New reason to hate Bush: FEMA "fakes" a press conference

By Dennis Byrne

For days, media vultures have been circling the California wildfires, eyes peeled for another Hurricane Katrina “blunder” by the Bush administration.

But in the absence of red meat, they had to settle for—horrors!—a “fake” news conference conducted by FEMA’s deputy administrator, Harvey E. Johnson Jr., as evidence of the administration’s ineptitude or, worse, deception.

Judging by the press reaction, you would have thought Johnson had set some of the fires himself. Hundreds of stories describing the supposed scandal popped up across the country, including this blast in the Los Angeles Times:

The “fake” press conference “…comes just more than two years after [FEMA’s] agonizingly slow-motion response to thousands of displaced New Orleans residents who waited for help in dreadful conditions at the Superdome. Michael D. Brown, the agency's head, resigned under fire after he became an embarrassment to President Bush, who appeared out of touch when he praised Brown with the memorable comment: ‘Brownie, you're doing a heck of a job.’”

It also reminded me of the agonizingly slow response to Katrina by Democratic Louisiana Gov. Kathleen Blanco and New Orleans Democratic Mayor Ray Nagin, but why bring that up when taking a shot at Bush is so much more fun? I suppose we should be glad that the two weren’t responsible for putting out the California fires.

The stories dutifully reported that an incensed Sen. Mary Landrieu (D-La.) demanded answers from the head of FEMA, and as chairman of the Senate's Homeland Security and Government Affairs Subcommittee on Disaster Recovery, who, but her is better positioned to keep the heat on?

Other than Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid (D-Nev.), who mindlessly blamed the wildfires on “global warming?”

FEMA and others in the Bush administration, frightened out of their skins by the possibility of a repeat of the Katrina public relations mess, hurriedly rushed forward with copious apologies, calling the press conference the worst thing imaginable—“offensive.”

Indeed, it didn’t take long after the California fires went out of control before the inevitable comparisons with Katrina were being raised. The only problem was that everyone seemed to perform well, which is what the “fake” press conference was supposed to be all about.

You can hardly blame FEMA for wanting to hold a press conference, both to blow its own horn and, more legitimately, to update the media on the progress of the fight against the catastrophic blazes. FEMA called a hurry-up news conference, with 15 minutes notice to reporters. The first mistake. Realizing that few reporters could make it, the agency provided an 800 number for reporters not on the scene to listen into the press conference, but no provision was made for them to ask questions—the second mistake. The only problem was that no reporters showed up for the actual press conference. Someone decided that it would be better to go ahead, with FEMA staff members asking questions reflective of ones that they had actually been fielding from reporters. Third mistake.

They might have avoided the problem if FEMA had just announced that no reporters were present, and in their absence FEMA was (A) canceling the press conference, or (B) forging ahead with Johnson’s prepared statement as planned, but frankly admitting that no questions could be asked. “Sorry we can’t do better at the moment, but call or e-mail us with your questions and we’ll get back to you as quickly as possible and try to set up a press conference later with better notice.”

I have no idea why none of this happened. The harshest critics will try to suggest that FEMA intentionally tried to fool the press into thinking that it was a legitimate press conference, and I can’t say that they didn’t. The critics also will recall that the administration already has been caught trying to “manufacture” the news, when it paid Armstrong Williams, a conservative commentator, $240,000 to promote Education Department programs.

But, having been in the news and PR businesses for almost a combined 40 years, I can’t imagine even the most idiotic publicist thinking that he could get away with faking a news conference. FEMA either needs better PR advice, or its top officials need to listen better to their PR experts if or when they give good advice.

Or, more pointedly, they shouldn’t be driven by the fear of what the partisan jerks will say. Such as Reid blaming Bush for the wildfires because his administration hadn’t provided enough funding for removing the dead tress and shrubs that fed the fire.

Maybe they’ll next accuse Bush of not “doing enough” to prevent the winds that stoked the wildfires.

Fan Dumb

By Dennis Byrne

Obviously, we mere fans aren’t privileged to read from the same secret playbook available only to team managers, coaches, general managers and owners.

How else can you explain why we don’t understand why, for example, starting Major League pitchers must be yanked automatically from the game after they’ve thrown 100 pitches?

How do you explain why throngs of Chicago Bears football fans failed to see that Bears quarterback Rex Grossman was obviously superior to Brian Griese?

Somewhere buried in those secret texts is an explanation for why the game-leading team—no matter in what the sport—must play “prevent defense” until the other team has had a chance to catch up.

