September 3, 2005

More Bush Administration CYA

Michael Chertoff, whom Bush appointed Secretary of Homeland Security after Bernie Kerik cratered, claimed today:

"We were prepared for one catastrophe [the hurricane]. The second catastrophe [the levee breaking], frankly, added a level of challenge that no one has seen before.”

No one except those insightful structural engineers Robert Plant and Jimmy Page, who pointed out on the fourth Led Zeppelin album (the bestselling nameless one from 1971 with "Stairway to Heaven" on it):

If it keeps on rainin’, levee’s goin’ to break,

If it keeps on rainin’, levee’s goin’ to break.

The name of the song is, by the way, "When the Levee Breaks."

Chertoff also claimed:

"That 'perfect storm' of a combination of catastrophes exceeded the foresight of the planners, and maybe anybody's foresight,"

Gosh, who could imagine that two disasters ever go together, like earthquake and fire in San Francisco in 1906 or earthquake and tsunami in the Indian Ocean in 2004?

As I noted in my new VDARE.com article, "Racial Realities and the New Orleans Nightmare," up a day early, the perfect storm wasn't Katrinia, it was the combination of fecklessness at all three levels of government and at the bottom of New Orleans society. Louisiana's Democrats have plenty to answer for, but Republican Presidents are supposed to provide adult supervision. New Orleans is always going to have bad government, but there are enough competent people in the U.S. to staff the Federal government properly.


My published articles are archived at iSteve.com -- Steve Sailer

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