People aint buying the BS.
Trolls on the other hand....
But they aint people.
The blossom is off the turd
Posted by SnarkyShark at September 18, 2005 03:13 PMLook, these people aren't going anywhere; they're lifetime GOP voters. Once they figure out that no actual negroes will benefit from this Katrina rebuilding, they'll be back in the fold.
Posted by dj moonbat at September 18, 2005 03:56 PMBush's New New Deal is a bad deal.
First, why build a city that's below sea level? We're just asking for this all to happen again. We're not even certain that we have the technology to build levees to withstand a category 5 hurricane. It's a complete waste of money to rebuild the area.
Second, it'll take 10 years to restore the wetlands.
Third, hundreds of billions will be dumped on the area via federal spending, charity, and insurance payouts. Now, THAT is inflationary. I wouldn't be surprised if Greenspan and the Federal Reserve continue to tighten the economic screws, worried that there will be way too much money being dumped on the economy. (First hint will come on September 20th, when the Fed meets!)
Fourth, many of those folks have relocated and are starting new lives. Let them do that, instead of going back to hurricane alley.
I think that's why the GOP base is a little upset: George Bush is a Democrat. And the Democrats are even worse. Fiscal conservatism is dead.
Instead of spending hundreds of billions to set us up for another disaster, why not give some aid to the folks that have had to relocate, and be done with it?
Posted by muckdog at September 18, 2005 04:02 PMA lot of people assume that only people who have been misled by Bush support him. I don't think that's true. He has a very strong core that supports him because they agree with what they hear him say -- government should be limited to police and war and public (sexual) morality. People get what they deserve, so (my) tax money shouldn't be given to them. Fortunately, the majority of Americans don't agree.
So as polls show that more Americans have finally seen the consequences of the Bush corruption, Bush tried to trot out the majority position to reverse the slide. However, the majority don't seem to buy it anymore, and the core base was betrayed.
So Bush has finally hit a spot where he can't keep the middle American who pays little attention to the news beyond hearing over and over again how honest and popular Bush is, and keep the rich cronies, and keep the fundie base all triangulated and happy.
First, muck, the Mississippi River is the main way by which we ship agricultural and industrial products out of and into the whole midsection of the United States, from Pittsburgh to Denver. We're going to need a city at its mouth, and expanding (say) Baton Rouge to cover the industry required would be no less onerous than rebuilding New Orleans.
Restoring the wetlands will take more than 10 years; it's an ongoing process, and would be just as required without Katrina.
Glad to see you're finally understanding this inflation thing- and that this stimulus is coming in what is already the most inflationary environment in a decade.
As for the evacuees, see my first point; New Orleans has to be rebuilt, and who better to do it than those who lived in and loved the city?
And you're right about one more thing-
The Era of Small Government is Over!
Posted by Brian J. at September 18, 2005 04:12 PMmuckdog did say one really important thing:
First, why build a city that's below sea level? We're just asking for this all to happen again.
Unless the rebuilding plan is centered on massively re-engineering the levee system, so that we stop the city from sliding into the Gulf, it's simply borrowing time.
I wonder how safe it is for the poor people to move back to New Orleans with all the pollution and other crap that was in the streets. Why isn't FEMA doing an environmental analysis before opening up the area for resettlement. Perhaps if it were a predominantly white neighborhood, FEMA would be more careful.
Posted by Cookie Monster at September 18, 2005 04:31 PMCookie Monster, I suspect that that's actually the EPA's job. But since the EPA has been emasculated in much the same fashion that FEMA was, where real concerned environmentalists have been replaced with industry plants, and political cronies. Actually protecting the public from enviromnental toxins isn't something they currently have any experience or interest in.
Posted by Oaklander at September 18, 2005 04:40 PM... why not give some aid to the folks that have had to relocate, and be done with it?Posted by muckdog
Are you asking for aid in moving to Iraq?
