Posted on 03/03/2006 6:19:03 PM PST by ncountylee
Katrina: Six months after the hurricane, at least two things are clear. One is that Washington can be as much a problem as a solution. The other is that Republicans should have known this.
As the Gulf Coast struggles to rebuild and the blame game rages, we're wondering what Ronald Reagan would have made of all this. Reagan, of course, was a critic of the federal government even as he skillfully led it. One of his core principles was that there was much that Washington did not do well and that other public and private entities closer to the people -- and, of course, the people themselves -- did much better.
Reagan believed in federalism. So, back then, did his party. And it once was the consensus view, not just a GOP position, that state and local governments were responsible for public order and safety, with Washington as a backstop if things truly got out of hand.
Times have changed. The Hurricane Katrina post-mortems show plenty of incompetence and confusion, but they also reveal a decided shift in expectations. Americans now seem to expect too little from state and local government and too much from the feds.
Partisan bias also has something to do with the constant criticism of the White House. When a videotape released last week seemed to show that President Bush was over-confident about FEMA's abilities -- no shock -- Senate Minority Leader Harry Reid declared that administration officials "have systematically misled the American people."
We heard no such concern when another tape showed that Louisiana's Democratic Gov. Kathleen Blanco was clueless about the state of New Orleans' levees several hours after first reports that they had been breached.
(Excerpt) Read more at biz.yahoo.com ...
AARGHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH
That would have been an okay article...except once again, Reagan's name is invoked.
HE IS DEAD PEOPLE...GET OVER IT!!!!!!!
america, the benchmark of the world. very sad...
Subsidiarity is the principle which states that matters ought to be handled by the smallest (or, the lowest) competent authority.
What a concept!
Self reliance works wonders. Relying on any government body, for anything, is waste of time.
If New Orleans had been flooded in 1985, I doubt Reagan would have let the city recover by itself.
Reagan, the benchmark of leadership. Never forget.
You have that right! He would have first of all verbally knocked some sense into people and inspired them all to do what they could to be part of the recovery. He had that awe inspiring enthusiasm that things aren't as bad as they seem.
Good lord look at the mess he inherited from Jimmy Carter. The whole country felt like New Orleans feels at that time, hopeless. I was a kid but I remember those days. It felt like the whole country was in a major depression.
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