Mr. Bush in New Orleans - New York Times

September 16, 2005
Mr. Bush in New Orleans
President Bush said three things last night that desperately needed to be said. He forthrightly acknowledged his responsibility for the egregious mishandling of the aftermath of Hurricane Katrina. He spoke clearly and candidly about race and poverty. And finally, he was clear about what would be needed to bring back the Gulf Coast and said the federal government would have to lead and pay for that effort.

Once again, as he did after 9/11, Mr. Bush has responded to disaster with disconcerting uncertainty, then risen to the occasion later. Once again, he has delivered a speech that will reassure many Americans that he understands the enormity of the event and the demands of leadership to come.

But there are plenty of reasons for concern. After 9/11, Mr. Bush responded not only with a stirring speech at the ruins of the World Trade Center and a principled response to the Taliban in Afghanistan. He also decided to invade Iraq, and he tried to do it on the cheap - with disastrous results, for which the country continues to pay every day.

This time, Mr. Bush must come up with a more coherent and well-organized follow-through.

Clearly chastened by the outcry over his slow response to the disaster and his administration's bumbling performance, Mr. Bush said last night that he was prepared to undertake "one of the largest reconstruction efforts the world has ever seen." If he is sincere about his commitment to New Orleans and the other damaged localities, and to the displaced residents, he may have a fight on his hands in persuading Congress to support such an ambitious and necessary effort. Obviously, any official with even a minimal sense of responsibility would understand that this work will have to begin with a promise to give up on any more of the Republican Party's cherished tax cuts.

The speech, as good as it was, marks only a moment of clarity. Mr. Bush's problem in dealing with Katrina has been, at bottom, the same one that has bedeviled the administration since 9/11. The president came to office with a deep antipathy toward big government that has turned out to be utterly inappropriate for the world he inherited. The result has not been less government, but it has definitely been inept government.

We have already seen what happened to the Federal Emergency Management Agency when it was taken over by an administration that didn't like large federal agencies with sweeping mandates. For Iraq, the White House asserted that open-ended and no-bid contracts doled out to big corporations run by people known to government officials would mean swifter, more efficient operations. What we got was gross inefficiency, which has run up costs while failing in many cases to do the jobs required.

Given this history, it's impossible not to worry about what will happen to the billions of dollars being committed to New Orleans, especially since the Army Corps of Engineers' top man in the reclamation effort was once the corps' top man overseeing contracts in Iraq.

The administration is staffed several levels deep with officials who share their leader's distrust of large, expensive federal undertakings. But it is now faced with an unprecedented task: housing hundreds of thousands of homeless people, making sure their children are educated over the short term and eventually getting them a start on a new life. There is no way to do that without a focused federal effort.

Last night, the president was particularly strong when discussing the nation's shocking lack of preparedness for disaster, and the stark fact - obvious to every television viewer around the globe - that the people left homeless and endangered by Katrina were in the main poor and black.

The entire nation, he said, saw the poverty that "has roots in a history of racial discrimination, which cut off generations from the opportunity of America." Polls show that black Americans are far angrier and more skeptical than whites about the administration's actions since the storm. Mr. Bush's words could begin a much-needed healing process. But that will happen only if they are followed by deeds that are as principled, disciplined and ambitious as Mr. Bush's speech.


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