News flash! Bush to blame for Hurricane Katrina damage

From AlterNet via the DNC website:

Washington knew exactly what needed to be done to protect the citizens of New Orleans from disasters like Katrina. Yet federal funding for Louisiana flood control projects was diverted to pay for the war in Iraq.

Well thank goodness - I wasn't sure if they were going to be able to pin this one on the President, but they found a way.

New Orleans had long known it was highly vulnerable to flooding and a direct hit from a hurricane. In fact, the federal government has been working with state and local officials in the region since the late 1960s on major hurricane and flood relief efforts. When flooding from a massive rainstorm in May 1995 killed six people, Congress authorized the Southeast Louisiana Urban Flood Control Project, or SELA.

Yet after 2003, the flow of federal dollars toward SELA 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.

Of course, we all know that if a newspaper prints it, it must be true and should be accepted without question, but lets set that issue aside for the moment. In this case, it is true that many of the funds for levee maintenance were diverted to Iraq, as were the dollars intended for lots of other projects.

Quiz time: Your house is in need of some repairs. You've got a leaky roof, a basement that floods, and the locks on the doors are pretty much a joke. You discover that a gang has moved into your neighborhood - they've already broken in once before. After paying your bills, you only have enough money to finish one of the projects, but can make minor progress on the others. Do you:

1. Fix the roof
2. Waterseal the basement
3. Put in new locks and an alarm system
4. Give most of it to the homeless guy who keeps coming around

Whoops! That other option is only for the liberals.

Make no mistake - the damage from Katrina is a huge tragedy. We all wish that it hadn't happened, that we had been more prepared for it. The fact of the matter is that there isn't enough money to adequately prepare for every catastrophe. The President didn't create this problem. They've been working on fixing it for 10 years, and they've known about it since the 1960's. When we recognized the importance of freeing Iraq, a lot of worthy projects had to move to the back burner. That is the cost of war.

Personally, I'm absolutely thrilled at how well this war is going, considering the vehement opposition from liberals and the Lamestream Media.

I'm still waiting to see how they're going to blame the President for the damages to the oil rigs, other parts of the state, and all the other states who were affected. No matter how improbable, I'm sure they'll find a way.