WASHINGTON, 7 September 2005 — Stung by accusations that this administration was unprepared for a disaster on the scope of Hurricane Katrina, President George W. Bush and the Congress promised separate investigations into the widely criticized federal response to Hurricane Katrina yesterday as Senate Democrats said the government’s share of relief and recovery may top $150 billion. “Bureaucracy is not going to stand in the way of getting the job done for the people,” Bush said after meeting at the White House with members of Congress on storm recovery efforts, their first since the hurricane swept along the Gulf Coast and left much of New Orleans under several feet of floodwaters a week ago.“Governments at all levels failed,” Republican Sen. Susan Collins, said at the Capitol. “It is difficult to understand the lack of preparedness and the ineffective initial response to a disaster that had been predicted for years, and for which specific, dire warnings had been given for days.”Congress formally returned from a five-week summer break yesterday, and many lawmakers said the hurricane would take top billing on their agendas in the coming weeks.The response “needs to be first and foremost,” said Majority Leader Bill Frist although he, like Bush, also stressed the Republican goal of confirming John Roberts as the next chief justice by the time the Supreme Court convenes on Oct. 3.Meanwhile, Federal Emergency Management Agency, FEMA, Director Michael Brown appears to have been singled out by critics as a scapegoat for his apparent inability to cope with the worst natural disaster in US history.
Brown initially admitted underestimating the impact of Katrina, and as the storm worsened he appeared to blame the storm victims by saying New Orleans residents had not complied with the mandatory evacuation order.
Over the weekend, facing increasingly harsh calls for his resignation, he told reporters: “People want to lash out at me, lash out at FEMA. I think that’s just fine.”
“That’s what happens when you have political appointees who frequently are not qualified. These poor choices by the president will eventually catch up with him, such as this dud, Brown, as head of FEMA,” said retired Army Col. Duquesne “Duke” Wolf, a resident of Niceville, Florida, currently visiting Virginia.
As communications to the region remain all but non-existent, BellSouth announced yesterday it would cost about $600 million to repair the damage from Katrina and said it could take four to six months to restore telephone service in the hardest-hit areas of New Orleans and the Gulf Coast of Mississippi.
Throughout the United States, the ramifications of Hurricane Katrina were felt by the tourism industry during the Labor Day weekend. Many areas said soaring gas prices had led to room cancellations and smaller-than-expected crowds as many vacationers opted to stay at home rather than submit to price gouging by profiteers at gasoline stations.
Some residents were being allowed to return home briefly to gather some of their possessions as floodwaters started to recede yesterday, and the US Army Corps of Engineers announced it had been able to repair two of the destroyed levees and started pumping water out of New Orleans. Since the storm, rumors abounded that looters from New Orleans had begun breaking into evacuated homes throughout the area.
