WSJ
. A blow by blow account of the misplaced priorities in Congressional and Presidential decision making
since
9/11 that led to the disastrous federal response to Katrina.
There seems to have been a systematic failure of the entire Federal
emergency response apparatus. A failure to allocate funds to the
correct programs (and to smart preventative measures), chaotic chains
of command at the new HSD, inability to coordinate activities with
state and local levels, the list goes on. Very bad news for all of us.
This means that 50% of what it takes to fight terrorism (mitigation of
terrorist attacks on US locations) is demonstrably missing — lost in a
vast labyrinth of bureaucracy and misallocated funds. The status of the
other 50% needed to fight terrorism (prevention) is at least open to
debate (although I would argue through my analysis of Global Guerrilla
development that this effort has been a failure too).
We may be worse off today than
before
9/11 at fighting terrorism.
We certainly are worse at mitigating the impact of natural disasters. [John Robb's Weblog]