Sep 7, 2005 at 11:22 PM by Political Chase
Terry Moran, ABC News’ Chief White House Correspondent, asked Scott McClellan, the White House Press Secretary, in a press briefing today (more about that later) how a Katrina refugee, who is the recipient of Social Security (e.g. retirement or disability payment) or some form of government benefit will receive said benefit. Mr. McClellan responded they could call the Social Security Administration. Better still, they have an 800 number, therefore no toll charges to worry about.
Sounds like "Brownie" has done a "heck of a job" restoring communications service in the devastated area spanning 90,000+ square-miles, installed thousands of public phones that don’t require money in the evacuation centers (e.g. Astrodome), and distributed thousands of mobile phones to the remainder.
Just give them a call. I’m sure there isn’t a hold time, no bureaucracy to prove who you are over the phone, and the check or medical supplies will arrive in a day or so.
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Sep 7, 2005 at 2:34 PM by Political Chase
The Senate and the House of Representatives announced their own investigation into the government’s poor response to Katrina. Not to undermine the absolute necessity of an investigation and my personal relief that the performance of the Bush administration will be reviewed by those outside the administration, a few questions or concerns come to mind.
- Will the White House cooperate with Congress (history has proven not) citing its own investigation, in addition to the virtually assured withholding of vital documents under the guise of executive privilege or "national security?"
- Duplication of efforts - bureaucracy as usual.
- Will any report(s) from either branch make the mistake, e.g., 9/11 Committee, of not directly addressing who failed - agency, official(s), in addition to what failed? In other words, will a person(s) be held directly accountable?
- Will the fruits of their labor yield comprehensive results/actions, or will there just be volumes of documents neatly placed on archive shelves to collect particulate? Will there be effective formal and accountable follow-up?
- Will specific, definitive projects (not necessarily more committees) with scheduled milestones be established to address recommendations?
- Congress should consider legislation that mandates appropriate action of some type before the reports are delivered, lest these investigations will amount to nothing more than rhetoric.
Notwithstanding the post 9/11 rhetoric and congressional investigations (initially begrudged by the White House), the disaster on the Gulf Coast is an obtuse display that the United States is grossly unprepared to handle any significant impact, terrorist or otherwise, to its environment.
True risk management, which encompasses significantly more than terrorism mitigation, must be put in place and have perpetual review, testing and remediation.
Unbridled creativity is paramount in these investigations. Restrained creativity will yield worthless results. I suppose I should qualify creativity. I do not mean Karl Rove creativity. Karl Rove is limited to monocreativity - negative and unjustified destructive partisan maneuvering. In fact, shouldn’t Karl Rove be banned from participating in any governmental investigation while he is the object of a serious federal grand jury investigation? Creativity will be the fodder for effective and efficient investigation and subsequent recommendations.
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