Okay, maybe not so cynical afterall.

Billmon expands with a lot more detail, what I alluded to last week. What would the Bush Administration's response have been to Hurricane Katrina, if it happened before the election?

FEMA has completely bungled this particular event, but look at how organized they were in advance of Hurricane Frances

The advance preparations included:

• FEMA’s National Emergency Operations Center, Emergency Support Team in Washington, D.C. and Region Four Regional Operations Center in Atlanta, Ga. are operating around the clock, coordinating the pre-positioning of assets and responding to state requests for assistance.
• FEMA has deployed an Advanced Emergency Response Team to the Florida State Emergency Operations Center in Tallahassee to facilitate state requests for assistance. In addition, three rapid needs assessment teams have been pre-deployed to Florida.
• FEMA Emergency Response Teams are positioned in Orlando to coordinate response efforts with the FEMA headquarters and the state Emergency Operations Center in Tallahassee.
• An Advanced Emergency Response Team and a Rapid Needs Assessment team have also been deployed to the Georgia State Emergency Operations Center to provide support as necessary.
• The U.S. Army Corps of Engineers, at FEMA's request, is coordinating the staging of 100 truckloads of water and 100 truckloads of ice at operational centers in Florida.
• A first shipment of 30,000 tarps is en route to Atlanta, Ga., to be pre-staged for delivery to areas affected by Frances once the storm has cleared.
• FEMA is working to provider 10 trailers of generators at the request of Florida that will be used to provide power to critical facilities affected by the hurricane. Generators will be staged at Warner Robbins Air Force Base.
• Four Urban Search and Rescue Teams are deployed to Florida — two in Miami and two in Jacksonville. Four teams are on alert.
• Two Disaster Medical Assistance Teams (DMAT) have been deployed to Florida to support medical facilities and hospitals that are not fully operational following the storm. Two additional DMATs are staged in Atlanta, three are enroute to Atlanta, and one Veterinary Medical Assistance Team is on standby. An additional four DMATs have been placed on alert, The DMATs are comprised of doctors, nurses and medical technicians trained to handle trauma, pediatrics, surgery and mental health problems. DMATs bring truckloads of medical equipment and supplies with them.
• Five pharmaceutical caches, containing emergency medical supplies, are being pre-positioned, and are currently en route to Atlanta and Tampa.
• FEMA's Mobile Emergency Response Services (MERS) communications staff and equipment are available to provide telephone, radio and video links in support of response and recovery efforts. About 100 MERS personnel and about 75 vehicles – including Mobile Emergency Operations Center (MEOCs) equipped vehicles and Mobile Radio Vans (MRVs) to provide radio capability have been assigned to support Hurricane Frances response and recovery operations.
• FEMA teleregistration centers are fully staffed, ready and able to register as many as 20,000 disaster assistance applications per day for affected residents in declared counties. The Internal Revenue Service is providing additional operators to support FEMA’s teleregistration operations, which are currently operating 24 hours a day, seven days a week.
• FEMA contract inspectors are ready for activation, with surge capability providing for up to 15,000 inspections per day within 14 days of activation. FEMA is working with the General Services Administration to analyze vacancy rates of various safe housing options (including apartments, homes, RVs, time shares, mobile homes, hotels and motels) as part of pre-planning temporary housing strategies for those whose homes are severely damaged or destroyed.
• The American Red Cross has opened more than 250 shelters in Florida that housed approximately 15,500 evacuees last night. Additional shelters have been opened in Georgia and Alabama in case need arises. In North Carolina, the Red Cross is manning state welcome centers to help evacuees with rest stop ministrations.

Unbelievable! You'd think with more experience that FEMA's response would improve, but as we all know now, there was essentially no response

Evacuee Raymond Cooper: Sir, you've got about 3,000 people here in this -- in the Convention Center right now. They're hungry. Don't have any food. We were told two-and-a-half days ago to make our way to the Superdome or the Convention Center by our mayor. And which when we got here, was no one to tell us what to do, no one to direct us, no authority figure.

There are politicians right now who say that this is not the time to place blame, and I agree with that to a point. Right now the priority should be rescuing those in the Gulf States that are still 7 DAYS LATER waiting for help. But, we, as American citizens, regardless of party, should be prepared to hold this administration accountable as soon as possible.

Our national security depends on it. If we cannot rely on our government to help us in a situation where we have advance notice, who knows what will happen to us should we be attacked by terrorists again. The world is watching and I'm sure some folks are taking notes.