Sept. 8, 2005 In 35 years of service as a soldier, Colin Powell earned a reputation as the quintessential disciplined warrior. As Secretary of State in President Bush's first term, Powell was widely seen as a disciplined, moderate and loyal voice for the administration. Now out of government service, Powell is airing openly his disappointments and frustration on everything from the invasion of Iraq to the federal response to Hurricane Katrina.
Powell, 68, who recently visited storm survivors at Reunion Arena in Dallas, said he was "deeply moved" by the families displaced by the devastating storm and was critical of the preparations for Hurricane Katrina. "I think there have been a lot of failures at a lot of levels local, state and federal. There was more than enough warning over time about the dangers to New Orleans. Not enough was done. I don't think advantage was taken of the time that was available to us, and I just don't know why," Powell told ABC News' Barbara Walters in an exclusive interview airing Friday night at 10 p.m. on "20/20."
Powell doesn't think race was a factor in the slow delivery of relief to the hurricane victims as some have suggested. "I don't think it's racism, I think it's economic," he told Walters.
"When you look at those who weren't able to get out, it should have been a blinding flash of the obvious to everybody that when you order a mandatory evacuation, you can't expect everybody to evacuate on their own. These are people who don't have credit cards; only one in 10 families at that economic level in New Orleans have a car. So it wasn't a racial thing but poverty disproportionately affects African-Americans in this country. And it happened because they were poor," he said.
Read the rest at:
http://abcnews.go.com/2020/Politics/story?id=1105979&page=1
Powell, 68, who recently visited storm survivors at Reunion Arena in Dallas, said he was "deeply moved" by the families displaced by the devastating storm and was critical of the preparations for Hurricane Katrina. "I think there have been a lot of failures at a lot of levels local, state and federal. There was more than enough warning over time about the dangers to New Orleans. Not enough was done. I don't think advantage was taken of the time that was available to us, and I just don't know why," Powell told ABC News' Barbara Walters in an exclusive interview airing Friday night at 10 p.m. on "20/20."
Powell doesn't think race was a factor in the slow delivery of relief to the hurricane victims as some have suggested. "I don't think it's racism, I think it's economic," he told Walters.
"When you look at those who weren't able to get out, it should have been a blinding flash of the obvious to everybody that when you order a mandatory evacuation, you can't expect everybody to evacuate on their own. These are people who don't have credit cards; only one in 10 families at that economic level in New Orleans have a car. So it wasn't a racial thing but poverty disproportionately affects African-Americans in this country. And it happened because they were poor," he said.
Read the rest at:
http://abcnews.go.com/2020/Politics/story?id=1105979&page=1
