If you house was swept away in floods, would you expect the feds to rebuild it? That’s an over simplification, and the U.S. does have some role to play in the future of New Orleans. But history professor Douglas Brinkley had a long Sunday piece lambasting the Bush administration for not having restored this pathology-laden society to its dysfunctional grandeur.
“Eventually, the volunteers’ altruism turns to bewilderment and finally to outrage. They’ve been hoodwinked. The stalled recovery can’t be blamed on bureaucratic inertia or red tape alone. Many volunteers come to understand what I’ve concluded is the heartless reality: The Bush administration actually wants these neighborhoods below sea level to die on the vine.”
Brinkley does occasionally recognize some of the real issues. It may be that, like the hurricane that hit Galveston at the beginning of the 20th century, Katrina drastically changed New Orleans: : “After the 1900 hurricane, in fact, Galveston, which had been a large, thriving port, was essentially abandoned for Houston, transforming that then-sleepy backwater into the financial center for the entire Gulf South. Galveston devolved into a smallish port-tourist center, one easy to evacuate when hurricanes rear their ugly heads. “To be fair, Bush’s apparent post-Katrina inaction policy makes some cold, pragmatic sense. If the U.S. government is not going to rebuild the levees to survive a Category 5 storm — to be finished at the earliest in 2015 and at an estimated cost of $40 billion, far eclipsing the extravagant bill for the entire Interstate Highway System — then options are limited.” And then there’s New Orleans way of doing things. Take the way Mayor Nagin looks to the rest of the country: “Everywhere I travel in the United States, people ask, ‘Why did you guys reelect such a doofus?’ There is a feeling that any community that reelected a ‘first responder’ who stayed in a Hyatt Regency suite during Hurricane Katrina, never delivered a speech to the homeless at the Superdome or Convention Center in New Orleans, and played the ‘chocolate city’ race card at a historic moment when black-white healing was needed probably deserves to get stiffed by the federal government.” Why indeed? We should not pour money into New Orleans until the city itself addresses the pathologies now so blatantly on display. Why indeed? We should not pour money into New Orleans until the city itself addresses the pathologies now so blatantly on display. “To be fair, Bush’s apparent post-Katrina inaction policy makes some cold, pragmatic sense. If the U.S. government is not going to rebuild the levees to survive a Category 5 storm — to be finished at the earliest in 2015 and at an estimated cost of $40 billion, far eclipsing the extravagant bill for the entire Interstate Highway System — then options are limited.” And then there’s New Orleans way of doing things. Take the way Mayor Nagin looks to the rest of the country: “Everywhere I travel in the United States, people ask, ‘Why did you guys reelect such a doofus?’ There is a feeling that any community that reelected a ‘first responder’ who stayed in a Hyatt Regency suite during Hurricane Katrina, never delivered a speech to the homeless at the Superdome or Convention Center in New Orleans, and played the ‘chocolate city’ race card at a historic moment when black-white healing was needed probably deserves to get stiffed by the federal government.” Why indeed? We should not pour money into New Orleans until the city itself addresses the pathologies now so blatantly on display. Why indeed? We should not pour money into New Orleans until the city itself addresses the pathologies now so blatantly on display.
“After the 1900 hurricane, in fact, Galveston, which had been a large, thriving port, was essentially abandoned for Houston, transforming that then-sleepy backwater into the financial center for the entire Gulf South. Galveston devolved into a smallish port-tourist center, one easy to evacuate when hurricanes rear their ugly heads. “To be fair, Bush’s apparent post-Katrina inaction policy makes some cold, pragmatic sense. If the U.S. government is not going to rebuild the levees to survive a Category 5 storm — to be finished at the earliest in 2015 and at an estimated cost of $40 billion, far eclipsing the extravagant bill for the entire Interstate Highway System — then options are limited.” And then there’s New Orleans way of doing things. Take the way Mayor Nagin looks to the rest of the country: “Everywhere I travel in the United States, people ask, ‘Why did you guys reelect such a doofus?’ There is a feeling that any community that reelected a ‘first responder’ who stayed in a Hyatt Regency suite during Hurricane Katrina, never delivered a speech to the homeless at the Superdome or Convention Center in New Orleans, and played the ‘chocolate city’ race card at a historic moment when black-white healing was needed probably deserves to get stiffed by the federal government.” Why indeed? We should not pour money into New Orleans until the city itself addresses the pathologies now so blatantly on display. Why indeed? We should not pour money into New Orleans until the city itself addresses the pathologies now so blatantly on display.
