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"We wanted soldiers, helicopters, food and water. They wanted to negotiate an organizational chart."--Denise Bottcher, Press Secretary for LA Gov. Kathleen Babineaux Blanco
"Who on earth could have known that Osama bin Laden wanted to attack us by flying planes into buildings? Any official who bothered to read the trellis of pre-9/11 intelligence briefs. Who on earth could have known that an American invasion of Iraq would spawn a brutal insurgency, terrorist recruiting boom and possible civil war? Any official who bothered to read the C.I.A.'s prewar reports.Who on earth could have known that New Orleans's sinking levees were at risk from a strong hurricane? Anybody who bothered to read the endless warnings over the years about the Big Easy's uneasy fishbowl." --Maureen Dowd
"I don't think anybody anticipated the breach of the levees." --George W. Bush 9/1/05
"They don't have a clue what's going on down here....They flew down here one time two days after the doggone event was over with TV cameras, AP reporters, all kind of goddamn - excuse my French everybody in America, but I am pissed." --New Orleans Mayor Nagin
Bush, who has been criticized, even by supporters, for the delayed response to the disaster, used his weekly radio address to put responsibility for the failure on lower levels of government. -- Washington Post, 9/3/05
"Before the supplies were pitched off the bridge today, people had to break into buildings in the area to try to find food and water for their families. There was not enough. This spurred many families to break into cars to try to escape the city. There was no police response to the auto thefts until the mob reached the rich area-Saulet Condos-once they tried to get cars from there. . . well then the whole swat teams began showing up with rifles pointed. Snipers got on the roof and told people to get back." --Michael Barnett, Interdictor
"Around 200 frightened Japanese, European, and American tourists, who had been thrown out of their hotel on Thursday morning, told how police fired over their heads as they attempted to get to buses to take them to safety." --Agence France Presse
"The medical condition is bad. We don't have any DMAT (Disaster Medical Assistance Team) support-we have been told they are all being used in Baton Rouge. Acadian Ambulance set up a triage area which somehow morphed into the city-wide evacuation center. It is located under an overpass on I-10. It is an amazing site. There are thousands of evacuees there. Some are uninjured and waiting to get on buses to go somewhere. Others are waiting hours for triage. Helicopters are landing in the grass at the rate of 2 - 3 per minute. They are full of evacuees. . . . Later today the unit was pulled from operations because conditions worsened. Once law enforcement improves, they'll resume rescue operations. Is this really America?" --Dr. Richard Bradley, UT Med School
"I'm 62 and I remember the riots in Watts, I remember the earth Quake in San Francisco, I remember a lot of things. I have never, ever seen anything as badly bungled and poorly handled as this situation in New Orleans. Where the hell is the water for these people. Why can't sandwiches be dropped to those people that are in that Super Dome down there...This is Thursday...This storm happened five days ago. It's a disgrace and don't think the world isn't watching." --Jack Cafferty, CNN
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 [Thursday], are you? You had no idea they were completely cut off?" "Paula," FEMA's head, Michael Brown replied unequivocally, "the federal government did not even know about the convention center people until today."
Asserting that the whole recovery operation had been "carried on the backs of the little guys for four goddamn days," Col. Terry Ebbert, director of homeland security for New Orleans said "the rest of the goddamn nation can't get us any resources for security."
