AUSTIN,
Texas -- Like many of you who love New Orleans, I find myself taking short
mental walks there today, turning a familiar corner, glimpsing a favorite
scene, square or vista. And worrying about the beloved friends and the
city, and how they are now.
To use a fine Southern word, it's tacky to start playing the blame game
before the dead are even counted. It is not too soon, however, to make
a point that needs to be hammered home again and again, and that is that
government policies have real consequences in people's lives.
This is not "just politics" or blaming for political advantage.
This is about the real consequences of what governments do and do not
do about their responsibilities. And about who winds up paying the price
for those policies.
This is a column for everyone in the path of Hurricane Katrina who ever
said, "I'm sorry, I'm just not interested in politics," or,
"There's nothing I can do about it," or, "Eh, they're all
crooks anyway."
Nothing to do with me, nothing to do with my life, nothing I can do about
any of it. Look around you this morning. I suppose the NRA would argue,
"Government policies don't kill people, hurricanes kill people."
Actually, hurricanes plus government policies kill people.
One of the main reasons New Orleans is so vulnerable to hurricanes is
the gradual disappearance of the wetlands on the Gulf Coast that once
stood as a natural buffer between the city and storms coming in from the
water. The disappearance of those wetlands does not have the name of a
political party or a particular administration attached to it. No one
wants to play, "The Democrats did it," or, "It's all Reagan's
fault." Many environmentalists will tell you more than a century's
interference with the natural flow of the Mississippi is the root cause
of the problem, cutting off the movement of alluvial soil to the river's
great delta.
But in addition to long-range consequences of long-term policies like
letting the Corps of Engineers try to build a better river than God, there
are real short-term consequences, as well. It is a fact that the Clinton
administration set some tough policies on wetlands, and it is a fact that
the Bush administration repealed those policies -- ordering federal agencies
to stop protecting as many as 20 million acres of wetlands.
Last year, four environmental groups cooperated on a joint report showing
the Bush administration's policies had allowed developers to drain thousands
of acres of wetlands.
Does this mean we should blame Bush for the fact that New Orleans is underwater?
No, but it means we can blame Bush when a Class 3 or Class 2 hurricane
puts New Orleans under. At this point, it is a matter of making a bad
situation worse, of failing to observe the First Rule of Holes (when you're
in one, stop digging).
Had a storm the size of Katrina just had the grace to hold off for a while,
it's quite likely no one would even remember what the Bush administration
did two months ago. The national press corps has the attention span of
a gnat, and trying to get anyone in Washington to remember longer than
a year ago is like asking them what happened in Iznik, Turkey, in A.D.
325.
Just plain political bad luck that, in June, Bush took his little ax and
chopped $71.2 million from the budget of the New Orleans Corps of Engineers,
a 44 percent reduction. As was reported in New Orleans CityBusiness at
the time, that meant "major hurricane and flood projects will not
be awarded to local engineering firms. Also, a study to determine ways
to protect the region from a Category 5 hurricane has been shelved for
now."
The commander of the Corps' New Orleans district also immediately instituted
a hiring freeze and cancelled the annual Corps picnic.
Our friends at the Center for American Progress note the Office of Technology
Assessment used to produce forward-thinking plans such as "Floods:
A National Policy Concern" and "A Framework for Flood Hazards
Management." Unfortunately, the office was targeted by Newt Gingrich
and the Republican right, and gutted years ago.
In fact, there is now a government-wide movement away from basing policy
on science, expertise and professionalism, and in favor of choices based
on ideology. If you're wondering what the ideological position on flood
management might be, look at the pictures of New Orleans -- it seems to
consist of gutting the programs that do anything.
Unfortunately, the war in Iraq is directly related to the devastation
left by the hurricane. About 35 percent of Louisiana's National Guard
is now serving in Iraq, where four out of every 10 soldiers are guardsmen.
Recruiting for the Guard is also down significantly because people are
afraid of being sent to Iraq if they join, leaving the Guard even more
short-handed.
The Louisiana National Guard also notes that dozens of its high-water
vehicles, humvees, refuelers and generators have also been sent abroad.
(I hate to be picky, but why do they need high-water vehicles in Iraq?)
This, in turn, goes back to the original policy decision to go into Iraq
without enough soldiers and the subsequent failure to admit that mistake
and to rectify it by instituting a draft.
The levees of New Orleans, two of which are now broken and flooding the
city, were also victims of Iraq war spending. Walter Maestri, emergency
management chief for Jefferson Parish, said on June 8, 2004, "It
appears that the money has been moved in the president's budget to handle
homeland security and the war in Iraq."
This, friends, is why we need to pay attention to government policies,
not political personalities, and to know whereon we vote. It is about
our lives.
