in the midst of the great debacle over slow response and mismanagement of federal response with regards to hurrican katrina, i found some interesting facts that put this into perspective.

before i get much further into politics surround this issue, i’d like to mention that hurricane katrina, as has been said by countless others, was a complete and total tragedy, and my thoughts and prayers are on the recovery effort at all times. i’ve donated some to the american cross, and i’d like to try and find some time to help out at reunion arena (where’s there’s a few thousand NO refugees..), i just haven’t had the time yet. i hope the stories that stick with us are the ones of friendship and kindness, and the way that the general populace has lent out a helping hand to our south-coast neighbors in their time of need. with that being said, hopefully my political ranting doesn’t sound too petty ;).

if you’ve been following the news on the aftermath of katrina to any kind of frequency, you’d probably know by now that there is a huge public, media, and government outcry to figure out “what went wrong” with respect to the slow response and overly-beuracratic process of relief efforts in new orleans. if you lean to the left even a little, or are a conservative with good radar, you’ve probably also picked up a growing political attack on the bush administration as a whole for this mismanagement.
now, i’m not here to put mr. bush in any kind of positive light, if you know me at all you probably know i’m not a huge fan of our current president, but what i would like to clear up is one issue that has gotten alot of press and seems to be a good “lead-in” issue for liberals looking to score some political points at the expense of the bush administration.

apparently, before michael brown was actually appointed to the head of fema, he worked for international arabian horse association, and was actually let go! this fact has been drawing alot of attention by criticizers (mostly to the left, but some to the right too) for good reason, but most people are placing all the blame on bush for hiring this obviously under qualified leader. the one thing that i hadn’t heard mentioned until today was the fact that joe lieberman and 3 other democratic senators actually approved his assignment to fema in 42 minutes. you can’t even get a pizza in 42 minutes! when brown was recommended a 2nd time, this time for promotion to head of fema, they approved him without a hearing. yes, maybe bush was slightly negligent in appointing brown for the post, but it is the senates job to be analytical and thorough with candidates before they are appointed. you can bet your house that from now on fema candidates will take at least as long to interview as supreme court nominees now that we’ve actually had a grandiose scale disaster to suddenly make it important. you really have to love political opportunism.