2007-10-26
CA Wildfires v. Katrina: Aircraft Boondogle
People who blame poor govt response to Katrina on racism must explain poor govt response to the wildfires threatening the lives and property of rich honkies in California. Surely these people would blame racism for idle firefighting aircraft in the midst of these fires, if the threatened people were black.
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Certainly there were mistakes in the handling of the fires, as with any disaster that requires action from the government's bureaucracy. Overall you must admit that the wildfires were handled much better than Katrina.
Perhaps this is partially because of the criticism from Katrina. Perhaps it is because of mistakes from the deadly 2003 wildfire season. Fires happen in California every year. They know what to expect, so they are better prepared.
However, you saw your President there immediately vowing to protect rich people's homes. Did he learn his lesson, or does he really care more about the rich white folks?
I'll let you answer decide that for yourself.
As we know from Katrina, the FEMA response to previous Bush-era hurricanes in Florida were identical to Katrina, and the Katrina response to NOLA was faster than to white areas in Miss. and AL. Of course, the conditions were worse in NOLA, due to decades of local leaders (black and white) failing both to take care of their own home. Bush's response of course did suck, but a perfect response from him would have done little, and a competent husbandry from the local leaders over the years would have rendered a Bush response nearly irrelevant.
Bush's fly-over was a disgrace, one of many by all leaders involved, up there with the mayor hiding in the luxury hotel and the governor neglecting to follow federal disaster steps, even turning down Bush's perfunctory offer.
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