[Vision2020] Clinton/Bush Domestic Infrastructure Failure!

[Tbertruss at aol.com]

All:

Funding to improve the New Orleans flood protection system was given scant 
attention by the Bush administration:

This info from this newspaper article dated 8/31/05 available at the web link 
below:

http://www.nj.com/news/ledger/index.ssf?/base/news-2/1125468020104100.xml&
coll=1&thispage=1

Until recently, efforts to squeeze coastal protection money out of Washington 
have met with resistance. The Louisiana congressional delegation urged 
Congress earlier this year to dedicate a stream of federal money to Louisiana's 
coast, only to be opposed by the White House. Ultimately a deal was struck to 
steer $540 million to the state over four years. The total coast of repair work is 
estimated to be $14 billion. 

In its budget, the Bush administration had also proposed a significant 
reduction in funding for southeast Louisiana's chief hurricane protection project. 
Bush proposed $10.4 million, a sixth of what local officials say they need. 
-------------------------------------------------------------

If the Bush administration had funded the 14 billion dollar figure the 
article above claims is needed for flood protection in and around New Orleans, would 
this have prevented or lessened the catastrophic flooding of New Orleans?  
Probably not, due to the years/decades it can take to complete such massive 
construction projects.  We could just as well blame Clinton for not prioritizing 
this critical infrastructure.  If his administration had funded 14 billion in 
flood protection for the New Orleans area, there would have been more time for 
construction before Katrina hit.

Nonetheless, the thousands of National Guard troops from Mississippi and 
Louisiana that are now in Iraq is certainly part of the problem with the 
insufficient response to this disaster.

The lack of investment in critical domestic infrastructure in the USA, while 
we spend hundreds of billions to fight the war on terror on foreign soil, 
suggests warped priorities on the part of the Bush administration.  Hurricane 
Katrina can be compared to a massive terrorist attack in terms of lives lost and 
damage to infrastructure.  

Political/economic ideology has resulted in an allocation of hundreds of 
billions of taxpayers dollars to fight wars oversees, while we neglect critical 
domestic infrastructure. Even if the war in Afghanistan and Iraq is agreed to be 
necessary for the protection of the USA, how can it be argued that we should 
at the same time underfund critical domestic infrastructure, that can prevent 
thousands dying and billions of dollars in losses from natural disasters?

If the response to Hurricane Katrina is symptomatic of how the new Homeland 
Security Department and other emergency response systems now operate, it 
appears obvious that our domestic preparedness to respond to a major terror attack 
are woefully inadequate.

Those who have been claiming that while we fight the war on terror on foreign 
soil, spending hundreds of billions of dollars, we are not domestically 
prepared for the very kind of large scale terror attack on US soil we at war to 
prevent, have just had their argument validated.

Ted Moffett
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