"Drowing in Incompetence in New Orleans"

The Chicago Reader's Michael Miner ponders the cruel joke that is the Bush Administration:

Congress and the public have shoveled new powers upon the White House in the last four years, and the deal was that the White House would use them to protect us. The Bush administration is now protesting that its hands were tied in New Orleans by an indecisive mayor and governor, but it had swaggered before the public as a crew that in a time of crisis could do and would do whatever it takes.

New Orleans was a flood in a small city -- and the White House froze. Imagine if it had been a dirty bomb in a bigger city -- let's say Chicago. Can anyone who has watched the White House flail and fumble over New Orleans believe for a second that the Department of Homeland Security has a serious plan to keep order and empty this city if a radioactive bomb goes off in the Loop, or that President Bush has meditated on such a disaster and will immediately take steps that meet the test of leadership?

The whole column will be available later today here.