« HarryTho on Hawaii's 'Very Senior Senators' | Main | Dr. Phil To Do Show on Natalee Holloway »
September 11, 2005
The Ghost Train of New Orleans
Topics:Here's a post from Little Green Footballs on the fact that Mayor Nagin not only kept his school buses parked, but also turned down the last train out of town that could have taken refuges - it left empty!: "Here's an example of how the mayor of a city threatened with total destruction should not act: The Steady Buildup to a City's Chaos."
Nagin did not tell everyone to leave immediately, because the regional plan called for the suburbs to empty out first, but he did urge residents in particularly low-lying areas to "start moving -- right now, as a matter of fact." He said the Superdome would be open as a shelter of last resort, but essentially he told tourists stranded in the Big Easy that they were out of luck.Be sure and read the entire WAPO article, and then ask yourself how could Blanco and Nagin, along with the Left and their allies in the MSM, have the nerve to accuse the federal government of not reacting appropriately."The only thing I can say to them is I hope they have a hotel room, and it's a least on the third floor and up," Nagin said. "Unfortunately, unless they can rent a car to get out of town, which I doubt they can at this point, they're probably in the position of riding the storm out."
In fact, while the last regularly scheduled train out of town had left a few hours earlier, Amtrak had decided to run a "dead-head" train that evening to move equipment out of the city. It was headed for high ground in Macomb, Miss., and it had room for several hundred passengers. "We offered the city the opportunity to take evacuees out of harm's way," said Amtrak spokesman Cliff Black. "The city declined."
So the ghost train left New Orleans at 8:30 p.m., with no passengers on board.
Posted by Richard at September 11, 2005 9:24 PM
I just read the report from the Washington Post. It was both excellent and comprehensive. I think that those who lay blame on the President for what went wrong are trying to score political points or trying to shift attention away from their own ineptness.
It seems that there were several weaknesses in this situation. I believe that Mayor Nagin must take responsibility for his own inept response to the situation. To have declined the offer of moving the evacuees from the city was nothing short of criminal. How many of the people who went to the Superdome for safety reasons could have been placed on those trains and been out of New Orleans when Katrina struck? Nagin was wrong to decline the offer. It is as if he simply did not believe the magnitude of the approaching hurricane.
Governor Blanco is not without blame because she seemed to have little understanding of what was required due to Federal/State/Local relations. With the inertia of Nagin to get the evacuation under way in time before the hurricane hit, Blanco was a little bit hog-tied. She could not move until Nagin had made the necessary request.
It seems to me that both Blanco and Nagin tried to cover their own mistakes by attempting to place the blame on the federal agency. The federal agency FEMA is not without blame. It seems to me that they did not have a proper plan in place, or at least a plan B just in case the levees were breached and help might end up being slow in arriving. It is as if these disaster planners never thought about thinking outside of the square or even discussed all of the possible scenarios that could happen in a worst case situation.
It seems to me that if anyone is to blame for things going wrong then that person, or persons is Mayor Nagin. His inertia and ineptness in handling the emergency situation prior to the hurricane striking stands out as the prime cause of the chaos that ensued. Governor Blanco is not without blame, but she was in the background trying to make sure that things were done, and for that reason she gets good marks, not a bad mark. Both Democrat leaders are wrong to blame George Bush for the things that went wrong. The responsibility for the disaster plan rested with the local authority. It was Nagin's failure to act that caused so much more of a disaster than was necessary.
Posted by: Maggie4Life 
at September 12, 2005 5:04 AM
Articles Related to :
