[Overpaid Slacker]

Great list -- and though there are a few cheap shots, the dichotomy in accountability and responsibility is there.


What frosts my muffins is that the same inept, corrupt (yet protected from media scourging by party affiliation) NO/Louisiana officials are now asking for $250 Billion -- that's $250,000,000,000.00 -- to recover from Katrina.

So, these same people who have proven themselves inept at best (and whom I would argue are culpable for their nonfeasance and malfeasance) now want a check for $250,000,000,000.00 to be disbursed as they see fit to fix the problems they helped create.

Just as a point of reference, $250,000,000,000.00 is about SIXTY-THREE (63) times as much money as the Army Corps of Engineers said it would cost to build levee systems required to protect NO from a Category 5 hurricane.

For $250,000,000,000.00 they could rebuild the entire city of NO on a 20' high plinth of gold-plated titanium and put a climate-controlled dome over the whole city.

I don't think the federal government should fully fund the bail out (so to speak) of NO -- and LSU Professor Jeff Sadow is thinking along the same lines:

Making matters worse is the pork-laden nature of the request. . . .

And who would control the disbursement of this money? It seems the nine-person panel would have a Louisiana majority.

So, let's get this straight. Louisiana, from some of her federal officials through some state officials all they way down to city and other local governments, countenanced negligence from benign to irresponsible in ensuring proper flood protection and in dealing with hurricanes. And now these same people have formulated a plan wanting the country to pay an incredible sum of money to the state controlled by people from the state to deal with the aftereffects and, apparently, Louisiana's past inability to utilize our resources efficiently in other areas?

The rest of the country is going to look at this and think we're still stuck on stupid.

JP