I am very surprised that one so well versed in the scientific method would argue with the point that a standard of reference is required for such a judgement.
Moreover you and others have focused your remarks only on the actions of the Federal Government, ignoring local government completely. This is particularly odd given the obvious and very relevant comparisons so readily available in recent very visible disasters in Florida and New York.
I believe all this constitures a very strong basis on which to question your objectivity and interest in the truth.
Oh, I'd be happy to talk about the incompetence (and corruption) of my local government, but most people wouldn't be interested. The feds are the one thing we all have in common.
As far as those recent disasters for comparison 1) I can recall no time that a major US city became almost completely (meaning all of it) uninhabitable and 2) you might find something other than you were expecting if you were to do some digging.
You do have a point in that nothing quite like this has happened in recent memory. Odd that little of the criticism here takes this into account. Doubly odd in that given the unique flooding risk confronting New Orleans, neither the City nor the State had done any planning to deal with it and that both ignored repeated warnings from Federal agencies as the storm approached, and even delayed giving federal authorities the legal right to intervene.
It will be interesting to learn more about the lake shore levees that failed, causing this disaster.. I seriously doubt that they were managed by the Federal Government or the Corps of Engineers, which is responsible only for navigable rivers. We shall see.
However you are dead wrong in neglecting to note the rather obvious differences in the leadership offered in both New York and Florida to the disasters that hit them, compared to the neglect, delay and fault-finding of the truly incompetent "leaders" of the City and State governments in response to the disaster in New Orleans.
Your error is further compounded in that you (and others) also ignore decades of incompetent and corrupt government in New Orleans and Louisiana, and somehow suppose that their lack or prepaeredness and ineptitude in meeting their responsibilities in this disaster were somehow not a part of the problem.
An you fail to recall that the Fed govt, so rich in pork , has, in recent years starved the Funding for already planned projects , such as the Pontchartrain levees . FEMA and COE were given all the studies.
You didnt recall that the "benchtop" study for an artificial distributary to nourish areas to the Barataria pass and at Pointe al Hatche were funded in 1999 and they were only demos.
The Fed govt has the ultimate responsibility for funding these large "navigable waters" projects (which includes Pontchartrain) in USCG environmental parlance a navigable water can be a tiny feeder stream to a larger waterway. Thats how the USCG got involved in all the stream remediation projects along the tribs of the Missouri.
Ill admit that there were some stupid things done by NO mayor and the gov. HOWEVER, that does not excuse the administration for gutting the only project that could have prevented all this destruction.
YET, we will have a shiny new bridge between mainland and 1 essentially unpopulated island in Alaska. ALL for the prince of pork.
These levees could have been beefed up, they were planned for a series of incremental fundings that beginning in 2002, would have prevented overtopping and breaching. The money was diverted in DC, not Baton Rouge. LSU and Tulane colleagues have been carping and preaching to a deaf FEMA and USCG that a disaster (actually worse than this) would befall the Crescent City and they were rebuffed .
Now, after loss of life, 2 wars (one of which had no purpose in hell) and major flooding, we will kick in badly needed money for rebuilding. This will strap our already wounded economy.
your turn.
I readily agree that the Civil Works Program of the Corps of Engineers is heavily politicized and includes a large number of pointless projects and pork. These are generally closely watched over by the respective Congressional delegations which frequently use legislation to earmark funds for specific projects that don't meet the Corps' plans, criteria, or priorities, and which often take funds better used for more important projects. This has been going on for many decades. Few states are as proficient as Louisiana in attracting such pork and in earmarking funds in often unrelated legislation. Former Louisiana Senator J. Bennet Johnson was a particularly prominent player in this game and I believe there is a new, but little used canal waterway named after him and constructed with Corps funds, taken from other more important projects, and earmarked by Louisiana Congressmen for this useless project.
The planning project you cite would not in any event have affected any Corps construction projects for at least five years, so it is quite irrelevant to the disaster at hand. One could instead ask why Louisians legislators otherwise so effective in attracting a very disproportionate share of such funds to their state and earmarking them to so many pointless projects, somehow over the last several decades overlooked the danger of flooding.
georgeob1 wrote:
It will be interesting to learn more about the lake shore levees that failed, causing this disaster.. I seriously doubt that they were managed by the Federal Government or the Corps of Engineers, which is responsible only for navigable rivers. We shall see.
No, they absolutely were run by the army corps or engineers. Upgrades were planned and proposed but there was no funding. They wouldn't have been completed in time for this storm, though.
