August 30, 2005

Nagin's Poor Planning?

New Orleans mayor Ray Nagin told CNN's Aaron Brown that the thousands stuck in the leaking Superdome may be there a week(!) because of the flood waters. Add this to the looting begining to plague the city and the Big Easy is becoming the island from Lord of the Flies. Brown gave the mayor and Louisiana officials the benefit of the doubt when he inquired why 3500 national guardsmen haven't arrived yet in the city. He told his audience that people can't plan for every possibility in a catastrophe. Events sometimes smack you upside the head--. The same could have been said of Baghdad after Saddam's army dissolved and vanished. The U.S. was pelted with indignation from the world community (and internal dissenters) that Donald Rumsfeld didn't have enough boots on the ground to quell looters. The unexpected happens no matter how much one plans. I doubt Nagin will get half as much criticism in New Orleans as the Bush White House got/is getting in Iraq.