Spin, spin, spin. The Congress is back in town, and instead of taking a fair, unbiased look at the federal government's failure to respond adequately to Hurricane Katrina, partisan politics is breaking out all across town. Republicans create a panel to look at the response effort, but don't consult Democrats. Democrats refuse to participate because they were not consulted and will not have bipartisan 'subpoena' powers, or an ability to sit on panel balanced with equal numbers of Democrats and Republicans. Republicans accuse Democrats of playing 'partisan' politics when Democrats question the Administration's response to the Hurricane. The President launches his own investigation: 'we'll investigate the administration response ourselves'.
Back and forth, back and forth, like a tennis match. For goodness sake! It's not lost on Americans across the country that the Republicans control everything in Washington: White House, House and Senate. The White House (with the President's inquiry) and the Republicans (with their inquiry) seem to be saying, 'we'll handle it': kind of like the 'accused' in a trial saying "forget about the judge and jury let me 'try' myself. I'll be fair, thorough, un-biased, and I'll do the right thing, just leave it to me".
Memo to the President and Congress: Please appoint an independent, non-partisan, un-biased commission, like the 9-11 Commission, so that Americans can feel secure in knowing that a fair, un-biased, comprehensive investigation will be launched and completed. To do anything less is a travesty. To do anything less means that the federal emergency response problems could continue without correction, thus jeopordizing more American lives in future natural or man-made disasters.
'Come on Washington. Do the right thing for the sake of our country'.
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