Under fire, Bush says feds well prepared for Rita(Watching on a plasma TV)

http://www.swissinfo.org/sen/swissinfo.html?siteSect=143&sid=6111396&cKey=1127577048000&ticker=true

COLORADO SPRINGS, Colo. (Reuters) - U.S. President George W. Bush on Saturday called the federal government well prepared and organised to deal with Hurricane Rita as he sought to reassure Americans and repair his image tarnished by the slow and chaotic response to Katrina.

"It comforts me knowing that our federal government is well organised and well prepared to deal with Rita," said Bush, who kept watch on the powerful storm from a military base in the Colorado Rocky Mountains, more than 1,000 miles (1,600 km) from the Rita-battered Gulf Coast of Texas and Louisiana.

On plasma screens in a conference room at the base, Bush received a briefing on Rita's path and impact, and on how troops were being used to aid in the recovery effort. snip

Bush has seen his approval ratings plunge after the slow response to Hurricane Katrina, which hit August 29 and devastated New Orleans, killed more 1,000 people and displaced 1 million.

You can crow all you like about your preparedness right now, but the crunch time has just started. It's what happens over the next week that counts.

And if you are, wonderful. Not only will you have helped hundreds of thousands of Americans, not only will you have demonstrated what you could have done with Katrina if you'd actually given disaster-preparedness any real priority (over, say, paying back campaign flunkies), you will have demonstrated for all to see that "big government" does have its uses.

When you remind them that Bush's plan is to take out some more loans from China to bankroll everything they get real nervous. Try it on someone. It doesn't matter if they are Dem's or Repug's either. The reaction is the same. See if you can find anyone who thinks borrowing money from China for Bush's follies is a good idea. I haven't found one yet.

Don