An Anniversary With No Closure

I should point out that there was once a time when the Sunday News and Opinion section of the Philadelphia Inquirer (before the title of that section was changed to the vague moniker “Currents”) actually contained some interesting content that tended to make you read and think about topical issues and formulate a well-reasoned opinion (basically, it did what I try to do here, only they used to do it in a much more professional way).

Now, however, it has shrunk in half from 12 pages to about 6, and whatever editorial content may be found is lumped in with book reviews and, in the case of yesterday, a mea culpa of sorts from the paper’s sex writer Faye Flam (“yes, my column really is necessary, and no, I’m trying to actually educate as opposed to getting everyone all horny for no good reason” – I’m still waiting for an explanation for the “Kirk on Spock” soft core porn feature a little while back, though).

Unfortunately, the freepers had their say yesterday (as they must as far as the Inky is concerned) in the person of James Jay Carofano of the Heritage Foundation, and the topic was the one-year anniversary of Hurricane Katrina, which will officially be marked tomorrow.

As you can read here, Carofano, in a column he wrote last December, complained that the biggest problem made obvious by the disaster was that we needed to have “a robust, fully manned and fully equipped National Guard” as a result, but of course Washington isn’t supposed to “step in and tell communities what to do,” even if, in the case of Katrina, the scope of the disaster was so overwhelming that it was impossible for representatives of federal government agencies (assuming they were competent of course, which is another story) to do exactly that.

Well anyway, here is Carofano’s latest on the Katrina aftermath (I know there’s more important things to do at a time like this than dissect freeper nonsense, but it is necessary unfortunately).

What went right: Just folks helping folks

James Jay Carafano
is a senior research fellow at the Heritage Foundation

There are two ways to learn from disasters. One is to figure out what went wrong and try to fix it. The second is to profit from what went right and try to build on that.

In the wake of the flawed response to Hurricane Katrina, we have spent far too much time trying to fix blame, point fingers and hyperventilate over our failures than recognize the courage, determination and creativity of Americans who saved lives and property. That's a shame. Efforts that worked during Katrina are the ones most likely to help us to meet future disasters. Emulating them ought to be our priority.

Washington's response to Katrina has been predictable. Stung by the criticism of the slow response of the federal government, Congress and the administration have spent the last year scrutinizing the failures and vowing "never again." The result is that by the onset of this hurricane season Washington was on a war footing, primed to dump assistance on the first state that saw a rain squall touch its shores. As a result, the government now focuses on hurricane response out of proportion to all of its other missions.

Doesn’t right-wing snark just want to make you gag? In response, I’d like Carofano to read this passage from this story in yesterday’s Inquirer.

Michael Vaughn can't cry anymore. He did that every night after Hurricane Katrina washed away his home, after his insurance company gave him $3,585 for all he owned.

Now he just feels dazed. He looks at the sky fearfully when it rains. He has frequent headaches and high blood pressure and was just diagnosed with diabetes.

"I'm so stressed, I don't know if I'm coming or going sometimes. A typical day inside my head feels like a bomb went off in it," said Vaughn, 50, who said he takes so many medications that he has his own pharmacy. "I've been in the military, I've been through a divorce, I lost my daddy, but that's nothing compared to what I'm going through right now."

So yes, Carofano, I have a feeling that when Michael Vaughan sees a rain squall, it probably leads to another incident of depression. It certainly isn’t a humorous occasion for him, though apparently it is for you, which speaks volumes as far as I’m concerned of your lack of character.

After it was created, the Department of Homeland Security outlined 15 catastrophic kinds of disasters where the federal government needed to be able to provide major assistance. A major hurricane was only one. Yet since Katrina, federal agencies have spent almost as much time planning for a major hurricane as they have planning for the 14 others.

Aside from being hopelessly vague, I honestly don’t know what this sentence means. What other kinds of disasters is Carofano talking about? Why can’t he be more specific? He doesn’t tell us how much time was spent on the hurricane disaster scenario as opposed to others, though of course he’s trying to blame the federal government somehow.

Not only have we fixated on only one kind of disaster; we also have come to expect that in the wake of any catastrophe, Washington should be able to solve all of our problems. That's a terrible idea. In fact, the opposite is true - and Katrina proved it. The most rapid and effective responses were those of local communities.

Of course, it’s only a matter of time in these screeds before you get to the crux of the freeper argument that there shouldn’t be any federal government anyway and everything should be handled locally. The problem wasn’t that there was a federal government role. The problem is that that role was performed so badly.

I’m not saying only Dubya is at fault on this. I’m just saying that the command and control function for coordinating disaster relief in the Gulf Cost region should have been handled first and foremost out of Washington in concert with state and local efforts, and it plainly wasn’t.

