An article in Time magazine by Amanda Ripley, in the Oct 31, 2005 issue (“How The Coast Guard Gets It Right”) quotes St. Bernard Parrish Sheriff Jack Stephens, responding to GAO representatives who asked him how he would fix FEMA as saying “I would abolish it…I would blow up FEMA and ask the Coast Guard what it needs”.
The point of this is that nearly every effort to centralize and standardize operations by the present administration has been marked by profound failure, deserved criticism, slow response, and bottlenecked infrastructure with many of the on-site responders absolutely frustrated by a lack of empowerment to act in a timely fashion.
I understand, ideally, the possible advantages, but the best intentions from Washington seem to be marred by a “central committee” aspect and micromanagement style that impedes real progress…we have all read the stories of millions spent on empty hotel rooms, volunteers and supplies turned away, people stranded and dying, and wasted time.
Effective crisis management, especially so in time-critical, destructive, life or death situations, comes down to the selection, training, support and facilitation of the right people in the right place at the right time, each of whom can be relied upon to perform necessary and essential tasks not as a result of a reliance on a massive centralized communications infrastructure and command system but because of training and motivation that empower them to act properly when they find themselves in the absolute absence of any but the most limited structure…you know, “An Army Of One” and all that.
The Bush administration has been hoarding together so much centralized power under the umbrellas of emergency response, public safety, and anti-terrorism that one begins to wonder if the Bill of Rights will continue to stand for another 100 years…but no WMD’s, no Bin Laden, a terribly erratic no-fly list, a lingering war (yes, starting to look just like Vietnam, sorry to say), a miserable, stifled, ill-designed FEMA “You’re doing a great job, Brownie!” – no wait, you aren’t. Hah hah, sorry. Misunderstood the central committee report.
The various highly touted acts and measures of this administration are like the old adage about mating elephants, lots of dust and commotion but really not much of any real importance getting done.
But here’s some threats that were narrowly averted:
The Secret Service confiscated a kid’s school project poster in North Carolina because it had a thumbtack poked through a cutout picture of Bush combined with a thumbs-down sign next to it. The assignment, of all things? The Bill of Rights.
http://www.alternet.org/walmart/26503/
Also, “The Onion” has been handed a ceast and desist order to quit using the presidential seal in it’s sarcastic spoofs of the administration.
http://today.reuters.com/news/newsarticle.aspx?type=oddlyEnoughNews&storyid=2005-10-26T163428Z_01_EIC659644_RTRUKOC_0_US-ONION.xml
Can anybody, on the right, left, or in the middle say that they feel that things are going well in DC? I can’t see it from any vantage point. But I see an attempt to centralize yet more resources as doomed to fail.