Bush and Democrats Still Posturing Two Years After Katrina

President Bush and the three top Democrats that want to replace him couldn’t get to New Orleans fast enough this week. The occasion of course was the second anniversary of the Katrina debacle. Predictably, Bush as he’s done in his twelve previous treks to the Gulf since Katrina publicly boasted that he’s done everything humanly possible to get the region back on its feet. He also insisted that much more still must be done and his administration will do it. Just as predictably, his would be replacements Barack Obama, Hillary Clinton, and John Edwards just as publicly lambasted Bush’s efforts as hopelessly failed and flawed. And they insisted that there’s no reason to believe that he’ll improve on the anemic effort.

They both missed the real story and tragedy of Katrina, and that’s that the naked face of poverty that shocked the world two years ago remains just as naked and shameful two years later. And Bush and the Democrats are to blame for it.

The talk about a fresh assault on poverty was dead in the water from the start. While Katrina momentarily increased empathy for the poor, it didn't fundamentally change public attitudes toward the poor. Poverty is regarded as a perplexing, intractable and insoluble problem that government programs can't or even shouldn't cure. In other words, the best cure for poverty is for the poor to get jobs and fend for themselves.

There's not much chance that this will change. Bush will exit the Gulf area quickly after his speech and head back to his Crawford, Texas ranch to continue clearing brush, biking and relaxing. In the weeks and months after that he’ll spend countless, and fruitless more hours trying to sell the Iraq war to Congress and the public. The Democratic contenders will just as quickly exit the area to get back on the campaign trail and spend countless hours hammering Bush and the Republicans for the wasteful war.

The Gulf's poor, meanwhile, will be just as numerous, scattered, dispirited, and forgotten. The talk about waging war on poverty will be tossed back on the political shelf until the third anniversary of Katrina.