That's been my view as well, Money is at the root of their need to 'control' the situation, Add to Nagin both Blanco, Landrieu and any other corrupt officials LA.
From an item by Michael Grunwald Washington Post Staff Writer Thursday, September 8, 2005:
"Over the five years of President Bush's administration, Louisiana has received far more money for Corps civil works projects than any other state, about $1.9 billion; California was a distant second with less than $1.4 billion, even though its population is more than seven times as large.
Much of that Louisiana money was spent to try to keep low-lying New Orleans dry. But hundreds of millions of dollars have gone to unrelated water projects demanded by the state's congressional delegation and approved by the Corps, often after economic analyses that turned out to be inaccurate. Despite a series of independent investigations criticizing Army Corps construction projects as wasteful pork-barrel spending, Louisiana's representatives have kept bringing home the bacon."
But doesn't the BLM do most of the engineering projects in the western states?