Who Lost New Orleans?

I know I'm not breaking any new ground here, but that's the question that has to start being asked. I've refrained from recriminations and Monday-morning-quarterbacking for a few days now, and I still think that with people still suffering and dying in the streets right here in America it may not yet be the time to start fighting about who's to blame for the almost universally-recognized inept government preparation and response. But questions are going to have to be asked at some point, because one thing has come jarringly into focus; the United States has learned very little of practical value from the attacks of September 11.

I'm no expert but it seems to me that a terrorist setting off an atomic bomb in a major American city, or some other equally horrible scenario, would have many of the same effects--rendering the area at least temporarily uninhabitable, knocking out communications and power, sparking the need for mass evactuation, etc.--and if what happened in New Orleans is any indication, we are absolutely not ready. Clearly, there is no plan. Let me repeat that: Four years after September 11, the federal government of the United States of America, led by the man who was re-elected because (among other things) 51% of the population felt he could protect us from terrorism, obviously has no plans to deal with the immediate aftermath of a terrorist attack or a major natural disaster. After days of embarrassment the feds seem to have finally gotten off their butts, but for the most part the administration and their apologists' idea of leadership seems to be to try to find a way to shift the blame to local officials. Not too impressive, cowboy.