... George Bush is a Democrat. And the Democrats are even worse. Fiscal conservatism is dead. Posted by muckdog
There never was such a thing as "fiscal conservatism." Every Republican administration increased the budget, increased the deficit, and increased the size of government. Bush is no different. Why complain? Is Bush a Democrat? In no sense of the word: He is fiscally irrepsonsible, he is incomptetent, and he is unwilling to meet or work with anyone who disagrees with him, and he is indiffent to contrary evidence. He is Republican to the core.
If you want a balanced budget and smaller government, vote Democratic.
Oaklander, you are correct. It is the responsibility of the EPA to ensure New Orleans is safe to reinhabit. This is the same EPA that refuses to impose fuel efficiency limits on the large SUVs. We are truly living in Wonderland!
Posted by Cookie Monster at September 18, 2005 04:47 PMIt's a complete waste of money to rebuild the area.
Considering the fact that NO is one of the busiest ports in the US, I would imagine that is why it needs to be rebuilt. The entire city is not below sea level. Get your facts straight. Besides, how do you tell the American people that you are spending billions on rebuilding Iraq and not a city in America? Can you imagine the outrage if Jr. said that he won't rebuild the Gulf Coast? With the Iraq debacle going on-he has no choice but to make at least the same commitment to Americans, who love our country, versus Iraqis, who are, at best, indifferent to, at worst, downright hostile to our country.
I'm willing to bet that Greenspan will do nothing. Through all the massive spending the GOP has done, and the massive borrowing, Greenspan has done very little to interest rates. He's a partisan hack and is not interested in anything but making the GOP happy. This is they guy who said Bush's tax cuts were a mistake but if he had to do it all over again he would do the same thing! What a joke.
George Bush is a Democrat. And the Democrats are even worse. Fiscal conservatism is dead.
No, George Bush is a conservative republican. Blah, blah, blah, the democrats are worse, LOL. This is the excuse people like you come up with for supporting Jr. Just admit your mistake and move on. Or next time, just don't even show up to vote. Fiscal conservatism is dead and the person who killed it is named Ronald Reagan. Before Reagan, people had to think about whether something was worthwhile because they had to pay for it. Reagan was the one who came up with "you can have it all plus tax cuts." In eight years, Reagan vetoed only one spending bill. Got that Muck: ONLY ONE SPENDING BILL! So W. is just the result of the conservative, you don't have to pay for it, revolution. Goldwater Republicanism has been dead since the eighties. Face up to the facts and move on.
Be careful of your reading of this finding. The Republican base burped here because of the one sentence reference to race. They don't want any benefit to accrue to "those people". See Bill Kristol's comments today on Faux News Sunday. He spent one whole portion of his segment talking about people using their FEMA debit cards to rent DVDs. That's the red meat the Republican base wants to hear. No doubt, Rove will make sure this is echoed throughout the Republican Noise Machine.
What makes this so surreal of course, is the fact that the real "looting", "waste, fraud, abuse" is just beginning and the ones who will be doing it are BushCo's very own pet corporations whose qualifications and failures we've already previewed via Iraq.
Rebuilding New Orleans is a no brainer. You've got the mouth of a river system that drains land in over half the American states, and almost all of it is navagatable. The worlds' fifth largest port cannot simply go anywhere, large oceangoing vessels have to be able to reach it. The bend in the river where NO is makes that city precisely where a great port should go. Some large vessels cannot make the turn at that bend safely and get to Baton Rouge. Remember your American history, if New Orleans wasn't so valueable for commerce, president Jefferson, the man who once had said "government is best that governs least" wouldn't have reversed his earlier critizism of large government to buy an empire, which is what the Louisiana Purchase had the practical effect of doing.
Louisiana already had plans to remake its coast so the the problems of the low lying city and its threatened wetlands could be mitigated.
Yes, the Reagan era is over. 911 actully began the process by showing the need for public security. As problematic as governmental solutions can be, there are some problems involving the general welfare, such as security and large scale infastructure projects like rebuilding New Orleans that only the government is equipped to provide solutions for.
Posted by rlp at September 18, 2005 05:38 PMGeorge Bush is a Democrat.
Wrong, he's a neo-con. Nothing Democratic about Bush.
