Well, fir one, it would have been a cabinet level position, Old Guy, which carries a lot more weight than and agency... Second, when it was demoted, it lost alot of it's budget...

I don't see this as the DEM's fault but, hey, inspite of their minority status, they are not completely blameless either... The fights the DEM's took up in the establishement of the DHS were related more to labor issues and less about organization... They picked the wrong fight, perhaps, but weren't the one's who had much control of how the organizational chart would end end up looing like...

But based on FEMA's track record in the 90's I think it's safe to say that it wasn't as capable when Katrina hit...

Added to that, as I have pointed out, Bush and the White House were AWOL in the early going and were late to the battle...

Bobert