As The Chickens Come Home To Roost....

Several articles showed up today in the news as predictors of what we will continue to see. They each chronicle the typical government response to large sums of money; divert it to your own pet project or skim a large chunk off for you and your friends.

The first story, Money Earmarked for Evacuation Redirected by Rita Beamish of the Associated Press, reports on money that was earmarked for Hurricane Studies. She found that most of the money never made it where it was intended, but was redirected in to studies about the causeway and other unidentifiable places.

The $500,000 that Congress appropriated for the evacuation plan went to a commission that studied future options for the 24-mile bridge over Lake Pontchartrain, FEMA spokesman Butch Kinerney said.

The second, Louisiana Officials Indicted Before Katrina Hit, by By Ken Silverstein and Josh Meyer, LA Times Staff Writers, explains that State officials were already in trouble trying to accounting for $30 - $60 million dollars that had been given to them for hurricane and disaster preparedness and studies.

Senior officials in Louisiana's emergency planning agency already were awaiting trial over allegations stemming from a federal investigation into waste, mismanagement and missing funds when Hurricane Katrina struck.

And federal auditors are still trying to track as much as $60 million in unaccounted for funds that were funneled to the state from the Federal Emergency Management Agency dating back to 1998.

The third, FEMA's Woes Were Merely the Beginning, by Nicole Gaouette, Alan Miller and Ricardo Alonso-Zaldivar, LA Times Staff Writers, discusses the Federal Agency's problems and unpreparedness for such a disaster.

Interviews with federal officials indicate that recovery difficulties have gone beyond the Federal Emergency Management Agency and span key agencies in Washington, where top officials are trying to respond to a huge reconstruction problem for which they had no policies or plans. Large contracts are pouring out of agencies, but the task ahead involves issues Washington hasn't thought seriously about since the 1960s.

As we sift through these articles it becomes evident that Murphy's Law has been broken. There are too many people in high places that have risen far above their ability to perform and are now responsible for situations that they are completely unable to handle. As I read, I wanted to cry out and volunteer to manage these problems. There are many experienced individuals around the country that can properly plan, direct and succeed at this monstrous task. But the sad truth is that while they were busy learning the tricks of the trade, the present position holders were handing out campaign bumper stickers and soliciting contributions for the present office holders.

I worried when the majority of the appointees of President Clinton all seemed to come from Arkansas and the appointees of President Bush appear to have a home address of Texas.

Now the worry is over and the predictable results are in play. We have thousands of people handling billions of dollars in reconstruction money that don't know how to change a door knob or plan a family picnic.