"Before We Lose A City"

The front page of this site linked me to a story about Newt Gingrich's speech to a New Hampshire banquet honoring free-speech advocates. The reason for the link was Gingrich's assertion that we may need "a different set of rules" to fight terrorism, a set that might not include the free speech we currently, sometimes, enjoy.

But what got my attention was the next paragraph of the story:

"We need to get ahead of the curve before we actually lose a city, which I think could happen in the next decade," said Gingrich

For Newt's information, we actually have: it's called New Orleans, and we lost it not to terrorists, but to the design and construction failures of the US Army Corps of Engineers. Would less freedom of speech have saved it?

Of course, drowning 80% of a city is not the same as nuking 80% of it.

Still, the city has lost just about that percentage of its mental-health professionals after the citizens have undergone a profound civic trauma that might call for the services of, let's just hypothecate here, some mental-health professionals. Speaks well for the social conscience of the profession.