Are the Dems still claiming that the administration has been “incompetent” in connection with removing Americans from Lebanon, just like Hurricane Katrina? I’m not sure; I’ve been traveling on business all week and may have missed the latest Dem talking points. The claim, in any event, is absurd. Austin Bay has some sensible comments on the difficulties involved and the time it takes to get ships from one ocean to another. Not to mention the fact that Hezbollah has ships in the eastern Mediterranean and would like nothing better than to attack a vessel ferrying Americans to safety.
And The Scotsman reports on citizens of the United Kingdom who still have to wait for up to two weeks before they are evacuated:
THOUSANDS of British passport holders were still waiting to be evacuated from Lebanon last night after the worst day of bloodshed in the country since the start of the latest conflict.
As about 1,000 US citizens were taken to Cyprus on the cruise ship Orient Queen to join thousands of other foreign nationals already rescued from the fighting, British officials pushed on with plans for a military evacuation of UK citizens.
The aircraft carrier HMS Illustrious and assault ship HMS Bulwark, which are expected to offer refuge to most of the British evacuees, had still not arrived off the Lebanese coast last night. Although no timescale has been put on the operation, an RAF statement suggested it was expected to take up to two weeks.
Actually, the Lebanese evacuation does in some respects resemble the federal response to Hurricane Katrina, which, as Popular Mechanics has documented, was both the largest and the fastest response to a natural catastrophe in human history.
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