In his May 10 Washington Post “Media Notes” column, Howard Kurtz uncritically reprinted responses by conservative bloggers to Kansas Gov. Kathleen Sebelius' (D) assertion, reported in a May 9 New York Times article, that the state was not able to respond quickly to a tornado that leveled the town of Greensburg because much of the Kansas National Guard's equipment had been deployed to Iraq and Afghanistan. Kurtz said the Times article “gave heavy weight to the argument of Democratic governors,” and then quoted conservative bloggers asserting that the facts refuted Sebelius' claims. However, the Times article itself included statistics that back up Sebelius' position -- but Kurtz did not report those in his column, much less try to sort out the merits of the competing claims.

Kurtz stated that Sebelius' “frame[]” of the issue “formed the lead” of the Times article, which began, “For months, Gov. Kathleen Sebelius of Kansas and other governors have warned that their state National Guards are ill-prepared for the next local disaster, be it a tornado, a flash flood or a terrorist's threat, because of large deployments of their soldiers and equipment in Iraq and Afghanistan.” One of the responses that Kurtz provided was from a May 9 Power Line post by Paul Mirengoff, in which Mirengoff asserted that Sebelius had “claimed that Kansas is missing 60 percent of its National Guard equipment because of the war, and has thus been hampered in dealing with the damage caused by the tornado.” Based on a May 7 American Forces Press Service article noted by the conservative QandO Blog, Mirengoff asserted that Sebelius' claim was untrue:

In fact, it's not true that Kansas was missing 60 percent of its National Guard equipment, or that the National Guard was ill-prepared to deal with the aftermath of the tornado. The Democrats' claim is pure invention. According to Randal Noller, public affairs officer for the National Guard Bureau, the Kansas National Guard has 88 percent of its forces available, and 60 percent of its Army Guard dual-use equipment on hand, along with more than 85 percent of its Air Guard equipment. If the Kansas National Guard were shorthanded in any way, it could have asked for assistance from other states under a national sharing agreement. It did not do so.

However, in the CNN segment Mirengoff linked to, which was posted on the blog Think Progress, Sebelius did not assert that “Kansas was missing 60 percent of its National Guard equipment,” as Mirengoff claimed she had. Instead, she stated that “here in Kansas, about 50 percent of our trucks are gone. We need trucks. We're missing Humvees, we're missing all kinds of equipment that can help us respond to this kind of emergency.” The Times article reported statistics from Kansas National Guard officials that support Sebelius' claim:

In Kansas, the National Guard is operating with 40 percent to 50 percent of its vehicles and heavy machinery, local Guard officials said. Ordinarily, the Guard would have about 660 Humvees and more than 30 large trucks to traverse difficult terrain and transport heavy equipment. When the tornado struck, the Guard had about 350 Humvees and 15 large trucks, said Maj. Gen. Tod Bunting, the state's adjutant general. The Guard would also usually have 170 medium-scale tactical vehicles used to transport people and supplies -- but now it has fewer than 30, he said. On the other hand, General Bunting said, it had more cargo trucks than it needed.

The Times article also reported Kansas officials' view that getting assistance from other states -- which Mirengoff pointed to as a way of addressing shortfalls -- would not solve problems regarding the state's response time:

But borrowing does not solve every problem, state officials said, and coordination can take time. The destruction from Hurricane Katrina ultimately required the help of 50,000 troops -- and they came from all 50 states.

Training is another issue. At a Washington news conference in February, Ms. Sebelius said, “The Guard cannot train on equipment they do not have.” She added later: “And in a state like Kansas, where tornados, floods, blizzards and wildfires can seemingly happen all at once, we need our Guardsmen to be as prepared as possible.”

Kurtz also provided two paragraphs from a May 9 post on the blog Wizbang by “Jay Tea,” who applauded the Bush administration for “immediately answer[ing] [Sebelius'] charges with facts.” The word “facts” was hyperlinked to the same May 7 American Forces Press Service article that underpinned Mirengoff's critique.

However, the administration responded not only with “facts,” but with falsehoods as well: as the Times article noted, Snow revised his initial claims regarding Sebelius' response to the disaster. The article reported that Snow blamed the slow response on the Kansas governor, initially claiming she had not “followed procedures by finding gaps after the storm hit and asking the federal government to fill them.” However, the article also reported that the White House later “acknowledged that [Sebelius] had requested several items that the federal government supplied, including a mobile command center, a mobile office building, an urban search and rescue team, and coordination of extra Black Hawk helicopters.”

