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Originally Posted by ubertuber
This is a little confusing ace. Reading between the lines, I'm gathering that you think charity helping people is better than government taking taxes and helping people?
I can understand where that point comes from, but at some level there has to be a coordinating agency or party to make sure that all of the individual charities aren't out buying water and no one buys blankets... That's an extreme example, but Katrina did show us that a major disaster brings up a lot of different needs and a lot of problems that only have long term solutions. To me, thats a formula that requires coordination by a government agency - I just don't see any other way to do it. I've also never (yet) heard a plan to accomplish that sort of large scale disaster response that sounded feasible.
So, on the whole FEMA is better than no FEMA, but competent FEMA is best of all...
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I think we had the most effective results from regular people and even from comapnies like the often hated Walmart. They responded with truckloads of needed items. I voted for Bush, but Walmart was delivering needed items before Bush did his first fly over.
I have confidence in people. Remember the 16 year-old kid who took a school bus a drove it full of people to Huston. He "coordinated" his trip while FEMA was "coordinating" conference calls. I also remember a story about a guy who chartered a plane with his own money to deliver supplies and then to take people out. He did this while congress watched it all on TV or did talk shows The stories go on and on. I stand by my point. FEMA added no value and people helping people is better than government helping people.