Supreme Blather

"In Louisiana, it took several days for the governor to issue such a proclamation. Meanwhile, doctors from all over the country just sat around in New Orleans, unable to do anything."

Brownie

It was almost possible to begin feeling sorry for former Arabian horse expert Michael Brown, until I read he was blaming the media for scapegoating him. (True, but deserved, no?) Via Kevin Drum I find that the Rocky Mountain News has printed an email that he sent to some friends before quitting:

" I don't mind the negative press (well, actually, I do, but I try to ignore it) but it is really wearing out the family. No wonder people don't go into public service. This country is devouring itself, the 24-hour news cycle is numbing our ability to think for ourselves .

"Um, Brownie, wasn't part of your problem the fact that you weren't paying attention to the 24-hour news cycle? Just asking . . . "

The Race Issue

USA Today poll echoes the racial divide found by last week's Pew survey: "Six in 10 African-Americans say the fact that most hurricane victims were poor and black was one factor behind the failure of the federal government to come to their rescue quickly. Nearly nine in 10 non-Hispanic whites say those weren't factors."

The president, in New Orleans, said: "My attitude is this: The storm didn't discriminate, and neither will the recovery effort," he said. "When those Coast Guard choppers . . . were pulling people off roofs, they didn't check the color of a person's skin. They wanted to save lives."

Richard Haass a State Department official in Bush's first term, says in Slate that the impact is truly global:

"The initial federal and local reactions to Hurricane Katrina, however, have sent the opposite message. The images seen around the world communicated a lack of competence and considerable chaos and suffering. The dominant overseas reaction has been sympathy mixed with shock and horror at what was seen by many as evidence of racism and a reminder of the extreme poverty in which many Americans live.

"America's enemies indulged in schadenfreude. Hugo Chávez could not resist the chance to taunt President Bush; North Korea radio linked the U.S. 'defeat' in Iraq with its 'defeat' by Katrina; jihadists celebrated what had happened and the possibility the price of oil would soar even higher. The world's only remaining superpower appeared to be anything but. In an era of 24-hour satellite television and the Internet, public diplomacy is about who Americans are and what they do, not just what they say. Unlike Las Vegas, what happens here does not stay here.

"The global impact goes beyond impressions. A priority of this administration's foreign policy is to promote democracy around the world. But the attractiveness of the American model, and the ability of the United States to be an effective advocate for more democratic, capitalist societies, which had already been weakened by the disarray in Iraq, is now weaker still as a result of the disarray at home. It will be more difficult to make the case for free markets and more open societies if the results of such reforms come to be associated with the disorder seen in New Orleans."

Dodging Bullets

CBS's new blog, Public Eye debuted yesterday with former Hotline guy Vaughn Ververs providing the analysis. When Katrina hit on Monday, Aug. 29, "the conventional wisdom was that the city had dodged a bullet, thanks to the storm's last-minute jog to the east. 'City Saved' read a graphic on ABC's newscast, where Charles Gibson said that the 'nightmare scenario of an entire city underwater did not happen.' Brian Williams, hosting the NBC Nightly News from New Orleans, talked about 'where the worst fears didn't come true.' The coverage was comprehensive but not remarkable. This was still, for the most part, just a hurricane story, albeit a big one . . .

"Andrew Heyward, president of CBS News, says that part of the reason there was no special on Tuesday was logistical. 'All of the networks were operating under these extremely onerous, difficult conditions,' he says. 'Just doing the basics was extremely taxing. By Wednesday, not only had the story taken on a new dimension, but we felt capable of adding to what we were doing on the evening news in primetime.' Heyward says that the logistical challenges were so significant that, for much of Wednesday, people in the news division in New York weren't even sure that the reporters expected to appear on the primetime special that evening even knew about it."

Finally, Salon has the most, ah, colorful of the New Orleans remembrances, by Laura Misch :

"I would marry a cop of easy virtue, pose nude in Hef's magazine, appear in some of the worst movies ever made and lie on the AstroTurf floor of the Superdome with former football star Paul Hornung, wondering why he had such bad cigarette breath."