RED CROSS, OTHER VOLUNTEERS TURNED AWAY FROM NEW ORLEANS

Talk Left discusses the Red Cross being ordered to stay outside of New Orleans.

From a commenter:

A panelist on Washington Week Tonight reported that a doctor at Charity hospital had operated on Al Gore's son years ago and he had somehow communicated with Al Gore who made arrangements for two American Airlines planes to evacuate patients to hospitals which had agreed to take them. But FEMA would not approve the plan because they can only work with public officials and Al Gore is now a private citizen.

In general, they also said that for whatever reason FEMA can only work with public institutions, they cannot provide assistance to private hospitals.

The transcript is supposed to be up on www.pbs.org at least Monday noon.

Utter incompetence in the face of dire emergency. Someone, fire these people, please.

A second commenter responded:

Litz - Like it or not you can't have people just flying in, on their own, to get people out. Especially in a situation in which criminals in the local population are shooting at rescue teams.

A competently run operation would secure specific locations as staging areas and coordinate offers of assistance from credible and proven sources such as the city of Chicago and Al Gore/American Airlines. We're not talking here about Sammy Samaritan and his teenaged kids wanting to bring in cookies his wife baked. Those responsible for this clusterf**k should have welcomed help from organizations that could do what they couldn't.

Canada, Britain, France and Germany have offered substantial assistance to the U.S., including mobile shelters, airplanes, medical crews, and other essentials. Have you heard a single word about our actually accepting it?

More and more it's sounding like the typical BushCo M.O. Insist on total control so nobody can get enough access or information to expose their incompetence. After all, if you accept help, it's an admission that you NEED it.