Thursday, September 01, 2005

Who's in charge of this relief effort, anyway?


Buried in the middle of a Globe front-page article, we have this puzzling tidbit of information regarding Hurricane Katrina relief efforts:

Spearheaded by the federal Department of Homeland Security, the federal government launched an unprecedented emergency response.

Excuse me? Spearheaded by the DHS? How exactly did the DHS come to be running this show? Isn't this sort of the department of the Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA)? Who exactly put the DHS in charge?

But things get a bit clearer if you check out the (new and improved as of July of 2005) six-point agenda for the DHS, whose first point reads, "Increase operall preparedness, particularly for catastrophic events."

Wow. You know, you'd have thought that's exactly what FEMA was all about, wouldn't you? Suddenly, all those FEMA budget cuts are starting to make sense. It's not like anyone needs them anymore, is it?

SPEAKING OF FEMA ... it's weird the kind of stuff you run across through Google, like this piece describing FEMA as a super-secret, alternate government of the U.S. I have no idea what to make of it, it just makes for some strangely amusing reading.

Besides, there's no way FEMA is some clandestine, top-secret unaccountable government agency. We all know that's the DHS.

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