U.S. PREPARED
FOR KATRINA
Editors' Note: We were so overwhelmed by the recent events in New Orleans that we cut our vacation short by a full day to get back to work. Waiting for us was this dispatch from Zontar, a small planet orbiting the triple sun of Remulac in a galaxy far, far away. It's a bizarre alien civilization totally unlike our own, but nonetheless – [We get the setup – Ed.]
By Angelina Jolie and Julia Roberts
Zontar Bureau
NEW ORLEANS, La. – President Al Gore wrapped up his tour of storm-battered New Orleans today, after inspecting the city's damaged levee system and conducting a series of town meetings with local citizens, vexed by the slow restoration of the city's cable television and cellphone systems.
Tourists return to New Orleans after learning that the rebuilt levee system saved the city
Gore congratulated the Army Corps of Engineers and the Federal Emergency Management Agency for insisting that hundreds of millions of dollars be spent during his first term to reinforce the city's complex levee system: "Thanks to the dedicated professionals who staffed both of these agencies, disaster was averted."
Gore told a town meeting that FEMA officials warned him during their first meeting in early 2001 that the vulnerability of New Orleans to a major hurricane was the "number one" disaster-preparedness issue in the United States.
As a result, President Gore continued, the Federal Government spent over $500,000,000 strengthening the levee system from 2001 through this summer. "Thus, when Katrina hit, the levees held, sparing New Orleans from a disaster of incalculable proportions," the President said.
Later, Gore received a thunderous response at a sweltering town meeting conducted at the New Orleans Superdome, which had sustained significant storm damage. Gore told the capacity crowd that New Orleans' narrow escape showed how important it was to invest in infrastructure instead of handing out tax cuts to the wealthiest Americans.
Republican reaction was swift and negative. Texas Senator George W. Bush accused Gore of "exaggerating" and "playing politics" with national disaster. Bush said that only prompt repeal of the estate tax could protect the country from catastrophe.
Although President Gore was warmly received in New Orleans, he continued to have his troubles with the national news media. New York Times columnist John Tierney scoffed that Bush must be taking "alpha-man advice from crazy feminist Naomi Wolf again." Schlox News blowhard Sean Hannity criticized Gore for stressing "pork barrel spending" and ignoring the critical threat to the United States posed by aging Iraqi supremo Saddam Hussein.
From New Orleans, Gore flew to the Gulf Coast of Mississippi, hard-hit by Katrina's winds and storm surge. He inspected the relief and reconstruction work being carried out by the Louisiana, Mississippi and Alabama National Guards, almost all of whom had been mobilized in response to the disaster.
Big Easy denizens relax after hearing that their beloved city dodged Katrina's bullet.
Gore told a rally in Gulfport that he had been cheered by the endless convoys of National Guard Humvees, amphibious trucks, generators and other vital equipment streaming into the storm-ravaged areas. "One hundred percent of equipment, personnel and manpower was sent into the storm-ravaged region," Gore told several hundred homeless Biloxi residents who had been moved into prepositioned mobile homes.
"This is what the National Guard is for: protecting the homeland," he noted. His statements could have been regarded as an oblique response to Republican calls for sending National Guard troops to Afghanistan. The Gore Administration has consistently refused to send National Guardsmen (and women) into active combat zones, preferring instead to increase the war-fighting capacity of the regular Army by four divisions.
Meanwhile, Halliburton chairman Dick Cheney grumbled that his company was passed over for emergency reconstruction work. In response, Homeland Security officials said that Halliburton had flunked their quality control and expenditure audits. Although Senator Bush took his friend's case to the White House, President Gore refused to intervene, saying he would not second-guess the decisions of qualified, dedicated public servants.
Senator Bush, not willing to concede the last word to the man who beat him in two successive elections, announced that he had arranged to house 500 refugees from the Gulf Coast at Houston's disused Astrodome. He also said a lucky 25 would be invited to his ranch for an old-fashioned Texas barbecue "just as long as they get out before 9 p.m., because it's important that I get my rest."
Volume CCXXXV, Number 92 September 6, 2005
