Obama Gets D+ for Katrina Recovery

[Shaman]

As hurricane season 2009 enters its final month in the United States, it's worth taking note of hard lessons learned (and stunningly repeated) from Hurricane Katrina. Taking stock of what Obama has learned (or not) from these crucial lessons, community leaders from Alabama, Louisiana, Mississippi, and Texas gave the president an overall grade of D+ for his post-Katrina efforts. His predecessor, Pres Bush, received a slighty lower grade of D- for his Gulf Coast recovery efforts.

Is Obama so quickly missing the lessons of history?

Report available here.

[White Lion]

While the federal government shares some of the culpability here, I find it strange how Mayor Nagin gets a free pass. He's the biggest fuckup of them all. Nagin and the governor.

[Shaman]

WL, thanks for your hasty feedback. But I wasn't aware that Nagin got a free pass for Katrina. And I certainly agree that there's plenty of blame to go around (in terms of both emergency and the recovery.) Indeed, I've read countless reports that provide a mostly scathing indictment at all levels, including the municipal level.

But the particular report that I posted examines the long-term recovery effort across the entire Gulf Coast (not just New Orleans). And it specifically examines the federal recovery commitments made by Congress, Bush, and Obama.

And so my question was specifically this: "Is Obama so quickly missing the lessons of history?"

Lots of folks like to go back in time and dig in the dirt and point fingers. That seems non-productive to me. I'm mainly interested in what MFO folks think about the current top federal commitment to Gulf Coast recovery and what these lessons portend for the future.

[White Lion]

No, I don't think so. He's in a tough spot at this point and time he has bigger fish to fry. This country is in sad shape and his socialist agenda will only make it worse. JOBS should be his number one concern. He's spending a little too much time on health care and not enough time on paying for it.

BUT, for the sake of not highjacking your thread, I will step aside.

[Shaman]

Yep, different thread. No problem.

BTW, drop me an email when you can: How's life?