When a disaster strikes - terrorist or natural - there are 3 things that absolutely have to be the top priorities immediately:
- Safety - blanket the area with troops, not just to prevent looting, but to locate people that need help
- Food - get food and water to the victims
- Accomodations - identify places for people to go and ways to get them there and then do it.
This administration failed on all 3 counts. Here's what they could have done instead.
They should have put a 3 Military Generals in charge - one for each core issue. I may hate the Bush War, but I sure as hell know where to find someone that can take control and make things happen. And it's not Halliburton.
- Activate the National Guard nation-wide and move thousands of troops in 48 hours. Even without anything other than arms and walkie-talkies, they would have made a huge difference.
- Put Walmart under military control. It's the greatest distribution system in the world. They have fleets of trucks, food and water. In 24 hours, Walmart could have had truckloads of food and water in every devasted community.
- Line up housing and take control of thousands of buses. What is this non-sense about not having buses, waiting for cities to volunteer refuge centers, and letting the Houston fire marshall decide how many people can stay at the Astrodome? This is ridiculous. People should have been moved out to every large facility in the country in 24 hours.
Let's hope that before the next disaster the US actually has a functioning emergency management agency.
Gee. I wonder whether we'll see a firing or another promotion for the people in charge of this one. Seems to be done by the same people that brought us post-war Iraq.