Going to New Orleans

Not that I have been the best about keeping up my blog recently, but work has actually been work recently. (I'm actually quite happy about that.)

But, no blogging til at least next Tuesday. Going to party at Mardi Gras. I feel I am doing my part to stimulate the Gulf Coast Economy.

Hell, I can't do a worse job than FEMA.

On Nation-Building...

Max Boot makes a strange comment in an op-ed in the NYT today:

No wonder our capacities in nation-building and strategic communications have withered — their practitioners are second-class citizens behind traditional foreign service officers.

Have we ever had ANY capacity (let alone business) in nation-building??? But wait! There's more:

If we expand [USAID's] ranks, it could become our lead nation-building agency, sort of a global FEMA, marshaling the kind of resources that have been lacking in Iraq and Afghanistan.

Exporting FEMA? Doesn't the world hate us enough already?

FEMA Holds Press Conference

I spent the weekend actually doing things -- fun things, even -- instead of sitting at my computer or watching television. (I was avoiding any and all things Red Sox) Consequently, I totally missed this parade of idiocy:

WASHINGTON (AP) — The White House scolded the Federal Emergency Management Agency on Friday for staging a phony news conference about assistance to victims of wildfires in southern California.

The agency — much maligned for its sluggish response to Hurricane Katrina over two years ago — arranged to have FEMA employees play the part of independent reporters Tuesday and ask questions of Vice Adm. Harvey E. Johnson, the agency’s deputy director.
The questions were predictably soft and gratuitous.
“I’m very happy with FEMA’s response,” Johnson said in reply to one query from an agency employee.

Not surprisingly, somebody got canned:

An official who faked a Federal Emergency Management Agency news conference into the handling of the California wildfires has been dropped from a job as a media chief, according to reports.

John P. "Pat" Philbin, formerly the public affairs director for FEMA, was involved in organising a briefing with journalists at short notice last Tuesday.

In and of itself, the firing shouldn't be that big of a surprise. But there's more...

''We do not normally comment on personnel matters,'' [Director of National Intelligence] spokesman Ross Feinstein said Monday. ''However, we can confirm that Mr. [NOT REGIS] Philbin is not, nor is he scheduled to be, the director of public affairs for the Office of the Director of National Intelligence.''

Yes, that's right. This guy was slated to be the mouthpiece for the Director of National Intelligence. This administration has sunk so low that it is incompetently evil.