The depth and scope of Hurricane Katrina’s devastation has been mind-boggling. And so have some of the political fumbles in terms of imagery that have emerged from this historical crisis.
You’d think that common sense would prevail. A city nearly emerges as the 21st Century’s Atlantis, communities are wiped out, the oil industry is disrupted, Americans of all ages and backgrounds do what they (except for Ann Coulter) do best in a crisis: put politics aside and rally to try and gather money and resources for a natural disaster’s victims.
So it’s a bit sad — and surprising — to see political fumbles like this. Again, you would think that common sense would prevail. But here are three cases where it didn’t:
PRESIDENT GEORGE BUSH: Yesterday in Grass Valley, CA, a dear friend who I was visiting said: “I’m mad about them blaming everything on President Bush.”
My response to him is the same I offer here:
The White House is purportedly staffed with political pros, but couldn’t they see criticism coming a mile away — from the moment the storms stuck? And, if they are as smart as many believe, couldn’t they have moved more swiftly to take actions to prevent it? This White House has some of the most single-mindedly focused political operatives in history. Yet, they repeatedly shoot themselves in the foot.
Would FDR have stayed on vacation an extra minute in a crisis like this? Unlikely. Richard Nixon would have rushed from his walks on the beach in San Clemente in his suit and tie to get right back to the White House to make a speech from the Oval Office. LBJ would have immediately been on all three networks in a speech from his office or, if he couldn’t get back, from his ranch. Ronald Reagan would have captured the mood immediately in a speech and probably been touring the area as soon as he could.
No, it isn’t a MINOR thing for a President to immediately jump into the fray, summarize a tragic or challenging situation, and quickly offer even some stopgap measures to instill confidence in government and unify the nation.
Bush responded, but it was as if the White House was off a couple of beats.
He should have left the ranch immediately — even if in practical terms he could do the same, exact work at his ranch — returned to Washington immediately, gotten down on the ground somewhere to vist some victims immediately, and offer some concrete help immediately.
It took too long to get him into gear (and even then when responded such as on Good Morning America if you watch the video here, it seemed belated and defensive.) On the other hand, he faced similar criticism right after 911 but negated it with his visit to Ground Zero. Will the same thing happen again when he visits the storm scene? (Unlikely: the country seems too polarized on political issues.)FOOTNOTE: Bush seemed to rebound a bit in his appearance with his father and former President Bill Clinton, who will help raise relief money.
But if he HAD acted moved (literally and figuratively) more swiftly, he could have short-circuited some of the criticism he now faces. His advisors failed him on this one.
Secretary of State Condoleeza Rice doesn’t have a job where she’d respond in a storm. Yet, newspaper items like this that show she’s happily enjoying a vacation isn’t going to help the administration’s image. Should she have cancelled it? The argument can be made — NO. She is Secretary of State. Not head of FEMA. But the fact info is appearing in the press about her fun downtime is going to be used against the administration. Once again, savvy political operatives might have helped.
Speaker of the House Dennis Hastert put his foot in his mouth by asking a question some have asked out on the streets:
Hastert, in a transcript supplied by the suburban Chicago newspaper, said there was no question that the people of New Orleans would rebuild their city, but noted that federal insurance and other federal aid was involved. “We ought to take a second look at it. But you know, we build Los Angeles and San Francisco on top of earthquake fissures and they rebuild, too. Stubbornness.”
Asked in the interview whether it made sense to spend billions rebuilding a city that lies below sea level, he replied, “I don’t know. That doesn’t make sense to me.”
Hastert later issued a statement saying he was not “advocating that the city be abandoned or relocated.”
“My comments about rebuilding the city were intended to reflect my sincere concern with how the city is rebuilt to ensure the future protection of its citizens and not to suggest that this great and historic city should not be rebuilt,” the statement said.
Again: not smart. He MAY be right; it’s no secret that New Orleans has known for years that the way the city was built meant it could be decimated by The Big One.and so it was. Does it make sense to rebuild exactly the same way so residents continue to in effect be poised to suffer possibly another disaster — maybe even a worse one?
But it is indeed a political fumble (he wouldn’t have issued his statement later if his people didn’t realize it was a mistake). Whether or not to rebuild New Orleans is not the issue on the table right now. A supposedly smart professional politician would have avoided opening his mouth so wide and shoving his foot so deeply in it.
