BCT Editorial – 7/23/06

This page was last updated on July 27, 2006.

Blame game; Editorial; Beaver County Times; July 23, 2006.

Below is a detailed critique of the subject editorial.

“Authorities in New Orleans last week charged two nurses and a doctor with administering lethal doses of drugs to four patients during the height of the Hurricane Katrina disaster.

“We won’t debate the issue of whether these people deserve criminal charges, but you have to put their alleged crimes in context.

“The three were stuck with hundreds of patients at Memorial Medical Center under some of harshest conditions known to man: no electricity, no water, toilets overflowing, high temperatures and 10 feet of putrid water covering streets.

“Meanwhile, the federal government sat back and watched for days while hundreds died.

“There’s plenty of blame - criminal and otherwise - to go around in this mess.”

[RWC] There may be “plenty of blame … to go around,” but did you notice the feds were the only guys to get mentioned? I guess the author missed all those Coast Guard members who risked their lives picking up “survivors” (read: residents who ignored evacuation orders) via helicopter. We all know why those folks charged with first responder responsibility – local and state government – weren’t mentioned. They weren’t President Bush but were Democrats.

According to Popular Mechanics, “the response to Hurricane Katrina was by far the largest - and fastest-rescue effort in U.S. history, with nearly 100,000 emergency personnel arriving on the scene within three days of the storm's landfall” and “4,000 Coast Guard personnel saved more than 33,000.”¹ Yep, “the federal government sat back and watched for days while hundreds died.” Apparently the editorial author still believes much of the proven bogus Katrina “reporting,” or perhaps the author hopes we forgot many of the reported myths.

If you’ve been following Times editorials, you remember in almost all cases they try to place the blame for Katrina’s problems at the feet of the feds. See my critique of “Bitter memory” for more about this.

1. Now What? The Lessons of Katrina; Popular Mechanics; March 2006.