McCain says U.S. government failed New Orleans
(CNN) — Sen. John McCain on Thursday blasted the Bush administration and all levels of government for the failed response to Hurricane Katrina in New Orleans.
We know we didn’t have the right kind of leadership … where government agencies were getting information from watching cable television rather than have a flow of information, McCain said during an event at Xavier University in New Orleans.
It was not only a perfect storm as far as its physical impact … it was a perfect storm as far as the federal, state and local governments’ inability.
Never again will there be a mismanaged natural disaster, he said, later assuring the crowd that it will never happen again in this country, you have my commitment and my promise.
McCain was into his fourth day in New Orleans on a tour through some economically struggling Democratic states, trying to convince voters he’s not necessarily your typical Republican.
He made stops this week in Selma, Alabama; Youngstown, Ohio, and Inez, Kentucky. Watch McCain discuss the economy in Youngstown, Ohio
The Arizona senator toured the New Orleans’ 9th Ward — the neighborhood hit hardest by Hurricane Katrina. He discussed the challenges ahead for this poverty-stricken area.
We … know that there’s enormous challenges ahead, McCain said. Americans have not forgotten New Orleans. Watch more on McCain’s tour in New Orleans
McCain and his wife Cindy, along with Louisiana’s Republican Gov. Bobby Jindal, walked about 20 minutes through the Lower 9th, stopping at a house being rebuilt by about a dozen volunteers from DeutscheBank in New York City.
I’m proud to be in your company. You’re what America’s all about, McCain told them.
McCain also visited with workers at the Lower 9th Ward Neighborhood Empowerment Association. He asked worker Leroy Crawford how things were going. It’s work, but we’re working, he replied.
On Wednesday, McCain toured Inez, where President Lyndon Johnson launched his War on Poverty — a campaign McCain’s party has criticized for decades.
As well as touring, McCain is trying to put out a political fire set by members of his own party — a controversial ad slamming Sen. Barack Obama that is running in North Carolina.
After McCain had effectively clinched the Republican nomination, he called on his party to run a respectful, above the fray campaign. Watch more on McCain’s campaign focus
But the ad, conceived by local North Carolina Republicans, appears to defy that call.
For 20 years, Barack Obama sat in his cube listening to his pastor, the TV ad says.
The ad then airs comments from Obama’s pastor, the Rev. Jeremiah Wright, who says: And then wants us to sing God Bless America? No, no, no. Not God Bless America, God [expletive] America.
McCain’s campaign released an e-mail he sent North Carolina’s GOP chairwoman Linda Daves that asked her not to run the ad.
In the strongest terms, I implore you to not run this advertisement, he wrote. This ad does not live up to the very high standards we should hold ourselves to in this campaign.
North Carolina Republicans refused to pull the ad.
I can’t dictate to them. But I want to be the candidate of everybody. I want to be the candidate of Republicans and Democrats and independents, he said Wednesday.
But even as McCain promised to stick to issues, he found an opportunity to knock Obama for remarks that suggested rural and working-class voters, bitter about the economy, focus on issues involving religion and guns.
Those are elitist remarks, to say the least, McCain said.
found here.
