(04-23-2016 12:32 AM)john01992 Wrote:  ah so it is going to be that kind of discussion.
for me, I actually understand that this forum is dominated by right wing nutjobs whose opinions/perspectives are completely out of whack. so if you perceive my not buying into your craziness as brilliance...I call it common sense. I find it painfully sad that for you, standards of brilliance = common sense.
now I assume you understand the concept of obtaining information from various sources. are your standards at the level of "two anonymous forum posters say X." if you want to say it is delusions of brilliance stating that is a bad idea, fine. But in reality that's not brilliance just common sense.
now if you want to understand what "delusions of brilliance" really is. Let's turn the tables. seeing how you seem to automatically accept what kap said...I'm going to go with your being the
you have once again stated "because I have personally done X." something you have done all the time. the "i'm a brilliant person" concept you created seems far more appropriate to someone doing exactly that where anything you are associated with automatically makes you the voice of reason and we are blessed with your presence.
it's funny that you are the only voice of reason to determine whether a management organization is actually a management organization (which it clearly is). isn't kap by his own admission a firefighter? isn't by your own admission FEMA is massive when it comes to disaster relief and has a lot of people? unless either of you two worked at some high levels of that agency, I seriously doubt either of you two knuckleheads are a figure of authority to say FEMA isn't a management organization.
it is more of you guys pulling the old "resort to the dumbest of trivial topics in order to declare yourself an expert in the entire field" trick.

I take it that this response means that you have never worked with FEMA, right? But you can't stand it that people who actually have disagree with you, so you launch your usual streak of ad hominems.

And for the record, I do not "automatically accept what kap said." Rather, he claims to have worked extensively with FEMA, which I believe because I have worked extensively with FEMA and my experience is consistent with his, and therefore I tend to accept his input. You claim that FEMA is clearly a management agency, apparently for no reason other than the appearance of the word "Management" in its agency name. Tell me, if FEMA is truly supposed to manage these emergencies, how many people do you think it takes to manage one such emergency, let alone cover the country as a whole? Now, how many employees does FEMA have? You can look this up pretty easily, I would tell you but you would simply reply with some sort of ad hominem, so you can do the work yourself. What other resources does FEMA have to support a management function? How many heavy trucks? How many bulldozers? How many boats? How many and what kinds of communications equipment? If FEMA has these things, where are they? How close to New Orleans? How long would it have taken to get them there (if they existed)? All you have to do is look at FEMA's actual structure, people, and resources (don't take my word, all of this information is available online) and you will very quickly see that they are unable to perform the mission that you have attributed to them.

As I said, and this would be a legitimate point to discuss if you were actually interested in useful conversation, we really do need an agency that is assigned the duty of actual management in such situations. My candidate has for some time been the National Guard, because they in fact have the resources to do the job. I would retask them from some sort of backup army reserve to a group that focused on domestic emergencies, anti-terror, and other aspects of homeland defense. I would modify their equipment and training, over time, to support those missions. That would be useful discussion to have, but you apparently have no interest in useful discussion.

Once again you have resorted to ad hominem attacks with no factual support. Face it, you don't have a clue what you are talking about here, and you have--fortunately or unfortunately, depending upon one's perspective--run into two people who are pretty much experts.

Continue the ad hominems if you wish. Just remember that all your attacks reveal is that you have a far higher opinion of me than I do of you. If you wish to engage in serious discussion, you could start by answering the questions I asked. Until then, I see no reason to give your comments any weight.

I have never seen a more appropriate usage of the term "rolling on the floor laughing"

Quote:I do not "automatically accept what kap said."

followed by:

Quote:two people who are pretty much experts.

in a thread where you are faulting others for thinking they are brilliant.

this is too freaking funny.

Quote:Once again you have resorted to ad hominem attacks with no factual support.

LOL the only factual support you have is your own personal undocumented stories. If you think my attempt to educate you on how I use common sense = ad hominem attacks, then you are validating the very quote I originally said about you.

ignoring the rest of your useless babble because at this point I don't see anything topping your last response. I will say this: it's a management agency, no ifs ands or buts about that. If you want to argue this stupid point further, fine I really don't care. this is a historical debate on the presidents and you have hijacked this thing way too much and I'm going to get back on topic. but on a side note I'm really not surprised that some crazy Bush fan boys decided to get into such an intense because they think it helps Bush's image.

