Village voice > news > Mondo Washington by James Ridgeway

Where was George? Where's the Plan?

At 5:00 PM EDT today President Bush finally spoke up about plans for relief for victims of Hurricane Katrina. Here's my summary of his speech: It was a disaster. The federal government is working hard. We're going to try to keep people from dying. We're going to try to come up with a plan for cleaning things up. That's about it.

He was proud of the plan to take 25,000 (mostly poor black folk) from one dome, and put them in another dome. Then again, he's proud of Guantanamo Bay. Maybe it's time for an open letter to President Bush:

Dear President Bush,

Bring the homeless people to Houston, but don't stick them in the Astrodome. I was in the Houston airport 3 weeks ago. That airport can process 25,000 people in an 2 hours. Keep the airport open an hour later tonight. Fill up 200 airliners and spread the homeless people out across the country, first to where they want to go, and then to places that have decent hotel rooms. If these people were your oil buddies and not low income minorities, you'd find a better place to put them than the Houston Astrodome.

HUD owns thousands of vacant homes. Let the displaced apply for emergency leases on the HUD homes, give them loans for furniture & essentials. Come up with a plan for giving them temporary jobs, filling potholes, working on the streets, whatever. Sign up applicants for new work crews for repair efforts back home in the Gulf states. Since you've admitted this can take months or years, do what FDR would have done and put these people to work.

Finally, face up to the hard question - how much SHOULD we rebuild New Orleans (and coastal areas in general). If they were overbuilt to begin with, don't repeat the same problem. Recognize that two environmental problems contributed to the New Orleans disaster: (1) destruction of wetlands; and (2) global warming. What are you going to do about these problems? In a best-case scenario we can make the second battle of New Orleans the first battle in our war against global warming. What will you do President Bush?

village voice > news > Mondo Washington by James Ridgeway