Quote:However you are dead wrong in neglecting to note the rather obvious differences in the leadership offered in both New York and Florida to the disasters that hit them, compared to the neglect, delay and fault-finding of the truly incompetent "leaders" of the City and State governments in response to the disaster in New Orleans.
And again, if the entire city of Miami had washed away you might have a point.
Quote:Your error is further compounded in that you (and others) also ignore decades of incompetent and corrupt government in New Orleans and Louisiana, and somehow suppose that their lack or prepaeredness and ineptitude in meeting their responsibilities in this disaster were somehow not a part of the problem.
I'm not ignoring anything. I know nothing of Louisiana's or New Orleans' governments and so wouldn't be at liberty to take into account something I know nothing of.
But, you leap to conclusions about my position on the catastrophe and its response.
Both New York and Florida demonstrated strong, competent leadership at the state and local levels in the disasters they faced. While the details were different, the challenges to government were the same. The difference with Louisiana is quite obvious. OK by me if you wish to ignore it, but don't ask me or anyone to say that makes sense.
FreeDuck wrote:[]
I'm not ignoring anything. I know nothing of Louisiana's or New Orleans' governments and so wouldn't be at liberty to take into account something I know nothing of.
.
Then your admitted ignorance should be kept in mind as you make rather sweeping judgements.
I'm sorry to link this in more than one place, but you two are having a good conversation and I think this is pertinent.
http://www.factcheck.org/article344.html
Quote:The project most closely associated with preventing flooding in New Orleans was the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers' Hurricane Protection Project, which was "designed to protect residents between Lake Pontchartrain and the Missisippi River levee from surges in Lake Pontchartrain," according to a fact sheet from the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers. (The fact sheet is dated May 23, long before Katrina). The multi-decade project involved building new levees, enlarging existing levees, and updating other protections like floodwalls. It was scheduled to be completed in 2015.
Over at least the past several budget cycles, the Corps has received substantially less money than it requested for the Lake Pontchartrain project, even though Congress restored much of the money the President cut from the amount the Corps requested.
In fiscal year 2004, the Corps requested $11 million for the project. The President's budget allocated $3 million, and Congress furnished $5.5 million. Similarly, in fiscal 2005 the Corps requested $22.5 million, which the President cut to $3.9 million in his budget. Congress increased that to $5.5 million. "This was insufficient to fund new construction contracts," according to a U.S. Army Corps of Engineers' project fact sheet. The Corps reported that "seven new contracts are being delayed due to lack funds" [sic].
The President proposed $3 million for the project in the budget for fiscal 2006, which begins Oct. 1. "This will be insufficient to fund new construction projects," the fact sheet stated. It says the Corps "could spend $20 million if funds were provided." The Corps of Engineers goes on to say:
Army Corps of Engineers, May 23: In Orleans Parish, two major pump stations are threatened by hurricane storm surges. Major contracts need to be awarded to provide fronting protection for them. Also, several levees have settled and need to be raised to provide the design protection. The current funding shortfalls in fiscal year 2005 and fiscal year 2006 will prevent the Corps from addressing these pressing needs.
The Corps has seen cutbacks beyond those affecting just the Lake Pontchartrain project. The Corps oversees SELA, or the Southeast Louisiana Urban Flood Control project, which Congress authorized after six people died from flooding in May 1995. The Times-Picayune newspaper of New Orleans reported that, overall, the Corps had spent $430 million on flood control and hurricane prevention, with local governments offering more than $50 million toward the project. Nonetheless, "at least $250 million in crucial projects remained," the newspaper said.
In the past five years, the amount of money spent on all Corps construction projects in the New Orleans district has declined by 44 percent, according to the New Orleans CityBusiness newspaper, from $147 million in 2001 to $82 million in the current fiscal year, which ends Sept. 30.
Just to be clear, I'm presenting this because it is pertinent to the current conversation, not because I think the flooding is Bush's fault. Clearly the work would not have been completed before this storm, and wasn't designed to withstand a storm like this anyway.
georgeob1 wrote:
Then your admitted ignorance should be kept in mind as you make rather sweeping judgements.
What sweeping judgment did I make?
That the past and current behavior of local government in Louisiana was not a chief factor in htis disaster.
Well, you're right about that George, i'm just surprised you finally admitted it.
georgeob. THe J Bennett WAterway is the most recent name given to the former MISSISSIPPI TO SHREVEPORT BEND OF THE RED RIVER WATERWAY. This has been a waterway since the late 1800s and is a consequence of trying to remediate the "raft lake" conditions that are always popping up on the Miss. The J Bennett (tighter name) was NOT A NEW and unused waterway.
