Let's get this out of the way

[erikred]

According to Talking Points Memo, Newsweek recently said:

"Louisiana Gov. Kathleen Babineaux Blanco seemed uncertain and sluggish, hesitant to declare martial law or a state of emergency, which would have opened the door to more Pentagon help."

Let's nip this in the bud. Blanco proclaimed a state of emergency on August 26, when the hurricane was about to hit, to extend to September 25.

So, if you catch someone at the watercooler saying that the reason the Feds reacted slowly is because Blanco didn't declare a state of emergency, print out the declaration and slap them with it.

Comments

[ophymirage.livejournal.com]

This little slipup was actually published in both Newsweek and the WashPost, according to dailyKos. WashPost retracted the next day, Newsweek has not.

Wondering myself if Bush's promise to investigate 'what went wrong' is a candidate for Most Ironic Statement of 2005, or simply Most Unaware..

[tagryn]

I think there's going to be plenty of blame to go around, and Blanco's going to bear quite a bit of it. I watched her news conferences on the local NOLA TV broadcasts online in the days following the hurricane, and I'm surprised she hasn't had a nervous breakdown yet, so scattered was her delivery; she was clearly not up to providing leadership or direction, regardless of the timing of the emergency order.

There's also this:
http://www.nola.com/newslogs/breakingtp/index.ssf?/mtlogs/nola_Times-Picayune/archives/2005_09.html#076943
---
Nagin singled out Gov. Kathleen Blanco for criticism,
saying that the governor had asked for 24 hours to
think over a decision when time was a luxury that no
one, especially refugees, had.
"When the president and the governor got here, I said,
'Mr. President, Madame Governor, you two have to get
in synch. If you don't, more people are going to die."
Blanco and Bush met privately at his insistence, Nagin
said, after which Bush came out and told Nagin that he
had given Blanco two options, and she requested a full
day to decide.
"It would have been great if we could have walked off
Air Force One and told the world we had it all worked
out," Nagin said. "It didn't happen, and more people
died."
---

local politicians - played politics with levee management, corruption.
NOPD - Communications system fell apart, morale collaped, desertions & looting by some officers.
Nagin - didn't follow his own city's evacuation plan, left buses unused.
Blanco - indecisive, overwhelmed, lack of direction.
FEMA/Bush - late reacting to emergency, underfunding of FEMA.
All levels - failures to coordinate activities.

The only ones who might come out of this with good marks are the military, who seem to have gotten the evacs completed & order restored once they were finally sent in.

[ophymirage.livejournal.com]

there's multiple timeline diaries on dailyKos, if anyone is interested. amusingly, hir response above looks a lot like the republican talking points memo diaried here. sigh... the spin goes on..

[therobbergirl.livejournal.com]

I wonder if the confusion is stemming from the mayor's declaration of a mandatory evacuation on August 28. According to this article, Bush "personally appealed" to the governor to get a mandatory evacuation underway. The usage of such language (personally appealed) has been common in reporting of the actions (or inactions) of all bureaucrats involved. This language combined with the two dates may be contributing to the problem. When I heard of the state of emergency, for example, I assumed that a mandatory evacuation was simply one part of the state of emergency declaration. Had you not made your post, I wouldn't have read the declaration and would still think that the two elements (state of emergency, mandatory evacuation) came from the same declaration.