All of these three involve political common sense — or the lack of it.
UPDATE: This post has provoked a lot of comment both in comments and particularly in emails, where it is said that (sigh) TMV can NOT be moderate or independent because he is not applauding the President. Alas, TMV doesn’t applaud local or state officials on this one.
And — in case to readers who missed the point of the above post — let’s spell out our theme again.
T-h-e-s-e p-e-o-p-l-e a-l-l s-h-o-u-l-d h-a-v-e k-n-o-w-n b-e-t-t-e-r.
They all suffer from a political tin ear and/or poor advisors who could have done things a bit differently and saved their bosses from a lot of political grief.
There he goes again. He must be a liberal or a Democrat.
One of our emails sent us a long laundry list of other officials who could have done more in the hurricane prep or relief. That’s NOT the point of our post at all. That’s apples and oranges. What X politico could have done to prepare is a separate issue from how people who are veterans of public life could allow themselves to look so poorly by not reacting to this crisis in ways that help their public images or allowing them to be seen in ways that invite criticism of them.
T-h-e-s-e p-e-o-p-l-e a-l-l s-h-o-u-l-d h-a-v-e k-n-o-w-n b-e-t-t-e-r.
Our UPDATE on this item now includes the fact that in addition to Halstert clarifiying his comments that it might be wise not to rebuild New Orleans (not the wisest political timing to say that) the New York Daily News’ reports that Rice is cutting short her vacation. It reports that she was booed by some members of the audience of Spamalot! when the lights came up. Here are a few highlights from that report:
Did New Yorkers chase Condoleezza Rice back to Washington yesterday?
Like President Bush, the Secretary of State has been on vacation during the Hurricane Katrina crisis, with Rice enjoying her downtime in New York Wednesday and yesterday. The cabinet member’s responsibilities are usually international, but her timing contributed to the “fiddling while Rome burns” impression given by her boss during the disaster, which may have claimed thousands of lives…….
Yesterday, Rice went shopping at Ferragamo on Fifth Ave. According to the Web site www.Gawker.com, the 50-year-old bought “several thousand dollars’ worth of shoes” at the pricey leather-goods boutique.
A fellow shopper shouted, “How dare you shop for shoes while thousands are dying and homeless!” – presumably referring to Louisiana and Mississippi.
The woman expressing her First Amendment rights was promptly removed from the store. A Ferragamo store manager confirmed to us that Rice did shop there yesterday, but refused to answer questions about whether the protester was removed, and whether by his own security or the Secret Service.
At the State Department’s daily briefing yesterday morning, before the New York incident, spokesman Sean McCormack responded to a journalist who asked whether Rice was involved with hurricane relief efforts by saying, “She’s in contact with the department as appropriate.” He made no mention that his boss had any plans to leave New York.
But yesterday afternoon, Rice had done just that. Department spokeswoman Joanne Moore told us: “The secretary is back in Washington, and she is being briefed on the situation.” Moore did not know whether Condi had planned a longer stay here.
What you’re seeing is each of these three trying to correct initial images that are not good ones as America copes with one of the biggest natural disasters in its history. Bush’s tour today of the hurricane areas will likely help chip away at the early image that brought him the criticism.
UPDATE II: In a New York Time’s piece about Democrats going after Bush on this issue, it quotes a Democrat who campaigned for George Bush against John Kerry (and YES this guy IS a Democrat)and who has supported GWB on the Iraq war
Ed Koch, the former mayor of New York who learned that it was essential to respond quickly to city disasters, said that Mr. Bush had not moved swiftly enough to express sympathy for the victims.
“I learned that people want you out there, they want you to suffer a little with them, they want you to convince them that you will protect them as part of your family, they want you to be an extension of them,” Mr. Koch said.
Joe Gandelman is a former fulltime journalist who freelanced in India, Spain, Bangladesh and Cypress writing for publications such as the Christian Science Monitor and Newsweek. He also did radio reports from Madrid for NPR’s All Things Considered. He has worked on two U.S. newspapers and quit the news biz in 1990 to go into entertainment. He also has written for The Week and several online publications, did a column for Cagle Cartoons Syndicate and has appeared on CNN.