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Originally Posted by fishweewee
Have we ever had a natural catastrophe in recent history that has taken out an entire U.S. City? N.O. was only ONE of several areas drastically hit by this storm. I don't think we have precedent for this, give the prez a break, there's only so much he can do in so little time. This is being billed as the WORST natural disaster in U.S. history!  |
Other than maybe Galveston (which has what, maybe a quarter of the population of NO?), there isn't another major US city that could be entirely taken out by a hurricane. Ben, hate to say this, but no hurricane expert anywhere is at all shocked at what happened down there--it's been predicted and modeled for years, and it happened exactly according to the "book".
Camille, the only prior comparable storm in my lifetime, was maybe half as big across as Katrina, and places like Biloxi and Gulfport were in fact devasted back then. As bad as Andrew was, it was a tiny storm in diameter and its swath of devastation was basically from Homestead to Coral Gables. People in Lauderdale or Boca only experienced gale force winds. What has changed since then is, the coastline has become more developed, everywhere. Mississippi being no exception. People bought houses without giving any thought to what would happen if a Big One came ashore.
But, the bottom line is, Nixon did more in a shorter time after Camille for the affected areas than GWB did. Hell, he didn't even cut short his 6 week vacation and fly back to DC until last Wednesday.