It appears that the money has been moved ...

[Brundle_Fly]

"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.

edit to provide link
http://www.pnionline.com/dnblog/attytood/archives/002331.html

[havocmom]

1. Suggestion: Provide a link. People are gonna want one

so they can use this. Good post, recommended!
:thumbsup:

[earthboundmisfit]

2. That quote should caption EVERY pic of NOLA's misery & desperation.

:grr:

[uppityperson]

3. Thank you, recommended.

good one. bastards

[Brundle_Fly]

4. I am so Angry....I can barely think.

The $750 million Lake Pontchartrain and Vicinity Hurricane Protection project is another major Corps project, which remains about 20% incomplete due to lack of funds, said Al Naomi, project manager. That project consists of building up levees and protection for pumping stations on the east bank of the Mississippi River in Orleans, St. Bernard, St. Charles and Jefferson parishes.

The Lake Pontchartrain project is slated to receive $3.9 million in the president's 2005 budget. Naomi said about $20 million is needed.

"The longer we wait without funding, the more we sink," he said. "I've got at least six levee construction contracts that need to be done to raise the levee protection back to where it should be (because of settling). Right now I owe my contractors about $5 million. And we're going to have to pay them interest."

"The system is in great shape, but the levees are sinking. Everything is sinking, and if we don’t get the money fast enough to raise them, then we can’t stay ahead of the settlement," he said. "The problem that we have isn’t that the levee is low, but that the federal funds have dried up so that we can’t raise them."

"We probably have 80 percent of our city under water; with some sections of our city the water is as deep as 20 feet. Both airports are underwater," Mayor Ray Nagin told a radio interviewer. -2004

[Brundle_Fly]

6. $20 million bucks

that's all they needed from Bush.

20 million.

and the cost now, 25 billion, untold family tragedy, millions displaced, a city lost....

[dchill]

5. This needs to be the top story...

EVERYWHERE. What are the chances of that?

[Nothing Without Hope]

7. The Bush Administration also gutted FEMA, sent the people who SHOULD

be helping, OUR National Guard, off to die in his immoral war of choice, and has so badly botched the short-term preparation and response to the levee breaches that New Orleans is MUCH harder hit that it ever had to be. I'm betting similar stories are true elsewhere in LA, in AL and in MS.

This thread puts this all together with the neocons' wish to banish the Guard and set up their own Pentagon-directed domestic police force - which has been totally unequal to even a small part of what has been needed.
http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=view_all&address=104x4523783
Thread title: CNN/New Orleans:"Mayor blasts failure to patch levee breeches" and that's { only the beginning:}
Nothing Without Hope GD Forum Wed Aug-31-05 09:49 AM

[Brundle_Fly]

8. I am sure if the story broke...

it would be blamed on Clinton anyways.

we are being taken over by inconsiderate evil thugs.

[Nothing Without Hope]

9. Actually it was Clinton's funding that was drastically cut and Bush hacks

that disrupted and gutted the normal functions and personnel of FEMA. The numbers and dates are very clear.

People are so pissed about what * has done to the South, there are a lot of normally very conservative papers that are blasting him.

This is going to open some eyes that have been blind to what has been there all along. The price is far, far too high. :cry:

[faithnotgreed]

10. crucial - thank you for posting

[Old and In the Way]

11. It was bound to catch up to them sooner or later.

Cut taxes, spend $300BB on a phoney war, and short the American public on schools, services, and infrastructure. They've been betting against nature (and us) for 5 years....they've lost bigtime.

[FrenchieCat]

12. Also this article that backs up your OP....

From reports (notably Editor & Publisher) http://www.editorandpublisher.com/eandp/news/article_display.jsp?vnu_content_id=1001051313

Instead of following the plan, Bush gutted the budget over the last few years that was supposed to be going to strengthen the levees. In 2003 and 2004, New Orleans did not get the funding that it was supposed to get.

"Local officials are now saying, the article reported, that had Washington heeded their warnings about the dire need for hurricane protection, including building up levees and repairing barrier islands, "the damage might not have been nearly as bad as it turned out to be."

Sounds like the the Iraq War cost trumps needs here at home which is why a sane foreign policy is so dire. Because it affects us right here at home.

[Brundle_Fly]

14. that word keeps hitting me.

GUTTED

Bush Gutted, its like a mantra.
with all the gutting, why are we all so broke?

[FrenchieCat]

15. Iraq and Tax cuts?

are my guess!

[andino]

16. Hehe

'with all the gutting, why are we all so broke?'

Did you see that tax cut for the oil companies?

[lostnfound]

13. This is a MUST READ. Don't miss it. nt

[FrenchieCat]

17. Bottomline right here.....

Bush took New Orleans disaster funds and used them for the Iraq war and for his tax cuts
by John in DC - 8/30/2005 09:57:00 PM

An amazing late-breaking article from Editor & Publisher
http://www.editorandpublisher.com/eandp/news/article_display.jsp?vnu_content_id=1001051313

Bottom line: Experts knew this was coming, and all the preparations ground to a halt because Bush stole New Orleans' disaster preparation money so he could use it for his Iraq debacle:

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.

...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. http://americablog.blogspot.com/2005/08/bush-took-new-orleans-disaster-funds.html

[Paradise]

18. The devastating repercussions from this immoral misadministration

will be suffered, interminably...

[DeepModem Mom]

19. How about this smoking gun on the home page? Thanks for posting. nt

[CWebster]

20. nice find.

pound it home to bring it into consciousness.

[FreeStateDemocrat]

21. Thanks, excellent research when will MSM report this type of documentation

[Oreo]

22. Just posted this quote on Congress.org

in an email to George. It's not meant for his eyes... it's meant for all the people that view the site.

This quote needs to be spread far and wide

:kick:

[crispini]

23. I am still amazed by this.

[GreenPartyVoter]

24. Another article

http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=show_mesg&forum=104&topic_id=4548159&mesg_id=4548285

[Brundle_Fly]

25. thx.

the more we know...

[texpatriot2004]

26. That's the problem with BushCo they are always moving the $$$

money to "Homeland Security" no, wait, it isn't in "Homeland Security" after all...maybe it's in Cheney's pockets - where is that Cheney?

[texpatriot2004]

27. kick n/t

[OneTwentyoNine]

28. There's your smoking gun and MUSHROOM cloud all in one....n/t