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Bush's New Orleans
Rebuilding Scam
By Wayne Madsen
9-16-5
- Bush announces plan to help big business to "recover"
from Hurricane Katrina. Speaking in a Karl Rove-staged photo op from New
Orleans last night, President Bush announced a series of measures that
will ensure tax breaks for big business, a permanent Diaspora for the
city's poor, and the future gentrification of poor and middle class
sections of the flooded city. The Bush speech was full of corporate
contrivances that dodge the type of assistance that is actually needed
for the displaced population of the New Orleans metropolitan
region.
-
- Bush recently named CIA Leakgate suspect Karl Rove as
his point man for the rebuilding efforts on the Gulf Coast. The Bush
speech reflected both Rove's emphasis on spin and a lack of interest in
the plight of the poor. Although Bush accepted responsibility for the
"problem" of his administration's poor response effort, he quickly
diverted his priorities to workers' recovery accounts (something that
sounds suspiciously like medical savings accounts); a "Gulf Opportunity
Zone" offering big tax breaks to corporations in Louisiana, Mississippi,
and Alabama; and a homestead lottery scheme to build homes on federal
lands.
-
- Bush did not address the immediate and long-term
focused concerns for the people of the Gulf Coast. For example, FEMA
continues to block needed assistance to the homeless residents of the
region.
-
- Bush failed to provide incentives for people to return
to their homes. He also failed to insist on incentives for
minority-owned businesses to participate in rebuilding efforts.
Yesterday, Rev. Jesse Jackson told a Washington, DC press conference
that there are 300 trucks in Memphis loaded with ice, water, and food
with an additional 1000 trucks standing by at warehouses across the
country. These trucks have not been granted permission by FEMA to move
out to the Gulf Coast, where some poor towns, particularly in
Mississippi, have not yet seen either FEMA or the Red Cross. 1800
children are still separated from their parents and Bush said nothing to
assure parents and their children that they will soon be
reunited.
-
- What many members of the Congressional Black Caucus
and African American national leadership have called for in relief and
reconstruction efforts were not addressed by Bush.
-
- There were no proposals by Bush for
-
- * an "adopt-a-family" tax credit
-
- * a one-time FEMA help grant for orphaned and homeless
children
-
- * a bankruptcy relief provision, provide temporary
housing at all available federal government assets (including many
closed military bases in the Gulf Coast region)
-
- * the setting of a 50 percent residency target for all
contracts
-
- * setting a 40 percent minority vendor target for all
reconstruction
-
- * a moratorium on all contracts until civil rights
provisions are restored (Davis Bacon minimum wage requirements, minority
contract set asides)
-
- * permit the admittance of minority community-based
counselors in evacuation facilities nationwide
-
- * Justice Department assistance in individual cases of
arrested and detained individuals, ensure evacuees can vote in state and
local elections (including February 2006 election)
-
- * ensure home owners have the right of first refusal
to reclaim property
-
- * freeze all foreclosures against property in affected
area for a minimum of 12 months
-
- * legal protections against predatory lenders
-
- * prohibition of collections and deficiency judgments
on real and personal property
-
- * prohibition on negative credit reporting or omission
of negative events from credit scores
-
- * voluntary waiver of late fees or interest on loans
for a period of at least three months
-
- * establish a diverse commission to monitor the
equitable distribution of relief resources by FEMA,
- the Red Cross, and Salvation Army
-
- * develop an action plan to secure wetlands in coastal
areas of the U.S.
-
- * stop the rollback and waivers of environmental
laws
-
- * and develop a comprehensive strategy to address the
poverty crisis in America.
-
- Many Gulf Coast residents see a lot of promises from
Bush's plan with no guarantees he will follow through. Already, House
and Senate conservative Republicans are carping about the Federal price
tag for the reconstruction. These include Sen. John McCain, who is
already politicking for the 2008 GOP presidential nomination on the
backs of the people of the Gulf Coast who lost everything. McCain has no
problem spending billions of dollars on a failed war in Iraq -- a ploy
by McCain to further ingratiate himself to the neo-cons in the
Republican Party.
-
- Bush asks America to trust him to plan the recovery of
the Gulf Coast when he couldn't even plan to use the potty before
addressing the United Nations on its 60th anniversary. The fool
embarrassed America before 160 assembled world leaders. A Reuters
photographer snapped this unforgettable presidential bloated bladder
moment.
-
- http://waynemadsenreport.com
|
The Mulindwas Communication Group
"With
Yoweri Museveni, Uganda is in
anarchy"
Groupe de communication Mulindwas
"avec Yoweri Museveni, l'Ouganda est dans
l'anarchie"
|
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