President Bush has announced that he will oversee an investigation into the delays and failures that characterized the disaster relief effort in the wake of Hurricane Katrina, beginning with the question of who decided to convert the Federal Emergency Management Agency into a warehouse for political patronage beneficiaries and why Air Force one didn’t fly low enough over Louisiana last Wednesday that the president could hear the screams of help from people trapped in attics and on rooftops awaiting rescue by helicopters that were grounded to clear air space for the president’s jet.

He will also examine whether the deployment of more than 10,000 Louisiana, Mississippi and Alabama National Guard troops and their equipment to Iraq and Afghanistan had any impact on the ability of those states to mobilize resources in response to the disaster, and whether the absence of top officials in Washington, due in part to the reluctance of the president, the vice president and many of their top aides to cut short their vacations as New Orleans and other cities and towns drowned, played a role in the incoherent federal reaction.

Bush is expected to ask tough questions of himself and the officials involved in the debacle. Among the most pressing issues, and one which White House deputy chief of staff Karl Rove and White House communications director Dan Bartlett are already attempting to answer, is “Who can we blame for this?”

The president may call upon conservative commentator and game show host Ben Stein to summarize his findings. Unlike FEMA and Department of Homeland security chiefs Michael Brown and Michael Chertoff, Stein has gotten a running start on his mission. On Sunday, less than six and a half days after the disaster struck, BTC News obtained excerpts of Stein’s classified report, which focuses on 12 main points.

8.) George Bush is rushing every bit of help he can to New Orleans and Mississippi and Alabama as soon as he can. He is not a magician. It takes time to organize huge convoys of food and now they are starting to arrive. That they get in at all considering the lawlessness of the city is a miracle of bravery and organization.

9.) There is not the slightest evidence at all that the war in Iraq has diminished the response of the government to the emergency. To say otherwise is pure slander.

10.) If the energy the news media puts into blaming Bush for an Act of God worsened by stupendous incompetence by the New Orleans city authorities and the malevolence of the criminals of the city were directed to helping the morale of the nation, we would all be a lot better off.

11.) New Orleans is a great city with many great people. It will recover and be greater than ever. Sticking pins into an effigy of George Bush that does not resemble him in the slightest will not speed the process by one day.

12.) The entire episode is a dramatic lesson in the breathtaking callousness of government officials at the ground level. Imagine if Hillary Clinton had gotten her way and they were in charge of your health care.

The report may be followed by indictments for slander aimed at liberal mudslingers such as Louisiana National Guard Lieutenant Colonel Pete Schenider, who told the New Orleans ABC affiliate on August 1 of this year that his organization needed to get their equipment back from Iraq.

When members of the Louisiana National Guard left for Iraq in October, they took a lot equipment with them. Dozens of high water vehicles, humvees, refuelers and generators are now abroad, and in the event of a major natural disaster that could be a problem.

“The National Guard needs that equipment back home to support the homeland security mission,” said Lt. Colonel Pete Schneider with the LA National Guard.

Schneider added that in the event of a disaster, he expected the Bush administration would “max out” its resources in response, which may serve to lessen his sentence in the event of a conviction.

Stein himself is already coming under fire for his failure to more liberally employ the term, “Clinton,” an omission he is expected to remedy in his final report. He will also recommend that FEMA chief Michael Brown be awarded the Medal of Freedom and a pony for his role in the disaster.

Bush is also expected to harshly criticise newspapers for failing to run the headlines Homeland Security head Michael Chertoff and Joint Chiefs of Staff head General Richard Meyers both claim they saw on Tuesday morning, the day after the Category Four hurricane flattened the Gulf Coast: “New Orleans Dodges a Bullet.” That failure on the part of the press led to hard words aimed at Chertoff, which may well have prevented him from reacting more quickly to the demand for relief, not that he didn’t respond immediately.

The inquiry will also address the inexplicable failure by thousands of refugees trapped in the New Orleans Convention center to notify Chertoff and Brown of their plight, about which the two men eventually learned from reporters who had been broadcasting from the scene for two days. Both Chertoff and Brown have said those trapped in the city should not have been there given the magnitude of the bullet the top government officials were told by non-existent newspaper headlines the city had dodged.

Both men have expressed reservations about the accuracy of actual press accounts, which is perhaps why they based their response to the situation on imaginary ones.

The president is expected to request that Congress refrain from launching parallel investigations which could interfere with his own efforts.

Stein’s final report will be issued in February of 2009, at which point action will be taken against any administration officials who may be found at fault, although some analysts say that the report could be delayed further if vice president Dick Cheney wins the 2008 presidential contest and wants to put his own stamp on the investigation.

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