Six years afterward Katrina, applause because Iren

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Tune in to "Piers Morgan Tonight" at 9 ET for a closer look at how the media and government responded to Hurricane Irene. Was it too much, and how much did it price?

New York (CNN) -- Six years after "Katrina" became shorthand because a botched response to a emergency, authorities by always levels of government are triumphing compliment for their handling of Hurricane Irene.

"Who would have thought, here we are, 6 years later, and instead of debating failures, we're debating being overprepared?" Chad Sweet, who served as chief of staff to sometime Homeland Security Secretary Michael Chertoff, said Monday. "I consider it's a good thing."

As Irene brained for the East Coast over the weekend,Cheap Oakley Sunglasses, rulers and mayors from the Carolinas to New England ordered residents to leave low-lying coastal places. President Barack Obama cut his summer vacation a day short to return to Washington, pledging to determine federal agencies "are doing anything in their power" to assist after the storm moved inland Sunday.

Though it lost steam as it migrated toward New York, Irene still killed 21 people in 9 states and occasioned flooding as far northwardly as Vermont. An estimated 3 million remained without power Monday.

Katrina, by comparison, annihilated 1,464 folk in Louisiana, 238 in Mississippi and 21 in additional states later it struck the Gulf Coast as a Category 3 hurricane ashore August 29, 2005. It flattened many of coastal Mississippi and flooded New Orleans when the city's protective levees failed, leaving tens of thousands stranded.

While some agencies like the Coast Guard won praise for their rescue exertions, the slow and disengaged response of the Federal Emergency Management Agency was a major discomfort for the Bush administration. A bipartisan inquiry by Congress called it "a citizen failure" at all levels of government, "one abdication of the maximum solemn liability to provide for the prevalent welfare."

But Sweet told CNN's "American Morning" that FEMA appears apt have studied hard lessons since then. The agency that has reacted to Irene below Director Craig Fugate is "FEMA 2.0," an that tries to reside ahead of accidents and embraces social medium to communicate.

"What Mr. Fugate is doing is prepositioning the assets before the storm kicks and being there,Oakley Sunglasses outlet," he said. "We've heard this across the embark, whether it's Republican or Democratic leaders across the states, thanking FEMA for being forward-leaning. That's the right model."

Sweet also praised governors like New York Mayor Michael Bloomberg and New Jersey Gov. Chris Christie fknow next to nothing ofunding the alarms early and going closely with FEMA and other allied agencies.

"We saw leading in near collaboration as a team,Oakley Sunglasses Discount," he said.

And elderly U.S. Army Lt. Gen. Russel Honore, who led the naval rejoinder to Katrina, told CNN.com that early shrieks to evacuate were "the right object to do."

"I've been in the storm affair for years, and I've not looked officials be prudent ample to repeal mercantile and sporting memorabilia before a storm," he said. "Folks in the Northeast did that. The daytime before Katrina, we had a football game in Baton Rouge. That's how distant the community has come."

The label "Katrina" speedily became a standard-issue epithet after the 2005 disaster. Critics tried to dub the 2010 Gulf oil catastrophe "Obama's Katrina," meantime a paralyzing Northeastern blizzard the following December became both "Christie's Katrina" or "Bloomberg's Katrina," relying on one's side of the Hudson and political bent.

Ahead of Irene, Fugate -- a practiced of many tornadoes in his before job for Florida's crisis management king -- dismissed suggestions that the alarms being issued were tinged along alarms of a reiterate of the 2005 storm.

"This is how I've always been operating,Oakley Sunglasses Cheap," he told CNN's "Piers Morgan Tonight" on Friday. "This is how we did it when I was in Florida. This is what we do here in the president's government, as we send the group attach. We obtain the crew prepared. We arrange for the worst and hope for the best. But we're not going to await to detect how wrong it is before we get ready."