from the "my point, exactly" dept.

Bits and bites:

The head of the New Orleans emergency operations, Terry Ebbert, has questioned when reinforcements will actually reach the increasingly lawless city.

"This is a national disgrace. Fema has been here three days, yet there is no command and control," Mr Ebbert said.

"We can send massive amounts of aid to tsunami victims, but we can't bail out the city of New Orleans."

One man, George Turner, who was still waiting to be evacuated, summed up much of the anger felt by the refugees.

"Why is it that the most powerful country on the face of the Earth takes so long to help so many sick and so many elderly people?" he asked.

"Why? That's all I want to ask President Bush."

And John Rhinehart, the administrator of a New Orleans hospital without power and water, said: "I'm beginning to wonder if the government is more concerned about the looting than people who are dying in these hospitals."

There is widespread agreement among commentators that somewhere there has been a breakdown in the system.

The Biloxi Sun Herald in Mississippi asked: "Why hasn't every able-bodied member of the armed forces in south Mississippi been pressed into service?"

And on Friday the Washington Post wrote: "Though experts had long predicted that the city, which sits below sea level and is surrounded by water, would face unprecedented devastation after an immense hurricane, they said problems were worsened by a late evacuation order and insufficient emergency shelter for as many as 100,000 people."

And then there's this idiot who can't see the forest for the trees:

http://worldnetdaily.com/news/article.asp?ARTICLE_ID=46106


And my response:

"I can't believe you blame the rest of the world for the American leadership's inability to be able to take care of its own.

Shame on you. Shame on your leaders.

It's a sad statement on a once great country that has lost its way.

And who pays? The poor of New Orleans and the rest of the Gulf Coast.

Home of the free, my ass."