Former EPA head admits she was wrong to tell New Yorkers post-9/11 air was safe

[malaise]

https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2016/sep/10/epa-head-wrong-911-air-safe-new-york-christine-todd-whitman
<snip>
Christine Todd Whitman, who as head of the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) under George W Bush at the time of the 9/11 attacks told the public the air around Ground Zero in New York was safe to breathe, has admitted for the first time she was wrong.
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Among those who were exposed to toxins released when the World Trade Center collapsed, the toll of illness and death continues to rise.

Speaking to the Guardian for a report on the growing health crisis to be published on Sunday, the 15th anniversary of the attacks, Whitman made an unprecedented apology to those affected but denied she had ever lied about the air quality or known at the time it was dangerous.

“Whatever we got wrong, we should acknowledge and people should be helped,” she said, adding that she still “feels awful” about the tragedy and its aftermath.

“I’m very sorry that people are sick,” she said. “I’m very sorry that people are dying and if the EPA and I in any way contributed to that, I’m sorry. We did the very best we could at the time with the knowledge we had.”

In 2003, the EPA inspector general criticized the agency’s handling of the crisis, finding that the EPA had no basis for its swift pronouncements about air quality. Politicians, including the then New York senator Hillary Clinton, laid into the Bush administration, accusing it of deceiving the public.

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They sure kept people safe

[eleny]

1. i remember one of giuliani's press conferences at that time

someone asked him if the air was safe and he emphatically said it was indeed safe. i looked over at my husband and told him that the mayor was a lying sack of shit. that moment is as clear as yesterday.

[malaise]

2. Rational people did not believe their crap

They kept no one safe

[a kennedy]

3. Ah, ya think??? Putrid air and hazy days and nights for months, and the air is ok???

[mikehiggins]

4. I worked at the ground zero site shortly after 9/11

We had to wear face masks and tyvek suits. I asked a supervisor why and he said the air was full of asbestos, silicon and human remains, all powdered as a result of having millions of tons of concrete and steel collapse on them. I immediately arranged to be transferred to another job.

No one with any understanding of construction believed Whitman for a New York minute.

No on believes Whitman did not know the truth when she lied about the air quality.

Bush needed America to get back to work, and to get Wall Street back up and running.

[mopinko]

12. no one who smelled that smell could have possibly believed them.

i went there in late october. the smoke was still billowing out of the steam vents.
as soon as i stepped out of the airport at newark i knew what that smell was. i imagine it smelled a lot like auschwitz. but it was gritty smelling. i could smell the concrete.

i will never forget that smell.

[Gabi Hayes]

5. who's worse....this guy, or Boris Epshteyn?

http://www.villagevoice.com/news/rudy-giulianis-five-big-lies-about-9-11-6424659

BIG LIE NUMBER 5:
'Every effort was made by Mayor Giuliani and his staff to ensure the safety of all workers at Ground Zero.'

gotta scroll down, cause my lousy box will not let me CandP this

and, malaise, check this out: I started this at Straight Dope after finding it here:

http://boards.straightdope.com/sdmb/showthread.php?t=804314

the ''letting media know we're out there, and paying attention'' thread

cheerio.....

EDIT: got a little bit from the voice:

Giuliani's campaign statement pointed a finger at then-EPA administrator Christine Todd Whitman, issuing a list of the many times that "Whitman assured New Yorkers the air was safe."

Instead of also detailing the many times Giuliani echoed Whitman—for example, "the air is safe and acceptable," he said on September 28—the campaign cited several Fire Department "briefings" about "incident action plans" for the use of respirators, suggesting that the city had tried to get responders to protect themselves from the toxins at Ground Zero.

The press release did not make a case that any of these "plans" had ever resulted in any real "action"; nor did it dispute the fact that as late as the end of October, only 29 percent of the workers at the site were wearing respirators. Of course, the workers might have noticed that the photo-op mayor never put one on himself. Instead, the other 9/11 visual we all remember is Giuliani leading at Ground Zero by macho example: The most in the way of protective gear he was ever seen wearing was a dust mask on his mouth.

this, regarding site toxicity levels:

The city had its own test results, of course, and when 17 of 87 outdoor tests showed hazardous levels of asbestos up to seven blocks away, they decided not to make the results public. An EPA chief, Bruce Sprague, sent an October 5 letter to the city complaining about "very inconsistent compliance" with respiratory protection. Sprague, who wrote the letter only after unsuccessful conversations with Giuliani aides, likened the indifference in a subsequent court deposition to sticking one's head "over a barbecue grill for hours" and expecting no consequences.

An internal legal memo to a deputy mayor estimated early in the cleanup that there could be 35,000 potential plaintiffs against the city, partly because rescue workers were "provided with faulty or no equipment (i.e. respirators)." Bechtel, the major construction firm retained by the city as its health and safety consultant, urged it to cut the exit-entry points from 20 to two so they could enforce the use of respirators and other precautions, just as was done at the Pentagon, but the recommendation was ignored.

[Gabi Hayes]

6. how's this for irony?

Should the current presidential frontrunners square off in 2008, Giuliani's culpability and subsequent indifference at Ground Zero will, no doubt, be sharply contrasted to Hillary Clinton's singular role in funding the Mount Sinai programs that have been aiding rescue workers for years. And the public price tag for the mismanagement at the pile (as the site was known among recovery and rescue workers) will run into the billions.

Ken Feinberg, who ran the federally funded Victims Compensation Board, has already paid out $1 billion to the injured, concluding after individual hearings that hundreds "were diagnosed with demonstrable and documented respiratory injuries directly related to their rescue service."

Anthony DePalma, whose extraordinary Times storieshave lifted the lid on Giuliani's role, recently reported that the health-care costs for rescue workers could soar to as much as $712 million a year. And the city is administering a billion-dollar liability fund to satisfy the thousands of lawsuits.

next time he's on the tube, spewing his vilebile, somebody ought to ask him what the status is on that billion dollar lie-a-bility fund, and what his response is to the charges that HIS giant lies were, in large part, responsible for the terrible toll paid by the real heroes of 911, while he sat there, pocketing MILLIONS as a result.

[malaise]

7. Thanks for these links

Guiliani should be in prison

[Solly Mack]

8. I don't believe her.

[BumRushDaShow]

9. This area of the country went into a very dry/drought period

There was little or no snow that winter (which helped with the recovery and cleanup effort in NYC) and not much rain during the spring, so the debris from towers 1, 2, 3, 6, & 7 was airborne for months and months.

[malaise]

10. Fascinating

Thanks

[whathehell]

11. Thanks for this..