(04-19-2016 05:04 PM)Kaplony Wrote:  From that bastion of right wing ideology UCLA

http://newsroom.ucla.edu/releases/FDR-s-...ssion-5409

Quote:Two UCLA economists say they have figured out why the Great Depression dragged on for almost 15 years, and they blame a suspect previously thought to be beyond reproach: President Franklin D. Roosevelt.

After scrutinizing Roosevelt's record for four years, Harold L. Cole and Lee E. Ohanian conclude in a new study that New Deal policies signed into law 71 years ago thwarted economic recovery for seven long years.

Quote:"President Roosevelt believed that excessive competition was responsible for the Depression by reducing prices and wages, and by extension reducing employment and demand for goods and services," said Cole, also a UCLA professor of economics. "So he came up with a recovery package that would be unimaginable today, allowing businesses in every industry to collude without the threat of antitrust prosecution and workers to demand salaries about 25 percent above where they ought to have been, given market forces. The economy was poised for a beautiful recovery, but that recovery was stalled by these misguided policies."

Quote:"High wages and high prices in an economic slump run contrary to everything we know about market forces in economic downturns," Ohanian said. "As we've seen in the past several years, salaries and prices fall when unemployment is high. By artificially inflating both, the New Deal policies short-circuited the market's self-correcting forces."

The policies were contained in the National Industrial Recovery Act (NIRA), which exempted industries from antitrust prosecution if they agreed to enter into collective bargaining agreements that significantly raised wages. Because protection from antitrust prosecution all but ensured higher prices for goods and services, a wide range of industries took the bait, Cole and Ohanian found. By 1934 more than 500 industries, which accounted for nearly 80 percent of private, non-agricultural employment, had entered into the collective bargaining agreements called for under NIRA.

Cole and Ohanian calculate that NIRA and its aftermath account for 60 percent of the weak recovery. Without the policies, they contend that the Depression would have ended in 1936 instead of the year when they believe the slump actually ended: 1943.

FDR also unconstitutionally confiscated(stole) gold from everyone and started the largest Ponzi scheme every invented...Social Security. I consider him a horrible President over all.

(04-22-2016 09:55 PM)john01992 Wrote:  

(04-20-2016 11:30 AM)BlazerFan11 Wrote:  

(04-20-2016 03:08 AM)john01992 Wrote:  The "Holocaust deniers" bit shows you are closed-minded and not even remotely capable of rational discussion. The fact that you, of all people, could actually call someone else a "partisan hack" shows that you are completely detached from reality. Your accusation of using talking points is hilariously hypocritical, as your post is filled with nothing but talking points. You are a dishonest coward with a tenuous grasp of the English language, and not worthy of my (or anyone else's) time.

So lemme get this straight. the guy who called me out for not responding to what he said with facts but a personal insult is now bowing out of the argument with his entire response being nothing but insults??? LOL.

your OP was nothing but an undocumented opinionated perspective that was obviously wrong, and political in its creation. you have two anti-Obama photo shops on your user page. one implying Obama is the biggest crook in presidential history. the other implying Obama doesn't give a s*** about the oath of office. playing the victim card when you are being called a partisan hack is hilarious. those pictures plus your ridiculous statements make it a statement of fact.

I never accused you of having talking points. I accused you of having demented viewpoints that are so out of whack with reality that anyone who believes said beliefs, attitudes, notions, concepts, etc. is not mentally fit to have a conversation on any historical, economic, or political topic.

for the record, and I can not stress this enough ==> your OP was not factual in anyway. it was purely an opinionated perspective on history that I provided a rebuttal to that included facts, specific details, logic, and reasoning. none of those traits were present in your OP and I even gave you the chance to defend yourself by asking for clarification and source material. you decided not to rise to my elevated standards yet you have the audacity to say I am the one being dishonest and a coward.

Oh my God. You are so incredibly blinded by your warped ideology, you can't even see that my sig has Republicans in it. This is amazing.

Your elevated standards? You've gotta be ******* kidding me. You have serious delusions of grandeur. You're a ******* clown. Your standards are somewhere between an amoeba and a cockroach.

