Paying the Price for Katrina and America’s Shadow Government

The Rutherford Institute ^ | 9/1/2005 | John W. Whitehead

[samm1148]

Was this piece written by Dale Gribble?

[planekT]

Looks like they might be from this. Doesn't say they funded the Superdome, but they are funding the transportation for the victims and will reimburse the costs to Harris County in regards to putting them in the Astrodome.

http://www.chron.com/cs/CDA/ssistory.mpl/topstory2/3332869

FEMA, which will reimburse Harris County for putting up the evacuees, is providing the buses for the journey to Houston, and refugees too frail to join the bus convoy will be transferred to the Astrodome in military aircraft.

[Just mythoughts]

The only shadow government I see in NO are looters inc.,

[COEXERJ145]

The amount of bullsh*t in this thread is enough to fill up all of Lake Pontratrain.

[OpusatFR]

Good grief. The whackjob right wingnuts are as damaging to this country with conspiracy crackpots as the left whackjob wingnuts at DU.

It just makes me sick to see what the political atmosphere in this country has become.

[american spirit]

Obviously, there's a lot of consternation and antagonism out there it all boils down to whether this country is going to survive as a "constitutional republic" or not. When we have illegals and their employers thumbing their noses at federal law, private property rights being shredded by the Supremes, executive orders being used to bypass Congress, legislation like the Patriot Act that many members of Congress never even read and was repudiated by dozens cities across the country then I say we're acting more like a banana republic than what we're supposed to be. Do you think this kind of nonsense bodes well for the future?

[combat_boots]

Uhhhhh.

I prefer to think there's a price being paid for this:

http://web.archive.org/web/20040919224458/http://southerndecadence.net/

Monday was supposed to be the start of the Southern Decadence Festival in New Orleans. That site is now down.

[theDentist]

At what point did I say anything about supporting the lib agenda of bigger gov't, levees, etc?

[tet68]

Funny, no mention of Bill Clinton turning down the same type of requests...

[George W. Bush]

There was a lot of talk back then that clinton might use FEMA to take over the country, after declaring a state of emergency. I thought at the time that there was something in this talk, because he certainly passed a lot of very suspicious presidential Executive Orders. If 9/11 had happened on clinton's watch, he probably would have used it to make himself President for Life.

Many days during the 2000 election year, I think about half of all FReepers seriously believed Clinton would refuse to leave office and use FEMA to do a fake takeover of the country so he could stay in office.

FEMA is really a bad program, far too secretive, far too powerful, far too susceptible to becoming an enemy of the people it is supposed to serve. Not surprising as it is part of the Carter legacy.

[George W. Bush]

Of particular interest is Part VI of Executive Order 12919. The head of any FEMA department or agency is empowered to establish an expertise-based National Defense Executive Reserve. Section 602 authorizes any head "to employ persons of outstanding experience and ability without compensation. ..."

You would have loved being here during the Clinton era. Every executive order was found and scrutinized word-by-word on multiple threads. Then Bush was elected, rescinded a few, and now yours is one of the first mentions of executive orders I've seen in years (except for a few minor ones Bush issued that didn't bother either the Right or Left).

FRegards.

[Cicero]

FEMA is not too dangerous as long as you have an ethical president like Bush in office. But there's a real chance that some day we will have another clinton--maybe even hillary--in the White House. Then it is dangerous.

But I still find it strange that this article never mentions clinton, although he certainly did a lot to gear FEMA up and make it more powerful.

[Cicero]

I don't blame Whitehead for being suspicious of FEMA. I just find it odd that he makes no mention of clinton whatever. Since he did quite a lot to fight clinton while he was in office, that seems extremely odd.

[kittymyrib]

LOL...he is whining that the funding was cut in JUNE 2005 for starting to plan for a Catagory 5 hurricane. What in the world could they have done since June except access another government expense account for travel, entertainment etc? Mayor Moon Landreau, Mary's father, left new pumps crated for FOUR YEARS in the '80s because they were fighting about funding. This author obviously knows NOTHING about NO politics and the tons of money thrown down this rathole.

[BlueNgold]

And to add to the trouble there is another problem the media isn't talking about...

Hidden in the shadows of all the stories about fuel problems and a shipping crisis is the fact that I can no longer get my regular ration of tinfoil...

Coincidence - I think not!

[jimfree]

... author of the award-winning Grasping for the Wind...

He's grasping at something.

[LanaTurnerOverdrive]

Blaming the Bush "cuts" for the slow relief effort are asinine. However....I have read the FEMA charter and everything this article claims about the real power and purpose of FEMA are true. I'm searching my storage space for the hard-copy that I have which includes the link....more to follow.

[jackbill]

What people fail to understand is that the "federal government" is made up of countless bureaucrats, just like those in the Postal Service. If you want to spend your life dependent on these people, good luck.

Question: How many FEMA people have been outside their air-conditioned offices today?

The only people that I've seen doing anything positive is - as usual - the Coast Guard, the National Guard and the rest of the military.

The rest of the government is just waiting to cash in on their terrific pensions. They aren't anxious to rock the boat.

[TradicalRC]

They hang with the black helicopter crowd.

LOL. I guess anyone who believes that there are black helicopters is a conspiracy theorist and therefore a kook. Next time try UFO crowd or Oliver Stone fan.

Fifth Edition of the Lexicon of FreeRepublic * * A helpful FR dictionary for newcomers * * http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/673536/posts

Scroll down to "black helicopter".

[Lancey Howard]

This is especially so in light of the fact that in June of this year the Bush Administration reduced funding for the New Orleans District of the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers by a record $71.2 million—an epic reduction for one fiscal year. As the Dolan Media news wire reported at the time, “The cuts mean major hurricane and flood protection projects will not be awarded to local engineering firms. Also, a study to determine ways to protect the region from a Category 5 hurricane has now been shelved.”

LMBO!!!
Is this simple bunghole John Whitehead implying that if these cuts had not been made about two months ago that New Orleans would not have been flooded??