Posted by ann at September 18, 2005 05:46 PMBill Kristol's comments have been echoed on the local Clear Channel radio station here in Houston. A reporter the other day just tossed out that "those people" were using their Fema/Red Cross cards to buy luzury items (gave no actual proof, of course) and then interviewed a florist who adamantly stated that IF one of "those people" wanted to buy flowers at her shop, she would refuse. Because, you know, flowers are a luxury.
Typical. Bill and other neocons want to get all in your personal business, but can't be bothered to give a skeptical eye to Halliburton KRB et al.
Posted by dorita at September 18, 2005 05:47 PMoops -- KBR
Posted by dorita at September 18, 2005 05:47 PMRebuilding New Orleans is a no brainer.
A little imprecise. Whether to rebuild New Orleans is a no-brainer; how to rebuild, though, is not a question we should answer without serious thinking as to the consequences.
I'm sure the original levee system seemed like a great idea at the time. Now we've seen what happens when one of America's great cities keeps sinking every year. We can't simply reinforce the existing mechanisms.
Posted by dj moonbat at September 18, 2005 05:50 PMI wonder how safe it is for the poor people to move back to New Orleans with all the pollution and other crap that was in the streets. Why isn't FEMA doing an environmental analysis before opening up the area for resettlement. Perhaps if it were a predominantly white neighborhood, FEMA would be more careful.
Cookie, they need cheap labor in NO to do the clean-up and rebuilding. Just like the Feds didn't tell the truth about the air quality in NYC after 9/11, they aren't going to tell the truth about NO. Besides, NO was horribly polluted before the hurricane. They've been taking our garbage and making our chemicals and refining oil for generations.
LA has a large number of superfund sites (6 or more, I think) that were never effectively cleaned up. It's tragic what we do to our land and air in the name of the almighty buck. As for anyone piping in with jobs vs. environment, sorry but that is bullshit. If the clean up was done as necessary, that would create lots of jobs.
Posted by ann at September 18, 2005 05:52 PMGeorge Bush is a Democrat.
Don't expect a Chri$tma$ card from Karl this year.
As for building a Neo Orleans, certainly I agree that wiser choices are possible, but not that it's necessary to relocate completely. I'm open to reasonable proposals that limit occupation of the lowlands - by anyone.
Posted by pessimist at September 18, 2005 05:55 PMLets cut to the deal. The levees in NOLA were written up as a major threat years ago. The problem with the entire Mississippi Delta and SOLA were also well documented, reported, published and all of this was well know by the Bush White House.....which ignored the threat, cut the Corps of Engineers budgets and any other help that could have prevented, or at least mitigated the breaches and sent the money to IRAQ. FORGET the FEMA smokescreen. The levee problems with NOLA were well known, and the funds were sent to Iraq. Oh yes, maybe the specific funds wouldn't have stopped the specific levee breaks....but hey, maybe the would have cut the losses....and besides.. what about the work that was to be done and was cut.....wait until the next big storm to see how weakened those levees have become. This is not the end, this is just the start of the NOLA problem. New apartments for the poor will be simply wiped away when another levee breaks.
Posted by T2 at September 18, 2005 05:57 PMBill Kristol: Worst Person in the World?
Posted by nlacey at September 18, 2005 05:58 PMIt's funny. Now the Republicans are upset with Georgie's spending habits. Where have they been for the past four years?
Besides, you'd think this kind of spending, trasferring the taxpayers' money to companies like Halliburton, would make them happy.
Posted by at September 18, 2005 06:30 PMI heard a woman by the name of Katrina (a sex phone operator by the way) on the Al Franken Show tell the same story about "those people" using the debit cards to buy luxury items. She lives in LA, so she knows ALL about those people. She pays enough in taxes already, and 2000 dollars to those people is way too much to give them.
My next door neighbor was worried that the crime rate would go up in our city (Louisville, KY) because we were supposed to get 500 people from New Orleans.
And finally, my Aunt, who I love dearly but worry about politically, is a big Bush supporter. She thinks that people are poor because they are just lazy, and all those folks in New Orleans could have walked out of the city before the hurricane.