But I'll feed you, little troll, bit by bit. Here's your first nugget:

Quote: In 1995, economist Robert Whaples of Wake Forest University published a survey of academic economists that asked them if they agreed with the statement, "Taken as a whole, government policies of the New Deal served to lengthen and deepen the Great Depression." Fifty-one percent disagreed, and 49 percent agreed.

http://money.usnews.com/money/business-e...-deal-work

Split right down the middle. Now admit that your Holocaust deniers line was incredibly ignorant, hyperbolic, and completely out-of-touch with reality, and I'll feed you a little more, you whiny little *****.

LOL at you still using insults. anyways I did a google on the author of that article and he has about 300 followers. obviously no one of note. then I googled the professor and I kid you not, the first link I clicked on him was a news article from a local newspaper where he is quoted talking about why Obama is a bad president. It's funny that all these guys who just so happen to take this view regarding the New Deal are the same kind who support libertarian philosophy while taking the position that an increase in the role of the govt is the devil.

Holocaust denial.

So you immediately discredit a guy's research just because he criticized Obama. And you actually have the audacity to call others "partisan hacks."

The survey was completed by randomly chosen members of the Economic History Association, which has recently had presidents who are economists at schools such as Oxford and Caltech.

http://eh.net/eha/about/2015-2016-eha-of...-trustees/

Please e-mail them and tell them that their members who disagreed with you are just like Holocaust deniers. Be sure to copy your e-mail and any responses you get here. We could all use (yet another) good laugh at your expense.

(04-23-2016 07:12 AM)john01992 Wrote:  ignoring the rest of your useless babble because at this point I don't see anything topping your last response. I will say this: it's a management agency, no ifs ands or buts about that. If you want to argue this stupid point further, fine I really don't care. this is a historical debate on the presidents and you have hijacked this thing way too much and I'm going to get back on topic. but on a side note I'm really not surprised that some crazy Bush fan boys decided to get into such an intense because they think it helps Bush's image.

It has the word "Management" in its title, but it is not a management agency because it cannot be a management agency because it lacks the resources to function as a management agency.

There's a simple way to resolve this objectively. Look up the number of employees FEMA has in total. I would give you the number but you do not accept facts, so look it up yourself. Similarly, find out what other resources FEMA has (this is harder to find than the headcount number, but doable). Now explain how an agency with those resources could function effectively as a management agency, keeping in mind that it is responsible for all 50 states plus territories. Short answer--it can't.

I don't expect you to haven interest in knowing the truth, so this is not posted for your benefit, but other people read this thread and if they are interested in understanding the issue then they might want to do a little research. Or they (but not you) can send me a private message and I will tell them.

(04-23-2016 12:33 AM)john01992 Wrote:  

(04-22-2016 11:14 PM)Kaplony Wrote:  

(04-22-2016 09:55 PM)john01992 Wrote:  

(04-22-2016 06:19 PM)Kaplony Wrote:  

(04-20-2016 02:51 AM)john01992 Wrote:  The fed is responsible for rebuilding. The state and local government were the ones who caused all the problems with their incompetence. The fed wasn't supposed to do what it had to do. That is totally a local issue. FEMA did do poorly was on the rebuilding, but the disaster after Katrina was on Nagin and Blanco.

the fed is responsible for preparation and relief. having supplies set up in the area so they can be easily transported into the affected zones and crews on standby close to the area is the appropriate response. and those were FEMA obligations. all three levels of govt screwed up. but holy hell it is ridiculous to absolve bush of blame here. especially when i've seen cons make far more ridiculous stretches to connect Obama to something but you are unwilling to connect this to bush. so you are not having an honest historical debate but a political debate.

By now I should be used to you speaking about stuff you do not know anything about and pulling stuff directly out of your ass, but this takes the cake. Since I am a whole lot more familiar with FEMA's disaster relief efforts allow me to educate you on how things work.

FEMA doesn't pre-position disaster supplies for natural disaster for a number of reasons.

1. You can't get them close enough to make an immediate difference to a specific area without putting them at risk of being affected and even neutralized by the same disaster.

2. The logistical nightmare that pre-positioning would cause would likely delay efforts, not enhance it. The amount of transport required to deliver supplies in an amount large enough to make a differences requires a staggering amount of trucks, transport aircraft, etc.....the vast majority of them making multiple trips. To pre-position supplies prior to a disaster would require that they start moving equipment weeks ahead of the actual disaster in order to have more than an insignificant, token amount on hand. Considering how much the track of your average hurricane can change in just 24 hours it's going to be wasted effort 9 out of 10 times.

