Michael Brown
Michael Brown
Former administrator of FEMA who resigned from his position after Hurricane Katrina in 2005. Many americans blamed him for the slow response to help those in New Orleans in the aftermath of the deadly hurricane.
ProfessionPolitician
Date of Birth8 November 1954
CityGuymon, OK
serve totally
I serve totally at the will of the president.
causing communication dangerous good ground hear help inability intelligence lack lives medical others problem pull save situation teams thugs total yesterday
The total lack of communication. The inability to hear and have good intelligence on the ground about what was occurring there, ... We had to actually take teams out yesterday because of the dangerous situation they were in. That's very frustrating not only to me but those teams. Those medical teams want to help save lives and the thugs and the others that are causing the problem are actually making it more difficult. So we had to pull them out for a while. They want to go back in. They're going back in.
good ground hear inability intelligence intelligence-and-intellectuals lack total
the total lack of communications, the inability to hear and have good intelligence on the ground about what was actually occurring there.
across community disaster federal government inherently respond size totally whatever
It is inherently impractical, totally impractical, for the federal government to respond to every disaster of whatever size in every community across the country,
best knew prepared quickly stretched
We were prepared but overwhelmed is the best way I can put it. We knew what to do. We knew how to do it. But because we're stretched thin, because we still had these logistical problems, it quickly overwhelmed us.
above clouds coming exciting
What is tremendously exciting is we can see it from Earth; we see these big clouds coming from above these methane vents or methane volcanoes.
darn good job
I've overseen over 150 presidentially declared disasters. I know what I'm doing, and I think I do a pretty darn good job of it,
governor mayor personally persuade pull regret sit strongly unable work
I very strongly personally regret that I was unable to persuade Governor Blanco and Mayor Nagin to sit down, get over their differences and work together. I just couldn't pull that off.
good management matter weaknesses
These demonstrate weaknesses in management and must be addressed as a matter of good practice.
emergency largest recovery resources response single
the single largest mobilization of emergency response and recovery resources in history.
garbage picked picking
I see them picking up the trees, but it's the garbage we need to get picked up now.
care people sure understand
I understand their frustration and I understand these people are suffering, we are doing everything we can to make sure we take care of them.
coast gotten guard people pockets understand
I understand that there are pockets where people have not gotten the basics, and we're working with the Coast Guard to get those,
absolutely disaster supplies understand
I understand people's frustrations. This has been an absolutely catastrophic disaster and so, we're doing absolutely everything we can to get the supplies into those folks.