"Someone described [GOP House Speaker Hasterts' comments that New Orleans "should be bulldozed" and it "doesn't make sense" to rebuild the city.] Had they been in the same place when the remarks were made, [Bill] Clinton said, 'I'm afraid I would have assaulted him.'" --Washington Post
"Don't tell me 40,000 people are coming here. They're not here. It's too doggone late. Now get off your asses and do something, and let's fix the biggest goddamn crisis in the history of this country." --Mayor C. Ray Nagin from his damaged Hyatt office newar the Superdome
"There is no question that we can see now with our own eyes the two Americas of which John Edwards began speaking a year and a half ago." --Tom Oliphant
"We cannot allow it to be said that the difference between those who lived and those who died" amounted to "nothing more than poverty, age or skin color" --Representative Elijah E. Cummings, Democrat of Maryland
"Everything just broke down for the folks who needed help the most. And when government cannot provide for those who need help the most, it makes everybody else feel less secure." --Clarence Page
"Screw this! They're lying! The President's lying! The rich fat cats that are drowning you will do it again and again and again. They lead you into imperialist wars for profit, they take away your schools and your hope and when you complain, they blame Blacks and Jews and immigrants. Then they push your kids under. I say, Kick'm in the ass and take your rightful share!" --Huey Long, 1927
"There is no such thing as a "natural" disaster. Hurricanes happen, but death comes from official neglect, from tax cuts for the rich that cut the heart out of public protection. The corpses in the street are victims of a class war in which only one side has a general. Where is our Huey Long?" --Greg Palast
"On Thursday morning, the president told Diane Sawyer that he hoped "people don't play politics during this period of time." Presumably that means that the photos of him wistfully surveying the Katrina damage from Air Force One won't be sold to campaign donors as the equivalent 9/11 photos were. Maybe he'll even call off the right-wing attack machine so it won't Swift-boat the Katrina survivors who emerge to ask tough questions as it has Cindy Sheehan and those New Jersey widows who had the gall to demand a formal 9/11 inquiry." --Frank Rich
"The president's declaration that "I don't think anyone anticipated the breach of the levees" has instantly achieved the notoriety of Condoleezza Rice's "I don't think anybody could have predicted that these people would take an airplane and slam it into the World Trade Center." The administration's complete obliviousness to the possibilities for energy failures, food and water deprivation, and civil disorder in a major city under siege needs only the Donald Rumsfeld punch line of "Stuff happens" for a coup de grâce." --Frank Rich
"Federal officials tried to wrest authority from Louisiana Gov. Kathleen Babineaux Blanco (D). Shortly before midnight Friday, the Bush administration sent her a proposed legal memorandum asking her to request a federal takeover of the evacuation of New Orleans.... The administration sought unified control over all local police and state National Guard units reporting to the governor. Louisiana officials rejected the request after talks throughout the night, concerned that such a move would be comparable to a federal declaration of martial law. Some officials in the state suspected a political motive behind the request. "Quite frankly, if they'd been able to pull off taking it away from the locals, they then could have blamed everything on the locals." --Washington Post
"Michael Chertoff, the homeland security secretary, was so oblivious to those on the lower decks that on Thursday he applauded the federal response to the still rampaging nightmare as "really exceptional." He told NPR that he had "not heard a report of thousands of people in the convention center who don't have food and water" - even though every television viewer in the country had been hearing of those 25,000 stranded refugees for at least a day. This Titanic syndrome, too, precisely echoes the post-9/11 wartime history of an administration that has rewarded the haves at home with economic goodies while leaving the have-nots to fight in Iraq without proper support in manpower or armor. Surely it's only a matter of time before Mr. Chertoff and the equally at sea FEMA director, Michael Brown (who also was among the last to hear about the convention center), are each awarded a Presidential Medal of Freedom in line with past architects of lethal administration calamity like George Tenet and Paul Bremer." --Frank Rich
"I'm satisfied with the response." --George W. Bush at NO Airport
"We're going to help these communities rebuild....Out of the rubbles of Trent Lott's house -- he's lost his entire house -- there's going to be a fantastic house. And I'm looking forward to sitting on the porch." (Laughter.) --Bush during Disaster Tour
"The storm surge most likely will topple our levee system" New Orleans Mayor Ray Nagin 8/28/05
"Bush slashed levee reinforcement funding "down to a trickle," and New Oreans is in a Democratic Party state." --Jerry Politex
"A better leader would have flown straight to the disaster zone and announced the immediate mobilization of every available resource." --Conservative NH Union Leader
"It looks like a lot of that place could be bulldozed." --GOP House Speaker Dennis Hastert
"An Act of God destroyed a wicked city." --Christianist Repent America director Michael Marcavage
"Take a close look at the people you see wandering, devastated, around New Orleans: they are predominantly black and poor." --NYT Columnist David Brooks
To help in rescue efforts, "donate cash [to Pat Robertson's] Operation Blessing." --FEMA website
"Since this administration won't acknowledge that global warming exists, the chances of leadership seem minimal." --NYT Editorial |
