From: John Cuccia 

On Sat, 4 Mar 2006 19:01:48 +0100, "Phil Payne"
 wrote:

>> FEMA screwed up but it certainly would have helped if Blanco hadn't spent
>> more than a day on the president's plane trying to decide whether she
>> wanted federal help.
>
>Isn't Air Force One sometimes called the Flying White House?  I wonder who
>she was talking to while she was on there?

Despite the rhetoric, she wasn't deciding whether or not she wanted
"federal help", she had plenty of that, from (at least) the Corps
of Engineers and FEMA. The Coast Guard was there rescuing thousands.

She was deciding specifically whether to turn command of the Louisiana
National Guard over to the US Army.  Under US law, that is her call, not
Bush's. It should not have taken her a day to make that decision; it was
obvious that the resources available at the time where overwhelmed.

The Army brought much-needed communications gear and a unified command
structure to a chaotic situation.

--- BBBS/NT v4.01 Flag-5