Plenty of Nothin' for New Orleans?
NEW ORLEANS -- Yes, there's bitching and moaning about what's in, and not in, the stimulus package. And then there's this, from last Friday's Times-Picayune:
The giant economic stimulus bill signed into law this week by President Barack Obama will provide $3.8 billion in financing and tax cuts for Louisiana, but none of it is earmarked specifically for hurricane recovery.
My first thought when reading that was, "Damn, three and a half years along, and we're not shovel-ready." Then, in the same paper, there's this:
Regional levee commissioners said Thursday that they fear that the Army Corps of Engineers is running into money problems in its efforts to build better flood protection by 2011 and that to cut costs, the corps might recommend what the commissioners consider to be unacceptable projects.
This, it should be noted, is the new, reformed, professional levee board, not the old political-hack operation. Reform of the levee boards is one of the first successes achieved by citizen action in New Orleans following the 2005 flood.
But back to the stimulus, and the long-running discussion I've been having with HuffPost readers about candidate-now-President Obama's level of commitment to the intelligent and compassionate rebuilding of this city. Here's verbiage from the president on Friday:
"The residents of New Orleans and the Gulf Coast who are helping rebuild are heroes who believe in their communities and they are succeeding despite the fact that they have not always received the support they deserve from the federal government," Obama said in a statement. "We must ensure that the failures of the past are never repeated."
But the chief failure of the past was the failure to adequately fund flood-prevention projects designed and constructed by the Army Corps, as well as to subject those designs to rigorous peer review. We appear well on the way to repeating those failures, words to the contrary notwithstanding.
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Isn't there still a huge pile of emergency money somewhere that was never even spent? I vaguely remember some sort of report to that effect.
We have already poured billions into NO, the new dykes cannot hold all the cash we have shoveled into a city that is built below sea level.
How about the state of La coming to the plate, oh wait that would mean raising tax's to pay for their own mess.
No its just easier to ask the rest of us to clean up that mess, sort of the kind of redistribution of wealth the Republicans only want when it suits their purpose.
I am sick of baling out Florida, Texas , Mississippi, La. South Carolina every time mother nature decides to have a display of PMS.
Time to tell those states that brag about low tax's with Republican Governors who yell about Federal Spending to stop expecting them to be bailed out by the rest of the country, time after time.
I am tired of my tax money being spent to clean up their states and then have some GOP Governor yell about the stimulus package that helps others.
New Orleans has received more money than prudent and the notion that we are rebuilding a city where a city should not be is beyond stupid.
Dear oldgeek1: your lack of compassion for the people of your own nation is appalling. You address the state of Louisiana's Katrina aftermath as "their own mess" when it should be "our own mess". I'm assuming that by your complaints about being "sick of baling out" other states that you're an American citizen. And by that, you live in the United---again, United!---States of America. American families, businesses, and lives were broken apart by the hurricane, and thousands of people drowned to death in what you call " a display of PMS" from mother nature. New Orleans was a monumental city of the US, as culturally definitive of our nation as New York City, or San Francisco. You complain about tax dollars. I'd rather be paying taxes in my own home than be one of the thousands of people who've been homeless for almost the past 4 years due to Katrina.
Wrong. The federal government provided BILLIONS in money for Louisiana to shore up their levees. They chose to not to do that and spent the money elsewhere. Those lives were broken apart by the irresponsible decisions made by their state government. Should we be helping them? Of course. I went and did my tour of duty there. But there is absolutely NOTHING wrong with putting blame where it belongs.
Obama is doing nothing about New Orleans. Just make sure and be consistent and use the same venom used against Bush as for Obama.
well said
hurricane Katrina: August 29, 2005
Bush is no to blame. it's that damn Brownie again. Wasn't he fired?
Brownie messed up the initial response, or lack thereof.
Bush could have done something wince August 2005. But what's in it for him? Poor people - not worth the time. SO not Bush's responsibility or fault.
Jindal: elected Governor October 20, 2007. But again why should he take care of the poor people, what's in it for Jindal?
Obama: the Prez. In office since Jan 20, 2009. I know he has the economic crisis to worry about and all the other things presidents do, but can't he multitask? He actually does care about poor people - sucker. It's been a little over a month now and he hasn't made New Orleans into a paradise yet? Slacker. If you're a Dem, then you care about poor people, and he's had a whole 1 month to show it.
The Repubs don't care and have never cared about poor people, so you can't expect them to do anything. Right?
Brownie was an idiot, and a scapegoat. FEMA did pretty well under him for the Florida trifecta a couple years earlier (Charlie, Francis, Jean). Then their budget got slashed and handed to homeland security.
Speaking of FEMA, isn't there some number of billions that have been allocated to the Gulf Coast, but hasn't been spent because the local FEMA guys would lose their cushy jobs?
Harry....you KNOW Bush and his cronies didn't give a rat's backside about NO. Now, your co-citizens have elected a Republican Governor that ALSO doesn't give a hoot about any of you. It's disgusting to listen to Jindal beginning his remarks by saying "Happy Mardi Gras". I'm sure that wasn't foremost on anyone's mind except for those who were ensured jobs through the festival.
Jindal lied about Katrina and his whereabouts, then discussed almost everything besides the topic the President addressed. Not prepared at all....didn't read the speech....whomever wrote his speech was out in left field also. Then there was the faux Presidential entrance that was just plain funny.
