White House is letting New Orleans die

WASHINGTON — New Orleans Mayor Ray Nagin has been guilty of hyperbole in the past, with his exaggerated reports of mayhem and death in the days after Hurricane Katrina made its tragic landfall. But his plea to Congress this week that his city "is being allowed to die as we speak" may have been an understatement. Three months after President Bush stood in Jackson Square and vowed "this great city will rise again," New Orleans instead appears to be circling the drain.

The president promised "we will do what it takes, we will stay as long as it takes, to help citizens rebuild their communities and their lives." It was a great sound bite and a great photo-op, but where is he now?

At the moment, in what's left of New Orleans, citizens are waging a spirited debate over how big a Mardi Gras they should try to stage next spring. There's also a sideshow legal battle over trademarking the name "Katrina" for a cocktail, presumably one that leaves you with an awful hangover. I see the virtue of laughing in the face of adversity, but what I'm hearing sounds like serious denial. How does the city plan its big annual party when most of the would-be revelers are scattered to the four winds and can't come home because there's nowhere for them to live or work or send their children to school?

The Gray Line sightseeing company has an idea for luring tourists back: a new bus tour, to be launched in January, called "Hurricane Katrina — America's Worst Catastrophe!" According to Gray Line's Web site, visitors will learn about the city's precarious geography, see ruined neighborhoods, hear an eyewitness account of the flood and even "drive past an actual levee that 'breached.' "

The old New Orleans is effectively gone. If the new New Orleans is to be more than a few port facilities and a sad little "sin and decadence" theme park for liquored-up conventioneers, you need the people to come back. The Congressional Black Caucus has introduced a comprehensive bill designed to attend to the needs of evacuees from the entire Gulf Coast and give them the resources they need to go home, but the Bush administration and the congressional leadership have preferred a scattershot, largely ineffective approach.

"I really get the feeling sometimes that our government would like for these people to remain scattered around the nation and not come back and rebuild," said Rep. Melvin L. Watt, D-N.C., chairman of the caucus. "Trying to do it in a piecemeal way is just going to prolong the agony for the people."