Excuse Me, But Doesn't the Governor Mobilize The National Guard?

I sure seem to remember national guard mobilizations being ordered by state governors.

I began to imagine myself crazy, because the MSM keeps telling me it's the President who has this power.

But I don't think I'm crazy now.

I guess the MSM forgot all those stories they've done previously about governors mobilizing the national guard in emergency situations.

Must have just f'n' slipped their minds.

Without doubt, Bush deserves some blame for this. He could have gone on national tv and addressed the country about the coming severity of the storm-- a presidential address underscores the gravity of the situation.

Still, many would have remained behind voluntarily. But some might have fled.

The Bush Administration also might have stepped in and removed authority from a clearly lackadaisical and incomptent state and local government. Sure, they would have caught heat for doing so ("Are you implying the black mayor of New Orleans is incompetent? Are you a racist?"), but people's lives have to be put ahead of politics. The mayor of New Orleans is an incompetent.

Hey, that may have even have been unconstitutional (I think there's a gray area in emergency situations), and I'm sure that Frank Rich and Paul Krugman would have had conniptions about the Tyrant in Washington.

But again, it's more important to save people than to avoid the typical girlish hyperventilating from Krugman and Rich.

Prudent disaster-preparation demands you hope for the best but plan for the worst. It seems that most government officials -- city, state, and federal -- got the first part right but the latter part wrong. They hoped for the best and also, it seems, planned for the best.

The best did not unfold.

I'm an admitted political hack. I have an agenda here-- yes, I do want to report the truth and express my true opinions, but I also do seek to deflect some (though not all) criticism from Bush.

I admit that.

But the MSM is supposedly a straight-shooter, ONLY interested in the truth.

I don't understand how they continue to embargo the story of the 600+ school and mass-transit buses the mayor of New Orleans allowed to remain idle. Buses which could have been, and should have been, making stops throughout all of New Orleans, especially the poorest areas, to ferry them (for free!) to a central terminal, and from there make the twenty mile (forty minute) drive to perfect safety.

I don't understand how the governor of Louisiana is excused for not mobilizing the national guard in advance of the storm so that they could assist in an evactuation -- and a forced evacuation at that, not a recommendeed one.

Of course, "I don't understand" is completely rhetorical. I do understand. I understand that the Governor of Louisiana and the Mayor of New Orleans are Democrats, and that the President of the United States is a Republican.

Hence the MSM's interest in only examining mistakes and negligence on the federal level.

The mayor of New Orleans is black.

If this is a question of race, why didn't this black mayor care more about his black citizens? Why the hell weren't those buses running constantly in the 24 to 48 hours before the storm's landfall?

Unfortunately, we'll never know the answer to that question, because the only people with access to him -- our straight-down-the-middle completely-neutral-and-impartial press -- will never ask him.

posted by Ace at 03:32 PM

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