Red Cross Blocked by FEMA from Entering New OrleansAccording to this article by Max Blumenthal in The Nation, the U.S. government has passed around a list of relief organizations for news outlets to promote. Only two of these organizations are non-faith-based.
Dozens of media outlets, including the New York Times, CNN and the Associated Press, duly reprinted FEMA's list, unwittingly acting as agents soliciting cash for Robertson. "How in the heck did that happen?" Richard Walden, president of the disaster-relief group Operation USA, asked of Operation Blessing's inclusion on FEMA's list. "That gives Pat Robertson millions of extra dollars."
One of the non-faith-based relief organizations is the Red Cross - and according to the Red Cross website, FEMA's parent agency, the Department of Homeland Security, is blocking them from coming into New Orleans.
FEMA, [at the same time], has reportedly turned away Wal-Mart trucks carrying food and water to the stricken city, teams of firemen from Maryland and Texas, volunteer morticians and a convoy of 1,000 boat owners offering to help rescue stranded flood victims. While relief efforts falter in the face of colossal bureaucratic incompetence, the Bush Administration's promotion of Operation Blessing has ensured that the floodwaters swallowing New Orleans will be a rising tide lifting Robertson's boat.
(Read the complete article here.)
The sheer criminality of this behavior is beyond comprehension.
Thanks to Christina Butts of Des Moines for submitting this article.
