Ohiocore

Howard Kurtz is incisive in his "Dressed for Success, Primed for Failure" at the Post. The topic is everybody's favorite former FEMA Director, Mike Brown:

After Brownie was reckless enough to appear alongside Bush in a long-sleeved white shirt, came this urgent advice from Worthy: 'Please roll up the sleeves of your shirt, all shirts. Even the president rolled his sleeves to just below the elbow. In this [crisis] and on TV you just need to look more hard-working.'

Look more hard-working. Key word: look. Forget results. It's all about image.

The hurricane hits on Aug. 29. What was the head of the Federal Emergency Management Agency worrying about? His appearance. 'You look fabulous,' Worthy told him.

'I got it at Nordstroms. ... Are you proud of me? Can I quit now? Can I go home?' Brown replied in perhaps his only rapid response of the crisis. And an hour later: 'If you'll look at my lovely FEMA attire, you'll really vomit. I am a fashion god.'

Yes Mike, you can quit now. A major American city was just decimated and permanently disabled on your watch, while you were getting paid a 6-figure salary to prevent precisely that! How great do you look now? It's messed up that you're *still* getting paid it too, even after being tossed from the job. So yes, Mike, you can take your FEMA funded fashion and phantom salary and go home, you prissy lazy incompetent bitch!!

You can get the firsthand account by reading Brown's own email correspondence, now part of the Congressional record, having been downloaded more than 350,000 times as of Nov 3rd.