Back in early 2001, "the Federal Emergency Management Agency ranked the potential damage to New Orleans as among the three likeliest, most castastrophic disasters facing this country.". The other two are massive earthquake in San Francisco, and, guess what, terrorist attack on New York City.

The Daily Kos also picks up on this bit of news, so did Salon.com. Here is Spiegel Online's take on the very same issue.

While the case of September 11 might be due to insufficient warning for the federal government to successfully prepare for the attack (giving them the benefit of the doubt), the case of the Louisiana levees can only be due to gross incompetence. Given four years of advanced warnings, the federal government still cut founding that would have helped prepare the Big Easy for the Big Katrina. Scientists have known for a long time that the city that sits between a lake and the Mississippi river is just a disaster waiting to happen--the only missing ingredient is a big storm. But no, half of the local National Guard is out of the country, and no money is available to reinforce the levee before it breaks.

And this administration has the guts to launch National Preparedness Month. Do they really expect some deity is going to come down and pick up the slack for them? The Bush Administration has been one lack of preparation after another. Going to Afghanistan might be a war of revenge, but going to Iraq shows a lack of preparation in gathering intelligence (where's that WMD now, George?), a lack of preparation in covering up that made up evidence (10 Downing Street anyone?), a lack of preparation of America's Army (our soldiers are dying because lack of armored vehicles), and a lack of preparation for the aftermath (no, it ain't gonna be easy-in-easy-out. This isn't the middle ages where we can just topple a regime and leave the smoldering pile of crap be). And now the lack of preparation for a natural disaster.

And now George Junior wants to say, with a straight face, to the American public, that "Sorry, but we didn't see this one coming." I have one word for that

Bullshit

To not see something coming is ignorance. To know something is coming and not prepare for it is incompetence. How the American people voted this near-sighted monkey into the White House is beyond me. But if Clinton almost became a second Andrew Johnson for making whoopie, I say we ought to impeach this circus side-show's ass.