Katrina, 1 Year Later

Every Sunday we ask for prayer requests during our worship service and every week, one of our 8 year olds asks us to remember the folk who are still suffering from the effects of that storm. This morning, the president said that he takes "full responsibility" for the federal response (or lack thereof). On the one hand, he should take responsibility. After all, he is the president. On the other hand, it is an easy political gesture that allows the rest of the government to escape their responsibility. After all, we have a Republican House and a Republican Senate. They congress has acted, in large degree, as a rubber stamp for the current administration. They must also bear responsibility for what has happened as they have shaped the policies and supported the philosophy that allowed the Gulf coast to languish while we destroy Iraq, allowed real anti-terrorism programs to suffer, and gave tax cuts to the rich. In two months we should vote them all out.

This morning there was an interesting editorial in our paper written by former FEMA head, James Witt and Max Stier. In the editorial they chose to focus on the positive lessons we should learn from the disaster. Basically it is an argument for good government, with good staff, adequate funding, and a long term perspective (all of which were and are lacking under an administration that argues against "big government.") We don't need less government. We need more. It just needs to be efficient and competent.