[Swiftwater Gazette] Bill Effros continues...

[Brad Haslett]

Ed,

Right after I wrote that, a Yahoo news article popped on my screen
(written by the AP).  A number of bloggers and pundits have noticed a
substantial difference between first AP articles published in local
papers and subsequent "sanitized" AP articles appearing on national
media sites.  Below is an article from the Saturday Louisville, KY
newspaper and following that is today's Yahoo account.  Now who is
blowing smoke?

Brad

------------------

January 31, 2009

Many pleading for faster response

MARION, Ky. (AP) — A crippling winter storm has plunged about a
million customers into the dark from the Midwest to the East Coast,
and thousands of people in ice-caked Kentucky have sought refuge in
motels and shelters.

Dozens of deaths have been reported and many people are pleading for a
faster response to the power outages. Some in rural Kentucky ran short
of food and bottled water, and resorted to dipping buckets in a creek.

Thousands fled frigid, powerless homes for hotels and even a heated
auditorium at Murray State University that was converted into a
shelter following Monday's storm that left some areas in up to 1 inch
ice.

Utility workers hoped to speed up efforts Saturday to turn the lights
back on. Still, rural communities feared it could be days or even
weeks before workers got to areas littered with downed power lines.

Temperatures were expected to rise just above freezing Saturday for
the first time in days.

At least 42 people have died in the icy arc of destruction that began
in the Midwest. At least nine deaths were reported in Arkansas, six
each in Texas and Missouri, three in Virginia, two each in Oklahoma,
Indiana and West Virginia and one in Ohio. Most were blamed on
hypothermia, traffic accidents and carbon monoxide poisoning from
generators.

In Kentucky, where 11 people had died, a man and two women were the
latest victims after they were found dead in a southwestern Louisville
home. One woman was found in a bed; the other two were found in the
garage with a generator, police spokesman Phil Russell said.

Meanwhile, the uncertainty of when power might be restored had many
appealing for help. Officials urged those in dark homes to leave.

"We're asking people to pack a suitcase and head south and find a
motel if they have the means, because we can't service everybody in
our shelter," said Crittenden County Judge-Executive Fred Brown, who
oversees about 9,000 people, many of whom spent a fifth night sleeping
in the town's elementary school.

Local officials grew angrier at what they said was a lack of help from
the state and the Federal Emergency Management Agency.

In Kentucky's Grayson County, about 80 miles southwest of Louisville,
Emergency Management Director Randell Smith said the 25 National
Guardsmen who have responded have no chain saws to clear fallen trees.
He said roads are littered with fallen trees and people shivering in
bone-chilling cold are in need.

"We've got people out in some areas we haven't even visited yet,"
Smith said. "We don't even know that they're alive."

Smith said FEMA was still a no-show days after the storm.

"I'm not saying we can't handle it," Smith said. "We're handling it.
But it sure would have made life a lot easier."

FEMA spokeswoman Mary Hudak said some agency workers had begun working
Friday in Kentucky and more help was on the way. Hudak said FEMA also
has shipped 50 to 100 generators to the state to supply electricity to
such facilities as hospitals, nursing homes and water treatment
plants.
"We have plenty of folks ready to go, but there are some limitations
with roads closed and icy conditions," she noted.

>From Missouri to Ohio, thousands were waiting in shelters for the
power to return. Others were trying to tough it out at home.

In Poplar Bluff, Mo., a man used a barbecue grill inside to cook and
keep warm, deputy police chief Jeff Rolland said.

"Luckily, one of our volunteers was in a position to see what he was
doing and inform him of the carbon monoxide dangers of using a
charcoal grill inside a residence," Rolland said.

President Barack Obama on Friday declared a federal emergency for
Missouri, making the state eligible for federal funds even as power
outages lingered in much of the southern portion of the state.

In Kentucky, Gov. Steve Beshear said crews were working around the
clock to restore power and get food and water to needed areas. Beshear
said state government would "spare no expense" in recovery efforts.

"We are pulling out all the stops, using all of our resources and
devoting our entire energy to this emergency and we will continue to
do so until the last home has power, the last road is cleared and the
last family is safe," Beshear said.

Beshear said 200,000 customers were without water or under an advisory
to boil their water Friday night.

