by Douglas DeBono, 2006

ARTICLE ORIGINALLY APPEARED AT StandingOrders.BlogSpot.Com, September 02, 2005

I'm not here to defend the Bush Administration. I don't buy into the idea that anyone could adequately plan for a disaster like the what has happened in New Orleans.

These pictures are from Fox News taken prior to Katrina's land fall. They show national guard troops handing out MREs, people boarding up houses and people taking hurricane evacuation routes.

These people prepared for a Hurricane, not a flood.

New Orleans weathered Hurricane Katrina fairly well. It was the failure of the levees that caused this disaster. The President declared disaster areas in advance of Katrina's landfall so that supplies could be prepositioned.

But no one thought they would have to swim to the people needing help.

Finally, these people need our prayers, our help and our charity. The Stars and Stripes have been around the world for every kind of natural disaster known to man. American troops, American aide, American charity, American goods have poured into places with names we can't pronounce, much less find on a map.

This time it happened here to a place we know and city we can find on the map. There will be plenty of time to point fingers later (if that is your game), but right now we need to pull together and be Americans.