James Lee Witt

We need to keep the heat on those who are responsible for the lack of preparedness. We are see the effect of cutting taxes and the war in Iraq along with patronage hires (rife in this administration) are making what would have been a bad situation MUCH WORSE.

It seems we've got part of our answer from James Lee Witt in this article from Knight-Ridder, which a number of readers were kind enough to send in.

Here's a passage

...

Being prepared for a disaster is basic emergency management, disaster experts say.

For example, in the 1990s, in planning for a New Orleans nightmare scenario, the federal government figured it would pre-deploy nearby ships with pumps to remove water from the below-sea-level city and have hospital ships nearby, said James Lee Witt, who was FEMA director under President Clinton.

Federal officials said a hospital ship would leave from Baltimore on Friday.

"These things need to be planned and prepared for; it just doesn't look like it was," said Witt, a former Arkansas disaster chief who won bipartisan praise on Capitol Hill during his tenure.

FEMA said some of its response teams were prepared.

Some were prepared.

-- Josh Marshall