Most of the things that go on with this administration I'm willing to write off to incompetence. But this is just straight up evil:
The Federal Emergency Management Agency has suppressed warnings from its own Gulf coast field workers since the middle of 2006 about suspected health problems that may be linked to elevated levels of formaldehyde gas released in FEMA-provided trailers, lawmakers said today.
At a hearing this morning of the House Oversight and Government Reform Committee, investigators released internal e-mails indicating that FEMA lawyers rejected environmental testing out of fear that the agency would then become legally liable if health problems emerged among as many as 120,000 families displaced by Hurricane Katrina who lived in trailers.FEMA's Office of General Counsel "has advised that we do not do testing," because this "would imply FEMA's ownership of this issue," wrote a FEMA logistics specialist on June 16, 2006, three months after news reports surfaced about the possible effects of the invisible cancer-causing compound and one month after the agency was sued.
Another FEMA attorney on June 15 advised, "[d]o not initiate any testing until we give the OK. . . . Once you get results and should they indicate some problem, the clock is running on our duty to respond to them."
...Nearly 5,000 pages of documents turned over to the committee "expose an official policy of premeditated ignorance," Waxman charged. "Senior officials in Washington didn't want to know what they already knew, because they didn't want the legal and moral responsibility to do what they knew had to be done."
Rep. Thomas M. Davis III (R-Va.) said FEMA obstructed the 10-month committee investigation and "mischaracterized the scope and purpose" of the agency's actions.
"FEMA's reaction to the problem was deliberately stunted to bolster the agency's litigation position," Davis said. The documents "make it appear FEMA's primary concerns were legal liability and public relations, not human health and safety."
These people lost everything in Katrina. Everything. And then, not only does our government give them contaminated trailers, the agency responsible for the trailers decides not to investigate the contamination because it might open up some sort of legal liability. Because in this situation, yes, that's obviously what matters most. Must protect FEMA from legal liability. That's the ticket.
And I love this idea that if they don't investigate, they won't be morally responsible for what happens. What a wonderful example of "compassionate conservatism" in action.
"Please, please, don't tell me! If I find out what's really going on, then I might have to actually care. And worse, do something to help someone. I'd really just prefer to keep drawing my salary and doing nothing, thank you very much."
Every time I think the actions of these people can no longer shock me, something like this comes along.
This is not who we are as a people. This is not the best we can do.
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