"By the end of this weekend, we hope to have generators at a majority
of the water plants," he said. "In the meantime, we are trucking
bottled water into every place we know that needs it, so no one should
be without drinking water over the weekend."

Laura Howe, a spokeswoman for the American Red Cross, said the
organization had opened more than 34 shelters for some 2,000 people.

Doris Hemingway, 78, spent three days bundled in blankets to ward off
the cold in her Leitchfield mobile home. News that it could take up to
six weeks for power to be restored sent Hemingway and his husband,
Bill, into a shelter at a local high school.

"I'd pray awhile and I'd cry awhile," Doris Hemingway said. "It's the
worst I've ever seen."
___
Associated Press writers Roger Alford in Leitchfield; Dylan T. Lovan,
Rebecca Yonker, Brett Barrouquere and Janet Cappiello Blake in
Louisville; Betsy Taylor in St. Louis; and Randall Dickerson in
Nashville, Tenn., contributed to this report.

---------

today's version of the same story...

FEMA gets decent marks for its ice storm response
By ROGER ALFORD, Associated Press Writer Roger Alford, Associated
Press Writer Mon Feb 2, 11:01 pm ET

EDDYVILLE, Ky. – In the first real test of the Obama administration's
ability to respond to a disaster, Kentucky officials are giving the
federal government good marks for its response to a deadly ice storm.

Yet more than 300,000 residents remained without power Monday and some
areas had yet to see aid workers nearly a week after the storm, a fact
not lost on some local authorities.

"We haven't seen FEMA. They haven't been here," said Jaime Green, a
spokeswoman for the emergency operations center in Lyon County, about
95 miles northwest of Nashville, Tenn.

Federal authorities insisted they responded as soon as the state asked
for help and promised to keep providing whatever aid was necessary.

FEMA has been under the microscope since the Bush administration's
botched response to Hurricane Katrina in 2005, which Barack Obama and
other Democrats made a favorite topic on the presidential campaign
trail. FEMA was reorganized and strengthened after that, and it has
avoided the onslaught of negative feedback Katrina generated.

The agency hasn't been tested the same way it was after the hurricane, however.

Gov. Steve Beshear raised Kentucky's death toll to 24 on Monday,
meaning the storm has been blamed in at least 55 deaths nationwide.
And while it also knocked out power to more than a million customers
from the Southern Plains to the East Coast, it's still considered a
medium-sized disaster, the kind FEMA has traditionally been successful
handling.

The Kentucky disaster will be closely watched, said Richard Sylves,
professor of political science at the University of Delaware,
particularly because Obama hasn't yet named the top FEMA officials,
many of whom must go through Senate confirmation.

"If it's perceived not to be handled very well, or if there's a sense
that there's insensitivity at the federal level to the plight of
people suffering, I imagine the people President Obama has appointed
to senior positions in FEMA will be grilled in their confirmation
hearings," said Sylves, who has written four books on federal disaster
policy.

Beshear asked Obama for a disaster declaration to free up federal
assistance Thursday, two days after the storm hit, and Obama issued it
hours later. Trucks loaded with supplies began arriving at a staging
area at Fort Campbell, Ky., on Friday morning, said Mary Hudak, a
spokeswoman for the Federal Emergency Management Agency.

On Saturday, Beshear ordered all of the state's Army National
Guardsmen into action to distribute supplies, many of which came from
FEMA.

Beshear has consistently praised Obama, a fellow Democrat, for the
attention he's devoted to what Beshear calls the biggest natural
disaster to hit his state.

"We have had tremendous and quick response from President Obama and
his administration," Beshear said Monday. "I don't think any of our
folks that have dealt with disasters before ever recall as quick a
response as we got last Wednesday."

Trina Sheets, executive director of the National Emergency Management
Association, based in Lexington, Ky., said that from what she's heard,
FEMA's response has been very good so far. Her group represents
emergency management directors from all 50 states.

"The governor's declaration request for an emergency was turned around
very, very quickly by FEMA and the White House," said Sheets, who just
had her power restored Monday after four days without it. "And
President Obama has spoken with the governor of Kentucky on several
occasions throughout the event."

Sheets said she hadn't heard any complaints so far about the federal response.

"FEMA and the Kentucky National Guard are doing everything they can to
get things back up and running," Sen. Jim Bunning said.

