New Orleans - a Historic Viewpoint

As we look to the new hurricaine saeson rapidly approaching and we see the incompetence of the admisistration
to either mitigate or improve the situation a number of unresolved questions come to the fore. Do we rebuild, no
question, but let's look at the problem beneath the surface.

New Orleans is one of the oldest cities in North America, the oldest being a spanish site now Saint Augustine
in Florida. New Orleans, a River and Sea Port city of the French here before Thomas Jefferson purchased the
Louisiana Territories from Napoleon. It has to be rebuilt as both a cultural city and as Senator Gary Hart said
on the Bill Maher Show on HBO last Friday'; it is the major port for the mid west up the Mississippi Valley.
Has anyone found a more responsible way to deal with the sea and reclamation? Yes, the Netherlands for
one; they have reclaimed massive amounts of land from the Zidder Zee. Remember the dikes of Holland and
the use of elevated land to hold back the sea.

So what is my plan, so to speak; as someone whose family is from New Orleans I would say this on that.
Use reclaiming technology to raise sections of the crescent city so that instead of levees you would have
heights of large areas protecting the basin of the French Quarter. You would guarantee that the former land
owners and renters be given homestead rights that protected their home sites for at least 18 months. Place
prohibitions in place to prevent a modern form of Scaliwag from again stealing southern land for development.

We are left with the problem that the government has not been able to truly rebuild Iraq; has not been able to
rebuild the gulf coast or New Orleans; nor do anything concrete besides wasting or diverting millions to billions
to some company named Halliburton. Dick Cheney is definitely being underpaid with that 1 million he gets as
the former CEO; if he was a salesman on commission his cut would be much larger. Wecan only hope that
the newly headed FEMA can extricate itself from the Homeland Security monilith that to date has enlarged
the size of government with little to show for it. If it was capable of doing it's job; why are we selling off parts
of our ports to the United Arab Emirates. That is a question for another days blog.