Recent editorial from The Independent

[AnnInLa]

Keeping His Promise
The Independent Weekly | 12/14/2005


President George W. Bush recently sent out 1.4 million Christmas cards with the following message: “With best wishes for a holiday season of hope and happiness 2005.” There are a lot of people in Louisiana with little hope or happiness this holiday season, and Bush owes them — and the rest of the citizens in Louisiana — some answers. It was only three months ago that he stood in Jackson Square and made a prime-time speech to America where he pledged, “Throughout the area hit by the hurricane, we will do what it takes, and stay as long as it takes, to help citizens rebuild their communities and their lives. And all who question the future of the Crescent City need to know there is no way to imagine America without New Orleans, and this great city will rise again.”


snip

Not anytime soon, and maybe never, unless Bush keeps his promise. New Orleans — and the surrounding areas of Jefferson and St. Bernard parishes — is still on its knees and desperate for healing. An estimated quarter of a million homes have been deemed uninhabitable. Businesses trying to reopen and rebuild are desperate for workers, and more than 400,000 people remain exiled from the Crescent City. Huge sections of the city remain without power and plunge into darkness at night. A post-Katrina emotional blackness haunts many of our fellow Louisianans, with the suicide rate increasing at an alarming rate.

snip

Bush apparently has a short memory. The man who built his political fortunes on compassionate conservatism is showing no compassion for Louisiana and letting partisan politics shape our destiny like vultures circling a dying dog. Bush has remained silent while legislators like Idaho Republican Sen. Larry Craig have cited Louisiana’s regrettable history of government corruption as a reason to block or limit federal aid. Since when did Louisiana become the only state in the country to be stained by unethical elected officials? And Bush refuses to commit to financing Category 5-strength levee protection, an absolute necessity for displaced residents and businesses who want assurance that they can return and will be protected if another monster hurricane hits New Orleans.

The president appears preoccupied with a laundry list of other challenges of his own making — the deadly and costly war in Iraq, the largest budget deficit in U.S. history and a bitter ideological debate over the next Supreme Court justice. Yet the House of Representatives still passed $95 billion in tax cuts last week, while the City that Care Forgot is turning into the City that George Forgot.

Although New Orleans’ plight receives the bulk of the national media attention, let us not forget our friends and neighbors to the west who are still suffering from Hurricane Rita. Coastal residents and businesses in places like Cameron Parish and Lake Charles are struggling with many of the same issues plaguing New Orleans: the largely inept response of the Federal Emergency Management Agency, endless unanswered questions regarding flood and homeowner’s insurance and confusing signals about rebuilding requirements. We’re not the only ones feeling forsaken. Last week, Republican Mississippi Gov. Haley Barbour lashed out at the lack of federal assistance for his state.

Continued at http://www.theind.com/editorial2.asp?CID=-1573759612

try to read the whole thing, if possible; really nails it

[AnnInLa]

1. PS

If you do visit the site above to read the whole editorial, please take a moment to click the "contact us" link on the left, and thank them for the editorial....Hopefully, these different editorials and articles critical of the administration will turn LA blue (big hopefully!)