Taking seriously his victory speech the night he won the Democratic presidential primary three years ago, when he said "[T]his was the moment when the rise of the oceans began to slow and our planet began to heal," and taking former adviser and now Chicago mayor Rahm Emanuel's advice to never let a crisis go to waste, President Barack Obama (D) has sacrificed the last days of his summer vacation in order to "take charge at hurricane command center."

Uhm, for a week or so, as Irene formed, those in charge of their respective fields of meterology, emergency management and local government were doing quite well getting the word out about the storm.  And Obama continued to golf.  But Irene kept growing so now we have the president in charge, chairing

"a meeting at the National Response Coordination Center (NRCC) set up at the Federal Emergency Management Agency's (FEMA) headquarters in Washington"

and

"convened a conference call with members of his senior emergency response team including Vice President Joe Biden and Department of Homeland Security Secretary Janet Napolitano, among others."

and one who even

"asked to be kept apprised of developments throughout the night and said that he wants the group to re-convene tomorrow morning."

while informing the totally clueless that

"This is going to be a tough slog getting through this thing," Obama said during a video teleconference including senior federal officials and local government agencies in the east coast path of Irene.

"It's going to be a long 72 hours. Obviously a lot of families are going to be affected ... the biggest concern I'm having right now has to do with flooding and power," Obama said during the videoconference.

"(It) sounds like that's going to be an enormous strain on a lot of states" that could last days, or even longer in some cases, he said.

He's hasn't yet however joined the silly reporters standing outside in the wind and the rain telling us how windy and rainy it is but maybe he will. 

Obviously experienced executives know how to delegate, know how to choose competent and experienced people who then report back to them.  But Obama has no executive experience.

So why is he doing this?  Even the AFP reporter was forced to admit

"The White House appears to have carefully considered the lesson of Hurricane Katrina in 2005, when a botched response effort and confusion between state and federal agencies inflicted a heavy political price on president George W. Bush."

Ah, but don't worry President Obama; the adoring media wouldn't think of blaming you.  And the "botched response effort" in New Orleans during Katrina was more a "botched response effort" by the mayor of New Orleans than by President George W. Bush (R) and a botched reporting job by the hysterical media eager to blame Bush for anything.   

Meanwhile, as New Jersey Governor Chris Christie (R) said as the impact of Irene became clear:

"Get the hell off the beach!"