My Pet Goat - The Sequel

Over the coming weeks and months the world will hear the tragic stories from the survivors and rescuers of the Katrina tragedy and of the "dereliction of duty" displayed by Bush and his top aides during the first few days of the disaster-into-chaos.

I ask all those living in the US: Do you feel safer since 9-11? Do you feel safer now that Homeland Security has been incorporated into the Constitution and FEMA was given sweeping powers to manage these types of events? And most importantly, would you trust these agencies to rescue YOU if your part of the country suffered a similar disaster?

I will be posting some of the stories that I think are reporting the truth and that I believe need to be distributed widely.

Gregg Mitchell's column in Editor and Publisher is one such article that puts many of the jigsaw puzzle pieces together regarding the dereliction of duty accurately and succintly.

My Pet Goat - The Sequel
This time, during a catastrophe, the president did not merely dither for seven minutes, but for three days, and his top advisors followed suit. Whilethe media has done a good job in portraying the overall failure ofleadership in this weeks hurricane's disaster, it has not focused enough on this deadly dereliction of duty.

By Greg Mitchell

(September 03, 2005) -- While a rising chorus in the press has taken the White House, FEMA and the Pentagon to task for performing miserably in their response to the human disaster on the Gulf Coast, few have focused on themost telling aspect of the entire failure. It's not just incompetence. It's a shameful lack of concern: The 9/11 "My Pet Goat" dithering on an administration-wide scale.

Simply stated, the president and his top advisers chose vacation over action.

While the media has done a good job in portraying the overall deadly failure of leadership, it has not focused enough on this deadly dereliction of duty.

President Bush, in his weekly radio address on Saturday, said: "In America, we do not abandon our fellow citizens in their hour of need." But Bush, and his top aides, quite frankly, did just that.

I was reminded of this today, seeing pictures of Vice President Dick Cheney finally showing up at the White House after riding out the storm-of-the-century in Wyoming. Perhaps he brought back with him a couple dozen trout to throw on the grill for the White House staffers.

His absence, and the president's performance during it, can only add to the rumors that Bush is clueless without the Big Guy at his side.

This follows Bush himself remaining on vacation for more than two days after the storm hit, despite acknowledging this was the worst disaster in the nation's history. He did take a trip during those days, not back to Washington but out to San Diego to deliver a political speech comparing his Iraq war to World War II. It got little play because nearly everyone else inthe country, beyond his inner circle, was focused on New Orleans instead.

What that trip did produce was a picture of Bush laughing with a country singer and strumming a guitar. But at least the president did start heading home late Wednesday. As he did, Secretary of State Condoleeza Rice was still enjoying her vacation in New York.

In fact, that night she enjoyed a few good yucks while attending the goofy Broadway play "Spamalot." Ironically, the Bush team's performance this week did indeed seem like something out of a Monty Python skit. Each, in his orher own way, took a bunch of "silly walks."

Condi also played tennis with Monica Seles and on Thursday went on a shoe-shopping spree on Fifth Avenue until a fellow customer yelled at her for not doing her job and bloggers exposed all of this. Then she hurriedly headed back to Washington. Whoops, we discovered she was overdue in getting a grip on offers to help that were pouring in from overseas governments and organizations.

Paging Andrew Card: Turns out he was Bush's Maine man.

And what of FEMA chief Michael Brown? He was so out-of-it that he didn't even know about 10,000 evacuees living and dying at the Convention Center, even after they had received wide TV coverage for a solid day.

The next day, the president greeted him with, "Brownie, you're doing a heck of a job." A medal is surely on the way.

At a press conference on Thursday, the fourth day of the disaster, with newspapers and TV reporting tens of thousands stranded at hospitals, homes and a highway overpass, Homeland Security chief Michael Cherotff was asked by a reporter if he thought only hundreds or maybe many more needed rescued. He replied:

"I'd be guessing. I mean, a thousand seems like a very large number, but we have already rescued several thousand. Hopefully, most people have gotten themselves onto roofs and have been picked up. But, as I said, rather than give you a guesstimate, I can tell you that as long as there is someone on a roof waving a flag, we're going to be sending a helicopter out there to get them."

Continued here.