Turf wars
Seems like I might have to change my opinion of former FEMA Director Michael Brown, after all.
I'd suspected (and later had those suspicions confirmed) that Brownie would be the sole sacrificial lamb offered up to an angry public in the wake of Katrina, and that others directly accountable for FEMA's egregiously inept response to the disaster would escape unscathed. But as this article in today's Washington Post reveals, Mr. Brown may have been the only individual in Washington who recognized the agency's state of unpreparedness from the moment he took the head job three years ago, and the lone voice actually fighting to make FEMA the organization we expected it to be.
What is most shocking to me about WaPo's report is the evidence that FEMA was unable to execute its primary function because of petty turf wars and political infighting. This is all the more distressing considering the specific time period during which these bureaucratic squabbles took place - the post-9/11 era. During the subsequent months and years in which American citizens were being regulary promised that our security was the number one priority of the Administration and its Department of Homeland Security, our safety was instead being undermined by the worst sort of "office politics" perpetuated by Tom Ridge, Michael Chertoff, and, in a broad sense, the White House itself.
In other words, they were playing games with our very lives.
To me, this is just one additional sign of the two-faced ineptitude repeatedly demonstrated by those charged with the task of protecting our nation. It's another clear indication that while we're being reassured daily that "keeping Americans safe" is the primary mission of this Administration, we are in reality being left nakedly exposed to ever-growing danger by the petty partisanship and deplorable mismanagement rampant within the White House and other key government agencies.
And, again, I have to ask: Can we really afford three more years with these same individuals at the helm?
I'd suspected (and later had those suspicions confirmed) that Brownie would be the sole sacrificial lamb offered up to an angry public in the wake of Katrina, and that others directly accountable for FEMA's egregiously inept response to the disaster would escape unscathed. But as this article in today's Washington Post reveals, Mr. Brown may have been the only individual in Washington who recognized the agency's state of unpreparedness from the moment he took the head job three years ago, and the lone voice actually fighting to make FEMA the organization we expected it to be.
What is most shocking to me about WaPo's report is the evidence that FEMA was unable to execute its primary function because of petty turf wars and political infighting. This is all the more distressing considering the specific time period during which these bureaucratic squabbles took place - the post-9/11 era. During the subsequent months and years in which American citizens were being regulary promised that our security was the number one priority of the Administration and its Department of Homeland Security, our safety was instead being undermined by the worst sort of "office politics" perpetuated by Tom Ridge, Michael Chertoff, and, in a broad sense, the White House itself.
In other words, they were playing games with our very lives.
To me, this is just one additional sign of the two-faced ineptitude repeatedly demonstrated by those charged with the task of protecting our nation. It's another clear indication that while we're being reassured daily that "keeping Americans safe" is the primary mission of this Administration, we are in reality being left nakedly exposed to ever-growing danger by the petty partisanship and deplorable mismanagement rampant within the White House and other key government agencies.
And, again, I have to ask: Can we really afford three more years with these same individuals at the helm?
posted by Bob P @ 6:00 PM
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