White House faces new questions on Katrina relief

By Paul Simao

NEW ORLEANS (Reuters) – Rescue crews prepared to speed up
the retrieval of the dead from Hurricane Katrina on Friday amid
reports that President George W. Bush chose unqualified
political supporters rather than disaster experts to head the
agency leading the relief effort.

The Federal Emergency Management Agency has hired a private
firm to coordinate the recovery of bodies in and around New
Orleans. The official death toll from the monster storm that
hit Louisiana and Mississippi has exceeded 300 but is expected
to climb much higher. Officials have 25,000 body bags on hand.

Water levels were slowly falling in a city still flooded
with a toxic brew of dark-brown water poisoned by bacteria,
gasoline, oil, chemicals, debris and submerged bodies. A fifth
of the city’s 75 major drainage pumps were back in operation
draining fetid water from the city, the New Orleans
Times-Picayune reported on Friday.

Rescuers were still going door-to-door in New Orleans
neighborhoods, trying to persuade reluctant stragglers to
evacuate and were soon expected to begin removing people by
force. Thousands of people were still believed to be holding
out in the city.

Officials said there were fewer fires than in recent days,
with 11 on Thursday, the Times-Picayune reported.

POLITICAL TIES TO BUSH

The Washington Post reported that five of the top eight
FEMA officials had little experience in handling disasters and
owed their jobs to their political ties to Bush.

As political operatives took the top jobs, professionals
and experts in hurricanes and disasters left the agency, the
newspaper said.

FEMA director Michael Brown, already under fire for his
performance as the disaster unfolded, came under further
pressure when Time magazine reported that his official
biography released by the White House at the time of his
nomination exaggerated his experience in disaster relief.

Brown was a friend of former Bush campaign director Joe
Allbaugh, the previous FEMA head. Brown had also headed an
Arabian horse association. Last week, as criticism of his
response to the disaster swelled, Bush gave him a public vote
of confidence, saying, “Brownie, you’re doing a heck of a job.”

Brown’s biography on the FEMA Web site said he had once
served as an “assistant city manager with emergency services
oversight,” but Time quoted an official in Edmond, Oklahoma, as
saying the job was actually “assistant to the city manager,”
with little responsibility. The magazine also said Brown padded
his academic accomplishments.

“The assistant is more like an intern,” city spokeswoman
Claudia Deakins told the magazine. “Department heads did not
report to him.”

In response to the report on Time’s Web site, FEMA issued a
statement that took issue with elements related to an
unofficial biography, and described his job in Edmond as
“assistant to the city manager.”

Bush administration officials were busy rushing fresh aid
to the region while also trying to blunt the political fallout
over the federal response to what, at an estimated $100 billion
to $200 billion, could be the costliest natural disaster in
U.S. history.

A Pew Research Center poll found 67 percent of Americans
thought Bush could have done more to speed up relief efforts,
and just 28 percent believed he did all he could. The
president’s approval rating fell to 40 percent, down four
points since July to the lowest point Pew has recorded.

Colin Powell, the former U.S. secretary of state and a
possible leader for Hurricane Katrina recovery efforts,
criticized the disaster response by all levels of government in
an interview to be broadcast on Friday.

‘ENOUGH WARNING’

“There was more than enough warning over time about the
dangers to New Orleans. Not enough was done. I don’t think
advantage was taken of the time that was available to us, and I
just don’t know why,” Powell said in excerpts of the “20/20″
program interview posted to the ABC Web site.

The task of retrieving and identifying bodies promised to
be grim and difficult. Many were feared to be trapped in the
poor, blue-collar subdivisions of the city, where people had no
means to evacuate ahead of the storm.

Many corpses have decomposed. Poor people may not have
dental records useful in identification. And family members of
the dead have scattered across the entire country.

The president sent Vice President Dick Cheney to
Mississippi and Louisiana on Thursday to help untangle
bureaucratic red tape that had triggered complaints from some
of the 1 million people displaced by the storm.

Cheney rode through the streets of downtown New Orleans in
a Humvee, the highest-ranking Bush administration official to
visit the shattered city center.

Asked about bureaucratic problems, Cheney said: “I think
the progress we’re making is significant. I think the
performance in general at least in terms of the information
I’ve received from locals is definitely very impressive.”

Congress on Thursday pushed through approval for $51.8
billion in new aid, after an earlier $10.5 billion was
exhausted in the first days since the storm hit on August 29.

Bush immediately signed the measure. “More resources will
be needed as we work to help people get back on their feet,” he
said.

Bush also issued an executive order on Thursday allowing
federal contractors rebuilding in the aftermath of the
hurricane to pay below the prevailing wage, drawing rebukes
from two congressional Democrats who said stricken families
need good wages to rebuild their lives.