Given all of the above, I am not suprised that Bush's base is getting some heartburn with all the so called money being thrown at the poor and blacks.
Posted by Merlin1963 at September 18, 2005 07:32 PMSadly, for what it's worth, there are forces that nature is exerting that will cause the eventual loss of New Orleans no matter what we do.
The lower Mississippi River is a very "mature" river system; it bends and curves a lot. This is in part owing to its very small elevation gradient. If left to its own devices, nature would fix this situation by choosing another channel to flow down. And indeed, the Atchafalaya River, coarsing to the west of the present lower Mississippi, actually contacts the Mississippi at several places very near the right-angle bend in the border of Louisiana and Mississippi. The Atchafalaya's route from the point of contact to the Gulf of Mexico is 110 miles shorther than is the Mississippi's. The water would rather go down the shorter straighter route.
But, guess what? The Army Corps of Engineers has built a massive set of dams at the points of contact to prevent nature from doing its thing. And the reason of course is to keep the navigation channel waters flowing through the Port of Southern Louisiana.
Now at some point in the future, a storm or flood is going to breach those dams and the Mississippi will change course, just like it has done many times in prehistory.
Adding this to the human-induced one-two punch of silt diversion causing loss of wetland and the rising sea level means that, taking a century-scale perspective, the present site of New Orleans is impossible to maintain.
So in my mind the question is not whether to rebuild New Orleans, but rather how to most gracefully transition between today and the inevitable tomorrow, while serving the needs of the citizens of the affected area, and the needs of the rest of the country, in the meantime.
In practical terms, this means rebuilding some bit of New Orleans to keep the important economic, historic, and cultural aspects alive, but realizing that in decades to come a New New Orleans needs to be built elsewhere.
Posted by Greg in FL at September 18, 2005 07:42 PMA name to watch: Rita. Projected, as of today, to hit the Texas coast. I know this projection can change, but still, it's enough to worry about.
T2, I hope that "the next big storm" is not already upon us.
Posted by dorita at September 18, 2005 07:46 PMdj,
Agreed, how to rebuild NO is the issue. There are loads of options, including learning from the Dutch.
Posted by rlp at September 18, 2005 08:07 PMThere are loads of options, including learning from the Dutch.
Let's hope that for the first time in several years, America chooses wisely.
Posted by dj moonbat at September 18, 2005 08:36 PMFirst, why build a city that's below sea level? We're just asking for this all to happen again.
And the same question could be asked.... why build a city near a major fault line where catastrophic earthquakes occur? We're just asking for this all to happen again.
It's not the "why" it's the "how. How do we rebuild responsibly...we have the know how, the expertise, the technology, the science....it seems we just lack the will to do it right.
Wait a minute. I thought conservatives accepted as a matter of principle that people should be able to do with their own money what they wish. Why should conservatives be bothered if evacuees spend money on DVDs? Should the nanny state step in and tell them that they need to spend X dollars on each of the four food groups? Is that conservative? If the problem is that the government is giving out $2000 at all, I think most people see it like an unemployment check. It is temporary, just to tide you over until you get settled with your next job and, in this case, home. If the Feds were doling these things out every month then it would be like welfare dependency, but it is clearly not. So, considering conservatives don't have a problem with temporary unemployment checks, why are they bothered if recipients of FEMA checks are spending money on luxuries? Or is that whole "people should be able to spend money however they want" just for white middle class people?
Posted by Elrod at September 19, 2005 07:20 AMFiscal conservatism is dead.
Muck, you shouldn't wait 5 years before hitting the "Post" button.
Posted by benjoya at September 19, 2005 07:36 AMWOW! A big fucking $2,000. Just how far to you trolls think $2000 will go? Kristol is a jerk. Sounds like the women driving a Cadillac to pick-up her welfare check story, but with a slight twist. I heard him talk about a woman who bought a Louie Vuitton handbag. I say "bull crap." Prove that story Kristol.
Posted by Judith at September 19, 2005 06:13 PM