3. Contrary to popular belief by you leftists during Katrina FEMA is not a first response agency. During training with FEMA we were flat out old that during a disaster we, meaning state and local authorities, should be prepared to be on our own for up to 120 hours after any event, especially one that affects a large scale area. During the October flooding here FEMA didn't arrive on scene in anything larger than an advance party until 3 days after the event. It was a week before they had their full complement of personnel on the ground.



While FEMA's performance during Katrina left a lot to be desired to be fair it was a royal cluster**** long before they arrived on scene because of the failures of the New Orleans and Louisiana emergency management agencies. Parishes surrounding New Orleans like St. Bernard were hit just as hard as the city itself but they were able to get a handle on their situation long before New Orleans did despite being pretty much neglected by the state.

It's funny that the one thing you decide is "pulling stuff directly out of your ass, but this takes the cake" is one of the most common sense concepts out there. any time there is a foreseeable natural event coming, shifting resources is done. you have to to be stupid off of your ass to not acknowledge that.

FEMA is a management organization and the management aspect of things was one of the biggest problems with the katrina fiasco

Exactly how much experience do you have with FEMA John? Either in an emergency situation or in an administrative role? I've done both and it's clear to anybody who has ever dealt with FEMA all you know about it is what you have read on Wikipedia. You want to see sheer terror.....walk in to the average local command post of a disaster and say "Hey Chief.....FEMA is here." The idea that an agency that is so encumbered by it's own bureaucracy it can barely move could do what you suggest, discounting of course the factors I listed above as to why they don't preposition disaster supplies in the first place, is right up there with gnomes and wizards in fairy-tale land.



First, where were they going to preposition these supplies where it would have made any difference? Remember that it wasn't until 55 hours before landfall that the first projection put the center of landfall anywhere close to New Orleans. Prior to that they had the center of the prediction cone between Pensacola and Tallahassee. They would have had to have found somewhere:

1. capable of off-loading and reloading the massive amounts of equipment

2. capable of securely storing the supplies until they could be deployed

3. wasn't in the path of the storm, acknowledging that when dealing with tropical systems it can be difficult to predict where it is going for sure even 24 hours out. God knows living here in hurricane country we were put on alert status numerous times to prepare to respond to the coast due to tropical systems only to be stood down when the storm shifted at the last minute and missed us.

Second off FEMA doesn't have it's own fleet of aircraft or ground transportation capable of pre-positioning supplies. It is dependent on the military and civilian companies for it's transport needs. Neither will have the necessary transportation assets just sitting idle waiting on a call from FEMA. It takes time to get the transportation resources in place to load, much less transport from wherever the supplies are to your mythical staging point.


Third, FEMA doesn't respond until they are requested by the state emergency management agency, just like the state emergency management doesn't deploy assets unless requested by the local emergency management agency. This is to ensure that you don't deploy limited assets to an area that doesn't need them leaving them available for the areas that do need them. I highly doubt that Blanco requested FEMA prior to landfall because she didn't request assistance from the Emergency Mutual Aid Compact (state level emergency mutual aid for everything from doctors to emergency services personnel and equipment to the national guard) until well into the incident.


It wasn't FEMA's finest hour, but it's hard to fault the Chef de Cuisine when the meal doesn't turn out great after the Sous-chef burned the fish and the Chef-de-partie didn't fully steam the rice. We have a saying in the fire service: The initial attack decides how the entire incident goes. If you get behind the incident from the get-go you are almost never going to get caught up. By the time Blanco requested FEMA New Orleans was beyond help. FEMA could have airlifted their entire disaster response capability in within hours and it wouldn't have made any difference. Blanco's delay in requested EMAC assistance meant that Louisiana had to get resources from other areas of the country. The team sent from my agency was already enroute to Mississippi before Louisiana even requested assistance. It wasn't until our third crew rotation (15 days) until we had personnel in Louisiana itself.

