We're From the Government, we're here to Help

Some bloggers see this as ridiculous:

Not long after some 1,000 firefighters sat down for eight hours of training, the whispering began: "What are we doing here?"
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"They've got people here who are search-and-rescue certified, paramedics, haz-mat certified," said a Texas firefighter. "We're sitting in here having a sexual-harassment class while there are still [victims] in Louisiana who haven't been contacted yet."

The US authorities were also castigated by British bus driver Ged Scott, from Wallasey, Merseyside, who was on holiday in the New Orleans area.

He stayed in the Ramada Hotel during and after the devastation with his wife, Sandra, and seven-year-old son Ronan. At one stage, Mr Scott, 36, had to wade through filthy water to barricade the hotel doors against looters.

He told the Liverpool Daily Post: "I couldn't describe how bad the authorities were. Just little things like taking photographs of us, as we are standing on the roof waving for help, for their own little snapshot albums.

"At one point, there were a load of girls on the roof of the hotel saying 'Can you help us?' and the policemen said 'Show us what you've got' and made signs for them to lift their T-shirts. When the girls refused, they said 'Fine' and motored off down the road in their boat."

For the record, we hope both stories are the result of sensationalist reporting. Sadly, we think the first one isn't.

Also for the record, before I myself experienced hours of sensitivity training required to be a career military man person, I would have had a two word desription for this. Now I simply refer to it as a "cluster".