<p><a href=“http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20051125/ap_on_re_us/brown_disasters[/url]”>http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20051125/ap_on_re_us/brown_disasters</a></p>
<p>Hey, he’s got the credentials.</p>
<p>Sortta like a former U.S. general starting a recruiting firm for insurgents…whoops, he might be better at it.</p>
<p>I’d say he has better qualifications than his boss. </p>
<p>Clarification. Brown’s boss was GWB’s campaign director who was appointed by GWB to be head of FEMA (no prior experience.) This man appointed Brown to be his counsel for four years while at FEMA. (Frontline, PBS, Nov 22)</p>
<p>I thought Brown to be come off pretty good on Frontline. He was fighting for more independence from DHS and the maintenance of his agency’s budget. FEMA’s budget has recently cut by GWB in the last few months.</p>
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<p>How about job preparedness, Mr. Brown!</p>
<p>This is priceless!</p>
<p>Being a disaster himself, I bet he now knows one when he sees it.</p>
<p>That’s pretty funny.</p>
<p>Am I the only person to see Frontline about FEMA. I really, really recommend that you view this show. Brown was just the frontman to take the fall. The problem goes much much deeper. Do not focus on Brown, but higher up.</p>
<p>Perhaps. I don’t blame the generals for the insurgent recruitment either - it’s amazing how we could take an insurgency which, at inception, had no more than perhaps 300-500 folks and turn it into (according to the Pentagon) a redoubtable fighting force of 20,000 indigenous fighters. Who says an Iraqi military force can’t be trained up to snuff?</p>
<p>mini, you’ve had too much leftovers today. Cranberries fermented?</p>
<p>Is it really so amazing that they are where they are and we are where we are. Unfortunately the cards have been shuffled and delt. Everyone will just have to play the cards out or someone folds. The pot keeps getting bigger.</p>
<p>My first reaction to Brown starting a disaster preparedness consulting firm was, “ho-hum, of course that’s what he would do.” (BTW, was that headline intentionally funny? “Ex-FEMA Head Starts Disaster Planning Firm” as if his firm will “plan disasters” rather than plan FOR disasters)</p>
<p>But after I thought about it for 2.5 seconds I wondered, who would risk the embarrassment of actually hiring this guy??? Then 3 seconds later, the answer came to me: probably some old cronies of his.</p>
<p>Hey - let’s hear it for a guy who really has “chutzpah”! ;)</p>
<p>For those who do not know Yiddish, it is roughly translated as " unmitigated gall!</p>
<p>ConcernedDad–do you really think there’s any one left in this country who doesn’t understand the word “chutzpah”? Even I, raised in WASP country by midwesterners and attending a private Episcopalian high school, learned that word at about age 13! </p>
<p>I also have to disagree with your translation. Chutzpah is not “unmitigated gall”–it is more “sheer unadulterated nerve, whether it’s a good idea or not.” (After writing that, I looked it up and see that one definition is “unbelievable gall”–another is “audacity.”) <a href=“http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chutzpah[/url]”>http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chutzpah</a></p>
<p>I also saw the Frontline episode about FEMA - should be required watching! Brown wasn’t as much of an idiot as I originally thought - he did have some pretty good insights into what did/did not happen and why. But I still wouldn’t hire him as a consultant.</p>
<p>More disturbing is the marginalization of FEMA within Homeland Security and the appointment of political hacks to positions which truly need experience.</p>
<p>Well dmd, given that when I venture too far off of I-5 in the PNW I am in danger of being the first Jew some have encountered, I thought it wise to translate. You never know who is out there.</p>
<p>“Chutzpah - Unmitigated gall, brazeness beyond imagination. Like the boy who killed both his parents, then threw himself on the mercy of the court because he was an orphan.” From: Bubby’s Yiddish/Yinglish Glossary</p>
<p>(Off topic, I know - but just this one post, then I’ll shut up)</p>
<p>Reminds me of the definition of ‘savoir faire’, from a conversation between an Englishman, a German and a Frenchman.</p>
<p>Englishman: ‘Gentleman, here’s what I what would call savoir faire. A man comes home early from work, finds another man making love to his wife, tips his hat and says “Pardon me” - that’s savoir faire’.</p>
<p>German: ‘Nein, gentlemen. The husband tips his hat, says “Pardon me - continue” - THAT’s savoir faire.’</p>
<p>Frenchman: ‘Ah, non. The husband tips his hat, say “Pardon me - continue”, and the lover continues - now zat, gentlemen, is savoir faire!’</p>
<p>FEMA on Wonkette … the al kamen piece noted that DHS is honoring FEMA - giving itself an award for 05 accomplishments </p>
<p>"It appears that the Department of Homeland Security is going a bit crazy with this whole giving-of-thanks thing. From Al Kamen’s “In the Loop” column in today’s WaPo:</p>
<pre><code>DHS Today will highlight FY05 Accomplishments in this column over the next several weeks. This week’s focus is on the Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA). The top FY05 FEMA accomplishments included:
Hurricane Katrina: The response to Hurricane Katrina was FEMA’s largest response in its history . . .
</code></pre>
<p>Other FEMA accomplishments to be celebrated in coming weeks:</p>
<p>-FEMA managed not to impale any puppies on crossbows, the largest non-puppy-slaying mobilization in the agency’s history.</p>
<p>-FEMA played no role whatsoever in ghostwriting Nicole Richie’s novel, the most impressive act of literary nonparticipation it has ever performed.</p>
<p>-FEMA, so far as it is known, has no plans to bomb Al Jazeera.</p>
<p>-FEMA: Not Bob Woodward’s source for the Plame leak.</p>
<p>-Uhm, we mentioned that whole puppy thing, right?</p>
<p>Alas, one disaster FEMA can still claim indirect credit for is also reported in Kamen’s column. Disgraced shirt-model-cum-horse-inspector Michael Brown has hied over to Joe Allbaugh’s lobbying office. Allbaugh is Brown’s predecessor at the head of the agency and by merest coincidence a former college crony of the smug pleated f***wad. – HOLLY MARTINS "</p>
<p>CCers…what else should FEMA be honored for???</p>
<p>FEMA had nothing to do with “So, you want to marry a millionaire?”</p>
<p>FEMA did not have sex with that woman, Ms. Lewinski</p>
<p>Cowards cut and run. FEMA does not.</p>