Monday, February 19, 2007
The New York Times decides, 18 months after Katrina, that the military should not be used for law enforcement
The New York Times is editorializing this morning against changes to the Insurrection Act and posse comitatus that apparently make it easier to use the United States military for domestic law enforcement. This appears to put the editorial board of the Times at odds with Paul Krugman, who excoriated the Bush administration on September 2, 2005 (Times Select) for not using the military for, er, law enforcment:
Even military resources in the right place weren't ordered into action. ''On Wednesday,'' said an editorial in The Sun Herald in Biloxi, Miss., ''reporters listening to horrific stories of death and survival at the Biloxi Junior High School shelter looked north across Irish Hill Road and saw Air Force personnel playing basketball and performing calisthenics. Playing basketball and performing calisthenics!'' [Note that nobody actually died at the Biloxi Junior High School shelter -- the claim is literally that 'reporters listened to horrific stories' at the Biloxi shelter, which is another thing entirely. - ed.]
Maybe administration officials believed that the local National Guard could keep order and deliver relief. But many members of the National Guard and much of its equipment -- including high-water vehicles -- are in Iraq. ''The National Guard needs that equipment back home to support the homeland security mission,'' a Louisiana Guard officer told reporters several weeks ago.
I don't know enough about the subject to know whether I agree with the Times or not, but I am relieved to know -- finally -- that the Times agrees that the Bush administration was right not to use the military to police New Orleans after Katrina.
6 Comments:
By 
Jeremiah, at
Mon Feb 19, 10:36:00 AM:
It's heartening to know that the Left will occasionally, when it serves its PR needs, refer to the U. S. Constitution as it was written and as it has been interpreted by people with an understanding of the document and its principles. Heartening, but insufficiently sincere for my taste.
The question that we continually forget to ask the Paul Krugmans, Bob Herberts, and Frank Riches of the world in the case of Katrina (and other FEMA-level events) is "What exactly would you have done and where would you have gotten the money to pay for it?"
Remember that when Katrina entered the Gulf of Mexico in late August 2005, there was considerable speculation about landfall, including variously, the Yucatan, Brownsville, Houston, New Orleans, the Gold Coast and Florida. People who live in blithe geographic ignorance seem to think that all these places are a stone's throw from each other and that landfall in one is not very far removed from landfall in another. In reality, the logistics and costs of moving enormous federal resources around like chess pieces on an 1,300 mile board in a 72-hour timeframe (even assuming that they were conveniently staged and warehoused at the outset)are horrific in their own right. Also, in order for a response to have been timely and effective, these costs would have had to be committed and actually incurred weeks before the storm's track, intensity and duration were known.
The feds did as good a job as possible in the circumstance, given the inept behaviors of State and local officials.
I, for one, am willing to accept the occasional Act of God and to acknowledge His pre-eminence in these matters. I wonder if anyone will someday link the atheistic / agnostic culture of what Bill O'Reilly calls the Secular-Progressives to their belief that their elected representatives are actually fit to take on the Deity...
By Assistant Village Idiot, at
Mon Feb 19, 02:30:00 PM:
What the NYTimes stated 18 months ago is irrelevant to what it states today.
By 
, at
Mon Feb 19, 02:38:00 PM:
They could have use the NATIONAL GUARD in NEW ORLEANS after KATRINA to stop all those looters and to have arrested their outlaw mayor RAY NAGIN
By Jeremiah, at
Mon Feb 19, 03:13:00 PM:
John,
You've jumped to the presumptive close - that there was, in fact, a way for the Guard to have been there in a timely fashion to render aid. Apparently you've missed my point. There was no way for the Guard to be deployed with any appreciably greater speed than they were. I know it's time consuming and boring to study things like logistics and I know the people at the NYT have better things to do than verify facts, but I've seen lots of irresponsible conjecture and not much in the way of verifiable fact around this question. Can you point me in the direction of such facts?
Thanks.
By , at
Mon Feb 19, 05:00:00 PM:
I disagree, the Federal Govt. was slow in responding. There can be no doubt about that. Wall Mart had relief trucks there before the Federal Govt. got in. Companies in Iowa delivered water before the Fed came to the rescue.
One other point, the Federal Govt. doesn't control the state national guard. The Gov. there was slow in sending them in.
There is plenty of blame to go around, and on both sides of the aisle.
By Jeremiah, at
Mon Feb 19, 08:33:00 PM:
Hi Anonymous,
I'm a bit new to TigerHawk's turf, but I believe in honest discourse as a way to achieve better understanding. Having said that, I need to ask you the same question I tried to ask John earlier. Let's agree that the federal response was slow. Let's agree that Wal-Mart stores that are already present in Louisiana have inventories in place that don't require further processing or transportation or accountability to taxpayers. Let's agree that random organizations in Iowa or Missouri or Tennessee who don't have the responsibility of being prepared to fend off terrorists, earthquakes, hurricanes, etc. across the entire 50 states could actually provide materiel and services pretty quickly.
Now let's address the specific concern: What do you think the federal government could have done differently that would have provided a substantial improvement in the response time of National Guard units to New Orleans?
