With a wonderful visit by the President, Governor Schwarzenegger and Senator Dianne Feinstein, the Southland begins pulling out of the ashes, while still battling some fires.
Federal, state and local leadership has been superb in dealing with this disaster.
Bush's message: You're not alone
By Andy Furillo - afurillo@sacbee.com
Published 12:00 am PDT Friday, October 26, 2007
ESCONDIDO – …President Bush spent four hours Thursday touring fire-ravaged San Diego and trying to show that he and his administration feel the pain of America's latest natural disaster victims.
Bush's tour of a torched Rancho Bernardo neighborhood and a hand-shaking, back-slapping encounter with soot-stained firefighters came barely two years after he was harshly criticized for his administration's response to Hurricane Katrina.
The president deflected a question about the Katrina-San Diego comparison, saying, "I'm thinking about people whose lives are turned upside down. The experts can try to figure out whether the response was appropriate or not.
He added, "There is all kinds of time for history to compare this response to that response."
Was Katrina on his mind? How could it not be, said Sen. Dianne Feinstein, D-Calif., who stood behind Bush while he made some brief remarks at Kit Carson City Park in Escondido, where 2,000 firefighters were camped out after five days on the front lines.
"Katrina is still on everybody's minds," Feinstein said in an interview with The Bee. "I don't think any of us will ever get over it."…
"It was very important for the president to come out here," Schwarzenegger said in an interview while touring the evacuation center at Escondido High School. "It was very important that he gave us the emergency declaration and the natural disaster declaration – that to us was the most important thing."