Indeed, the White House making a false claim about the actions of a Democratic governor recalls the post-Hurricane Katrina political debate, which is the ostensible theme of Kurtz's column. As Kurtz noted in his September 12, 2005, Washington Post column, a September 4, 2005, Washington Post article on the Bush administration's effort to blame state and local officials for the Katrina debacle included the false claim by “a senior Bush official” that "[a]s of Saturday [September 3, 2005], [Louisiana Gov. Kathleen Babineaux] Blanco still had not declared a state of emergency." In fact, Blanco made the declaration on August 26 -- well before the hurricane hit the Gulf Coast on August 29, 2005 -- a fact the Post later noted in a correction attached to its September 4 article.

From Kurtz's May 10 Washington Post column:

Natural disaster strikes. People are killed. Emergency services are rushed in. And political finger-pointing begins.

That's the pattern, and it doesn't take very long to get from A to D.

We saw it in New Orleans, where liberals blamed Bush and conservatives blamed [New Orleans Mayor] Ray Nagin [D] and Kathleen Blanco (and everyone blamed FEMA). And the latest example is the tornado that destroyed Greensburg, Kansas.

Think that tragedy has nothing to do with Iraq? Guess again.

The Democratic governor framed the problem, which formed the lead of this front-page New York Times story:

“For months, Gov. Kathleen Sebelius of Kansas and other governors have warned that their state National Guards are ill-prepared for the next local disaster, be it a tornado, a flash flood or a terrorist's threat, because of large deployments of their soldiers and equipment in Iraq and Afghanistan.”

The piece did quote Tony Snow, but gave heavy weight to the argument of Democratic governors, along with a Democratic state senator in Kansas who invoked Katrina and said this was “becoming a trend.”

Conservative bloggers mounted a Category Five response, including John Hawkins of Right Wing News:

“Oh, it's a trend all right. When Republican governors like Jeb Bush in Florida or Haley Barbour from Mississippi have disasters in their state, they handle them fairly well. When Democrats like Kathleen Blanco in Louisiana and Kathleen Sebelius in Kansas screw them up because they're incompetent, they blame George Bush because they know the media will ignore the fact that disaster response is primarily a local responsibility.

”It's really no different with the big cities. Show me the worst run cities in America, cities like New Orleans and DC, and I'll show you cities run top to bottom by Democrats who blame Republicans for their incompetence."

Wizbang also thundered about it:

“Kansas' governor, Kathleen Sebelius, responded in much the same fashion as Governor Blanco of Louisiana did after Katrina: blame the Bush administration. The state's National Guard was unable to respond as effectively as it could because of its involvement in the war in Iraq.

”This time, though, the Bush administration was prepared. They immediately answered her charges with facts, spelling out just what equipment and staffing the Kansas Guard had on hand, just what Governor Sebelius had requested from the federal government, what the federal government had already provided (which was above and beyond what she had requested), and what more they intended to do."

Power Line's Paul Mirengoff:

“The Democrats and their left-wing pals never miss a chance to blame misfortune on the Bush administration and, if possible, the war in Iraq, even if that means making up facts. Thus, Kathleen Sebelius, the Democratic governor of Kansas, claimed that Kansas is missing 60 percent of its National Guard equipment because of the war, and has thus been hampered in dealing with the damage caused by the tornado. [Sen.] Barack Obama [D-IL] made the same claim, while somehow managing to state that the death toll was 10,000, not 12. And of course lefty bloggers tried to hammer the point home . . .

”In fact, it's not true that Kansas was missing 60 percent of its National Guard equipment, or that the National Guard was ill-prepared to deal with the aftermath of the tornado. The Democrats' claim is pure invention. According to Randal Noller, public affairs officer for the National Guard Bureau, the Kansas National Guard has 88 percent of its forces available, and 60 percent of its Army Guard dual-use equipment on hand, along with more than 85 percent of its Air Guard equipment. If the Kansas National Guard were short-handed in any way, it could have asked for assistance from other states under a national sharing agreement. It did not do so. Gov. Sebelius has backed off of her comments."

Actually, the governor later issued this statement: “I have said for nearly two years, and will continue to say, that we have a looming crisis on our hands when it comes to National Guard equipment in Iraq and our needs here at home. The equipment shortage will likely slow long-term efforts to recover and rebuild in Greensburg. We can only hope that we not have another significant natural disaster in Kansas. That would put our Guard, and the people of Kansas, in a real bind.

”I appreciate the president's help, quick response and concern in dealing with the tornado damage in Greensburg. But I will not back down on the issue of replacing our National Guard equipment throughout the country."