Besides the finishing of the J Bennett occured about 1 year before the 1995 compact that generated an ongoing budget to continuously (until we bit the bullet and built a THAMES style diversion) repair and build up the sea -side levees that protect most of NO. The The SE Louisiana Flood District Projects were summarily gutted and robbed by GW' desire to fight a war in Iraq. Besides robbing the cash, his minions tok a lot of the NAtional Guard for protracted undefined duty and left only about 4500 NAt Guards people and not much equipment.
The dirty secret is that this entire disaster was preventable and I want you to understand that its no "Well, the other guy was incompetent too" . Thats an argument that Ive stopped using in maybe fourth grade. This president stands on his own record. Hes a mess.
georgeob1 wrote:That the past and current behavior of local government in Louisiana was not a chief factor in htis disaster.
I think you are mistaken, but if you can quote me making such a statement I'll reconsider.
george, out loud saidQuote:That the past and current behavior of local government in Louisiana was not a chief factor in htis disaster.
Hee hee hee hee hee. Ive just engaged in "QuOTE MINING"
Y'ever been on the J Bennett? , I have, in a C-Dory Its a waterway that, because there were quite a few sunken paddlewheels and shallow Deadrise motor haulers, in the old raft lake sections, we used to calibrate geophysical equipment . The aluminum sludge barges would disagree that its "little used'
georgeob1 wrote:Tit for tat may be your game, but it is not mine.
then why in the world would you bring up clinton in the way you did ?
we were talking about presidents that have been more competent than gwb. and rather than point at one that you thought was more competent, you chose to point at clinton and go, "yeah, like this guy was any good..."
you could have easily said something positive about reagan and i would have agreed with you. all and all, ronnie was not too shabby.
and yes, of course, i thought clinton did a lot of good stuff. he also left office with a +/- 62% approval rating.
do you really think that gwb will leave office with a similar number ?
farmerman wrote:georgeob. THe J Bennett WAterway is the most recent name given to the former MISSISSIPPI TO SHREVEPORT BEND OF THE RED RIVER WATERWAY. This has been a waterway since the late 1800s and is a consequence of trying to remediate the "raft lake" conditions that are always popping up on the Miss. The J Bennett (tighter name) was NOT A NEW and unused waterway.
Besides the finishing of the J Bennett occured about 1 year before the 1995 compact that generated an ongoing budget to continuously (until we bit the bullet and built a THAMES style diversion) repair and build up the sea -side levees that protect most of NO. The The SE Louisiana Flood District Projects were summarily gutted and robbed by GW' desire to fight a war in Iraq. Besides robbing the cash, his minions tok a lot of the NAtional Guard for protracted undefined duty and left only about 4500 NAt Guards people and not much equipment.
The dirty secret is that this entire disaster was preventable and I want you to understand that its no "Well, the other guy was incompetent too" . Thats an argument that Ive stopped using in maybe fourth grade. This president stands on his own record. Hes a mess.
Well the Eire canal has been a commercial waterway for even longer but we don't see the Federal Government investing taxpayer dollars in it - a waterway whose economic value has long since vanished. There is a well-developed protocol for the economic analysis of such projects, one designed to balance the budget cost, potential economic benefit and environmental impact. The process is rather convoluted and very often intractable disagreement, mostly over environmental issues, occurs among Federal Agencies and self appointed interest groups who establish status as interveners in the EIS process. Canal traffic has been in decline for many years, and I would be very surprised if this one passed even the economioc test.
The planning & approval process for such projects takes 5-7 years. For a project such as you demand to have existed now, it would have had to have been initiated long before Bush took office.
I'm very skeptical about your expressed need for a Thames-style seawater control measure at the mouth of the Mississippi. There is little similarity in the hydrologic problems in the lower Mississippi and the Thames estuary. The threat to new Orleans is not so much from an ocean surge as it is from stormwater in the adjoining very low-lying region, replete with sheet flow regions, as was evident in the recent disaster. It was the Lake, not the river that flooded New Orleans.
If youve read my posts, I have consistently stated that the major threats to Nawlins were from the lake side AND inundation from a tidal surge at a weakened delta mass such as the Barataria Bay area.I had not stated that the river levees failed anywhere.
