FEMA and Florida Forever.

Here's one of those stories that just won't die. The South Florida Sun-Sentinel got hold of a memo from a FEMA consultant written as Hurricane Frances bore down on the state last September, arguing that the agency should work with the White House and Bush reelection campaign officials to create a unified communications strategy about the response to the disaster. Not quite a smoking gun, in my book. The best quote in the piece is from FEMA Director Michael D. Brown: "The men and women at FEMA don't give a patooey about who the president is or who the governor is. Whenever people say stuff like that ... we're just offended by that because that's just not how we operate." But as GovExec columnist Charlie Mahtesian pointed out last fall, the mere fact that FEMA did its job well certainly didn't hurt the president.