Now if you have any factual information to counter any of the above I welcome it. I get the feeling, however, that you are well out of your league in this matter. I've probably got more FEMA and EMAC deployments than the number of times you have ever uttered the acronym "FEMA".

the part you said regarding being en route to mississippi.

what's the deal with this:

In a September 26, 2005 hearing, former FEMA chief Michael Brown testified before a U.S. House subcommittee about FEMA's response. During that hearing, Representative Stephen Buyer (R-IN) inquired as to why President Bush's declaration of state of emergency of August 27 had not included the coastal parishes of Orleans, Jefferson, and Plaquemines.[26] (In fact, the declaration did not include any of Louisiana's coastal parishes; rather, they were included in the declaration dated August 29.[27]) Brown testified that this was because Louisiana Governor Blanco had not included those parishes in her initial request for aid, a decision that he found "shocking." After the hearing, Blanco released a copy of a letter dated August 28 which showed her requesting assistance for "all the southeastern parishes including the City of New Orleans" as well specifically naming 14 parishes including Jefferson, Orleans and Plaquemines.[28]

just generally curious since you mentioned it.

We were alerted to prepare for deployment to Mississippi or Alabama on the 26th, so evidently their requests came in either on the 26th or before.

I had deployed to Florida earlier in the year and missed out on the initial deployments. I was scheduled for our third deployment, the one that actually made it to Louisiana, but my Captain at the time suffered a back injury on a house fire and they didn't want to take the two senior people out of our company at the same time. I did, however, make bank pulling a ton of overtime filling in for the people who did deploy.

There is actually a substantive discussion to be had here about the topic of what kind of response capability should we maintain to respond to disasters and other emergencies.

John probably won't take part, because he's somehow convinced that FEMA is that agency. It's not, it's nothing more than a bunch of bean counters. Somehow, he gets the idea that my point is somehow trying to make Shrub look good. I think most of you who know me on here realize that I'm no fan of Shrub's. I've made it pretty clear that I much preferred Bill Clinton, for one.

My point is a different one. IMO we actually need some sort of disaster response capability, for events ranging from hurricanes to earthquakes to 9/11 to the PP blowout. FEMA is not that, that's not its mission, it isn't structured to perform that mission, it can't perform that mission. I think we should shift the focus of the National Guard away from being a sort of reserve army reserve to having civil defense and disaster response as its primary mission. One appeal, of many, is that it's essentially a standby organization, so we don't have to pay for the capability 24/7/365 (which is prohibitively expensive), rather only when it is needed. Another is that it could be provided the necessary equipment, or at least significant components, at local centers throughout the country, so a lot of the capability would already be on site when the need arose. You preposition stuff to deal with hurricanes in Louisiana, stuff to deal with earthquakes and wilderness fires in California, and so forth. If anyone here would be interested in serious discussion on that point, I would be interested in discussing. Maybe it's hijacking to discuss here, perhaps we need another thread.

The biggest problem I see is you will never get the states to relinquish control of the Guard, and for it to serve as you desire it will have to be a federal agency.


I have often felt that the biggest problem with FEMA is the fact that they are trying to do too much. I believe they should be more focused on training state and local emergency management and public safety personnel, and coordinating logistical and technical support during and after an emergency.

The second biggest problem FEMA has typically had is it's leadership. The vast majority of people in leadership positions within FEMA aren't leaders, they are either political appointees or bureaucrats. The best EMD personnel I have worked with have either been prior military or prior public safety. They were the best because they are used to being in command during chaotic situations, and that's exactly what a disaster is. I have to give Obama credit for appointing Craig Fugate as FEMA Administrator. Fugate did a great job as director of Florida EMD. He's a former firefighter/medic. He is probably the best qualified head of FEMA since General Becton.

(04-23-2016 05:06 PM)Kaplony Wrote:  The biggest problem I see is you will never get the states to relinquish control of the Guard, and for it to serve as you desire it will have to be a federal agency.
I have often felt that the biggest problem with FEMA is the fact that they are trying to do too much. I believe they should be more focused on training state and local emergency management and public safety personnel, and coordinating logistical and technical support during and after an emergency.
The second biggest problem FEMA has typically had is it's leadership. The vast majority of people in leadership positions within FEMA aren't leaders, they are either political appointees or bureaucrats. The best EMD personnel I have worked with have either been prior military or prior public safety. They were the best because they are used to being in command during chaotic situations, and that's exactly what a disaster is. I have to give Obama credit for appointing Craig Fugate as FEMA Administrator. Fugate did a great job as director of Florida EMD. He's a former firefighter/medic. He is probably the best qualified head of FEMA since General Becton.

