Chertoff describes disaster preparations.

USATODAY.com News - Top Stories: "Chertoff told senators he accepts responsibility for "many lapses" during the catastrophe that left 1,300 dead and caused tens of billions of dollars in damage. "

This picture appears to indicate the amount of time, effort, and planning the Homeland Defense Department and FEMA put into preparing for the next natural disaster. Prior to Katrina, there was the fraud, waste and abuse hearings and investigations in the aftermath of Florida's destructive hurricane. But, not a word of it was learned from or taken to heart as the amount of waste, fraud, and abuse in the aftermath of Katrina and Rita dwarfed that in Florida which became a scandal.

In the real world, people get fired for this kind of colossal failure to prepare for and do their job. Of course, we all know, Wa. D.C. is not part of the real world the rest of us live in. Actions such as these are apparently endearing to political leaders calling forth the circling of wagons to defend such ineptitude and incompetence. A few are even promoted - all the way to President. American politics is a very odd beast. A beast that is killing our future by thouands of bites and scratches, resulting in a kind of slow hemorraging death in the form of incompetence, deficits, and national debt.