Billmon over at Whiskey Bar notes how incredibly effective FEMA was during the triple-storm barrage of Charley, Frances, & Ivan unleashed on Florida in 2004.
[T]he Bush family is prepared to spend almost unlimited amounts of federal money on preventative measures — that is, on efforts to prevent them from losing an election.
It’s instructive, on that score, to compare the current response to Hurricane Katrina (in which the Three Stooges apparently have seized control of the Federal Emergency Management Agency in a bloodless coup) with the administration’s efforts on behalf of the voters of Florida following last year’s triple storms — Charley, Frances and Ivan.
True, the 2004 disasters didn’t completely take down a major metropolitan area by turning its urban center into a bowl of shit soup. But the difference in the federal goverment’s performance before, during and after those storms had passed is stlll rather striking. It appears there’s something special about years divisible by two — and particularly every other year divisible by two — that can inspire amazing feats of bureaucratic energy and competence, at least in large, populous swing states.
…and then he proceeds to show all of the local newspaper coverage of the fast reaction and the emergency preparedness that undoubtedly saved lives and ameliorated the damage… and interestingly enough turned a 47%-41% John Kerry state into a 49%-41% Bush state. It’s definitely worth a read.
It’s 2005. No elections coming for fourteen months. And poor black people in New Orleans don’t vote Republican anyway.
