WE Blog

Mike Brown, the much-criticized director of the Federal Emergency Management Agency, did the right thing today by resigning, a few days after being relieved of command of the federal Hurricane Katrina response. He had little credibility left. Katrina exposed glaring management problems at FEMA and troubling questions about Brown’s qualifications for the post.
The resignation doesn’t answer this question: Why didn’t President Bush fire Brown? And is the president planning further housecleaning at FEMA, Homeland Security and other underperforming agencies?
Let’s hope so. The buck doesn’t stop with Michael Brown.
Posted by Randy Scholfield

We have long suspected that former Westar Energy executives David Wittig and Douglas Lake were crooks. Nonetheless, we were pleasantly surprised that a federal jury found them guilty Monday of looting the state’s largest utility. The way so many corporate cases go these days, we feared that the duo might end up walking. But unless their convictions are tossed on appeal, they will be doing a well-deserved perp walk.
Posted by Phillip Brownlee

We had a large number of entries this week in the cartoon caption contest. Apparently a lot of people have some strong opinions about this tragic incidence of governmental bungling. Here are some of the best of the losing submissions. From Suzie Fowler of Wichita: "How many bureaucrats does it take to screw up a national disaster?" Joel Fein sent in "We should be arriving at the Twin Towers any time now…" Frequent winner, Bruce Cole said, "Plop, plop, fizz, fizz; what inadequate relief it is!" His daughter, Valerie, took a more poignant approach: "They gave us helmets to protect our heads, but nothing to protect our hearts." Oh, and here’s another one from Bruce: "Even our little buddy Gilligan couldn’t have screwed things up as much as we have!" He was, no doubt, reflecting on the passing of Bob Denver last week. From Udall, Mike Burley submitted "You know, if we could convince them that the terrorists were responsible for the hurricane, I think they would have given us a boat with a motor!" John and Sherrie (no last name given) took things all the way to the President with "I figure if Katrina had hit Crawford, Texas, we wouldn’t be stuck in this here paddle boat!" And Gene Elmore of Wichita took it all the way down to the local Wichita area: "The city of Wichita called and offered to pay for a consultant to study how we can peddle faster."

It’s hard to remember in the presence of human events as overwhelming as Hurricane Katrina, but our laws transcend our lives. Long after today’s presidents, senators, governors and mayors have left office, the decisions of today’s judges will stand. All of this underscores the importance of this week’s hearings of the Senate Judiciary Committee, including Sen. Sam Brownback, R-Kan. So far, the court of public opinion seems to favor Judge John Roberts as the right man to succeed the late William Rehnquist as chief justice of the United States. Brownback and other senators need to proceed with care, fairness and foresight. What they do this week could reverberate through American life for many decades.
Posted by Rhonda Holman

Sen. Pat Roberts, R-Kan., chairman of the Senate Intelligence Committee, recently told The Johnson County Sun that he still hopes to hold hearings related to the Valerie Plame case and the issue of cover of all CIA agents and analysts. Of the underlying trip by Plame’s husband, former Ambassador Joseph Wilson, to Niger to investigate whether Saddam Hussein was trying to uranium there, Roberts said this: “I was amazed, ‘A,’ that (Wilson) was picked; ‘B,’ at the lack of a good job that he did; ‘C,’ the fact that there was no written report; and, ‘D,’ that he ignored what the British still say was well-founded, and that was that Niger and Iraq were planning some kind of deal with regard to ‘yellow cake.’” Sounds like Roberts doesn’t need hearings to help him form an opinion of Wilson.
Posted by Rhonda Holman