Originally Posted by
tom911
Surely you don't expect FEMA to have sufficient personnel in-house year-round, to not need assets from other federal, state and municipal agencies?
No, I don't. Providing people to supplement disaster relief is a National Guard mission, and they should have been called up.
If I was asked to provide "volunteers" from my office, I'd ask my superiors just what essential mission we're currently performing do they want deferred/delayed?
Originally Posted by
sbm12
They're too busy fighting a war.
Or, put another way, they were loaned to the army for something more urgent.
Show me that every member of the Texas National Guard is deployed overseas, and you may have a point.
Originally Posted by
birdstrike
No always true. The Coast Guard is a thin agency and they frequently travel to serve.
It doesn't help that baby Bush has been calling on everyone and his brother, including the coasties, to bail out his Iraqi debacle.
The Coast Guard has a dedicated unit - the Deployable Operations Group - set up to respond to disasters like this. And if they ask for volunteers to augment - something they were doing before isn't getting done.
I know, because I served 21 years in the Coast Guard.