This happened on CNN yesterday.<br /><br /> Nancy Pelosi, all set for what she thought was a softball interview with Kyra Phillips on CNN. But it was anything but softball. <br /><br />Kyra Phillips' first question: "I want to ask you, as you stand here and continue to criticize the administration and criticize the director of FEMA, I do want to tell you the White House coming forward today, Scott McClellan coming forward today, basically disputing your accounts of your meeting with the president. I'm looking at it here. It's saying that you said you urged the president to replaced the embattled FEMA director because of the poor emergency response to Hurricane Katrina, but McClellan says that that's not what you discussed with the president. You were discussing other things with the president, and that things are being twisted here a bit." <br /><br />PELOSI: Oh, that's absolutely not true. Uh, Mr. McClellan wasn't there, so he couldn't possibly know. What happened was I said to the president, "Mr. President we can begin to help these, uh, victims of Katrina (sniff) become whole again. The first thing you can do is to uh, replace Michael Brown as the head of FEMA." To which the president said, "Why would I do that?" And I said, "Because of what happened last week and the failure of FEMA to be the real link between the federal government and the people in need in our country, the social compact." To which the president said, "What didn't go right last week?" That's what happened in the meeting. I stand by that. If the president thinks everything went right last week, and he wants to keep Michael Brown there, then I think that's going to be a cost to the American people in lives and livelihood. <br /><br /> Ms. Phillips then said, "Well, if we want to be historical here and we want to back in time, then we can go back to the Times-Picayune and the investigation when reporters revealed time after time monies were asked for from all types of various politicians, politicians you work side by side with, laws that you yourself vote on, monies that should have gone to Louisiana to take care of the problems with regard to the flood control systems," and then she kept going. She said this to Pelosi. <br /><br />PHILLIPS: And I think it's unfair that FEMA is just singled out. There are so many people responsible -- <br /><br />PELOSI: Right. <br /><br />PHILLIPS: -- for what has happened in the state of Louisiana. <br /> <br /> <br />PELOSI: That is true and I'm sorry that you think it's unfair but I don't. I think it's unfair that people lost their family members, their lives, their livelihood, their homes, their opportunity, uh, and FEMA, uh, uh, is -- did a poor job. It had no chance, it was. <br /><br />PHILLIPS: But what about all those warnings -- <br /><br />PELOSI: May I please respond? <br /><br />PHILLIPS: What about all the warnings from the Army Corps of Engineers years ago -- <br /><br />PELOSI: No! <br /><br />PHILLIPS: -- saying there's a problem with these levees, there's a problem with these cities? <br /><br />PELOSI: Myra, Myra, Myra... <br /><br />PHILLIPS: It's Kyra. <br /><br /> PELOSI: If you want to make a case for the White House -- <br /><br />PHILLIPS: It's Kyra. <br /><br />PELOSI: -- you should go on their payroll. <br /><br />PHILLIPS: I'm not making a case for the White House by all means, believe me. <br /><br /><br />PHILLIPS: And by all due respect, nobody in this organization or any network is on the payroll of the Bush administration right now. Everybody has been challenging every leader and every agency in this disaster because it's pathetic to see something like this happen in the United States and to see dead bodies still on the ground in -- on American soil. It is absolutely pathetic. So -- <br /> <br /> <br />PELOSI: Thirty -- 30 bodies retrieved from the nursing home last night, 14 from Memorial Hospital. <br /><br />PHILLIPS: Should have never happened.
