Katrina hit land almost 2 days ago. While millions of Americans have lost their homes or lives in the devastation wrought by hurricane Katrina, Bush not only goes about business as usual, he plays the guitar. This is just another gilmer into the man who’s polocies and politics allow the increase of American poverty levels, increase in the number of Americans without medical insurance (over 45 million now), and the dying of the young men and women in Iraq for a “war” started on emotion and ultimately driven by a monitarily cause.
Party up Bush… why don’t ya sing us a song on how you’re vacation is going…
Just so you know as well: Bush has show his support for Louisiana, Alabama and Misouri by cutting the funding for flood control, and hurricane support and this spring, the Bush administration proposed ‘the steepest reduction in hurricane- and flood-control funding for New Orleans in history.'”
There’s a story making the rounds in the blogosphere about the Southeast Louisiana Urban Flood Control Project. The most comprehensive information comes from Will Bunch of the Philadelphia Daily News
New Orleans had long known it was highly vulnerable to flooding and a direct hit from a hurricane. In fact, the federal government has been working with state and local officials in the region since the late 1960s on major hurricane and flood relief efforts. When flooding from a massive rainstorm in May 1995 killed six people, Congress authorized the Southeast Louisiana Urban Flood Control Project, or SELA.
Over the next 10 years, the Army Corps of Engineers, tasked with carrying out SELA, spent $430 million on shoring up levees and building pumping stations, with $50 million in local aid. But at least $250 million in crucial projects remained, even as hurricane activity in the Atlantic Basin increased dramatically and the levees surrounding New Orleans continued to subside.
Yet after 2003, the flow of federal dollars toward SELA dropped to a trickle. The Corps never tried to hide the fact that the spending pressures of the war in Iraq, as well as homeland security — coming at the same time as federal tax cuts — was the reason for the strain. At least nine articles in the Times-Picayune from 2004 and 2005 specifically cite the cost of Iraq as a reason for the lack of hurricane- and flood-control dollars.
Policies have consequences. Bad policies have bad consequences.
No one’s blaming George Bush or the Republicans for the hurricane; that’s a force of nature. But the Bush Administration chose to give massive tax breaks to the wealthy and to start a war in Iraq. They chose to cut funding for infrastructure projects and disaster relief, and to move materiel and people that might have helped mitigate this disaster halfway around the world. The policies they chose have made the situation on the Gulf Coast worse. The dots aren’t that hard to connect.
Will Hurricane Katrina get the attention of red state Bush supporters and wake them up to Rep policies and politics? I have a feeling you’re going to see the Bush Administration push rather hard on the media to slow the publishing of hardship reporting in the gulf and you’ll soon see a rise in stories of heroism and saving grace.. oh and maybe god too…