FEMA interrogates itself in news conference

Only in Amurika...

FEMA workers masquerade as reporters - The White House - MSNBC.com

One way to get decent coverage in this rough-and-tumble city is to arrange to have your own employees interrogate you at your news conference.

...some FEMA employees played the role of reporter, asking questions of Johnson (deputy FEMA administrator) - queries described as soft and gratuitous.

"I'm very happy with FEMA's response," Johnson said in reply to one query from a person who was an agency employee, not an independent journalist.

Asked about this, Mike Widomski, FEMA's deputy director of public affairs, said, "We had been getting mobbed with phone calls from reporters, and this was thrown together at the last minute."

Johnson issued a statement Friday saying that FEMA's goal was "to get information out as soon as possible, and in trying to do so we made an error in judgment."

Truth be told, I'm glad they made this error in judgment rather than repeating Katrina. But it's still awesome the lengths to which this government will go to look better than it really is.

And the truly scary thing: They look so bad!

How bad would they look if they didn't try to cover up, obfuscate, hide, and/or lie about? Banana republic, anyone?