RE: Re: By the way, Bill

Bill and All,
     You and I will just have to disagree about the state of the economy, although I'm sure that once the Republicans are out of office, somehow you'll be on my side on this issue.
     It is axiomatic that to make one choice is not to make another.  To spend money here, where money is finite, is not to spend it there.  This so elementary.  Now, from _Der Spiegel_ on Spetember 1:

"A year ago the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers proposed to study how New Orleans could be protected from a catastrophic hurricane, but the Bush administration ordered that the research not be undertaken. After a flood killed six people in 1995, Congress created the Southeast Louisiana Urban Flood Control Project, in which the Corps of Engineers strengthened and renovated levees and pumping stations. In early 2001, the Federal Emergency Management Agency issued a report stating that a hurricane striking New Orleans was one of the three most likely disasters in the U.S., including a terrorist attack on New York City. But by 2003 the federal funding for the flood control project essentially dried up as it was drained into the Iraq war. In 2004, the Bush administration cut funding requested by the New Orleans district of the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers for holding back the waters of Lake Pont
 chartrain by more than 80 percent. Additional cuts at the beginning of this year (for a total reduction in funding of 44.2 percent since 2001) forced the New Orleans district of the Corps to impose a hiring freeze. The Senate had debated adding funds for fixing New Orleans' levees, but it was too late."
     
Here's from the _Chicago Tribune_, same day:

"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."

New York Daily News, same day:

"Some 7,000 soldiers from the Louisiana and Mississippi National Guard are stationed in Iraq. They include more than 3,000 members of the 256th Brigade Combat Team, a unit based in and around New Orleans.

Those soldiers, who represent 40% of Mississippi's and 35% of Louisiana's regular Guard strength, were forced to watch helplessly from their barracks in Iraq the past few days as the hurricane swept through their neighborhoods and threatened their families.

Quite simply, the two states hardest hit by this storm were handicapped from the start by not having enough Guard units and military equipment like trucks, Humvees and helicopters on the ground to handle the crisis."

Sorry Bill, but the money pit that is our illegal invasion of Iraq is quite connected, although I will agree that the systematic devastation of wetlands as a natural barrier has nothing to do with Iraq.

As for your call for intellectual honesty, I've done my bit.  Maybe next time you can try it yourself, and without claiming in the same breath that I despise my country.  Shame on you for that. 

sincerely,
Clark

-----Original Message-----
From: [email protected] on behalf of William Highfield
Sent: Mon 9/5/2005 9:11 AM
To: [email protected]
Subject: Re: [CAT23-Achat] Re: By the way, Bill
 
Clark,

(1) The economy is not in the crapper, no matter how badly you wish it 
to be so, how many times you repeat the statement.

(2) Iraq has nothing to do with a hurricane leveling a major 
metropolitan area, nor does it have anything to do with state and local 
- and yes - federal incompetence in managing the evacuation and aftermath.

(3) The levees that broke WERE upgraded.  It didn't help one bit, and 
you would have had to build them twice as big (which is not feasible) to 
keep a Cat5 hurricane, 25 foot storm surge, and water from upstream of 
the Mississippi from flooding an area 7 feet below sea level.

I know you guys despire the President, the war, and the US on a daily 
basis., but please, use a little intellectual honesty here and recognize 
that NOTHING was going to save New Orleans, war in Iraq or not.

More lives could have been saved in the mayor and governor had done 
their jobs, and even more if the local FEMA director hadn't erred so 
badly in the first couple of days, but again, NONE of that has anything 
to do with budgets, Presidents or wars.  You're just taking one more 
"slam" trying to make a conection that does not exist.

-- 
Bill Highfield
St Cloud, Florida, USA!

Top Choice Videos and Music
~12,000VHS ~4,000DVD ~2,000CD in stock!
We special order & We ship ANYWHERE!
Visit one of our online stores!
http://stores.ebay.com/topchoicevideos?refid=store
http://www.amazon.com/shops/topchoicevideos