Katrina: What Went Wrong?
There are those who believe that if the New York Times, the Washington Post, and the Los Angeles Times all put out big analysis articles on the aftermath of a hurricane on the same day, and all three of them agree, in large part, as to what went wrong and who was responsible for it, that just means that liberal media bias is at work again.
I am not one of those people.
Sure, there are biases that all reporters and their editors bring to their jobs. But unlike many of the so-called “news organizations” that are shameless advocates for one position or another, the three major US daily newspapers mentioned above embody a culture that to a greater or lesser degree strives for objectivity and accuracy.
Anyway, I think they’ve got the early version of this story pretty well covered. See Kevin Drum’s brief item linking to all three: FEMA’s failures.
Drum summarizes:
As these stories make clear, there’s blame to go around. But as they also make clear, FEMA’s failures were extensive and systemic, and much of its feeble response was due to poor planning, poor execution, a lack of leadership from George Bush, and the inexperience of Bush appointee Mike Brown, who found himself in over his head when the worst happened.