I don't know that they try to do too much but rather that the public gets misled by the title and expects them to do too much. At least here on the Gulf Coast, when I've worked with them, they've been pretty clear that they're bean counters and not much more. They've been more concerned that we get our accounting codes correct on the reimbursement requests than anything else. I have worked with them to some extent in negotiating blanket contracts in advance, and they seem to do a pretty competent job there, although all their good work in that area pretty much went for naught in Katrina because all their contractors got knocked out. You may have a somewhat different perspective because you have been in a boots on the ground mode while I was more in a planning and coordination role.

Overall, I agree with your thoughts about their role--train local authorities, line up vendors with blanket contracts in advance, help with administration and funding after the fact. Those are the things they are equipped to do well.

(04-23-2016 06:27 AM)Owl 69/70/75 Wrote:  

(04-23-2016 12:32 AM)john01992 Wrote:  ah so it is going to be that kind of discussion.
for me, I actually understand that this forum is dominated by right wing nutjobs whose opinions/perspectives are completely out of whack. so if you perceive my not buying into your craziness as brilliance...I call it common sense. I find it painfully sad that for you, standards of brilliance = common sense.
now I assume you understand the concept of obtaining information from various sources. are your standards at the level of "two anonymous forum posters say X." if you want to say it is delusions of brilliance stating that is a bad idea, fine. But in reality that's not brilliance just common sense.
now if you want to understand what "delusions of brilliance" really is. Let's turn the tables. seeing how you seem to automatically accept what kap said...I'm going to go with your being the
you have once again stated "because I have personally done X." something you have done all the time. the "i'm a brilliant person" concept you created seems far more appropriate to someone doing exactly that where anything you are associated with automatically makes you the voice of reason and we are blessed with your presence.
it's funny that you are the only voice of reason to determine whether a management organization is actually a management organization (which it clearly is). isn't kap by his own admission a firefighter? isn't by your own admission FEMA is massive when it comes to disaster relief and has a lot of people? unless either of you two worked at some high levels of that agency, I seriously doubt either of you two knuckleheads are a figure of authority to say FEMA isn't a management organization.
it is more of you guys pulling the old "resort to the dumbest of trivial topics in order to declare yourself an expert in the entire field" trick.

I take it that this response means that you have never worked with FEMA, right? But you can't stand it that people who actually have disagree with you, so you launch your usual streak of ad hominems.

And for the record, I do not "automatically accept what kap said." Rather, he claims to have worked extensively with FEMA, which I believe because I have worked extensively with FEMA and my experience is consistent with his, and therefore I tend to accept his input. You claim that FEMA is clearly a management agency, apparently for no reason other than the appearance of the word "Management" in its agency name. Tell me, if FEMA is truly supposed to manage these emergencies, how many people do you think it takes to manage one such emergency, let alone cover the country as a whole? Now, how many employees does FEMA have? You can look this up pretty easily, I would tell you but you would simply reply with some sort of ad hominem, so you can do the work yourself. What other resources does FEMA have to support a management function? How many heavy trucks? How many bulldozers? How many boats? How many and what kinds of communications equipment? If FEMA has these things, where are they? How close to New Orleans? How long would it have taken to get them there (if they existed)? All you have to do is look at FEMA's actual structure, people, and resources (don't take my word, all of this information is available online) and you will very quickly see that they are unable to perform the mission that you have attributed to them.

As I said, and this would be a legitimate point to discuss if you were actually interested in useful conversation, we really do need an agency that is assigned the duty of actual management in such situations. My candidate has for some time been the National Guard, because they in fact have the resources to do the job. I would retask them from some sort of backup army reserve to a group that focused on domestic emergencies, anti-terror, and other aspects of homeland defense. I would modify their equipment and training, over time, to support those missions. That would be useful discussion to have, but you apparently have no interest in useful discussion.

Once again you have resorted to ad hominem attacks with no factual support. Face it, you don't have a clue what you are talking about here, and you have--fortunately or unfortunately, depending upon one's perspective--run into two people who are pretty much experts.

Continue the ad hominems if you wish. Just remember that all your attacks reveal is that you have a far higher opinion of me than I do of you. If you wish to engage in serious discussion, you could start by answering the questions I asked. Until then, I see no reason to give your comments any weight.

Actually the National Guard was in place just blocks from the Superdome, but Gov. Blanco wouldn't release them to help.