In our ignorance, we fail to grasp the many reasons why such rules must be adhered to, come hell or high water, even if they fly in the face of common sense. Take manager Lou Piniella’s controversial decision to pull Cubs starting pitcher Carlos Zambrano out of the first game of the division series after six innings and not even 100 pitches, even though he was throwing a superb game. Got to save him for the fourth game of the series, was the explanation. The Cubs, of course, never got to the fourth game, having been swept in three by the Arizona Diamondbacks.

It’s safe to say most fans would have left Zambrano in; it’s also safe to say that most managers—not just Piniella—would have taken him out. Not just because it’s the playoffs, but because of the precious 100-pitch rule. It’s hard to imagine that under such circumstances that baseball will see another Ed Walsh, the White Sox Hall of Fame pitcher, who in 1908 won 40 games, with 24 complete games in 49 starts, 464 innings pitched, 11 shutouts and 249 strikeouts. Imagine how delighted owners would be to have another house-packer like Walsh show up, but it’ll never happen again, thanks to the 100-pitch mentality.

Speaking of owners, they can be just as mystifying. For years, Chicago Blackhawk fans couldn’t fathom why the family ownership forbad full television coverage of this legendary hockey franchise. If the Wirtz family had nurtured, instead of restricted, the coverage, the fan based would have increased, providing the increased revenues harvested that might have prevented the disgraceful trashing of the franchise.

The tragedy is that the Wirtz family had one of the best examples of how the process works, right here in its backyard. The Chicago Cubs, despite being the most pathetic losers in MLB history, has a large and loyal following, here and nationally. Why? Because every game was televised, home and away, on commercial TV. On top of that, national exposure on Chicago’s WGN-TV’s superstation, produced a countrywide fan base. The Wirtz family also should have learned from the Chicago White Sox, whose descent into the city’s “second team” status began when the ownership restricted the team’s telecasts. The fans knew all this, but it sadly took the death of family patriarch, Bill Wirtz, for younger ownership to move to telecast the Blackhawks on a less limited basis.

Stubborn is the word for it, and perhaps stubbornness is the curse of the good fortune or riches needed to run or own a professional sports team. Stubborn, as in Bears head coach Lovie Smith’s unbending loyalty to Rex Grossman as the team’s starting quarterback, in spite of years of injuries and his demonstrated failure. The fans knew that a strong arm alone wouldn’t get the job done and demanded that Griese replace him. (Perhaps, you could say the fans got what they deserved, since they originally demanded Grossman in place of whoever at the time was the latest in a long string of quarterback failures.)

Not to rub Smith’s nose in it, but it became apparent from the first moment that Griese stepped on the field as starting quarterback that he would be more effective than Grossman. Each week he improved, until he was named the NFL’s offensive player of the week following his spectacular come-from-behind win last Sunday. The fans were right again.

Griese led the successful drive, virtually by himself, calling his own plays. We’re getting varying reports on just how many plays he called on his own during that drive, but it raises an interesting question about the practice of coaches and managers calling plays from the sidelines or the booth. Why not let the guy who’s in the middle of the action call the plays? Sending in plays from the sidelines has the same feel as generals who watch from a distance, sending in orders to the troops who actually are doing the fighting.

A last observation on football. Fans can see when a “game plan” is failing; why does it take so long for the coaches to see it? What is with the pig-headed determination to keep running the ball up the middle when it isn’t working? Why the insistence on “establishing the ground game first” before establishing the passing game? What makes the ground game so sanctified when all it produces is an endless series of three runs and a punt?

If these questions make fans scratch their heads in wonderment, the logic of some trades brings on hives. Take Aaron Rowand, the White Sox center fielder who was traded to the Philadelphia Phillies just a few months after winning the World Series. Many fans were appalled, even when the Sox got slugger Jim Thome (and $22 million) in return. Rowand was a fan-pleasing “fence crasher” and epitomized the team’s “grinder” image. It was like cutting out the team’s heart; the team was never the same.

Now there’s talk about the Chicago Bulls trading several front-liners to the Los Angeles Lakers for the perpetual pain-in-the-neck Kobe Bryant. The Lakers only want all-star Luol Deng, leading scorer Ben Gordon, the promising Tyrus Thomas and the exciting rookie Joakim Noah; in other words, gut the team for a “super-star” who will disrupt the locker room and, dare I say, anger the fans. By the time you read this, a variation of the trade may already have happened, and, for me, that’s it for the Bulls.

Here I’m making no claim to fan superiority when it comes to all things sporting. If teams took a plebiscite every time a trade came up or called a play, there’s no guarantee that things would be any better.

Nor, possibly, would things be any worse.