Good luck to everyone down there. Wish I had the $$ and health to come help out.
In defense of Jindal, he's a Repub and they don't care about poor people, everyone knows that. So can't blame him, can you?
And for those in the money-making industry it was a happy Mardi Gras, because they fixed that part of New Orleans. Jindal is also a Repub, so can't really blame him for ignoring the poor parts of New Orleans, right?
Stay on 'em, Harry.
I shouldn't be surprised that with the country moving forward on policies that will help EVERYONE, Dr. Shearer is still beating the New Orleans dead horse. Either he has a posting quota to fill and no ideas, or he's deluded himself into thinking this subject really matters.
may you one day personally experience the ongoing hell that has been post-Katrina New Orleans. And for the same duration.
Amen!
Your posting is horrifically offensive.
A major American City is wiped out - and is being set up to be wiped out again, and to you it's a dead horse and doesn't really matter.
Eff-You.
.
It seems to me that part of this is the fact that southerners so resist "big government" that they don't want to fund any project that build sufficiently strong levees.
This is a lie, and you know it. Bush stole the levee repair money, resulting in levee failure, and he refused to help New Orleans during and after the flood. The city has been crying for help since Katrina and help has not come.
And then they elected Jindal who apparantly doesnt' care, either. It's about time that the government started LISTENING to citizens. Screw their re-eleftion! That's why I like being able to say what I want when writing to Obama. Always know that someone is at least reading them.
As www.levees.org said, we need a serious investigation, and the money.
http://www.nola.com/news/t-p/letterstoeditor/index.ssf?/base/news-13/1235629910176920.xml&coll=1
When Ray Nagan was at the White House briefing (after the mayor's meeting) he specifically said that if the balance of the original funds (from the 2005 allocated monies) was made available - it WOULD BE NICE! Millions of dollars have been held up in the Homeland Security/FEMA pipeline for the last three years
Nagan could not even keep his police force on duty during the hurricane and kept buses parked. He did not watch after his own citizens. He is a complete failure.
Harry, you would expect that Governor Jindal would be out front on the stimulus pushing for improvements in the Levee's and more innovative improvements such as the ones discussed on your last show. Instead he's turning away money. What's up with that? Next I expect him to offer a tax credit to those people that buy row boats so they can be ready for the next hurricane, when the Levees fail. This is his way of helping.
What's up with that?
It might just be that the Governor is a educated idiot.
You know Bush attended Harvard and Yale, but he was far from educated, as his Daddy paid for every passing grade the boy brought home, so he has an excuse, but the Governor does not.
Best test takers money could buy.
Why aren't and didn't the resident of NO and LA protest to their republican congressmen when they had a chance to make a difference?
Instead of trying to undermine the President the so-called peoples' representativesd from LA could have been trying to get something in the stimulus bill that would have alloted money to repair the levees.
How many of the citizens of LA and NO were out raising their voices. I read the LA and NO newspapers and did not get the impression that anyone down there cared. And there are still no indications that anyone there cares.
I think, like bankers, they're betting, betting the next flood won't happen for another 100 years.
The priorities in the US are ass-backwards.
Maybe it's the comet or maybe y'all got to get a little more French
rabble rabble rabble
What's it take to get you people angry and out in the streets already?
God loves apathy. And no citizenry is more apathetic than the American citizenry.
Louisiana needs to pay upwards of $336 million just to fix the levees.
http://www.barackoblogger.com/2009/02/jindals-state-must-pay-336-million-to.html
And Jindal thinks he can refuse any stimulus money? Doesn't make sense.
Louisiana cannot fix its own levees. By congressional mandate, only the US Army Corps of Engineers is authorized to design/build the flood protection in New Orleans.
and they are designing/building it with the equivalent of Tinkertoys, setting NOLA up for yet another disaster.
The Corps of Engineers is a total failure when it comes to building flood protection.
Harry-
I was listening to Le Show yesterday, and realized something- could this be the end of "Dick Cheney: Confidential"?
Say it ain't so! That's one of my favorite segments!
As long as there are innocent people to be shot in the face, laws to be broken, and files to be stamped "To be treated as secret" there will be a "Dick Cheney confidential" in a secure and undisclosed abandoned missile silo somewhere in Montana. If we have "Nixon in heaven" , we can still have "Cheney Confidential."
At least FEMA's on the mind of the administration.
http://www.nola.com/news/index.ssf/2009/02/homeland_security_secretary_ja.html
But where's the governor, shouldn't he be yelling at the top of his lungs for levees and coastal restoration money? Hello Bobby, where are you?
He's out trying to justify his refusal to extend unemployment benefits.
And raising money for his run for President, $3million worth.
Happy Mardi Gras!
Hurricane Katrina is a prime example of "Taxation Without Representation". Unfortunately neither the people of Louisiana nor its government have had much representation in Washington DC. But you can bet that Seagrams the largest distiller in the world has. The people of this nation need to reject the idea that taking care of its people is not socialism but simply the right thing to do. Louisiana can start to change things by voting Jindal out of office, his ideas and actions are proving he could care less about the people of Louisiana and more about his own agenda. I wonder if he received any campaign donations from Seagrams?
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