Hawaii Reporter
by Don Newman

09/13/05

With all the accusations and recriminations being bandied about concerning who is responsible for the fiasco that became the disaster in New Orleans, there is one element that isn't being examined at all that is at the heart of the matter. The poor results were directly attributable to one thing: bureaucracy. Whether it was the Louisiana Emergency Management Agency turning away the Red Cross trucks bound for the area filled with supplies, the failure of the mayor of New Orleans to foresee the disaster and get the people who had no other means of transportation on the available school buses and out of town as his own emergency plan called for, the governor of the state of Louisiana postponing in declaring a mandatory evacuation of the city and asking for National Guard help, or the president lollygagging an extra day on his ranch before he realized the seriousness of the situation, what they all have in common are a dependence and unrealistic expectation that bureaucracy will operate in fast and efficient manner...

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Informant: Thomas L. Knapp