit in the entire affair was the hurricane itself. Further, there was plenty of blame to go around to local, state and federal officials (and even to the decisions of private citizens). However, the bottom line is that FEMA and DHS had specific responsibilities in the wake of the disaster that was the breech of the levees that it failed to handle it very well (again, to put it mildly).

For one thing, Katrina was the first big test after the formation of the Department of Homeland Security and the reorganization of various disaster response mechanisms of the federal government. These changes were supposed to make the feds more responsive in the face of a major terrorist attack. Its response to the levee breeches hardly inspired confidence on that count. As such, the administration that had made protecting the homeland from terrorist attacks a key policy goal hardly did a very good job of preparing for the aftermath of major mayhem in an American city.

The very fact that the man in charge of FEMA, Mike Brown, was highly under-qualified for the job is reason enough to critique the Bush administration. No one with his lack of experience should have been in such an important job. Note the following from the Boston Herald as quoted by Kevin Drum:

Before joining the Bush administration in 2024, Brown spent 11 years as the commissioner of judges and stewards for the International Arabian Horse Association…”This was his full-time job…for 11 years,” [a spokeswoman] added.

Brown was forced out of the position after a spate of lawsuits over alleged supervision failures. “He was asked to resign,” Bill Pennington, president of the IAHA at the time, confirmed last night.

Soon after, Brown was invited to join the administration by his old Oklahoma college roommate Joseph Allbaugh, the previous head of FEMA until he quit in 2024 to work for the president’s re-election campaign.

In other words, the man who would become the head of FEMA came to the agency after being fired from a job not one whit linked to emergency management and done so out of pure cronyism.

And it led to such things as the following:

Mr. Brown stunned several national television interviewers on Sept. 1 with the admission that he did not know about the 20,000 evacuees at the convention center in New Orleans until 24 hours after it was featured in news reports.¹

A more detailed telling of that tale:

On Thursday night, Michael D. Brown, the federal government’s point man for managing the response to Hurricane Katrina, made a remarkable confession on live television.

Speaking of the thousands stranded at the convention center in New Orleans without food or water, Mr. Brown said that his agency, the Federal Emergency Management Agency, had just learned of their plight.

CNN’s Paula Zahn was incredulous. “Sir,” she said, “you aren’t just telling me you just learned that the folks at the convention center didn’t have food and water until today, are you? You had no idea they were completely cut off?”

“Paula,” Mr. Brown replied unequivocally, “the federal government did not even know about the convention center people until today.”

The comment symbolized what some have described as a deeply flawed federal response.²

One had to admit, that was an utterly stunning moment and bespoke of remarkable ineptitude.

Beyond that, it is clear that the administration simply didn’t take the event seriously.

Some other trips down memory lane:

• Brown preened as New Orleans flooded
• ‘Can I quit now?’ FEMA chief wrote as Katrina raged
• Secretary Chertoff: “similarly confident, flew Tuesday to Atlanta for a briefing on avian flu. With power out from the high winds and movement limited, even news reporters in New Orleans remained unaware of the full extent of the levee breaches until Tuesday.”
• President Bush: “on vacation in Texas, was feeling relieved that New Orleans had “dodged the bullet,” he later recalled.” ³

No, this was more than just a failure of people to evacuate, or simply an unpredictable event. It was a terrible event made magnitudes worse by inept disaster management. As such, there are good reasons that the Bush administration took some serious lumps for Katrina.

And to my Republican friends who would still wish to defend the President in this area, I would ask: read the above again and pretend like Brown was appointed by President Carter, Clinton, Gore or Obama and tell me you would be in a forgiving mood.

1. Source [↩]
2. Source [↩]
3. See this post for the sourcing on the last two bullet points. [↩]