(04-23-2016 05:15 PM)Owl 69/70/75 Wrote:  

(04-23-2016 05:06 PM)Kaplony Wrote:  The biggest problem I see is you will never get the states to relinquish control of the Guard, and for it to serve as you desire it will have to be a federal agency.
I have often felt that the biggest problem with FEMA is the fact that they are trying to do too much. I believe they should be more focused on training state and local emergency management and public safety personnel, and coordinating logistical and technical support during and after an emergency.
The second biggest problem FEMA has typically had is it's leadership. The vast majority of people in leadership positions within FEMA aren't leaders, they are either political appointees or bureaucrats. The best EMD personnel I have worked with have either been prior military or prior public safety. They were the best because they are used to being in command during chaotic situations, and that's exactly what a disaster is. I have to give Obama credit for appointing Craig Fugate as FEMA Administrator. Fugate did a great job as director of Florida EMD. He's a former firefighter/medic. He is probably the best qualified head of FEMA since General Becton.

I don't know that they try to do too much but rather that the public gets misled by the title and expects them to do too much. At least here on the Gulf Coast, when I've worked with them, they've been pretty clear that they're bean counters and not much more. They've been more concerned that we get our accounting codes correct on the reimbursement requests than anything else. I have worked with them to some extent in negotiating blanket contracts in advance, and they seem to do a pretty competent job there, although all their good work in that area pretty much went for naught in Katrina because all their contractors got knocked out. You may have a somewhat different perspective because you have been in a boots on the ground mode while I was more in a planning and coordination role.

Overall, I agree with your thoughts about their role--train local authorities, line up vendors with blanket contracts in advance, help with administration and funding after the fact. Those are the things they are equipped to do well.

Yeah, I have seen FEMA come in and try to usurp control. On one incident I literally saw the FEMA rep pitch a hissy fit complete with "BUT I AM WITH THE FEDERAL GOVERNMENT!! YOU HAVE TO LISTEN TO ME!!" when he was informed he couldn't legally do something he wanted to do. Let me tell you it set the tone for one of my most frustrating deployments.

Honestly I preferred working with EMAC because we were dealing with people from fellow state and local EMDs so they tended to be easier to work with and they made more of an effort to make sure the field troops didn't have to deal with red tape. If we asked for something we typically got it and in short order. With FEMA I have literally seen task force leaders have to account for each and every can of spray paint they used to mark structures they searched. In a perfect world FEMA would just make sure they supplied whatever EMAC said they needed, let them handle the initial rescue response then come in and handle the recovery phase. THAT is something they do tend to do well.

(04-19-2016 07:29 AM)Crebman Wrote:  

(04-19-2016 02:55 AM)BlazerFan11 Wrote:  

(04-19-2016 12:34 AM)john01992 Wrote:  I really don't understand how you can say FDR mishandled the depression. his policies proved effective, many of which withstood the test of time and still functioned long after his time.

It was the weakest recovery on record, with unemployment spiking again after the second wave kicked in. The economy only started to recover after the SC threw out a big chunk of the New Deal as unconstitutional. The FDIC is insolvent. The SEC has failed to do pretty much everything it is supposed to do, then got caught destroying documents to hide their incompetence. Social Security is a black hole of tens of trillions in unfunded liabilities. And those are the headliners.

The only way they "function" is to keep bureaucrats fat and happy.

Would it be the black hole that it is if those in Washington from the 1970's to now hadn't thrown the money into the general fund so they could spend it?

Look - I'm no FDR apologist, but a lot of our problems are due to the gross incompetence of the Federal government and a large reason it's incompetent is because there are never negative consequences for being so. So if you want to say FDR sucked because he grew government, I'll buy that.

What I wish more than anything is we had some politicians that really went after the waste and mismanagement the pervades the Federal bureaucracy..........

Hell, anytime the Fed initiates a new program to fix some problem -the problem ALWAYS get worse - why, because those supposedly in place to fix it are out of a job if they do and actually gain more power and money if it gets worse. The incentives are backwards.

That might be a fair point, but isn't that the natural course of a government program? Politicians are always going to plunder any spare cash lying around. Why do you think they're now pushing for more control of retirement accounts? Because there are trillions there that they want to take (to plug the gaping holes they created by plundering SS). Maybe it wasn't FDR's fault that they did it decades later, but he was a smart guy and was probably aware that it would happen. Do you really think he cared? After all, the Keynesian mantra is "In the future, we're all dead." (I wonder how that applies to climate change policy.)