one day till Hurricane season begins and no one is prepared [View All]

[Jeffersons Ghost]

What have we learned from Katrina?

AMID WIDESPREAD CRITICISM, GOVERNMENT PREPARES FOR NEXT HURRICANE SEASON

While the Senate has recommended the dissolution of the Federal Emergency Management Agency and every level of government has come under fire for its handling of Hurricane Katrina, government organizations are launching initiatives to deal with another potentially active hurricane season.

The Senate Committee on Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs said in an April report that officials at all levels of government were culpable and that they "did not appear to truly grasp the magnitude of the storm's potential for destruction... Katrina showed that the nation is still unprepared to respond to a catastrophe," the report concluded.

Other investigations by the House, White House and FEMA itself all concluded that much needs to be done before the next season of hurricanes originating in the Atlantic Ocean begins June 1.

FEMA, under the Department of Homeland Security, is charged with coordinating preparation and response to natural and man-made disasters. The Senate panel's primary solution was the dissolution of FEMA and in its place, the installation of a National Preparedness and Response Authority, which, like FEMA, would fall under DHS but unlike the embattled agency would have a direct link to the president and could use that link in times of crisis.

White House homeland security adviser Frances Townsend responded to the report by telling reporters, "As we're heading into this hurricane season, now is not the time to really look at moving organizational boxes."

http://www.pbs.org/newshour/updates/hurricaneprep_05-09-06.html

I'm no super-scientist, all I know is that my flowering plants now bloom out of season and the weather gets harder to live with every year. Are these side-effects of global warming? We are the majority and we can do something if we all pull together:

http://www.truemajority.org/ExxonToastsThePlanet.html