Re: ADT Security Canada

[Robert L Bass <sales@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx>]

On Wed, 07 Sep 2005 20:16:23 -0400, J. Sloud
<jsloud@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx> wrote:

> On Wed, 07 Sep 2005 15:12:34 -0400, Robert L Bass
> <sales@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx> wrote:
>
>
> >
> >Same as New Orleans.  FEMA knew this could happen but they did
> >nothing to prepare.  The same was true of the mayor, the state
> >government and virtually everyone who *should* have been more
> >prepared.
>
>
> Accountability.  It should start here:
>
> Explaining Michael Brown
>
> The idea that someone like Michael Brown could possibly get a job as
> director of FEMA belongs in parody. We're talking about a guy who had
> spent a decade running horse shows before being fired for supervision
> failures in 2001, when Bush crony Joe Allbaugh was hired as FEMA
> director. Brown had never managed a natural disaster, but his
> experience as Allbaugh's old college roommate got him the deputy
> director's job. After Allbaugh left to consult for companies seeking
> contracts in Iraq, Brown took over the agency. When Katrina hit, Brown
> spent his time denying the facts about what was going on in New
> Orleans, in a transparent attempt to fool people into thinking the
> situation was under control. Now Brown's FEMA is expending lots of
> effort in blocking incoming aid. Even Michelle Malkin wants Brown
> fired.
>
> The difference between this and the stellar performance of James Lee
> Witt's FEMA during the Clinton administration is like night and day.
> When the manager of the Des Moines Water Works called local officials
> shortly after midnight on July 11, 1993 to say that flooding was going
> to shut down the city's water supply, FEMA set up 29 water
> distribution points in town by that evening. While floods rendered the
> Water Works inoperable for two and a half weeks, the city had all the
> water it needed. Five hours and three minutes after the Oklahoma city
> bombing -- an event that occurred with no warning whatsoever -- FEMA's
> advance team was on the scene to assess the damage, and James Lee Witt
> himself had arrived within 12 hours.
>
> Why did James Lee Witt and the disaster-relief commandos of the
> Clinton Administration suddenly give way to Michael Brown and the
> incompetents of the Bush Administration? It would seem that there
> would be plenty for an administration to gain in hiring effective
> disaster-relief people, given the political fallout that accompanies
> mismanaged disasters.
>
> A look at Kevin Drum's timeline suggests one answer. The
> Allbaugh/Brown regime saw FEMA chopped apart and folded into the
> Department of Homeland Security. One of the benefits of hiring
> clueless but loyal hacks to head government agencies is that they
> won't complain when you dismember their agencies or privatize
> essential functions in order to satisfy your anti-government
> preferences. If you actually hire somebody with genuine competence in
> doing things that the agency is supposed to do, you might get some
> angry complaints and defense of turf when mission-critical functions
> are compromised by your agenda.
>
> There's also a reason that lies deeper in Republican psychology.
> Republicans don't really want to see government succeed in doing
> things right. Sure, when they're running the country, they want to get
> the political advantages of success, if such advantages are to be had.
> But this desire is in tension with a desire to see government fail, to
> see it held up to public scorn for its incompetence and
> ineffectiveness. So they're not going to go all-out to hire the
> absolute best people, especially if their buddies just got fired from

You've got to stop making so much sense.  This is ASA.  Such
foolhardy attempts at explaining things with reason, intelligence
and understanding are doomed to failure.  :^)

--

Regards,
Robert L Bass

Bass Burglar Alarms
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