When the levee breaks, mama, you got to move

The Neglected Levees of New Orleans: A Victim of Iraq War Spending

"It appears that the money has been moved in the president's budget to
handle homeland security and the war in Iraq, and I suppose that's the
price we pay. Nobody locally is happy that the levees can't be finished,
and we are doing everything we can to make the case that this is a security
issue for us."
-- Walter Maestri, emergency management chief for Jefferson Parish,
Louisiana; New Orleans Times-Picayune, June 8, 2004.

Today the New Orleans Times-Picayune wrote: "No one can say they didn't see
it coming. For years before Hurricane Katrina roared ashore Monday morning,
devastating the Gulf Coast, officials from Louisiana, Mississippi and
Alabama have been warning about their vulnerability to the storms..." See:
<http://www.nola.com>,
<http://www.nj.com/news/ledger/index.ssf?/base/news-2/1125468020104100.xml&coll=1>

WILL BUNCH, (215) 854-2957, bunchw@phillynews.com,
http://www.editorandpublisher.com
Will Bunch is a senior writer at the Philadelphia Daily News. The
article states: "Did New Orleans Catastrophe Have to Happen?
'Times-Picayune' Had Repeatedly Raised Federal Spending Issues" for Editor
& Publisher. He wrote: "After 2003, the flow of federal dollars toward SELA
[Southeast Louisiana Urban Flood Control Project] dropped to a trickle. The
Corps never tried to hide the fact that the spending pressures of the war
in Iraq, as well as homeland security -- coming at the same time as federal
tax cuts -- was the reason for the strain. At least nine articles in the
Times-Picayune from 2004 and 2005 specifically cite the cost of Iraq as a
reason for the lack of hurricane- and flood-control dollars." Bunch is
continuing to write on his blog: <http://www.pnionline.com/dnblog/attytood>.
The New Orleans Times-Picayune ran a five-part series in 2002 titled
"Washing Away" about the threat of a major hurricane. The series is
available at: <http://www.nola.com/hurricane/?/washingaway>.