“To be fair, Bush’s apparent post-Katrina inaction policy makes some cold, pragmatic sense. If the U.S. government is not going to rebuild the levees to survive a Category 5 storm — to be finished at the earliest in 2015 and at an estimated cost of $40 billion, far eclipsing the extravagant bill for the entire Interstate Highway System — then options are limited.”
And then there’s New Orleans way of doing things. Take the way Mayor Nagin looks to the rest of the country:
“Everywhere I travel in the United States, people ask, ‘Why did you guys reelect such a doofus?’ There is a feeling that any community that reelected a ‘first responder’ who stayed in a Hyatt Regency suite during Hurricane Katrina, never delivered a speech to the homeless at the Superdome or Convention Center in New Orleans, and played the ‘chocolate city’ race card at a historic moment when black-white healing was needed probably deserves to get stiffed by the federal government.” Why indeed? We should not pour money into New Orleans until the city itself addresses the pathologies now so blatantly on display.
Why indeed? We should not pour money into New Orleans until the city itself addresses the pathologies now so blatantly on display.
“After the 1900 hurricane, in fact, Galveston, which had been a large, thriving port, was essentially abandoned for Houston, transforming that then-sleepy backwater into the financial center for the entire Gulf South. Galveston devolved into a smallish port-tourist center, one easy to evacuate when hurricanes rear their ugly heads. “To be fair, Bush’s apparent post-Katrina inaction policy makes some cold, pragmatic sense. If the U.S. government is not going to rebuild the levees to survive a Category 5 storm — to be finished at the earliest in 2015 and at an estimated cost of $40 billion, far eclipsing the extravagant bill for the entire Interstate Highway System — then options are limited.” And then there’s New Orleans way of doing things. Take the way Mayor Nagin looks to the rest of the country: “Everywhere I travel in the United States, people ask, ‘Why did you guys reelect such a doofus?’ There is a feeling that any community that reelected a ‘first responder’ who stayed in a Hyatt Regency suite during Hurricane Katrina, never delivered a speech to the homeless at the Superdome or Convention Center in New Orleans, and played the ‘chocolate city’ race card at a historic moment when black-white healing was needed probably deserves to get stiffed by the federal government.” Why indeed? We should not pour money into New Orleans until the city itself addresses the pathologies now so blatantly on display. Why indeed? We should not pour money into New Orleans until the city itself addresses the pathologies now so blatantly on display.
“To be fair, Bush’s apparent post-Katrina inaction policy makes some cold, pragmatic sense. If the U.S. government is not going to rebuild the levees to survive a Category 5 storm — to be finished at the earliest in 2015 and at an estimated cost of $40 billion, far eclipsing the extravagant bill for the entire Interstate Highway System — then options are limited.”
And then there’s New Orleans way of doing things. Take the way Mayor Nagin looks to the rest of the country:
“Everywhere I travel in the United States, people ask, ‘Why did you guys reelect such a doofus?’ There is a feeling that any community that reelected a ‘first responder’ who stayed in a Hyatt Regency suite during Hurricane Katrina, never delivered a speech to the homeless at the Superdome or Convention Center in New Orleans, and played the ‘chocolate city’ race card at a historic moment when black-white healing was needed probably deserves to get stiffed by the federal government.” Why indeed? We should not pour money into New Orleans until the city itself addresses the pathologies now so blatantly on display.
Why indeed? We should not pour money into New Orleans until the city itself addresses the pathologies now so blatantly on display.
“To be fair, Bush’s apparent post-Katrina inaction policy makes some cold, pragmatic sense. If the U.S. government is not going to rebuild the levees to survive a Category 5 storm — to be finished at the earliest in 2015 and at an estimated cost of $40 billion, far eclipsing the extravagant bill for the entire Interstate Highway System — then options are limited.”
And then there’s New Orleans way of doing things. Take the way Mayor Nagin looks to the rest of the country:
“Everywhere I travel in the United States, people ask, ‘Why did you guys reelect such a doofus?’ There is a feeling that any community that reelected a ‘first responder’ who stayed in a Hyatt Regency suite during Hurricane Katrina, never delivered a speech to the homeless at the Superdome or Convention Center in New Orleans, and played the ‘chocolate city’ race card at a historic moment when black-white healing was needed probably deserves to get stiffed by the federal government.” Why indeed? We should not pour money into New Orleans until the city itself addresses the pathologies now so blatantly on display.
Why indeed? We should not pour money into New Orleans until the city itself addresses the pathologies now so blatantly on display.
Why indeed? We should not pour money into New Orleans until the city itself addresses the pathologies now so blatantly on display.