One-Sided Katrina Blame Game

Doug Stephan, host of the nationally-syndicated Talk Radio Countdown Show, joins a host of left-wingers that are perpetuating the lie that the "slow response" to Hurricane Katrina is due to Bush Administration ineptness. (And, as rapper Kanye West says, the slow response is because "George Bush doesn't care about black people.") How low can these people go?

We need to call a spade a spade (oops, that was NOT intended to be a reference to Kanye West!). Challenge these people, and lead them to the truth when they claim they don't know where the truth lies. What follows is an email I wrote today to Doug Stephan (doug@dougstephan.com). I'm not going to write to Kanye West - somehow I doubt if he can even read.

Doug, a woman called you this morning, regarding your one-sided approach to "The Blame Game" over who’s responsible for the slow response to the Katrina disaster. She mentioned the fact that the Red Cross was prevented from helping early-on, citing Fox News reports and the American Red Cross website. While a quick internet search will bear this woman’s claims as factual, this was also mentioned in a USA Today article (9/9/05 print edition), as well as on CNN’s NewsNight report (9/8/05) by Tom Foreman. References below.

By failing to mention this in your broadcasts, you are contributing to the one-sided, media-driven "Blame the Administration" game that can only be described as politically-motivated. I am not in the news or talk business, yet I heard and read about this long before that woman called you. If indeed you were unaware of this, you need to do a better job of researching what you’re going to talk about.

Here is the reference for the Red Cross statement:
http://www.redcross.org/faq/0,1096,0_682_4524,00.html#4524
"Access to New Orleans is controlled by the National Guard and local authorities and while we are in constant contact with them, we simply cannot enter New Orleans against their orders. The state Homeland Security Department had requested--and continues to request--that the American Red Cross not come back into New Orleans following the hurricane. Our presence would keep people from evacuating and encourage others to come into the city. "

Here is the USA Today article:
RED CROSS SAYS LA. OFFICIALS DECLINED AID. Louisiana officials told the American Red Cross not to plan to go into New Orleans after Hurricane Katrina hit to provide relief to residents at the Superdome – and also refused help from the organization before the storm hit.

As its workers evacuated the city before the storm, the Red Cross offered to drop off food, water, cots and other emergency supplies to the Superdome, but officials declined the supplies, Red Cross spokeswoman Carol Miller said Thursday. The Red Cross was aware that the Superdome was a refuge of last resort for people who couldn’t evacuate New Orleans.

Red Cross President Marty Evans said that officials from Louisiana’s homeland security department told the relief agency not to drop off the supplies, Miller said. She didn’t name officials.

In the days after Katrina hit, television broadcasts from the Superdome showed thousands of people there complaining about the lack of food and water. Miller said the Red Cross didn’t offer its own shelter in downtown New Orleans because it is the agency’s policy ‘not to shelter in unsafe areas.