By Monday, FEMA officials were checking in on supply distribution
points in some rural areas. FEMA official Don Daniel stopped by to ask
emergency management officials in Grayson County, who had criticized
FEMA's absence late last week, what they needed.

More generators, they told him, to keep essential services such as
hospitals and water supplies running.

"If they need more, they'll get them," Daniel said. "That need has to be met."

Federal authorities hadn't made it everywhere yet, however.

Brocton Oglesby, director of emergency management in Hopkins County,
said he has seen virtually no contribution from FEMA in the county,
where more than half of the 27,000 homes remained without electricity.

"They need to be here — at least a presence, a liaison to work with
us, to start feeding information and gearing up for the next stage,"
Oglesby said. "That's where they're going to be needed the most."

Oglesby's seen FEMA show up after other disasters to assess the
damages and write checks. Beshear asked for FEMA to have a role on the
front end this time, though, and Oglesby said that hasn't happened.

"As soon as they want to come in and start working, we're ready to go," he said.

Oglesby said he would like FEMA to bring in outside electricians to
help go door to door to make sure the electricity is operational in
each house once it comes back on.

"Right now, mom and pop are going to have to fend for themselves and
find an electrician," Oglesby said. "This is where we're needing
FEMA's presence."

___

Associated Press writers Joe Biesk in Frankfort, Ky., Dylan T. Lovan
in Louisville, Ky., Jeffrey McMurray in Lexington, Ky., Bruce
Schreiner in Leitchfield, Ky., and Eileen Sullivan and Frederic J.
Frommer in Washington contributed to this report.

On Tue, Feb 3, 2009 at 7:19 AM, Brad Haslett <flybrad at gmail.com> wrote:
> Ed,
>
> Rush Limbaugh is despised because so much of what he says is common
> sense.  The Left hates him because he's not "educated", he's rich, and
> he has real power to influence voters.  That said, I don't listen to
> Rush often because he's primarily an entertainer, and I just don't
> invest that much time in media entertainment.  The market is proving
> the winners and losers in the "truth business" and old media is dying
> because people are waking-up to the propaganda. You don't see people
> in Beijing hanging on to every word printed in the China Daily, and
> fewer people are reading the New York Times and then feeling they are
> "informed".  Last week was a perfect example: over a million people
> are still without electricity throughout the MidSouth.  Almost fifty
> people have died as a result of the storm.  The Governor of Kentucky
> mobilized 100% of the Kentucky National Guard and told KY residents to
> leave the State and head South if they have the resources to do so.
> The Red Cross and Salvation Army are on the ground doing the "heavy
> lifting" as usual.  FEMA is late to the scene as always.  Meanwhile,
> President Obama is eating $100 steaks at "bipartisan" dinners and
> throwing Super Bowl parties at the White House where aides say "he
> keeps the temperature so high you could grow orchids in there".  Now
> believe it or not, I'm not slamming President Obama.  It is the job of
> the Governors of the States hit and their first responders to deal
> with the situation.  FEMA doesn't have the resources or the management
> to add any value to this or any other disaster, no matter who's in the
> Whitehouse.  Obama riding in on a white horse (or maybe a unicorn in
> his case) to make a photo op won't warm anyone's home.  What I am
> saying is this:  why hasn't the press gone apocalyptic over this
> situation?  Does the President hate white people from Red redneck
> fly-over states?  The story doesn't fit their meme so it doesn't get
> covered.
>
> The MSM will die from its own incompetence and irrelevancy soon if
> left alone. They won't be left alone, expect a bailout.  In fact, I
> expect some version of the "Fairness Doctrine" to be passed.  Rush is
> successful (whether you agree with him or not) and therefore must be
> stopped!
>
> Now you understand why people like my wife and her friends who lived
> through the Great Leap Forward and the Cultural Revolution are not
> impressed with 'Dear Leader'.
>
> Brad
>
>
>
> On Mon, Feb 2, 2009 at 11:14 AM, tootle <tootle at charter.net> wrote:
>> Bill,
>>
>> You continue to read the New York Times, a great source of left wing
>> opinion.  Try other sources of information.
>>
>> Look and read some of the speeches and articles at this site:
>>
>> http://www.hillsdale.edu/news/imprimis.asp
>>
>> Read the attached right wing opinion...
>>
>> Ed K
>>
>> No virus found in this outgoing message.
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>> 18:02:00
>>
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>>
>