One district in Louisiana, for example, had 40 operating shelters in the immediate aftermath of the storm. Tens of thousands of people were sheltered and fed by local groups. Local faith-based organizations responded quickly and effectively by providing facilities and resources and by mobilizing volunteers - all without government direction or assistance.

Specifics? Names? Dates? Quotes from the participants? Anything??

In fact, Louisiana residents generally rated the assistance provided by private sources such as nonprofit, community, and faith-based organizations substantially higher than they did assistance from federal, state and local governments and national organizations such as the Red Cross.

Probably because those are the first individuals people deal with in the event of a disaster, with the government working “behind the scenes” if its doing its job properly.

Local groups are and will always be the core of any effective response by a community to disasters large and small.

So says you.

The worst reaction to the aftermath of Katrina would be to adopt a more heavy-handed federalized approach that would undercut the very kinds of responses that proved the most effective.

I can absolutely guarantee Carofano and others that, as long as we’re under Republican rule, he will never have to worry about that (and it doesn’t make me happy to point that out).

What Washington should focus on is being ready and able to help state and local governments when their responders are overwhelmed. That means not stepping in and telling them what to do, but quickly providing the assistance they need when they really need it. Washington should worry about whether its own responders are ready to go, rather than funnel billions in grants back to state and local governments.

I’ll tell you what, Carofano. Instead of all this vague winger pontificating, I’m going to present a link to this speech by James Lee Witt who, as many people know, was FEMA director under Clinton. If you read his speech, you will get an understanding of his philosophy of “client relationships” between different levels of government meant to ensure swift response and resolution in the event of disasters exactly like Katrina and possibly (believe it or not) worse. You will quickly realize that this handy assignation of blame on your part (federal government is bad, but everything else is good) is totally childish.

The Coast Guard offers a case in point. The Coast Guard saved at least 33,000 lives during and after the storm. They were the first federal responders on the scene and without question the most effective. Yet Congress still underfunds the Coast Guard's modernization budget and sends its men and women into harm's way on ships and planes old enough to collect Social Security.

You went on about this last December also; as much as I’d like to blame Congress for that, I think part of the problem lies elsewhere (re: a very high-profile government agency doesn’t know how to do its math). According to this story...

The Pentagon’s own budget—for fiscal year 2006, the widely reported amount of $419 billion in discretionary budget authority—does not include the costs of nuclear warheads, which the Department of Energy produces; the defense-related activities of the Department of State, including “foreign military financing”; the past military services being compensated currently by benefits provided through the Department of Veterans Affairs; the defense-related activities of the Homeland Security Department, such as the Coast Guard’s defense activities; various defense-related activities of several other federal departments; or the current interest costs of previous, debt-financed military activities. Applying my rule of thumb, I estimate that the government’s total military-related outlays in fiscal year 2006 will be in the neighborhood of $840 billion—or, approximately a third of the total budget, as opposed to the 16 percent that one calculates by comparing the Pentagon’s $419 billion request to the administration’s total request, $2.57 trillion.

And I’m sure it will be as helpful to the Coast Guard for it to be under DHS as it has been for FEMA, right?

Likewise, the National Guard will always be essential to backing state and local governments in any large-scale catastrophe, as it did after Katrina. Yet the Guard doesn't have units properly organized and prepared for this mission.

And you know why, don’t you Carofano?

In addition, the war on terror has made heavy demands on its people and equipment.

No, not “the war on terror.” The actual, real live war in Iraq, which according to this poll, is not the same as the “war on terror” or “war on Islamo-fascism” (whatever the hell that is) as far as the majority of the people of this country are concerned.

Congress, however, has done nothing to ensure that these forces will be funded adequately so that they can respond to missions at home and abroad.

The American answer to Katrina was remarkable. A less effective response by the nation would have resulted in tens of thousands dead.

Oh, so “only” 1,836 people dead is somehow acceptable to you? The pictures of people being washed away from their homes and their cars, cars and houses in trees, people clinging for their lives before they drowned, waiting for hours and days for help before they finally succumbed is somehow just dandy as far as you’re concerned?

The “American answer” to Katrina, despite some admittedly heroic efforts by many people at the disaster scene, was sickeningly pathetic. It demonstrated that the Republican Party (those primarily at fault) has no interest whatsoever in governance or formulation and implementation of public policy, and the results were on display before the utter amazement and disgust of the whole world.

We should be building on the successes that saved lives - not simply throwing Washington's time and money at the problem.

And what would this screed be without a finishing touch of freeper boilerplate?

Here is my answer: a speech that columnist Mark Shields gave in 2002 that should be required reading for every citizen of our country, including you, Carofano.