Jackson Free Press

As at the Coalition Provisional Authority in Baghdad, so at FEMA in Washington, the larder of administrators would soon be stocked with second and third-rate Bush supporters and cronies. Five of FEMA's top eight managers would, according to Spencer S. Hsu of the Washington Post, arrive with "virtually no experience in handling disasters," three of them "with ties to President Bush's 2000 campaign or to the White House advance operation." A "brain drain" of competent administrators followed as—à la the Pentagon—FEMA's focus turned to the war on terror, money was drained from natural-disaster work, and the agency was "privatized" with previously crucial activities outsourced to Bush-friendly corporations.

In March 2003, Allbaugh departed FEMA, putting the increasingly starved and down-sized operation in the hands of Michael Brown, an old college buddy whose previous job had been overseeing the International Arabian Horse Association. He then made his faith-based career choice—no, not to join the Salvation Army or the Mennonite Disaster Service. Instead he opted for what the Bush administration really believed in—both in Iraq and at home. He became a high-priced consultant/lobbyist, founding in the ensuing years three consulting firms. At Blackwell Fairbanks, LLC, he teamed up with Andrew Lundquist, who led the Dick Cheney task force that produced the administration's National Energy Policy, to "successfully represen[t] clients before the executive and legislative branches of the United States government." Then there was the Allbaugh Company through which he represents Halliburton's KBR as well as military-industrial powerhouse Northrop Grumman. Finally, there was New Bridge Strategies, LLC, where he serves as chairman and director. New Bridge Strategies bills itself as "a unique company that was created specifically with the aim of assisting clients to evaluate and take advantage of business opportunities in the Middle East following the conclusion of the U.S.-led war in Iraq."

Not surprisingly, the firm's vice chairman and director, Ed Rogers (who, during the "2004 campaign cycle… made over 150 live TV news appearances defending and promoting the Bush administration") also serves as vice chairman of the consulting firm Barbour, Griffith & Rogers, Inc. (which he founded with Haley Barbour, now the governor of storm-battered Mississippi); New Bridge's Director, Lanny Griffith, who serves as the CEO of Barbour, Griffith & Rogers, "was national chairman for the Bush/Cheney Entertainment Task Force and coordinated entertainment for the 2001 Bush Inaugural." He was, typically enough, one of the 2004 Bush campaign's "Rangers"—an elite group of fundraisers, each of whom was responsible for gathering up over $200,000 for the President; while New Bridge Strategies' Advisory Board Member Jamal Daniel is "a Principal with Crest Investment Company"—a firm co-chaired by the president's younger brother Neil.

In answer to critics who claimed he and others were cashing in on their service to Bush and Cheney, Allbaugh responded, "I don't buy the ?revolving door' argument. This is America. We all have a right to make a living."

As President and CEO at Allbaugh Co. and assumedly as a former head of FEMA, not to say as close friend and mentor to FEMA's (now departed) head and as a Presidential pal, he found himself at the front of the Katrina disaster line, apparently pushing hard (although he denied it) for such companies as—you guessed it—KBR and the Shaw Group. By September 7 at the latest, unlike the administration, he was down in Louisiana surveying the damage in the Gulf Coast and the wreckage of the agency he once presided over, while directing his clients to the lucrative world of American disaster, now that the lucrative world of Iraqi disaster had been sucked reasonably dry.

Ground Zero New Orleans