White House Stupidity Today

Very poor judgment, to say the least. I can only imagine how terrified all those people were.

http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20090428/ap_on_re_us/us_low_flying_plane;_ylt=ArPVI0_d9b5c2Ge9EjK2ZBxH2ocA;_ylu=X3oDMTJtdDFqZTQ3BGFzc2V0A2FwLzIwMDkwNDI4L3VzX2xvd19mbHlpbmdfcGxhbmUEY3BvcwM3BHBvcwM3BHNlYwN5bl90b3Bfc3RvcmllcwRzbGsDamV0Zmx5b3Zlcmlu

A "friend who is on this list" forwarded this to me, if you read it, it seem clear NYC's Office of Emergency Management wasn't even appraised of it in advance, only after the fact.

...alway bad when one creates panic among those who are supposed to know of such things.



From: NYC OEM [mailto:[email protected]]
Sent: Monday, April 27, 2009 10:30 AM
Subject: FAA Authorized Flyover over Lower Manhattan Area



Mon Apr 27 10:29:29 2009
STATUS: Open - Active
PROGNOSIS: Monitoring
Aviation-Flyover
Manhattan Lower Manhattan Area

To OEM All Call..

The FAA Regional Operations Center has advised Watch Command that a coordinated flyover involving a 747 and several military airplanes was authorized along the Hudson River in the vicinity of Lower Manhattan. The aerial mission is completed, and there is no emergency situation at this time.

RESPONDING UNITS: OEM MONITORING
INCIDENT NO: Inc-102016-671-042709

...you'd think OEM would be among those told.

Perhaps a press release, something on 1010 WINS. Idiots.

eggcream wrote: How much did this cost? Photoshop would have been much cheaper Barry.

You're kidding, right? You think somehow that Obama was behind this?

exactly, part of my salary is federally funded, and this post is explicitedly authorized by him.

Carnivore wrote: [quote=vidro3][quote=Carnivore][quote=eggcream]How much did this cost? Photoshop would have been much cheaper Barry.

You're kidding, right? You think somehow that Obama was behind this?

anything anyone working for a government agency does first gets an explicit okay from Obama. Didn't you know that?
Yet somehow Bush and Cheney aren't responsible for a systematic torture program that they explicitly authorized... :roll:
Exactly! Now you're getting it.

eggcream wrote: Wait, I know what happened now. Barry's Teleprompter broke down and Barry couldn't read about where his plane was yesterday.

You do know that there are (at least) several planes that are used as Air Force One, right? :roll:

eggcream wrote: And you think he didn't know? BS. There are schedules to get Air Force One, plus two Boeing 747's that fly with it, in the air.

Obama was at an event on the West Coast. One of the two planes that serve as AF1 was there, providing transportation for him. This was the backup plane. The idea that the President of the US personally micromanages the "schedules" of those planes is simply ridiculous. He's barely managing his own schedule.

When you say Barry, I think you mean Marion Barry, former mayor of Washington, DC . . . just so you know, it's a pretty ineffective term of disrespect, which appears to be what you're going for.

I thought he was talking about Barry White.

what in god's name are you talking about? they notified the city govt AND NYPD, who failed to publicize it or pass it up to the Mayor's office.

On to your next made up controversy that has nothing to do with actually governing a country...

http://cityroom.blogs.nytimes.com/2009/04/28/the-forgotten-e-mail-that-rocked-new-york/

April 28, 2009, 5:54 pm
The Forgotten E-Mail That Rocked New York
By Fernanda Santos

On Monday, Mayor Michael R. Bloomberg was fuming. On Tuesday, he was forgiving, characterizing the actions of a low-level manager who failed to notify him or his superiors of a planned flyover exercise in Lower Manhattan as merely a mistake.

Perhaps it was because the mayor had already punished the manager, Marc Mugnos, with a letter of reprimand (and, presumably, a tongue-lashing). Perhaps it was because of all the apologies the city had received — from Mr. Mugnos, most likely, and also from the White House. (President Obama has ordered a review of the matter.)

“The guy just didn’t do it. He read the thing and just didn’t do it,” Mayor Bloomberg told reporters during a news conference at City Hall, referring to Mr. Mugnos’s inaction after receiving an e-mail message last Thursday from the Federal Aviation Administration, notifying him of the plans for a flyover by F-16s and a backup to Air Force One. (The New York Police Department received the same e-mail message.)

That might be all in the past for Mr. Bloomberg, but a lot of people out there are wondering who Mr. Mugnos is and why the F.A.A. would pick him to share information about what turned out to be a nerve-rattling event for those who live and work in Lower Manhattan, particularly those who were there on Sept. 11, 2001.

Here’s what City Room has been able to find out:

Mr. Mugnos joined city government in 2000 as a director of operations for the Sports Commission. It was his first job after graduating from college; he had obtained a bachelor of science degree, with a major in marketing, from Lehigh University in Bethlehem, Pa., that June, according to an announcement published in the time in The Putnam County News and Recorder, a weekly newspaper. (Montel Williams was the commencement speaker, the announcement notes.)

Mr. Mugnos occupied the post until May 2007, when he was brought to the newly formed Office of Citywide Event Coordination and Management under the same title, director of operations, at an annual salary of $60,000, city officials said.

As director of operations, Mr. Mugnos is in charge of making sure that the public events held in the city — everything from parades to street fairs and the New Year’s Eve celebration in Times Square — are properly staffed. He also coordinates the logistics for those events with the various agencies that issue permits for street activities, like the Police and Parks Departments and the Office of Film, Theater and Broadcasting, the officials said.

His job is part of the broad mandate of an agency that functions as a clearinghouse of sorts for every public event held in the city, coordinating them, spreading information about them and making sure that permit-holders are following the rules.

Mr. Mugnos’s relationship with the F.A.A. dates almost as far back as his 23-month tenure in the agency. Together, they have coordinated the no-fly zone established at the United States Open tennis tournament, held every year in late August and early September in Queens, and worked out the logistics for the Red Arrows air show, held last summer on Staten Island.

“That history is why they used him as a contact,” Jason Post, a spokesman for the mayor, said in an e-mail message.

Mystery solved.

Mr. Mugnos could not be reached for comment. Mr. Bloomberg said that his was an error in judgment, that he has been reprimanded and that “we’ve all learned something” from the situation. “Now,” the mayor added, “it’s time to make sure our procedures are better and to get on with other things.”