MORE GOP CRITICISM OF BUSH RESPONSE

From your Chicago Tribune:

U.S. Sen. David Vitter (R-La.) called the Federal Emergency Management Agency "completely dysfunctional" and "completely ineffective."

Vitter used harsher language than President Bush, who this morning called federal relief efforts since the storm struck Monday "not acceptable" before leaving for a tour of the hurricane-battered Gulf Coast.

The senator joined New Orleans Mayor Ray Nagin and others in saying the federal government had bungled the relief effort and let people die in the streets for lack of food, water or medicine.

Vitter said his personal estimate of deaths in Louisiana was 10,000, with the "great majority" of fatalities in New Orleans. The senator rated FEMA's performance "an F, or whatever the grade level is below that."

"I think FEMA has been completely dysfunctional, and I don't understand it because the (hurricane) scenario is completely predictable," he said. "It seems like there has been no coherent plan, and I don't understand, because there has been plans for this scenario for 20 years."

When asked about the difficulties repairing vast sections of broken levees, Vitter said, "Every one of those complications was predictable."

It just wasn't predictable to anyone in George "I don't think anyone anticipated the breach of the levees" Bush's administration.