As far as where you refer to a project that "I demand" I have no ideas what youre talking about. Remember, you are the one who brought up the J Bennett Waterway and I responded that its history predated J Bennett Johnston and it is not as "unused" as youve claimed. Its a bargeway and pleasureboat way and a nature area that is rather heavily used by barges from Aluminum production facilities.(That whole area of the state is loaded with basic Aluminum metal production plants)
My referral to a THAMES style is a referral to the fact that we would have to build a large(SIMILARLY EXPENSIVE) granular centered levee with deep spread pile cores. Then they would have to be movable to add additional storm surge protection and be workable in such a dynamic compaction environment.(Ive always found engineers to be slow on uptake of the analogy end of an analysis)
Since youve been in the environmnetal business you know thatThe NEPA process can be short circuited in a project with critical H/S concerns. This aint a nuke plant or a runway or some other elective project. The surge gates and levees from the sea were needed to be built yesterday. They were funded yesterday, and much was already in the construction phase . The unfinished end, because of contract shortfalls and funding cuts was in the 17th St area.Ive heard that only about 80% of his area was stabilized and 20% was not even touched and this is where it blew out.
The real issue that you wont stipulate to is that GWB has diverted much funding from this needed project to "other" areas and still has signed one of the biggest pork infested Hiway projects over the protests of individuals from his own party.
So maybe you define competence as the ability to screw people without making it appear devious. We will now have to come up with billions for tidal gates , levees, sediment distributaries and rebuilding a large part of a city, for what? so GWB could send some more cash to fight his damned war?
As this thread concerns itself with the competence of the current administration, and FM has referred, justifiably, on several occasions to the Shrub's dirty little war, so comments on that topic are in order.
Pappy Bush has stated in print his reasons for not driving on to Baghdad to depose Hussein. He cites the enormous cost of an occupation, the likelihood of being enmired for a decade or more, the collapse of international support, the resentment of the Arab world, and the lack of a clear operational goal and an exit strategy. He could not have been more prophetic about just how badly the Shrub has bungled this.
Rumsfeld has shown himself to be no kind of military thinker. We were fed horseshit stories about shock and awe (against people who had been bombed to distraction in the first Gulf War, and who had been the target of Persian missiles in the previous war); we were told it would be over in a few weeks; we were told the people would strew flowers at the feet of our soldiers, that they'd welcome us with open arms. They completely ignored the soundest, most basic principle of operational planning--prepare for the worst and hope for the best. They ignored the Powell doctrine of deploying overwhelming force, one of the most brutal consequences of which was the horrible bleeding wound of a fight in An Nasirihya, where they cobbled together their BS hero story with Jessica Lynch, to divert attention from their inability to keep open communications and a supply route without constant bitter fighting. They practiced the most venal cronyism in their no-bid contracts to Halliburton and Bechtel. When gross irregularities and thinly-veiled theft have been uncovered, those corporations have simply blamed it on subcontractors, and the scam continues. They most vilely traded upon the good nature and willingness of young Americans to help others in need, and cynically exploited their feelings to castigate their critics and accuse them of a lack of patriotism, stopping just short of an accusation of treason. Well, i have an accusation for them. I accuse them of knowing lies, i accuse them of venal cronyism just short of theft in office, i accuse them of military incompetence resulting in the deaths of tens of thousands, i accuse them of an aristocratic indifference to the suffering of the Iraqis and the deaths of young Americans and Englishmen. You could not write fiction which would better describe how to so totally screw up a war; you could not better describe war for all the wrong reasons.
Very passionate. The shade of Emile Zola would be either impressed or offended by the plagarism.
Do you believe the Iraq war in both its costs and consequences (good and bad) will be judged by history in the same neighborhood as the Crimean war? the Boer War? the Gallipoli Campaign in 1915? All of WWI for that matter? the Japanese intervention in China? the French colonial wars in Syria and later Algeria? Vietnam? the Soviet intervention in Afghanistan? Saddam's wars against Iran and later Kuwait?
Get real.
I was attempting to suggest that many wars that appear justified in their cause, efficient in their execution, and beneficial in their effect at the time are judged very differently in the context of history. The converse is true as well - as the anectotal history of our own Civil War so amply demonstrates. I think you know this very well, and should consider the attendant possibilities in your evaluation of Iraq.
Despite all the sound and fury - much of it quite obviously politically motivated - there has been no evidence of cronyism in the award of contracts in the Middle East. Brown & Root held the preplaced support contract there for many years. Haliburton bought them several years ago and got the contract with it. The contract relationship preceeded the war. Similar reports oif scandal plagued Lincoln's administration throughout the Civil war, but history judges these events as inconsequential and trivial - as they were.
