The Florida Governor's Hurricane Conference in Ft. Lauderdale is wrapping up today. In this thoroughly Halliburtonized age, where governments at all levels excel at nothing beyond writing large, no-strings-attached checks to
court favorites contractors, we find that the most energetic activity is the laying on of swag.
Flip for more...
The link, from today's Ft. Myers, FL,
News-Press:
Vendors woo attendees at storm summit
The gist: Hundreds of vendors compete for local government contracts for goods and services related to all aspects of hurricane perparation and management, and do so through grotesquely decadent spectacles of food and prizes.
Some of the more hair-raising passages from the piece:
So vendors are lavishing gifts, desserts and expensive prizes on the 3,400-plus people attending this week's Florida Governor's Hurricane Conference. Among the people here hawking their goods: former FEMA director turned consultant Michael Brown.
Hey, when Brownie's in town, you know fun times are sure to follow!
What's at stake? Billions of dollars in taxpayer-funded contracts from federal, state, county and local governments for services ranging from hauling away trash and downed trees to supplying emergency generators or even food for emergency crews.
Right, since government was long ago declared "the problem," we shouldn't be doing those things ourselves.
In a scene akin to a Midwest county fair exhibit barn, 250 vendors and groups doled out free goodies and collected fishbowls full of business cards, raffling off golf clubs, Hawaiian shirts, a laptop computer, Outback Steakhouse gift certificates and other valuables.
In the four years I earned a county paycheck, albeit as a low-level flunkie, I couldn't accept so much as a box of doughnuts offered by a grateful customer without running the risk of getting canned. Times have changed. Must be Clinton's fault.
Brownie is after his own slice of the pie:
On Thursday, Brown was working the OnScreen Technologies booth, touting the effectiveness of RediAlert, a $15,000 portable, lighted message road sign. Brown is now chief public-sector strategist for the Portland, Ore., sign company.
No word on what OnScreen is offering to grease the skids. Maybe some of those Margaritas about which Brownie was dreaming when he quit?
But Brownie says the Las Vegas-style perks aren't what really motivate dutiful public servants anyway:
"You can put out all the goodies in terms of food and drinks and whatever else. Most of the government employees walking through here are not really impressed by the razz-matazz," Brown said. "They're impressed by, 'That's going to make my job easier. That's going to make me better able to help the constituents I serve.'"
So I guess all those officials, transported and lodged at public expense, were rebuffing displays like these with Stoic resolve?
During a dessert buffet Wednesday night, government officials dipped and drizzled strawberries and marshmallows into triple-tiered vats of molten dark and white chocolate. The cascading "chocolate fountains" were provided by AshBritt Environmental, a Pompano Beach corporation specializing in storm debris removal.
This must be coincidence, then:
AshBritt Environmental has contracted with at least 38 Florida counties and cities, its brochure states, including Brevard and Sebastian.
If Daily Kos readers aren't aware of it already, Delware Dem's harrowing New Orleans photodiary should drive home the point quite well that nothing meaningful has occurred in the cleanup of New Orleans. People are still living in motels and mean trailers, vast square miles are littered with often-toxic debris as if the storm was just yesterday, and government officials at all levels seem capable of little more than the most brownian of motion. The circle of misery continues to expand as the national flood insurance program remains bankrupt and incapable of paying claims. Tens of thousands of homeowners take the shiv from private insurers who excel at winning wars of attrition over denying legitimate claims. Worse off still are those misfortunate enough to have an insurer who simply unplugged the phones and moved out in the middle of the night, leaving the homeowners with nothing but a pile of cancelled checks for a policy that was worthless.
Against this backdrop of despair, now so conveniently swept aside by foul-breathed bloviatings about "the blame game" and "Katrina fatigue," thousands of those entrusted with the public good partake in parties that would've made old Caligula himself nod appreciateively. The thought of grown adults jostling and grasping sweatily after prizes like a bunch of laughing children at a carnival makes me want to tear down City Hall with my bare hands. I guess public officials have devolved into something like those eyeless worms that live near volcanic vents on the ocean floors, living off of chemicals that would kill more advanced life. They have an unmatched instinctual ability to seek out swag and grease in an environment that would corrode the souls of actual humans, but can do little else.
Yes, I get a little hyberbolic when the topic concerns hurricane preparation and recovery. I'll freely admit it's the personal being the political. I had my own too-close brush with a severe storm, and saw first hand the boundless misery it caused, and is still causing to this day.
Once again, the United States of Dubya, 2006, proves that, no matter how bad you think it is, it really is worse. Insult will always be layered thickly on injury. I used to think that we would get to some kind of scandal nadir, because the grifting and grafting would work something like approaching the speed of light, where there simply wouldn't be enough energy and evil for the national situation to get worse. Looks like we need a whole new school of physics.